Starfield modder gets DLSS working even before launch day

The internet is abuzz with news about Starfield, Bethesda’s newest open-world (open-worlds?) RPG with a spacefaring twist. The game doesn’t even officially launch for another week, but players who shelled out for the $100 premium edition are playing it right now. The game is already seeing hundreds of thousands of concurrent players, despite pre-release controversy about the developers prioritizing AMD’s FSR upscaling over Nvidia’s DLSS. But as is always the case with Bethesda RPGs, there’s a mod for that.

Specifically, the Starfield Upscaler mod, which is live on the popular NexusMods platform right now. The tool replaces AMD FSR with your choice of Nvidia DLSS or Intel XeSS, whichever works best with the graphics card you’re currently using. It went live a little after 2 a.m. this morning, just hours after the game was first available to the pre-ordering public. Installation requires another mod called Upscaler Base Plugin and a few tweaks to the game’s internal files, but if you’re an old hand at modding Skyrim or Fallout, it’s nothing you haven’t seen before.

PC gamers (or at least those who had bought a pricey Nvidia RTX card) were upset when Starfield made no mention of supporting the DLSS upscaling method, presumably due to a partnership with AMD that sees the game bundled with some Ryzen CPUs and Radeon GPUs. According to a statement from AMD, nothing is stopping Bethesda from supporting Nvidia or Intel upscaling methods, but it’s safe to assume that the partnership means the developers are prioritizing AMD’s platform-agnostic tech at launch. As PCGamer notes, this particular modder has released similar tools for older Bethesda RPGs, which also don’t support upscaling tech.

A single upscaling method isn’t the only issue Starfield has at launch. According to initial reports, gamers with Intel ARC discrete GPUs can’t even play the game at all. Intel is hoping to have the issue resolved before the wider September 6th launch date.