AMD is accusing NVIDIA of deliberately crippling the performance of games developed using its GameWorks toolset when run on AMD's hardware. NVIDIA on the other hand insists that those accusations are unfounded.
"Gameworks represents a clear and present threat to gamers by deliberately crippling performance on AMD products (40 percent of the market) to widen the margin in favor of NVIDIA products," Robert Hallock, AMD's head of technical communications, software and technologies told Forbes. "Participation in the Gameworks program often precludes the developer from accepting AMD suggestions that would improve performance directly in the game code-the most desirable form of optimization."
Hallock's claims were then challenged by NVIDIA's director of engineering and developer technology, Cem Cebenoyan, who assured that they are uncalled for as the toolset doesn't stop anyone from getting access to code. Additionally, he noted that NVIDIA didn't make any agreements with developers to prevent them from cooperating with AMD when using GameWorks toolset.
"I've heard that before from AMD and it's a little mysterious to me," he said. "We don't and we never have restricted anyone from getting access as part of our agreements. Not with Watch Dogs and not with any other titles."
"Our agreements focus on interesting things we're going to do together to improve the experience for all PC gamers and of course for Nvidia customers," he added. "We don't have anything in there restricting anyone from accessing source code or binaries. Developers are free to give builds out to whoever they want. It's their product."
More importantly, Cebenoyan asserted that GameWorks are not designed to limit AMD performance in any way. Nonetheless, NVIDIA would never stop developers from adding AMD-specific optimizations.