We are very interested in the game performance of Qualcomm's Arm-based Snapdragon X series processors. The early signs looked promising, but it seems that emulation issues are holding things back. Quelle surprise. Anyway, despite some potential teething problems, Microsoft and Qualcomm have verified more than 1,400 compatible games for Windows on Arm and more than 1,200 "good at 30fps or better"

In a DirectX blog post, Microsoft revealed that along with Qualcomm, they passed compatibility data to Linaro, a company specializing in the Arm ecosystem. It was. The full list of compatible games can be seen in the works on Windows on Arm. 

The listed games are given values ranging from "perfect" to "unplayable" that run at 1080p resolution at 60fps or higher without glitches or problems. 

Our Benevolent hardware monarch Dave James is pleased with the "perfect" rating of Football Manager 2024, but it's no surprise that more demanding games like Cyberpunk 2077 often receive a mere "run." And for those who like to play Elden Ring (with or without the shadow of Erdtree DLC) on Arm-powered Windows devices, there's bad news. There is no list at all at the time of writing, I am afraid.

The other major Arm-based announcement is that Microsoft is partnering with several anti-cheat software providers, including BattlEye, Denuvo Anti-Cheat, and Wellbia XIGNCODE3/UNCHEATER, all supported by Windows on Arm, while the current scuttlebutt, Fortnite and others are still supported by Windows-based Arm devices. He says that is why it seems not to have been tested.

Still, games with supported anti-cheat software like Rainbow Six Siege can now be played on Snapdragon X-series Cpus. That is, anyone planning to pick up one of the many new laptops with a chip can beat the wall.1 But it's probably not a big frame rate, as it currently only holds an evaluation of "execution".

The early Snapdragon X benchmarks seem disappointing, so it seems like it might be a long way off for Windows Arm-based games. Still, with Prism, an emulation engine that converts X86 and x64 instruction codes to Arm64 instruction sets, Microsoft and Qualcomm are working together, which could improve performance over time. In the meantime, it has at least a lot of "playable" games.