The beta version of Nvidia's game capture software called ShadowPlay saves 20 minutes of your latest gameplay and will allow direct streaming to Twitch, according to a blog post on the company's website.
ShadowPlay requires a recent Nvidia graphics card (GeForce GTX 600 series and above) to work. There are two configurable modes available and they are explained in a post:
"Shadow mode, continuously records your gameplay, saving up to 20 minutes of high-quality 1920×1080 footage to a temporary file," Scott Herkelman, the GeForce GTX general manager, wrote. A feature that is useful in capturing unexpected moments and kills. You wouldn't need to capture the entire length of each game session you play if you just want to have footage of your best moments.
"Alternatively, in manual mode, which acts like traditional gameplay recorders, you can save your entire session to disk," he added. Software that most gamers would love to have if they are fond of making extensive "let's play" videos and posting them on YouTube.
FRAPS is a common software tool used by gamers that is similar to ShadowPlay with the exception of Nvidia's shadow mode. The latter is also free as long as you have one of the aforementioned graphics card models. If you already have an Nvidia graphics card, this can save consumers a lot of money from purchasing expensive video editing, recording, and streaming applications.
"The beauty of ShadowPlay is that, because it takes advantage of the hardware built into every GTX GPU, you don’t have to worry about any major impact on frame rates compared to other, existing applications," Herkelman noted how its performance differs from other game capture tools.
Another feature boasted is the software's future integration with Twitch to allow users to stream their games to spectators worldwide.
ShadowPlay will be launching with the upcoming release GeForce Experience 1.7 on Monday, October 28th.
