Get Far Cry 5 for free when you buy a new AMD PC

Cult-busting simulator Far Cry 5 is coming out at the end of March with a whole bunch of special AMD features, and to celebrate AMD is giving the game away for free for anyone who buys a select pre-built PC system with AMD graphics in it between now (February 27th) and May 20th 2018.

The PC in question will need to have one of three AMD graphics cards inside it in order to qualify: the AMD Radeon RX 580, which currently sits at the top of our best of list for 1440p gaming, the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 or the AMD Radeon RX Vega 64.

Once gamers have purchased their select system, they'll receive a Far Cry 5 coupon code for use with their UPlay account, which they can redeem via AMD's Rewards website. They'll have until July 15th to do so. Don't think that you'll be able to start playing the game early by buying a new PC now, though, as you'll still need to wait until launch day before you can actually launch it.

You can find a full list of participating retailers in AMD's terms and conditions, but in the UK this includes retailers like Box, CCL, Chillblast, Overclockers UK, PC Specialist and Scan, while those in North American can go to AVADirect, CyberPower PC, Cybertron PC, Digital Storm, Extreme PC, Falcom NW, IBuyPower, Maingear, OriginPC, Puget Systems, Velocity Micro, Xidax and Xotic. Sadly, anyone in China, Cuba, North Korea, Syria, Sudan and Iran are excluded from taking part in the offer.

Much like how Final Fantasy XV has been optimised for Nvidia graphics cards, Far Cry 5 will make use of several special AMD features that Nvidia peeps won't have access to. These include AMD's so-called 'Rapid Packed Math' technology, 'Shader Intrinsics' and FreeSync 2, which I will now attempt to explain in turn using words that actually mean something to normal human beings.

Starting with 'Rapid Packed Math', this essentially allows a graphics card to execute two math-based instructions at once, allowing all that juicy code to be processed faster and spat out at higher, more stable frame rates on your screen. 'Shader Intrinsics', meanwhile, is another bid to increase efficiency, giving developers the same sort of tools they'd find on consoles to get the most out of AMD's graphics hardware on PC.

FreeSync 2, on the other hand, is now AMD's all-encompassing term for both its adaptive frame rate technology and its new fancy pants high dynamic range (HDR) standard. The former is designed to minimise screen tearing and stutter by dynamically adjusting your monitor's refresh rate to the number of frames generated by your PC - handy if your graphics card isn't quite up to the task of a full 60fps at high resolutions, for example. Then there's the HDR part, which brings huge improvements to a game's overall image quality, such as exponentially better contrast and colour representation, as well as brighter whites and darker blacks for maximum impact. All the better for murdering those pesky cult leaders with.

Admittedly, with graphics card prices still going through the roof at the moment, a free copy of Far Cry 5 may not seem like much of a consolation at this point, but here's hoping prices start to come down over the next few months before the promotion comes to an end.