https://www.techpowerup.com/297245/intel-tweaks-graphics-driver-program-effectively-retiring-gen9-5-igpu Intel Graphics, with its latest Graphics Drivers 31.0.101.3222, changed the coverage of its latest driver updates. The company would be providing game optimizations and regular driver updates only for its Gen11, Gen12 (Iris Xe), and Arc "Alchemist" graphics products. Support for Gen9 and Gen9.5 iGPUs integrated with 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th generations of Intel processors, namely "Skylake," "Kaby Lake," "Coffee Lake," and "Cascade Lake," will be relegated to a separate, infrequent driver update cycle, which only covers critical updates and security vulnerabilities, but not game optimizations.
Intel's regular Graphics Driver cycle will only cover the Gen11 iGPU found in 10th Gen "Ice Lake" mobile processors, Gen12 Xe iGPUs found in 11th Gen "Tiger Lake," "Rocket Lake," and 12th Gen "Alder Lake" processors; besides the DG1 Iris Xe graphics card; and Arc "Alchemist" discrete GPUs. Version 31.0.101.3222 appears to be a transitioning point, and so it has drivers from both branches included within a 1.1 GB package (the main branch supporting game optimizations for new GPUs, and the legacy branch for the older iGPUs). You can grab this driver from
here.
This makes perfect sense and it was not entirely unexpected.