Dear Devs: Please Make Games with Lower End Machines in Mind

[neogunhero]

This will be an open rant about the state of modern gaming graphics, coming from a low-end machine scrub.

Lately, there has been a trend in modern games where they put a lot of focus into the visuals but not much thought into performance. This comes in many different ways, such as ditching baked-in shadows in favor of ray-traced shadows, minimally compressed textures eating up your VRAM, over-reliance on AI upscaling techniques like DLSS, "fake frame" methods like Frame Gen, and a general lack of optimization passes.

On one hand, we have to keep pushing boundaries and innovating on old techniques. This is especially important in the tech industry. We can't rely on the same CPU designs for more than a year, there needs to be something newer and better almost every year. This also translates into gaming where we have been chasing realistic life-like visuals since gaming first began. Each year there is a new game that takes the crown for the most visually impressive game ever. This is fantastic and all, but then there is the other hand: it alienates people without the hardware means to run these games properly.

Budget/low end gaming used to be a viable option for PC gamers. Hardware manufacturers even used to make budget card for this specific reason. The GTX 1660 SUPER was released in 2019 for an MSRP of $229 and was meant for budget gamers in mind. This was around the time crypto mining was taking off, so I'm unsure how close to MSRP it stayed, but I know that it wasn't hundreds of dollars more like GPUs are today. As I stated in another thread, the 4 year old RTX 3060 still comes to around $400 on Amazon today, and it launched with an MSRP of $329. I know MSRP doesn't mean too much especially after board partners make their tweaks and distribution costs etc., there are so many factors to contribute to a card not being MSRP, but it is still ridiculous to pay that kind of money on hardware that has been surpassed many times over by now.

The main thing I'm trying to get at is if we don't introduce more options for lower-end gamers to enjoy modern games, then PC gaming as we know it could have a larger issue. Of course these gamers could always play indie games, older games, games that don't look very good, but of course that is not how the general gaming audience is. We want to play the latest and greatest games, and we want them to look good and work well.

When GTA 6 finally comes to PC, what will those specs look like? Someone with an older graphics card will definitely need to upgrade, but when they start shopping around for a new graphics card, they will only find GPU's the price of buying a new PC. If this person doesn't have the means to buy a whole new PC, then maybe looking at a console would be a better alternative, ditching their PC for a box that is a fraction of the price that plays all the same games without issue.

Devs need to keep these gamers in mind. They can have different options in their games to let gamers tweak settings to be able to run on their PCs. Don't for RT shadows and ambient occlusion, make it an option that you can enable or disable. Offer more options to get the game running better without looking like total crap. I know these kinds of things are easier said than done, but I think it would prove beneficial to games companies.

In the past, good graphics pushed hardware sales, but I just don’t think that is the case anymore with how expensive things are.

 

[Colif]

The reason why features are the focus over raw power now is power draw. The 5090 uses almost all of a 600watt cable can provide now, and expecting more raw power out of it would require more power into it. Fire problems exist now so they would need to make sure that fixed before adding 2 cables to a GPU. Even it is pushing features, its just the best at maintaining 4 fake frames at once.

So while I might hate the idea, features are the only way to make it look better going forward. IF you want it look better each generation. I don't value graphics as highly as gameplay as its been ignored for years now. Glossed over by ever prettier graphics.

Games are built to use the features of their engines and most use UE5 now, and its got its detractors. We don't need the entire industry using the same engine. It might be part of the restrictive requirements in some games.

Of course these gamers could always play indie games, older games, games that don't look very good, but of course that is not how the general gaming audience is. We want to play the latest and greatest games, and we want them to look good and work well.

Consoles exist for them.

You want games that scale to lower as well as high. That increases development time, so unless game has a long burn time, they need to pick a minimum and recommended specs to show the suggested builds. that or you get Star Citizen that is suffering from mission creep and ever changing graphical possibilities. Just release it already.

They could in theory have a high res texture pack for those who want better, Diablo 4 had that.

 

[Pifanjr]

Presumably enough people can afford high end PCs, otherwise games that require high end PCs wouldn't sell.

 

[Zloth]

In the past, good graphics pushed hardware sales, but I just don’t think that is the case anymore with how expensive things are.

Prices for graphics cards have gone WAY up. On the other hand, the advancements are much smaller, too. There's no point in buying a whole new PC every two or three years like before. If somebody handed me a free 4080, I don't know if I would bother to swap out my 3080. I don't think it would make any noticeable difference in any game I'm playing. It might have given a bit of a frame boost to Horizon: Forbidden West that could have helped, and certainly would have helped with Cyberpunk, but that's it for the past couple of years.

GTA6 is still a long ways away for PC. It wouldn't surprise me at all if lower end graphics cards were able to support it just fine - or maybe old higher end graphics cards, if it needs a lot of video memory.

 

[Colif]

Buying a new card every generation doesn't make sense anyway, especially since the gains are getting smaller per generation.
The advantages to not updating every generation are getting smaller though, as if there isn't a lot of change between them, you have to wait longer to get any uplift.

Soon there won't be any point at all.

Most of the people who used to come here and want to post about GTA5 wouldn't be able to play GTA6 if they made its requirements too high. I expect if anyone has a wide range of requirements, its likely Rockstar. They have had years to make it.

 

[mjs warlord]

I can remember a time when pc gamer tested games on both high end and lower priced rigs and reported their findings. I cant remember how long it is since they stopped doing this but i think they might have stopped it because a budget price machine that you buy today would have been classed as high end many years ago.

I have seen first hand how high demands can effect users .... as you know my go to game is SATISFACTORY and when the company changed the required spec due to graphics demands plus adding unreal 5 a lot of players said they would have to stop using it. But to be fair to them i have seen users of other games say they cant run a certain something due to unreal 5 demands.

My rig was built in 2016 and the gtx 1080 had only just come out , the only thing i could do is increase ram speed but mobo spec says i can only go to 2600 MHz so i dont think the slight increase would be worth the cost. My set up can handle high or ultra at 144 fps on a lot of games. The most demanding game is actually my go to game ... satisfactory , everything on ultra , good temps but only around 50 fps , it looks ok so i can live with that.

A lot of players dont realise how demanding the number crunching is in satisfactory , regardless of a new playthrough or a massive layout your pc has to work very hard.

The tower COOLERMASTER HAF-X FULL TOWER GAMING CASE
The cpu is Intel® Core™i7 Six Core Processor i7-6800K (3.4GHz) 15MB Cache.
The motherboard is ASUS® ROG STRIX X99: ATX, USB 3.1, SATA 6 GB/s.
The ram is 16GB HyperX FURY DDR4 2133MHz (4 x 4GB) ....
The graphics card is 8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 - DVI, HDMI, 3x DP - GTX VR Ready!
The main drive is 480GB HyperX SAVAGE 2.5" SSD
The second drive is 960GB HyperX SAVAGE 2.5" SSD
The third drive is Sandisk 2TB SSD

The dvd/blue ray is 24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM.
The power supply is CORSAIR 650W CS SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET.
The cpu cooler is Noctua NH-D15S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler

 

[Colif]

I can remember a time when pc gamer tested games on both high end and lower priced rigs and reported their findings. I cant remember how long it is since they stopped doing this but i think they might have stopped it because a budget price machine that you buy today would have been classed as high end many years ago.

thats called progress. Certain expectation that the users will upgrade more than once every 10 years or so, so the base level system is a moving target every year.

reviewers of all kinds tend to live in this imaginary universe where everyone buys the latest hardware every year, and they are sad when there isn't a constant 20% increase in performance, when realistically there will come a time when you can't just keep getting better. That and most people tend to get 5 or more years out of both GPU and CPU, and so the standards reviewers expect has a pretty wide gap back to the normal users.

Satisfactory might be easier to deal with if it used more than one core. It can be split into multiple threads but since it only uses the one core, I have to assume that means 2 threads at most. A faster CPU might make it better

 

[BeardyHat]

I know you're disappointed with how the Oblivion Remaster runs on your current setup, Neo, but in this case it might be worth waiting a year just to see how it runs after some patches.

I don't necessarily disagree with the premise, but I also think many games need further optimization until they're "proper" for old hardware. For instance, as I understand it, Baldur's Gate 3 was pretty busted on Steam Deck at release, but at this point it's in the "mostly fine" category or at least, playable.

And that said, I think more games run better than they don't. With the i7-7700 and 1070 GTX in my HTPC, I've been able to run everything I've thrown at it. Not at the native 4k my TV is, but everything from Witcher 3, Dead Space Remake, Lies of P, Elden Ring, etc at 1080p and then you have the Steam Deck, which can run Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, as well as all the aforementioned at a reasonable graphical setting and 30FPS. Also worth reiterating that you don't need to always run at native resolution and can find something fractional that is in the same aspect ratio as your native res.

Also, it's worth taking a look at AMD cards. the 6600 and 7600 can be had at Microcenter for $220 and $300 respectively, adjusting for inflation with the mentioned 1660 Super, that's $290, so prices are not far off and with a 7600, you're looking at anywhere from an 80%-100%+ performance increase over the 1660 @ 1080p and the 6600 boasting anywhere from 20%-50% faster over the 1660. I myself just picked-up a used 6650 XT for $200 back in December and it's anywhere from 50%-100% faster in any given game.

I think budget is still a fairly reasonable option, especially if one looks as second hand stuff. Just as an example, right now on my local Craigslist, someone is selling an Alienware R11 for $400 with a monitor and keyboard. Specs: Intel Core 15-10400F CPU @ 2.90GHZ, 24Gb Ram, GeForce GTX 1650 Super. If they're unwilling to bargain, give them the $400, sell the 1650 Super for $75, toss in that $200 6650 XT I mentioned earlier and you're looking at $525 for a very decent gaming machine that'll play Cyberpunk, Oblivion, RDR2, etc, etc. and you have a solid platform to upgrade over the next few years with a newer, more powerful processor. In my looking at used parts on Craigslist, I also came across a $250 3060 Ti, which could potentially be bargained down.

Now, all that said, I do think things are going to get more expensive very soon, for obvious reasons; but barring insane trade wars, budget gaming computers, capable of 1080p 60FPS gaming can be had at not unreasonable prices.

Sorry, my brain can't help but play Devil's Advocate.