Performance Analysis
At this time, I'd like to turn it over to the one and only, you know him, you love him, Mr. Jarred Walton. He's the hardware guru, I'm the game guru. He's the DJ, I'm the . . ok, ok!
<Enter Jarred>
We'll wrap things up with a short discussion of performance followed by our conclusions. Considering how nice the game looks, performance is really quite good. Naturally, if you have a PC that's capable of running Crysis, you should experience no problems whatsoever in maxing out all of the detail settings. Even last year's high-end hardware (which is now available for less than $200) is fully capable of providing a good gaming experience at 1920x1200 with 4xAA. Frame rates might periodically dip down into the mid-20s, but average frame rates should have no difficulty staying above 40 FPS.
For those that prefer concrete numbers, Eddie used FRAPS to test performance over the first 20 seconds into one of the races. The section used for the benchmark is at the beginning of the race, so there are lots of vehicles on screen which may cause frame rates to be be slightly lower than what you will see in other areas of the game. The test system is Eddie's rig which consists of an overclocked Core 2 Duo E6300 (2.80GHz, 14x200), 4GB Corsair XMS2 PC6400 RAM, an ASUS P5B motherboard, and an EVGA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB video card. For those of you who read his recent blog post, the 7900 GTO is no more. He does still have the Rosewill PSU though! While his rig specs are by no means earth shattering, his has achieved some pretty nice results on maximum settings. Check em out.
Performance with ATI Radeon HD 3870 was generally similar, with lower performance once anti-aliasing was enabled. We also looked at performance with GRID using multiple graphics chips in our Radeon HD 4870X2 preview. Everything performs about where you would expect for cutting-edge hardware, except that we experienced drastic performance drops at 2560x1600 on most of the GPUs (the 4870X2 being one exception). Updated drivers have addressed most of our performance concerns, and you will definitely want to run the latest drivers if you are using any dual-GPU setup.
As usual, users with lower end hardware (i.e. GeForce 8600/9500 GT or Radeon HD 2600/3650 or lower) will definitely need to step down the resolution and/or detail settings in order to achieve acceptable frame rates. Ultra quality settings are viable for higher end hardware, but you will need to drop to medium detail or even low detail for lesser graphics chips. Needless to say, the game doesn't impress nearly as much at medium or low detail, so you might be better off putting some money towards an upgraded GPU first if you fall into this category of users. Lucky for us, you can now get some serious graphics hardware like the Radeon HD 4850 for only $175, or you can pick up an 8800 GT like Eddie did for a measley $110 after mail in rebate.
<Enter Eddie>
Thank you, Jared! I'm still waiting on that rebate, by the way.
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mesherman - Sunday, September 21, 2008 - link
looks good, but the game makers are just into what it looks like and not what is in the game. These racing games now days suck ass.. All they do is hurry up and put the game out so thay can make money. There is so much more they could have done with this game to make it real. What would you think about a car game you can buy and sell car's, and parts to other players online. And have a caution, that you can still drive under caution and have a black flag for the people that just dont know how to drive. Car setup on the game and a temp gage for your heat on you tires in the caution. plus a pit... Make the game real.. if they did this we would finally have a good racing game.djfourmoney - Saturday, August 23, 2008 - link
I downloaded the demo after I installed my Visiontek HD3870 512mb card and Wow this game looks great (when its not crashing my system). Too bad I only get to drive for about 1 lap maybe 1 1/2 laps before the darn thing crash to BSOD with that stupid IRQL NOT LESS OR EQUAL (if anybody knows what is causing that, let me know, all the drivers, including motherboard drivers are NEW, RECENT, Up To Date).I ran it at 1920x1200 default detail (AAx4)(which I hear in the demo is set to high, not ultra) and FRAPS didn't give me an average but mid 20's is the lowest and down the longest part of track in the Muscle Car Race about 40-42fps. Like I said it looks great, fun and I wish I could get to stop crashing so I can enjoy it more.
Best looking PC racer out there, bar none and Codemaster's have outdone themselves.
System Specs -
HTPC Windows Vista Home
AMD 64x2 5000+ Black Edition (2.91Ghz)
Dual Channel Memory (3GB@800Hz)
Visiontek HD3850 512MB
MS Sidewinder Wheel (Non-FF)
I know Codemasters uses motion blur in this game because at 30-40fps it looks faster than GT-L looks@60fps *Vsync. Hardcore SIMs should look this good, they would sell more games...
I hope this is only an issue with the Demo. I'll know when I get the full version. Should I download via Steam or get the DVD? I'm going to replace this HD3870 with a HD3850 because its under $100 at New Egg and includes a free copy of GRID and I can't find a HD3870 single slot cooler for the same price I paid for the current one ($119).
marc1000 - Monday, August 18, 2008 - link
Just to let you guys know: I am playing GRID-demo (wich I guess defaults to maximum quality) with a 20-30 fps average at 1280x1024 without AA, but on a old Pentium-D 3.4ghz on single-channel 2GB DDR2-667 and a cheap Radeon HD3850 512mb.This system also runs Crysis at Medium quality with no problems. We do not need the absolut top hardware to have a great fun. BTW I joust bought a good XBOX360 controller too. very good to someone who just wants to have fun and is used to play NFS-series on the keyboard.
No complaints about the physics. I want to have fun, and not learn how to be a real racing driver.
marc1000 - Monday, August 18, 2008 - link
i'm back to fix my own words: i bought the complete GRID game, installed, and entered the "advanced" graphics settings. i'm with almost everything on MEDIUM, with mirrors disabled, and 2xMsaa. the rest is the same as above. I know that my CPU is the bottleneck, because Rivatuner shows about 60~70% of GPU usage. even this way, it still looks beautiful to me. bye.marc1000 - Thursday, August 21, 2008 - link
now I maxed out everything, except mirrors, and got the same FPS... if someone mind to know about a aging system! haha!M Farkus - Monday, August 11, 2008 - link
In nearly every race, especially the drift races, I can't hear my engine AT ALL. The sound options are extremely limited and by the time I crank up my volume to hear my engine, the other sounds are deafening. Maybe it's my older SoundBlaster card, but every other game I have sounds fine. Anyone else have this problem? A fix? BTW the replays are gorgeous, esp with enough horsepower to run the game. 4870 x-fire E8400 @4.0 1900x1200 full AA all around = 90 fps. Amazing. The lack of (adjustable) engine sounds is a real deal breaker with one, unfortunately.shortylickens - Saturday, August 9, 2008 - link
Its pretty, but wasnt much fun to play. Other racing games have been much more enjoyable for me.Wait, when I said "pretty" what I really should have said was: "scared the crap out of me". This game is so photorealistic I had to stop playing every 5 minutes to remind myself it was just a game.
Of course, thats with a 4870.
;)
flobo - Saturday, August 9, 2008 - link
I commented on this game Grid. But later on I thought it is not being very realistic that is the point, but it is a shame such a good site is not more interested in Iracing, which is a whole new concept in onlineplaying with laserscanned tracks the best physics until now, and a >learn to drive clean and fair< that no other sim has. It is very sophisticated and would match this site much better, then a game that is in many ways a setback.Maybe something about Iracing in the future?TantrumusMaximus - Friday, August 8, 2008 - link
I haven't had a chance to read the review here but I will add this game ROCKS. There is great value in the wide range of cars and I love the adaption of the formula cars... the sound is dead on.Before this I really loved the Flatout racing games and GRID really sucked me in because not only does it have great damage modelling... the damage actually impacts your driving performance unlike Flatout.
Flatout was not a serious racing game so I realize it's apples to oranges.... it's more that this game sucked me away from Flatout. My more casual gaming friends however hate this game because guess what... you have to learn how to drive, you can't just come into a turn full throttle and come out ok like the other.
This game caused me to run out and get a better gamepad... got the xbox 360 windows controller.
The one track that just makes me furiously upset is the Le Mans course.... in the beginning of the track there is a dipsy doo right then left slant that almost always has me spinning out due to the physics. ARGH!!! But I love it.
Googer - Friday, August 8, 2008 - link
I have played the PS3 version online and the one problem that seems to persist is people who don't want to race, but instead wish to cause accidents. It gets annoying after a while when the person at the starting gate holds down the reverse key to cause a large 12 car pileup or goes the wrong way or goes round the track trying to make others wreck and no one votes to ban that individual. If the PC version offers a dedicated, moderated, privately owned server then the PC version may have an edge over the console where the PS3 acts as the both the client and session server. The console version lacks moderation, does the PC version offer a dedicated server option?