Today nosotros're checking out Final Fantasy Xv CPU operation using the new standalone benchmark released ahead of adjacent month's PC launch. The reason we want to look at CPU performance first is considering the game is extremely CPU intensive, far more and then than we were expecting. Developer Square Enix recommends gamers pack at least a Cadre i7-3770 or FX-8350, that's significantly more than firepower from Intel, but we'll expect into that before long.

The indicate here is that the game calls for an 8-thread CPU for the recommended specs, while on the GPU front, they believe you tin get away with a GTX 760 or R9 280. Oddly in that second comparing AMD packs far more than firepower, just then once more this is an Nvidia sponsored title with GameWorks baked in.

According to Nvidia the game features integration of Nvidia Menstruum, Nvidia HairWorks, Hybrid Frustum Traced Shadows, Turf Effects, and Voxel Ambient Apoplexy. As I understand it, these GameWorks features are only enabled with the High quality preset so although the CPU testing has been carried out using a GeForce GTX 1080 Ti, I've as well tested with the Standard and Low-cal quality presets as well.

The standalone benchmark runs for over 5 minutes and covers several events, maps and characters used in the game. For our test though nosotros are reporting frame rates across a 90 2nd slice of that benchmark and all results are based on an boilerplate of 3 runs. The test begins at the start of the car journey and ends soon after everyone gets out of the machine. Please annotation I found that frame times were often negatively impacted between the fade to and from transitions, so I avoided testing across those.

As usual, any auto overclocking functions in the BIOS were disabled and locked CPUs were paired with the advisable retentiveness, for example the Cadre i3-8100 was tested with DDR4-2400 memory. The unlocked processors used DDR4-3200 retention and this was also truthful for all the AMD Ryzen CPUs.

Benchmarks

Starting things off nosotros have the High quality results at 1080p. This is the maximum quality preset which has all the GameWorks features enabled. Here the GTX 1080 Ti created a organisation bottleneck with an average of 91 fps, then information technology'southward quite shocking to see such a high-stop GPU limited to less than 100 fps at this relatively low resolution.

For this graph allow'due south focus on the average frame rates before sorting the data past frame time results. Here we see that the Ryzen processors all perform very well in relation to Intel 8th gen CPUs, though Intel is being limited by the GTX 1080 Ti.

Fifty-fifty the much older Core i7-2600K and FX-8350 look quite good though the A12-9800 falls into a heap and isn't able to deliver playable performance.

Sorting the data by the one% low frame time results nosotros see that the 8700K is 23% faster than the Ryzen 7 1800X and Ryzen 5 1600X. The 1800X is roughly on par with the onetime Sandy Span 2600K and quite shockingly the FX-8350. That said we see reasonable functioning across the entire field with the exception of the A12-9800.

And so if we focus on the 0.1% data the older 2600K and FX-8350 processors fall away, every bit for the mod quad-cores such as the Ryzen 3 1300X and Cadre i3-8100, though the higher clocked 8350K withal does quite well.

Since we were then heavily limited at 1080p with the GTX 1080 Ti, at least for the loftier-end 8th gen Core processors I decided to endeavour 720p resolution. Here the 8700K is now 11% faster than the 1800X for the boilerplate frame charge per unit, though the 1% low data was much the aforementioned despite pulling away by an xviii% margin for the 0.1% low upshot.

There's the high quality results and for the most function things looked pretty skilful. Notwithstanding considering the results are based on an average of iii runs they in a way smooth out some of the frame glitches we saw at present and then.

Even with the Cadre i7-8700K and GTX 1080 Ti nosotros still saw occasional lag spikes in the frame charge per unit and this was really only a trouble when using the loftier quality settings. If nosotros disable GameWorks features using the standard quality preset performance smoothed out and nosotros saw a few interesting things, let'due south movement on to take a await.

Here are the standard quality results at 1080p and right away nosotros are seeing more consistent performance, with perhaps the exception of the older 2600K and FX-8350 processors.

Yet looking at the 8700K and 1800X we now see a much smaller deviation in performance, the 8700K is now 12% faster when comparison the 0.1% results, whereas previously it was virtually 30% faster. The variation in the average frame rate and one% low result is also far less significant.

In fact, Ryzen looks very impressive using the standard quality settings equally the Ryzen v 1400 delivers much more consequent functioning when compared to the Cadre i3-8100, for example.

If nosotros sort the graph by the 1% low results we run into simply how close information technology is between the top 6 processors which includes the Ryzen 7 1800X forth with the Ryzen 5 1600X and 1500X. Meanwhile, the Ryzen 3 1200 is comparable to the Core i3-8350K and Cadre i7-2600K which is a solid consequence. The FX-8350 also does surprisingly well getting amongst that bunch as well.

While I was at it, why not invest the time to check out the Lite quality preset and this pb to some very interesting findings...

Normally Intel's higher clocked CPUs run abroad with low resolution, low quality testing every bit they tin provide much college maximum frame rates, and nosotros do see that here when looking at the average frame rates.

The eighth Gen Cadre i5 and Core i7 processors were able to max out the GTX 1080 Ti at 171 fps making them at least 11% faster than the Ryzen vii 1800X. However you might have noticed something strange when looking at the frame time data, so let'southward focus on that.

Here we find something unexpected. When sorting the data by the 1% depression result the Ryzen CPUs come out on top, in fact even the Ryzen 3 1300X is able to beat the Core i7-8700K. That'due south not the case for the 0.ane% event, but here the Ryzen v and Ryzen 7 CPUs still beat the mighty Cadre i7-8700K. This is very unusual and we'll have to dig a chip deeper to observe out why we're seeing this.

Waiting for the Actual Game

Those were some interesting results and should requite you a adept idea of the kind of processing power y'all'll require to play Final Fantasy Fifteen come March half dozen.

Normally nosotros'd assume the benchmark tool is very accurate given the developer has released it ahead of time to allow gamers to set their systems. That said, prove has surfaced that the tool might not exist useful for measuring actual/expected GPU performance for the game. What's probably an unintentional bug in the benchmark, it renders objects information technology doesn't demand (out of field/view, using GameWorks features) and is therefore overly taxing on the graphics card. And then it might non be authentic for GPU testing, but we believe the CPU results should prove accurate.

Based on our testing, if you lot have a quad-cadre that'due south clocked below 4 GHz you're probably going to struggle with anything more than than the Lite quality setting. The game is very CPU intensive. For example, the 12-threaded 8700K rarely dipped below 40% utilization and in our examination spent most of its fourth dimension over 50%, at times hit every bit loftier as 80%. It was a similar story with the Ryzen seven 1800X though more time was spent hovering around the 30-40% mark. Still the lower-end Ryzen CPUs featuring 12 or less threads were very well utilized.

We should annotation the 1600X and 1800X were 5-x% faster with SMT disabled depending on the examination, but I didn't get to in depth there as we dubiousness many of y'all are going to disable SMT but to gain a bit of extra performance in Final Fantasy XV, simply note you could if you wanted to.

The High quality settings which patently enable all the GameWorks features were a bit concerning, stuttering was an issue here even with the nigh extreme hardware configurations. Simply it's possible this is due to the issues that renders out of view objects. On that note, AMD has said they won't release their optimized driver until next calendar month when the game is out.

Obviously we're really smashing to test the game once it'southward released and hopefully nosotros'll accept a neat deal of settings that nosotros can fine tune for amend results. We'll evaluate doing a proper GPU benchmark test for Final Fantasy XV once we get closer to release and tin can confirm it volition reflect the actual gameplay experience.