Alan Wake American Nightmare test GPU
BASIC GAME INFORMATION |
Year of construction: 2012
Genre: arcade
developer: Remedy
Publishing house: Microsoft
Alan Wake's American Nightmare is a story-driven action-horror film released in digital format. The game is a successor to Alan Wake, but is not its sequel. American Nightmare is presented as an independent game that does not reflect the main storyline of the series; the game only expands the universe. The developers assure that American Nightmare will not be the last part of the Alan Wake series, since a sequel is already in development.
Alan Wake appears to be stuck in Arizona. What's more, he's inside one of his Night Springs episodes previously written for the show. While uncovering the mystery of his creation, Alan finds himself in a battle of light and darkness. According to the trailer shown at the Spike Video Game Awards on December 10, 2011, Alan is hunting for Mister Scratch, his Dark Place counterpart first seen in the final episode of the first game.
THE GRAFICAL PART |
This subsection of our review highlights the main graphical aspects of this game. Particular attention is paid to the version of the graphics engine used, the version of the API used, graphic settings and the quality of development of the main visual aspects.
Supported OS and graphics API |
Alan Wake American Nightmare is supported by major operating systems Windows, which includes Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista and Windows 7. Other operating systems are not currently supported by the developers and are unlikely to receive support.
The priority and main graphics API is only DirectX 9. Alan Wake initially planned to support DirectX 10, but over time this solution was rejected.
Game engine |
The game engine is a product of Remedy's own development. The computer version is a consequence of the console porting. Unfortunately, we could not find either the name of the engine or its characteristics. The PC version added improved graphics quality settings and higher resolution.
Unfortunately, we could not find more detailed information about the game engine, except for visual observations.
Advanced Game Settings |
Alan Wake American Nightmare has both basic and advanced graphics settings. Remedy did a great job with the game, making it a solid console port.
Below we have provided screenshots of the game at various graphic settings so that our users can see for themselves what they will have to sacrifice if the performance of their home PC is insufficient.
Low quality settings |
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Medium quality settings |
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High quality settings |
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As we can see, the difference between high and low settings in Alan Wake American Nightmare is almost invisible to the naked eye.
General visual design and game physics |
As we described above, Alan Wake American Nightmare is a very solid and high-quality port of the Xbox 360 version. Other developers should learn from Remedy how to properly port games to PC. During the porting process, the graphics part was significantly improved and the controls for the mouse and keyboard were qualitatively adapted.
Visually, Alan Wake American Nightmare stands at a fairly high level - the effects, the shadows, the surroundings, everything is done at a very high level. However, the same console orientation prevents it from being a technologically advanced project. Separately, this concerns the facial expressions of the characters, which are, frankly speaking, wooden. The physics in the game is quite conventional and is used only in story scenes.
Well, then we will move directly to gaming tests and determine what impact this game has on modern computer hardware.
TEST PART |
Test configuration |
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test stands |
Test bench No. 1 based on the Intel Socket 2 platform011 Test bench No. 2 based on the Intel Socket 1155 platform Test bench No. 3 based on the Intel Socket 1366 platform Test bench No. 4 based on the Intel Socket 115 platform6 Test bench No. 5 based on the AMD Soket AM platform3 Test bench No. 6 based on the AMD Soket AM3 platform Test bench No. 7 based on the AMD Soket AM platform2 Test bench No. 8 based on the Intel Socket 1155 platform |
Multimedia equipment |
3D monitor LG W2363D Monitor LG E2750 Dell U3010 monitor product provided by the company AMD 3D Vision Kit product provided by the company Nvidia |
Software configuration |
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Operating system |
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate Edition x64 SP1 |
Graphics driver |
Nvidia GeForce/ION Driver Release 301.24 AMD Catalyst 12.4 |
Monitoring program |
MSI Afterburner v2.2 |
Test GPU |
All video cards were tested at maximum graphics quality using the MSI Afterburner program. The purpose of the test is to determine how video cards from different manufacturers behave under the same conditions. The minimum and average FPS were taken as the performance indicator. Below is a video of the test segment:
Our video cards were tested at separate screen resolutions of 1680x1050, 1920x1080 and 2560x1600 at maximum graphics quality settings allowed by the game. Multi-chip configurations from both manufacturers have optimization issues. SLI works as a single option, and Cross Fire even goes into the minus...
Testing at maximum quality settings 1680x1050
At a resolution of 1680x1050 at maximum settings, all of our video cards showed acceptable minimum and average FPS, starting from the level of the Radeon HD 5750 or GeForce GTS 450.
Testing at maximum quality settings 1920x1080
With a resolution of 1920x1080 at maximum settings, normal medium FPS indicator provided video cards of the level Radeon HD 5770 or GeForce GTX 550 Ti. The optimal solutions for these settings will be Radeon HD 7750 or GeForce GTX 460SE.
Testing at maximum quality settings 2560x1600
At 25600x1600 resolution at maximum settings in Alan Wake American Nightmare average FPS of 25 frames provided video cards of the level Radeon HD 6870 or GeForce GTX 560. The optimal solutions for these settings would be Radeon HD 6950 or GeForce GTX 480.
VRAM test |
Testing of video memory consumed by the game was carried out by the program MSI Afterburner. The indicator was based on results on top video cards from AMD and NVIDIA with separate screen sizes 1680x1050, 1920x1080 and 2560x1600.
Testing at maximum memory quality settings GPU
The optimal amount of video memory for this game is 896 for standard resolutions, and more than 1 gigabyte for ultra-high resolutions.
Test CPU |
We tested processor dependence on 12 models of basic configurations that are relevant today. The test was carried out in those places where the video card value for the game is minimal and its load was less than 99%, this time at a resolution of 11920x1080 with maximum graphics quality settings.
Testing at minimum quality settings 1920x1080
The processors were tested according to the scheme shown in the video below. All of our CPU test models provided optimal performance.
RAM test |
Testing of the RAM consumed by the game was carried out by monitoring directly through the task manager Windows. The test was conducted on the base configuration of Core i 7 3930K@4.8 GHz with pre-installed video memory of 8GB DDR3 2400 MGz.
Testing at various quality settings
As we can see, with different quality settings, the amount of RAM consumed in Alan Wake American Nightmare is at the same level and amounts to 500 megabytes.
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