RoadCraft - PC performance graphics benchmarks of Graphics Cards and Processors
We have tested the released RoadCraft on maximum graphics settings with video cards of the GeForce RTX 20, 30, 40 and 50 series, as well as Radeon RX 6000, 7000 and 9000. Also, during the tests we conducted, we assessed the quality of the graphic display of the game itself.
| 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 |
RoadCraft — a driving and transport logistics simulator based on the Havok engine, designed for stable operation in 1080p resolution. The game supports DirectX 12 and requires an SSD even at minimum settings. System requirements indicate a wide range of compatibility — from mid-range configurations to modern gaming systems.
System Requirements
The minimum
• OS: Windows 10 (build 18362+) / Windows 11 (64 bit)
• Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 1500X / Intel Core i5-8400
• RAM: 8 GB
• Video card: AMD Radeon RX 590 / NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 / Intel Arc A580 (6 GB VRAM)
• Storage: 40 GB
• Note: SSD is required. 30 FPS at 1080p, "Low" preset
Recommended
• OS: Windows 10 (18362+) / Windows 11 (64 bit)
• Processor: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X / Intel Core i5-12600K
• RAM: 16 GB
• Video card: AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT / NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 / Intel Arc B580 (8 GB VRAM)
• Storage: 40 GB
• Note: SSD is required. 60 FPS at 1080p, "High" preset
| DEVELOPMENT HISTORY |
RoadCraft was conceived as a continuation of the ideas of tactical logistics, but with an emphasis not on commercial transportation, but on the restoration of civilization after disasters. The concept of the game has gone far from the standard "mud" simulator: here the emphasis is on real responsibility - emergency restoration of infrastructure, construction of bypass roads, connection of power lines and launch of temporary life support in destroyed regions. This required not only changes in the game design, but also in the logic of building a world that should not be static, but deteriorating and changing under the influence of the elements.
From the start, the developers were faced with the need to go beyond the usual structures. The game was built not as a showroom of heavy machinery, but as a simulator of a complex engineering task. This meant that physics, load calculations, precipitation, destruction, and even task deadlines had to affect the end result. Initially, the team tried inserting disasters as scripted events, but they quickly became outdated. As a result, a hybrid procedural destruction engine was developed, where the consequences of disasters were calculated dynamically: this complicated the logic, but provided variability. Each collapse, fire, or road failure ultimately looked different, which increased the feeling of a unique challenge.
During testing, it became clear that most players get lost in the logistics interface. We had to rework the vehicle control and tracking system, adding intuitive elements — displaying route points, the ability to pre-set mechanical tasks (for example, dig, lift, level) to reduce the number of routine actions. This did not simplify the game — on the contrary, it complicated its depth, as there were risks of incorrect planning. But at the same time, it allowed us to focus on decision-making, rather than endless manual control.
Later, temporary events were added to the game: landslides, frosts, changing weather fronts. They not only affect the appearance, but also the availability of routes and the need to rearrange columns. This system required the introduction of a multi-agent simulation, in which different types of disasters affect each other. For example, a fire causes the destruction of a power line, a power station shutdown reduces the water supply, as a result of which the epidemiological situation worsens - and the player receives new tasks. Such a cascade of events turned out to be difficult to balance, and the developers were forced to introduce a "buffer" mechanic for prioritizing tasks so as not to create a feeling of total failure.
| GRAPHICS |
RoadCraft does not use realism for the sake of the picture, but for the sake of perception of the load. The main task of the graphics engine is to show not beautiful equipment, but the complexity of the environment in which it operates. All elements of the environment are subordinated to the idea of "resistance to the world": cracks, dirt, precipitation, soil deformation. Locations are created in such a way as to be inconvenient - there are no convenient routes, clear roads or smooth slopes. Every surface can become a threat. Stones, garbage, remains of buildings - everything is present in the environment, and the equipment reacts to everything.
The lighting model is not built for artistic expression, but for perception purposes: visibility is limited by the weather, light sources, interference from dust, rain, smoke. Locations often look blurry, dirty, and this is not a bug, but a planned technique. It emphasizes the general atmosphere of destruction. Visual effects do not “decorate”, but destabilize perception: rain disrupts focus, fog hides objects, sharp flashes of lanterns blind at night. This complicates orientation, requires the use of maps and cameras, and not rely on vision.
The animation of impact has been developed separately. When the equipment drives on wet soil, deep traces are left, which eventually fill with water. When colliding with debris, cascading physical reactions occur: panels fall, beams shift, blocking the path. All this is built on arrays of physically active objects, which makes each episode unpredictable. As a bonus, these objects affect the physics of control: if a fence falls, it can roll under the wheels, causing slippage and demolition of the route.
The design of the equipment is made without excessive "gamer" stylization. Panels, cabins, bodies - everything is visually accurate and close to industrial standards. There are no neon strips, gloss, decorative solutions. All that the player sees is dirty, worn out, but working equipment. Inside the cabin - instruments, dirty glass, fogging. In-game pollution is supported: the glass gets dirty, the optics get dim, and if the player does not clean it - he loses his view.
In open spaces, the global illumination system and local sources are active. This means that during night missions without installing spotlights, visibility will be zero. Lighting mechanics have technical significance - for example, proper lighting speeds up repair work, reduces errors when installing supports or stretchers. In snow or sand, the light is scattered, and in rain, it is reflected from puddles. This requires taking into account the angle and type of spotlights.
Visualization of equipment fatigue is also implemented. For example, frequent braking causes disks to overheat, which is displayed by glowing. If the equipment is hit, dents are left on it, which can deform the load or affect passage under bridges. Visually, this is not smoothed out in any way - damage accumulates, the equipment becomes more and more worn out. The game does not hide flaws, but emphasizes them.
| GAME ENGINE |
The technological basis of RoadCraft is built on a heavily modified version of the Saber Physics Engine, which was previously used in games with an emphasis on the physics of machinery. However, here it has been expanded and modified for the tasks of crisis modeling. The key feature is a full-fledged physical simulation of all large objects: beams, supports, ground, blocks, panels - everything is subject to the laws of inertia, weight and resistance. Any movement of machinery causes a reaction in the environment. There are no scenario collapses - only calculated ones. If you overload a bridge, it will crack and collapse to the side, and machinery can get stuck or slide off.
The engine supports DirectX 12 and works with Vulkan on Linux, which allows for multi-threaded processing and acceleration via video memory. The game integrates FSR 3 with frame generation support, which is especially useful at high settings in 1440p and 4K. Thanks to this, even with a high density of objects, reflections and particles, you can achieve a stable 60-80 FPS on mid-range video cards (RTX 3060 / RX 6700 XT). The console version also features dynamic resolution adjustment and adaptive render rate.
A lot of attention is paid to the physics of transport. Every element — from suspension stiffness to transmission behavior and load weight — is calculated in real time. This is not just an acceleration or braking setting, but a full-fledged system where the car's behavior in mud, on an incline or on a slope is different. The mass of the load, its displacement, angles of attack — everything affects stability. Internal telemetry has been added to the game, which allows you to track the behavior of equipment and adjust it in real time. Including through remote control of drones.
The damage system has been developed: in addition to visual effects (deformations, loss of elements), there are functional ones - cable breakage, engine failure, fuel leakage. Damage can spread: a broken suspension affects control, a broken generator reduces power, and overheating of the brakes affects the braking distance. The game provides for technical maintenance, which adds realism: before a long mission, you need to refuel, check the connections and, if necessary, change a set of tires or filters.
The AI system in the engine works on the behavior of zones and scripted reactions. The equipment is controlled simply, but the environment reacts in a complex way: drone cameras can be knocked down by the wind, automated routes are disrupted when conditions change. Disaster scenarios activate cascading events: if a water intake is destroyed, the territory is flooded, if a lift is damaged, access to the upper tier is lost. All this is calculated in real time, and not written manually, which makes the behavior of the world organic and unpredictable.
| QUALITY |
On low settings RoadCraft disables volumetric effects and uses simplified textures. Scene lighting is flat, and object shadows are blurry or absent. The environment, including trees, road signs, and small environmental elements, is drawn with a delay, and visibility is limited. Rain, mud, and suspension dynamics are displayed in a basic form.
On high settings Improved materials with reflective surfaces, a full system of shadows from vehicles and architecture, and a detailed drawing range are activated. Lighting receives realistic transitions depending on the time of day. The surfaces of cars and roads reflect light, the tracks look richer due to the elaboration of details - from small debris to wet areas with dynamic dirt. The physics of interaction with the environment is also improved - from tire tracks to suspension deformation when driving on uneven surfaces.
| TEST PART |
Below you will find a table of equipment that was kindly provided by our sponsors: GIGABYTE, ASUS, Kingston и Deep Cool. It reflects the list of motherboards, video cards, memory modules and cooling systems used in the tests, and also indicates the current configuration of the operating system and drivers.
| Test configuration | |
| GIGABYTE | |
| motherboards | |
| ASUS | |
| motherboards | |
| Video Cards |
Asus GeForce RTX 5070 TUF Gaming OC ASUS ROG Strix GeForce RTX 4070 Ti OC |
| KINGSTON | |
| RAM |
16 GB DDR4 4600 CL19 Kingston FURY Renegade 32 GB DDR4 3600 CL16 Kingston FURY Renegade 32 GB DDR4 4000 CL18 Kingston FURY Renegade 32 GB DDR5 5600 CL40 Kingston FURY Beast 32 GB DDR5 6000 CL30 Kingston FURY Renegade 32 GB DDR5 7200 CL36 Kingston FURY Renegade 48GB DDR5 7200 CL36 Kingston FURY Renegade |
| Storage devices |
Kingston FURY Renegade PCIe 4.0 NVMe M.2 SSD |
| Deep Cool | |
|
Cases and cooling |
|
| Software configuration |
|
| Operating system | Windows 11 24H2 |
| Graphics driver |
Nvidia GeForce/ION Driver Release 576.52 WHQL AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition 25.5.1 |
| Monitoring programs | MSI Afterburner 4.6.6 Beta 5 Build 16555 |
All video cards were tested at maximum graphics quality using MSI Afterburner. The purpose of the test is to determine how video cards from different manufacturers behave under the same conditions. Below is a video of a test segment from the game:
Our video cards were tested at different screen sizes 1920x1080, 2560x1440 и 3840x2160 with maximum graphics quality settings without upscales.
| TEST GPU |
In the video card test, the default resolution is 1920x1080, other resolutions are added and removed manually. You can also remove and add any video card positions. You can also select any of our test processors from the list in the drop-down menu, comparing its performance with the given video card tests (the most productive solution is selected by default). The test is carried out on the most productive in this game CPU and scales to other processors, taking into account their testing on NVIDIA and AMD video cards.
- Ultra
When resolved 1920x1080:
- Average FPS (25 frames): Reached on video cards of the level of Radeon RX 6700 XT or GeForce RTX 3060.
- Minimum FPS (25 frames): Provided by video cards of the Radeon RX 6700 XT or GeForce RTX 3060 level.
- Comfortable average FPS (60 frames): Possible with video cards of the Radeon RX 6800 or GeForce RTX 40+0 Ti level.
When resolved 2560x1440:
- Average FPS (25 frames): Reached on video cards of the level of Radeon RX 6700 XT or GeForce RTX 3060.
- Minimum FPS (25 frames): Provided by video cards of the Radeon RX 6700 XT or GeForce RTX 3060 level.
- Comfortable average FPS (60 frames): Possible with video cards of the Radeon RX 7800 XT or GeForce RTX 4070 level.
When resolved 3840x2160:
- Average FPS (25 frames): Achieved on Radeon RX 6800 or GeForce RTX 2080 Ti level graphics cards.
- Minimum FPS (25 frames): Provided by video cards of the Radeon RX 6800 or GeForce RTX 4060 Ti level.
- Comfortable average FPS (60 frames): Possible with video cards of the GeForce RTX 4080 level.
| VIDEO MEMORY CONSUMPTION |
Testing of the video memory consumed by the game was carried out by the MSI Afterburner program. The results on video cards from AMD and NVIDIA at separate screen resolutions of 1920x1080, 2560x1440 and 3840x2160 with different anti-aliasing settings were taken as an indicator. By default, the most current solutions are displayed in the graph. Other video cards are added and removed from the graph at the reader's request.
- Ultra
GameGPU
Resolution 1920x1080:
- Video cards with 12 GB of video memory: consume 10 GB
- Video cards with 16 GB of video memory: consume 10 GB
- Video cards with 24 GB of video memory: consume 10 GB
- Video cards with 32 GB of video memory: consume 10 GB
Resolution 2560x1440:
- Video cards with 12 GB of video memory: consume 10 GB
- Video cards with 16 GB of video memory: consume 11 GB
- Video cards with 24 GB of video memory: consume 11 GB
- Video cards with 32 GB of video memory: consume 11 GB
Resolution 3840x2160:
- Video cards with 12 GB of video memory: consume 12 GB
- Video cards with 16 GB of video memory: consume 13 GB
- Video cards with 24 GB of video memory: consume 13 GB
- Video cards with 32 GB of video memory: consume 13 GB
| TEST CPU |
Testing was carried out at a resolution of 1920x1080. In the processor test, you can remove or add any processor positions. You can also select any tested video card from the list in the drop-down menu, comparing its performance with the given processor test results (by default, the most productive solution from NVIDIA is selected). Testing takes place on the most powerful NVIDIA and AMD video cards and scales to low-end models.
- Ultra
When using NVIDIA video cards:
- Processors for acceptable FPS (not lower than 25 frames per second):
- AMD Ryzen 3 3100
- Intel Core i3-10100
- Processors for comfortable FPS (at least 60 frames per second):
- AMD Ryzen 5 3600
- Intel Core i3-10100
When using AMD video cards:
- Processors for acceptable FPS (not lower than 25 frames per second):
- AMD Ryzen 3 3100
- Intel Core i3-10100
- Processors for comfortable FPS (at least 60 frames per second):
- AMD Ryzen 3 3100
- Intel Core i3-10100
- Ultra
Loading and using streams:
- Maximum load: The game can load up to 16 streams.
- Optimal loading: Uses up to 12 threads as efficiently as possible.
| RAM TEST |
The indicator was taken as all used RAM. The RAM test on the all system was conducted on various video cards without launching third-party applications (browsers, etc.). In the graphics, you can add and remove any resolutions and video cards as desired.
- Ultra
GameGPU
Resolution 1920x1080:
- Video cards with 12 GB of video memory: consume 21 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 16 GB of video memory: consume 20 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 24 GB of video memory: consume 20 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 32 GB of video memory: consume 21 GB of RAM
Resolution 2560x1440:
- Video cards with 12 GB of video memory: consume 21 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 16 GB of video memory: consume 20 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 24 GB of video memory: consume 20 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 32 GB of video memory: consume 21 GB of RAM
Resolution 3840x2160:
- Video cards with 12 GB of video memory: consume 22 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 16 GB of video memory: consume 20 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 24 GB of video memory: consume 20 GB of RAM
- Video cards with 32 GB of video memory: consume 21 GB of RAM
| SPONSORS TESTS |
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