Horizon Forbidden West: hands-on with the eagerly anticipated PC port

One of the technologically-advanced video games on PlayStation 5 is coming imminently to PC. Horizon Forbidden West is acclaimed for its lovely rendering and easy efficiency on PS5, and we have been fascinated to see how porting specialists Nixxes have tailored it to PC – and to see how correct its (solely cheap) really helpful specs are in-game. The studio continues to work on and refine the sport up till launch, however we’ve got had round per week with preview builds and might supply our preliminary impressions.

In making ready this piece, I did have time to talk with Guerrilla Video games and Nixxes (and we’ll be publishing an interview quickly), the place I used to be intrigued to be taught that the studios are aiming for a ‘console-like expertise’ when it comes to ease-of-use and snappiness, whereas retaining the power to tweak the sport to your liking. And that is my first takeaway: the fundamentals are executed proper. The consumer interface is logical and practical and adjustments to graphics settings are proven in real-time, permitting you to see the distinction as you tweak – and are available to your individual conclusions concerning the high quality will increase versus the efficiency hits for extra superior options. Much like different Nixxes initiatives, there is a wealth of upscaling choices obtainable and anti-aliasing choices that embrace SMAA or no AA in any respect for the temporal anti-aliasing sceptics.

As standard, Nixxes does its greatest to accommodate the preferred PC choices, together with ultrawide help – and a 21:9 side ratio is a superb match for Horizon’s expansive vistas. The power to show off letterboxing throughout cutscenes can also be spectacular. Elsewhere, there’s additionally a snappiness when it comes to loading instances too, the place a high-end PC with a quick NVMe drive working at PS5-equivalent settings is comparable with the fast expertise on console. That is aided by DirectStorage, although GPU decompression is not enabled. At current, the builders really feel this function is simply too restrictive when it comes to mixing and matching decompression codecs and is not fairly the completed article. We’re instructed that as Horizon is not closely CPU-limited, it is sensible to run decompression on the CPU slightly than including further burden to the GPU.

Horizon Forbidden West PC vs PS5: Enhanced Options, Efficiency Checks + Picture High quality Boosts!

Both manner, the frame-time points we noticed with GPU-based DirectStorage in Ratchet and Clank aren’t seen right here – and whereas we’re on the subject of stutter, it is good to see that the preliminary load of the sport is accompanied by a shader precompilation step. It takes a couple of minute on a venerable Ryzen 5 3600 processor, and just below half that on a top-of-the-line Ryzen 7 7800X3D. Right here your PC is compiling compute shaders used for procedural vegetation placement within the sport world, with extra shader compilation occurring in-game within the background on spare CPU cores. The tip result’s that even on my Ryzen 5 3600 system, I did not see any PSO stuttering – although, after all, it will possibly’t be fully dominated out. Usually although, based mostly on my testing thus far Forbidden West on PC gives a easy gameplay expertise.

Precise upgrades over the PlayStation 5 model are considerably extra conservative than, for instance, Ratchet and Clank: Rift Aside. The place there are boosts, it is largely about rising pattern counts or the standard of the sport’s numerous results. Take anisotropic filtering, which runs at 2x, 4x or 8x based mostly on the floor on PS5. In fact, PC ramps as much as 16x with a lot better texture high quality the additional you go into the space. Degree of element and terrain high quality are additionally improved, with extra detailed brush and degree geometry.

Past that, the upgrades are much less apparent. For instance, PC unlocks full-quality depth of discipline throughout the board, whereas it is just utilized in cinematics on PS5. Realistically although, you will be squinting to inform the distinction between PS5’s high quality mode and the maxed-out expertise on PC – and it is really the 16x texture filtering possibility that gives probably the most noticeable improve when it comes to visible options.

Nevertheless, picture high quality is a special matter, thanks to higher PC choices when it comes to efficient decision and anti-aliasing – particularly when in comparison with PS5’s efficiency mode, which makes use of each checkerboard rendering and a dynamic decision to focus on 1800p. Nevertheless, this resolution is sort of a downgrade in opposition to native 1800p and, basically, the console model is much less clear and secure than the identical decision on PC. Certainly, native 1440p or 1440p DLSS resolves extra element than PS5’s efficiency mode. With that in thoughts, customers can faucet into higher-quality upscaling together with the PC model’s dynamic decision system and obtain nice outcomes.

When setting the PC model to a dynamic 1800p with DLSS utilizing an RTX 3070, picture high quality is markedly superior to PlayStation 5’s efficiency mode – however then, you would possibly anticipate that from a GPU of this class. Past that then, I attempted an RTX 2070 Tremendous working at dynamic 1440p with DRS and located that, though a contact blurrier than PS5’s 1800p checkerboard efficiency mode, extra element was resolved. The fundamental level I am making an attempt to make right here is that good picture high quality is definitely attained on this port.

On high of picture high quality upgrades, there are additionally efficiency upgrades on PC. 120fps – whether or not achieved by way of brute pressure or by way of DLSS 3 – is one other palpable enchancment over the console expertise. The query is whether or not your PC has the horsepower to take action, which brings us onto the subject of Nixxes’ really helpful settings. Generally, I believe they’re wonderful – with one caveat. To attain the targets set out within the spec sheet, dynamic decision scaling is required for consistency.

The specs say that an RTX 3070 can obtain 1440p at 60fps at excessive settings – however even within the sport’s opening areas, you are really within the 50s. That is wonderful for VRR shows after all, however solely with dynamic decision scaling (which is engaged by default) do you get nearer to a sustained 60fps. In fact, the console model is utilizing DRS too – and checkerboard rendering – to hit its personal 60fps goal. It really works there fairly properly and I extremely advocate utilizing it on PC too to maximise efficiency and graphical high quality.

I might recommend focusing on a selected frame-rate and pairing it with the perfect upscaling resolution your PC is provided with: DLSS, XeSS or FSR2, in that order. DRS goes down as little as 50 % of native decision, continuously adjusting in small increments to maintain your GPU pegged as shut as attainable to full utilisation.

Subsequent up, let’s discuss graphics playing cards with 8GB of VRAM – a setup that hobbled many current PS5 to PC ports on launch. At 1440p, each the RTX 2070 Tremendous and RTX 3070 had no points with frame-rate drops on account of VRAM working out. I additionally tried bumping up the decision to 1800p with the RTX 3070 and located that after a cutscene, throughout a cutscene, or after quick touring, I might see massive frame-rate drops and swings as VRAM was overfilled and the sport began paging to system reminiscence. As a substitute of degrading texture high quality, the Nixxes system for VRAM administration retains textures at top quality, however is compelled to tug them from system reminiscence at instances. Except that is modified sooner or later, I like to recommend 8GB GPUs play at a most of 1440p if they’re utilizing the excessive texture setting. If going higher-res, the medium texture setting seems competent visually and didn’t have the identical efficiency pitfalls in my expertise.

When it comes to CPU efficiency, I used to be questioning if I might obtain a console-equivalent 60fps utilizing a (now) lower-end Ryzen 5 3600. We’re CPU-limited above 60fps, however surprisingly, regardless of that, frame-times have been nonetheless easy – and it is attainable to get expertise right here, even at excessive settings. Solely within the sport’s heaviest scenes, corresponding to sure cutscenes or bigger fight encounters, have been we CPU-limited below 60fps.

That is completely cheap given the age of the CPU in query (it is getting on for 5 years previous!), however I used to be really actually impressed by frame-time consistency below load – usually, being CPU-bottlenecked is a recipe for catastrophe when it comes to hitching and stuttering, however even the lowly Ryzen 5 3600 holds up pretty properly right here. Proper now, the most important points when it comes to stuttering on this CPU have been restricted to the preliminary cutscene, one thing I reported to Nixxes, so possibly there will be some adjustments on the way in which.

Talking of adjustments, there are some issues that I would love the sport so as to add in future updates. As of proper now, there isn’t a FSR 3 body technology, however Nixxes has talked about it to me – so I assume it’s coming, however possibly not as a launch function. Likewise, I want to see barely extra dynamic decision management with the power to customize the highest and backside decision if attainable, and maybe enable for finer grain frame-rate limiting above and under the refresh price.

Lastly, if attainable, I might wish to see some tweaks to unusual behaviours just like the occasional texture by no means resolving to its highest high quality, or the doubling of frame-times within the intro, resulting in depressed efficiency. These are smaller blemishes, however ones I seen instantly with out even taking part in the PS5 model to check.

These are my preliminary ideas on Horizon Forbidden West in its pre-launch state. It is obtained so much going for it and does seem like port with loads of customisation potential and an honest array of PC extras. Most significantly, it runs easily, with out among the consistency points I noticed within the launch variations of Marvel’s Spider-Man or Ratchet and Clank – and basic efficiency ought to fulfill customers, particularly if the default dynamic decision scaling possibility is enabled.

We’ll be again quickly with a have a look at optimised settings and PS5-equivalent settings (assume: excessive settings with some tweaks) however till then, let’s simply say that our experiences with the pre-launch code have been constructive and making an allowance for we have been focusing on 60fps with a Ryzen 5 3600 and a 2070 Tremendous on console-equivalent settings, that hints at diploma of scalability for lower-end package.