I’ve rather enjoyed my time with Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate. Yes, it suffers many inherited problems from the series – ones that will take quite an internal shake up at Ubisoft to ever be fixed. But, a few minor glitches aside, the experience has been solid. On consoles at least.
I have this sneaking suspicion that the game is going to run poorly on PC when it sees release later this month. It’s not because Ubisoft games have a propensity to be broken on PC, or that I don’t have faith that the teams behind Assassin’s Creed and its ports aren’t able to deliver a game that works. Rather, by the fact that it’s another game that utilises Nvidia’s Gameworks.
According to NVidia and Ubisoft, Gameworks is supposed to make the game look and run better, but in my own completely subjective experiences, I’ve only ever found Gameworks to make things worse.
Here’s the list of stuff that’s exclusive to NVidia’s GPU’s.
- TXAA: NVIDIA algorithm for Temporal Anti-Aliasing – Works only on NVIDIA hardware
- HBAO+: – NVIDIA algorithm for Ambient Occlusion – Works on both NVIDIA and AMD hardware
- PCSS: NVIDIA algorithm for Soft Shadows – Works on both NVIDIA and AMD hardware
- GeForce Experience: Player with GFE can have adjusted graphics options for smoother performance experience
- G-Sync Support: Support of special monitor with NVIDIA G-Sync chip
To show the tech off, Nvidia has released a Gameworks Trailer for Syndicate.
Now that looks very nice and all, but I have to view it with a fair bit of suspicion. If you’ll recall, we also got a very lovely Gameworks trailer showing off how Arkham Knight looked with the tech – and we all know how that turned out in the end. Hopefully that wont be the case here, and that Syndicate will actually play well for PC gamers, no matter which side of the red/green divide they lie.
Though it may be sour grapes, AMD seems convinced that Gameworks cripples performance, regardless of the hardware choice .
“Nvidia Gameworks typically damages the performance on Nvidia hardware as well, which is a bit tragic really, ” AMD’s “gaming scientist” Richard Huddy said earlier this year. “It certainly feels like it’s about reducing the performance, even on high-end graphics cards, so that people have to buy something new.”
As a reminder, here are the specs you’ll need to play Syndicate on your PC (which we posted last week).
Minimum
- OS: Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8.1, Windows 10(64bit versions)
- Processor: Intel Core i5 2400s @ 2.5 GHz or AMD FX 6350 @ 3.9 GHz
- RAM: 6GB or more for Windows 7, Windows 8.1, Windows 10
- Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660 or AMD Radeon R9 270 (2GB VRAM with Shader Model 5.0)
- DirectX: June 2010 Redistributable
- Sound: DirectX compatible with latest drivers
Recommended
- OS: Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8.1, Windows 10 (64bit versions only)
- Processor: Intel Core i7-3770 @ 3.5 GHz or AMD FX-8350 @ 4.0 GHz
- RAM: 8GB
- Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 (4GB) or the newer GTX 970 (4GB) or AMD Radeon R9 280X (3GB) or better
- DirectX: June 2010 Redistributable
- Sound: DirectX 9.0c compatible with latest drivers
- Hard Drive: 50GB available space
“For a recommended experience, says Ubisoft, “the game requires a video card with at least 3GB of VRAM when playing at a full HD resolution. While we encourage you to fiddle with the advanced options to fully customize your gaming experience, please keep an eye out for the VRAM meter usage when you adjust these settings.”
Last Updated: November 9, 2015
Alien Emperor Trevor
November 9, 2015 at 11:33
Unoplay AND Gamedoesntworks? HAVEN’T WE SUFFERED ENOUGH!?
Hammersteyn
November 9, 2015 at 11:49
You get what you pay for?
#SteamSpecials
Alien Emperor Trevor
November 9, 2015 at 11:53
Anyone preordering on PC have paid full price 😛
Mustavi Sadi Aryan
November 9, 2015 at 19:34
I play cracked games. TXAA is no longer NVIDIA GameWrecks shitware exclusive. Also in GTA 5. Buy the Gold Edition on PC a few years later. All the DLCs are available without pre-order.
Grand Admiral Chief SpaceNinja
November 9, 2015 at 11:53
Green Team stuffing up again
Hammersteyn
November 9, 2015 at 11:57
http://38.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m7wj87pKfs1qemehio1_1280.jpg
WitWolfy
November 9, 2015 at 12:10
Enjoying this game so much, got all the secrets of London yesterday, 70% complete with the game overal and just got to sequence 8. Trying to pad this baby out as much as I can until Rise of the Tomb Raider releases.
Just one question. I got DLC codes for more Charles Dickens DLC Is it suppose to release on at a later stage or how to I activate it? I’ve done everything as far as I know and it says only 74% of London stories have been done so far… Weird..
miaau
November 9, 2015 at 12:13
How on earth do you find the time, with wife and child(s) and all that?
WitWolfy
November 9, 2015 at 12:19
wanna see me juggle?
http://38.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m8yteqnFZt1ro8ysbo1_500.gif
Geoffrey Tim
November 9, 2015 at 12:27
They actually just get baked in to the game, so if you’ve done side missions for dickens and/or darfwin, you’ve probably already done them.
WitWolfy
November 9, 2015 at 12:36
Oh, ok then. I did all of them this weekend. Was expecting something more epic to be honest.
Mustavi Sadi Aryan
November 9, 2015 at 19:36
I think it’s Barfwin.
CypherGate
November 9, 2015 at 12:49
Am I imagining or is games becoming a lot more demanding specwise?
oVg
November 9, 2015 at 12:53
I LOVE SYNDICATE 🙂
I rate it 7.5/10. It would have been 9/10 if it ran at 60fps considering its resolution is 900p.
Mossel
November 9, 2015 at 12:58
So 9/10 on PC then? xD
oVg
November 9, 2015 at 13:03
10/10 if its 1080p/60fps. The game is fantastic, probably because Im a pommie and have a hard on for posh British accents. EVIE FTW
Im on 90% and it oozes the same vibe as Black Flag. It must be the same developers.
Jacob will grow on you after a while and you will learn to appreciate the witty comedy for what is. London is beautiful.
Its just a pity that the console will always be inferior to the PC when it comes to ports. Batman excluded.
Mossel
November 9, 2015 at 13:12
That’s awesome! Guess I’ll have to procure it then. Once I get my backlog to 80% completion… on 70% now.
oVg
November 9, 2015 at 13:20
I enjoyed it more than GTAV. The attention to detail is still amazing me. Everything from the reflections in the puddles to folk songs in the pubs. If you have been to London then its a must. So much history for all the landmarks.
Most people are not happy with the combat as its comes across as a button masher. But once you learn the animations it becomes fun trying to do a double, triple or quadruple kill animation. Kind of like Batman. I spend my drunk play sessions in the level 8 fight club.
Nikola
November 9, 2015 at 14:56
That’s really awesome news! I love Black Flag and feel like a new AC game this is good!!
oVg
November 9, 2015 at 15:06
Another interesting fact, like Unity all the buildings are full scale so the zip line was necessary to traverse these things. It actually feels like you are in London. Climbing up Elizebeth Tower to get to Big Ben actually felt real.
Nikola
November 9, 2015 at 15:25
Nice excited to pick this up next month sometime:) Just want to finish Unity then will go for this not that there is no more bugs I can finish it in peace hate skipping a game in franchise!
Mustavi Sadi Aryan
November 9, 2015 at 19:37
The game is actually 1080p unlimited FPS. Yet it has NVIDIA GameWrecks shitware.