One of Sony’s biggest business practices over the past few years has been to bring experiences that were only available on PlayStation to PC. This way, a new audience has the opportunity to enjoy quality experiences. However, these ports are not perfect, especially for those who have a low- and mid-range computer or laptop. Even so, the company’s different studios have done everything possible to offer decent versions that everyone can enjoy. Continuing with this practice, on September 19th, the PlayStation 4 finally arrived. God of War: Ragnarok Steam and the Epic Games Store. You can learn more about this title in our original review here. So, I spent the last few days playing Santa Monica’s latest work on PC, and the end result is interesting.
God of War: Ragnarok is the latest PlayStation offering on PC. However, this work is not in the hands of Nixxes Software, who have worked on ports of Horizon Forbidden West, Ghost of Tsushimaand more. Instead, the studio teamed up with Jetpack Interactive, with whom they also collaborated on God of War (2018), to bring Kratos and Atreus’ epic adventure to a new audience. This culminates in a pretty amazing experience, but one that is limited if you don’t have enough power.
First of all, it is important to mention that at the moment I have an ASUS laptop with 16 GB of RAM and an NVIDIA 3050 graphics card with an Intel i5 processor, which puts it, in theory, within the recommended specifications that are needed to play. God of War: Ragnarok on PC, but only slightly below what is needed to enjoy this experience in all its glory. In other words, it is mid-range hardware. Still, I can assure you that my experience was positive, although it was not without problems.
I say that in theory my PC can run God of War: Ragnarok due to a very important element that will limit the experience for many people. This time, 6GB of VRAM is required, something that, from what I’ve seen on the internet, has caused some players with minimal requirements on a low-end computer to not even be able to open the game. In my case, I don’t have the necessary amount, since I only have 3.6GB. Although a message always appeared warning me that this could cause poor performance, at least I was able to start playing.
Once inside, the lack of VRAM did affect my experience in a very important aspect for many people. Because it did not meet this requirement, God of War: Ragnarok It didn’t allow me to tweak things like texture quality, shadows, lighting, and a bunch of other elements that are basic to personalizing the experience. However, it was still possible to change everything to a low, medium, or high option in a general sense. While I was able to tweak the visual quality, the details were out of my reach, which is pretty weird, but at the same time it freed me from having to keep checking what works and what doesn’t to get the game to perform optimally.
Fortunately, I was able to tweak the rest of the performance options. Here we once again encounter DLSS, or Deep Learning Super Sampling Technology, which is focused on providing the best possible performance without using up too many PC resources. God of War: Ragnarok allows the frame rate to be fixed at 30fps, 60fps, and up to 144fps, of course, with possible drops depending on what you have activated. However, it is also possible to choose an option with which DLSS takes over this section entirely, and choose to focus on performance, visual quality, or find a middle ground between these two. As always, the final result will depend entirely on your components.
In my case, the default DLSS option worked very well. This allowed the game to look great, similar to what’s present on a PlayStation 4, although with some less impressive details. However, performance varied between 20fps and 40fps, which is not a bad thing, since drops below 30fps were rare, and did not ruin some of the fights I participated in. The rest of the DLSS options had similar results. By focusing entirely on performance, the title could reach up to 60fps, and rarely went below 40fps, but the visual quality was not the best, and a motion blur effect was added when moving the camera. On the other hand, by putting an emphasis on visual quality, the title showed how beautiful it can be, but the frames per second were more unstable.
It’s a tricky situation, as I’m sure having enough VRAM would have provided better performance when choosing a DLSS option. Still, the game still amazed me with how good it looks. With everything in between, the visual quality and performance were more than efficient, to the point where they were almost on par with what we’ve seen on the PlayStation 4. Of course, the experience isn’t without its issues. Notably, when switching realms, the game takes a couple of seconds to load textures, so you can see gaps in the void for a moment. Likewise, Kratos and Atreus’ armor looks fine from a distance, but when a cinematic causes a close-up, you can see that the textures are lower than many elements around them. Thankfully, the character models maintain a high quality throughout, even with low settings.
God of War: Ragnarok On PC, it’s a rough experience, at least for now. If you have the requisite 6GB of VRAM, you’ll likely have no issues with the game, but if you don’t, then you’ll run into a couple of issues. This is still a great port, though, and I was surprised from start to finish by how smoothly it runs, even with the limitations. I didn’t encounter any visual glitches or issues that genuinely ruined the experience. It’s a great piece of work that all PC users should give a try.
Beyond the technical section, God of War: Ragnarok on PC continues to offer all the content that is already available on PlayStation consoles. This means that you will be able to enjoy an epic adventure that puts an end to the Nordic saga of the series. Likewise, the update of Valhallawhich adds a roguelite mode, is already included, and you can access it from the moment you install the game. It is important to mention that, before starting, you have to register your PlayStation Network account. Fortunately, this only needs to be done once, and you don’t have to do it again. The only catch is that this is totally required, and if you don’t have internet, then you simply can’t start playing.
In general, God of War: Ragnarok On PC, it’s a good experience. Even if you have a limited PC, the game runs very well. If you haven’t experienced the original title, now is the perfect time to do so. As always, the final result will depend a lot on your hardware, but with a mid-range PC, I’m sure you’ll be able to enjoy this title without too many problems.
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