What are the top specs of the game?

**hellenes** · 10-13-2006, 11:10

At which point does the game stop taking advantage of the hardware? I mean what is the best GPU after which upgrading higher is a waste of money? Cause RTW had no limit CPU wise since it could bring even $1500 cpu monsters at its knees with 38k men on the field in custom battle...

**Censor** · 10-13-2006, 22:45

There is no such point. The best video cards out there right now can not sustain above 60 fps throughout, which IMO is necessary for the smoothest experience possible. Don't start arguing about how much the eye can see, 60fps can be "felt". When you are scrolling around the battlefield in 60fps compared to 30, it is quite noticeable.

**Maizel** · 10-13-2006, 22:54

I think it'll sooner come down to Engine limitations.

**Incongruous** · 10-14-2006, 09:18

Yes, that's what it will most likely come down to.

**AlJabberwock** · 10-14-2006, 09:40

You can spend about 1200 US on a pair of GX2 7950s from NVidia with a SLI hookup, then buy one of the decent new boards for about 200 with twin PCI-E 16 x slots, and SLI 590 chipset, and one or two pairs of paired 1gig Corsair Memory with EPP (another 3 to 400 per pair), and then tweak them all up some more, maybe in conjunction with a dual core cpu (not too much cash there) decent fans and the like... decent sound and PhysX card... 2k US ought to get you about where you need to go if you build it yourself. Give or take a few hundred. Upper limits on the game for small monitors may be reachable with that kind of hardware and even lessor cards in tandem, easily before the engine begins to be the limiting factor. Larger monitors in the greater than 21 inch viewable range however, may offer a greater challenge when highest resolutions are used, and here the argument of FPS might hold water, but I have not the understanding of the limitations of the engine to know.

**hoom** · 10-14-2006, 12:47

There really is no such thing as "max spec." for a properly coded game.
Eg, Total Annihilation, released in 1997 when most people had something like a Pentium 75 & no hardware 3d acceleration can run at any resolution that your D3d compatible 3D card can run at and with at least 5000 units per side * up to 8 players (40,000 units).
The most powerful PC out there even now will not be able to hit those kind of numbers without lagging out.
Similar is the case with RTW where you'll hit hardware (& OS/directx) limtations before the game engine itself throws a hissy fit.