'GTX 680 Minimum' Required For Assassin's Creed Unity On PC

News on Ubisoft’s Official Blog greeted with dismay, but there’s something a little off with the recommendations.

News on Ubisoft’s Official Blog greeted with dismay, but there’s something a little off with the recommendations.

Late last week Ubisoft published the minimum and recommended specs for Assassin’s Creed Unity on the official Ubisoft Blog, and immediately fans of the franchise sat up and took notice thanks to some fairly hefty minimum requirements:

64-bit operating system:- Required

Supported OS:- Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8/8.1 (64bit versions only)

Processor
Minimum:- Intel Core i5-2500K @ 3.3 GHz or AMD FX-8350 @ 4.0 GHz or AMD Phenom II x4 940 @ 3.0 GHz

Recommended:- Intel Core i7-3770 @ 3.4 GHz or AMD FX-8350 @ 4.0 GHz or better

RAM
Minimum:- 6 GB

Recommended:- 8GB

Video Card
Minimum:- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 or AMD Radeon HD 7970 (2 GB VRAM)

Recommended:- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 or AMD Radeon R9 290X (3 GB VRAM)

DirectX:- Version 11

Sound Card:- DirectX 9.0c compatible sound card with latest drivers

Hard Drive Space:- 50 GB available space

Peripherals Supported:- Windows-compatible keyboard and mouse required, optional controller

Multiplayer:- 256 kbps or faster broadband connection

Supported Video Cards at Time of Release

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 or better, GeForce GTX 700 series; AMD Radeon HD7970 or better, Radeon R9 200 series
Note: Laptop versions of these cards may work but are NOT officially supported.

There’s an awful lot to digest in this component list. First up, the CPU requirements are significant (if a little lop-sided) with an Intel Sandy Bridge Core i5-2500K or AMD Phenom II X4 940 @ 3GHz. Presumably it’s the quad-core nature of the CPU that’s paramount here, but considering that even high-quality FPS titles are still rocking a pre-Sandy Bridge minimum this is a pretty hefty step-up.

On the other hand a 6GB minimum/8GB recommended RAM requirement isn’t too taxing these days. Most gaming rigs should be running 8GB by now, and certainly most next-generation titles have begun to recommend at least 8GB.

Finally, we come to the GPU, for which there has been much wailing and gnashing of teeth. An NVIDIA GTX 680 or AMD HD7970 are both major component hurdles even as a recommended GPU, never mind a minimum. Similarly a GTX 780Ti / R9 290X is extremely high end as recommendations go, but this may reflect resolutions higher than 1080p. However this is where things get a little fuzzy…

Ubisoft list all GTX700-series and R9 200 series GPUs as supported. In the cases of the R9 200’s, many are rebadged HD7000-series cards, or the same GPU with slightly higher memory or core clock speeds. Similarly GTX 750 and 760-series cards, whilst being great in their own right, don’t surpass the GTX 670 and 660Ti in performance. Furthermore laptop gamers are left totally out in the cold, with no GPU officially supported (although many should have no difficulty).

For some time now Ubisoft’s porting and optimisation process from console to PC has some in for some flack, most recently with Watch_Dogs. It’s certainly possible that they have got their wires crossed somewhere and lower-end GPUs are supported, but also the game may just run like pudding on mid-range PCs. Either way it’s spooked consumers, as the prospect of needing a >£200 GPU to simply play the game should.

If you’ve pre-ordered Assassin’s Creed Unity and have a system which isn’t up to the minimum it may be time to reconsider a day-one buy-in. Fundamentally, the take-away here is to wait for PC-specific reviews and perhaps a patch & driver cycle before your purchase.

Assassin’s Creed Unity is set for release on the 14th November for PC, PS4 and XBox One.

Source: Ubisoft Blog