Paradox Interactive sort of lied about specs.

[NSEP]

So, i got my hands on HOI4 now, it works fine. But! Before i got the game, i looked up the system requirements of the game, and it said i needed to have a GTX-470 (minimum) in order to run the game. (I have a GT320 Btw) But something made me thinking, the source said that with the minimum requirements you should play the game with a descent framerate. Not that it is the Absolute minimum. And then i found a post on the steam forum, that said you can run the game below minimum with 40-50 FPS (with some graphics tweaks). So i was brave enough to get the game, and geuss what! It worked! Fine, nice, sleek, smooth, whatever you want to call it.

So, Paradox, Minimum is Minimum!

[p1t1o]

People these days dont know how good they have it. I remember when 20fps seemed like a magical dream and I was playing military flight sims at 5-10fps.

Mind, that was back when having a 3d card at all was optional.

Nowadays the performance of graphics cards and the processing required for high-detail, high-framerate play are much closer together.

[NSEP]

1 hour ago, p1t1o said:

People these days dont know how good they have it. I remember when 20fps seemed like a magical dream and I was playing military flight sims at 5-10fps.

Mind, that was back when having a 3d card at all was optional.

Nowadays the performance of graphics cards and the processing required for high-detail, high-framerate play are much closer together.

Can totally relate to that. 

[pxi]

4 hours ago, p1t1o said:

People these days dont know how good they have it. I remember when 20fps seemed like a magical dream and I was playing military flight sims at 5-10fps.

I remember playing Doom on my 25MHz 386 - ran at a reasonable framerate once you shrunk the window enough that it only filled about 1/4 of the screen.

On the other hand I was amazed at how smoothly I could run Frontier: Elite 2 with texture mapping and everything, because until I went to PC, I was completely accustomed to running it on the Amiga 500 at about 7fps.  It never really occurred to me at the time that this was slow.

 

As for minimum specs, I've seen publishers who mean 'The game will boot with these specs' and others who mean 'The game is actually playable at these specs'.  It'd be nice to have some sort of formal standard for what 'minimum specs' actually means, but I don't see that happening tbh.

Edited February 16, 2017 by pxi

[Camacha]

7 hours ago, NSEP said:

So, i got my hands on HOI4 now, it works fine. But! Before i got the game, i looked up the system requirements of the game, and it said i needed to have a GTX-470 (minimum) in order to run the game. (I have a GT320 Btw) But something made me thinking, the source said that with the minimum requirements you should play the game with a descent framerate. Not that it is the Absolute minimum. And then i found a post on the steam forum, that said you can run the game below minimum with 40-50 FPS (with some graphics tweaks). So i was brave enough to get the game, and geuss what! It worked! Fine, nice, sleek, smooth, whatever you want to call it.

So, Paradox, Minimum is Minimum!

Sorry, but Paradox is actually doing you a favour. Game makers tend to be horribly optimistic when it comes to minimum specifications, which often means that someone buys a game, only to find they can run it at 4x3 pixels, without sound and at 4,75 fps. That is not a good gaming experience for anyone. Yet you spend your money, only to be disappointed. Nowadays, things are a little better due to things like Steam refunds, but still.

The minimum is generally not a hard limit, some required technologies excepted, which makes it a tool to mislead people. Paradox decided to take the high road. That can only be commended.

[NSEP]

9 hours ago, Camacha said:

Sorry, but Paradox is actually doing you a favour. Game makers tend to be horribly optimistic when it comes to minimum specifications, which often means that someone buys a game, only to find they can run it at 4x3 pixels, without sound and at 4,75 fps. That is not a good gaming experience for anyone. Yet you spend your money, only to be disappointed. Nowadays, things are a little better due to things like Steam refunds, but still.

The minimum is generally not a hard limit, some required technologies excepted, which makes it a tool to mislead people. Paradox decided to take the high road. That can only be commended.

But then, your still quite misleading the audience. If they could point out the absolute minimum, (as an extra,so normal Minimum would still be there.) it would be less misleading. 

[Harry Rhodan]

What should that absolute minimum look like? The point where you drop below 30fps? The point where your machine will still show a picture of the game after screaming in pain for a couple of minutes? HoI4 is relatively new and they are probably going to churn out lots and lots of DLCs and will probably add some bling for free along the way that will all cost more and more ressources. Would it be a good idea for them to advice their customers to buy the game with the lowest possible requirements imaginable? They probably also don't want to burn their ressources on testing their game on any old piece of hardware one can find.

[NSEP]

1 hour ago, Harry Rhodan said:

What should that absolute minimum look like? The point where you drop below 30fps? The point where your machine will still show a picture of the game after screaming in pain for a couple of minutes? HoI4 is relatively new and they are probably going to churn out lots and lots of DLCs and will probably add some bling for free along the way that will all cost more and more ressources. Would it be a good idea for them to advice their customers to buy the game with the lowest possible requirements imaginable? They probably also don't want to burn their ressources on testing their game on any old piece of hardware one can find.

The limit that your the game does not crash. Simple. If your PC does not support DX9, it will crash. And you dont have to test hardware in order to find out the minimum, just the game size, the graphics it supports, and other things, pretty simple, anything below, not possible.

[Randox]

1 hour ago, NSEP said:

The limit that your the game does not crash. Simple. If your PC does not support DX9, it will crash. And you dont have to test hardware in order to find out the minimum, just the game size, the graphics it supports, and other things, pretty simple, anything below, not possible.

So you don't think being playable should be a factor?

 

I'll give you an example. I bought GTA 4 at a time when I had been playing older games on a weak laptop, and didn't give much thought to the specifications for what was then a relatively new game. And, my laptop could absolutely launch and play the game; wasn't an issue. What was an issue was the render times and range. The frame rate was workable, but as soon as I tried to drive I found out that I was driving into obstacles and other vehicles before they could be rendered (I was hitting things that were invisible at the time of impact).

My laptop was I think rightly well under the minimum specifications, but it could run the game regardless. It just couldn't run the game well enough to be considered playable.

[Camacha]

4 hours ago, NSEP said:

The limit that your the game does not crash. Simple. If your PC does not support DX9, it will crash. And you dont have to test hardware in order to find out the minimum, just the game size, the graphics it supports, and other things, pretty simple, anything below, not possible.

People have been able to run Windows XP on ridiculous hardware like smartwatches. In some cases, it takes about an hour and a half to boot, though. According to you, this would be a viable minimal hardware configuration and telling people they need faster hardware is cheating them. Do you really think people will not feel cheated, paying good money for a game that is not enjoyably playable?

[munlander1]

I think that the requirements should be where it is playable. I downloaded the test version of astroneer and I was able to run it. I was getting less then a frame per second. I did not meet the minimum requirements. If I did because it was only runable then I would have been out $20 dollars.

[NSEP]

2 hours ago, Randox said:

So you don't think being playable should be a factor?

 

I'll give you an example. I bought GTA 4 at a time when I had been playing older games on a weak laptop, and didn't give much thought to the specifications for what was then a relatively new game. And, my laptop could absolutely launch and play the game; wasn't an issue. What was an issue was the render times and range. The frame rate was workable, but as soon as I tried to drive I found out that I was driving into obstacles and other vehicles before they could be rendered (I was hitting things that were invisible at the time of impact).

My laptop was I think rightly well under the minimum specifications, but it could run the game regardless. It just couldn't run the game well enough to be considered playable.

Absolute Minimum should not be about it being playable, but if you could run it. Playability is a important factor. But its nice to know the absolute minimum, just in case you are in between.

51 minutes ago, Camacha said:

People have been able to run Windows XP on ridiculous hardware like smartwatches. In some cases, it takes about an hour and a half to boot, though. According to you, this would be a viable minimal hardware configuration and telling people they need faster hardware is cheating them. Do you really think people will not feel cheated, paying good money for a game that is not enjoyably playable?

No, Absolute Minimum does not mean playable, but runable. But again, it would be nice to know if you are in between. Just in case, 10fps or maybe even lower is fine if you get used to it.

[NSEP]

It seems like people don't seem to get my point, so this is what i want a specs page of a game should look like:

Minimum (Absolute):

-Shows what you need in order to run the game without crashing.

 

Minimum (Playable):

-Shows what you need in order to play the game at a enjoyable gameplay experience.

 

Recommended

-Shows what you need in order to play at 60fps or higher.

[Camacha]

2 hours ago, NSEP said:

No, Absolute Minimum does not mean playable, but runable. But again, it would be nice to know if you are in between. Just in case, 10fps or maybe even lower is fine if you get used to it.

You are proposing to tell people their hardware meets minimal requirements, even though it results in a game that will take hours to load en be unplayable by any reasonable definition. I am not sure what that will achieve, other than being utterly ridiculous. You can just hear the outrage already, and rightfully so.

It might help if you read up on what specifications mean. It means operation is guaranteed within them. It does not mean a lack of operation is guaranteed outside of them. That is something different completely.
 

1 hour ago, NSEP said:

It seems like people don't seem to get my point, so this is what i want a specs page of a game should look like:

Minimum (Absolute):

-Shows what you need in order to run the game without crashing.

This is already included in the specifications. Look at the minimally required Windows version, DX version, hard drive size and sometimes certain video card features. Those are hard requirements.

Besides, presenting people with two minimal requirements is a terrible idea. People barely have an idea what they are talking about as it stands. Just imagine the confusion with two standards. You are trying to make absolute something which is not absolute.

[NSEP]

16 minutes ago, Camacha said:

You are proposing to tell people their hardware meets minimal requirements, even though it results in a game that will take hours to load en be unplayable by any reasonable definition. I am not sure what that will achieve, other than being utterly ridiculous. You can just hear the outrage already, and rightfully so.

It might help if you read up on what specifications mean. It means operation is guaranteed within them. It does not mean a lack of operation is guaranteed outside of them. That is something different completely.
 

This is already included in the specifications. Look at the minimally required Windows version, DX version, hard drive size and sometimes certain video card features. Those are hard requirements.

Besides, presenting people with two minimal requirements is a terrible idea. People barely have an idea what they are talking about as it stands. Just imagine the confusion with two standards. You are trying to make absolute something which is not absolute.

I did not know that that "absolute" specs where mixed up with "playable" on the page. Sorry did not know that.

Thanks.

[p1t1o]

On 2/16/2017 at 7:12 PM, pxi said:

As for minimum specs, I've seen publishers who mean 'The game will boot with these specs' and others who mean 'The game is actually playable at these specs'.  It'd be nice to have some sort of formal standard for what 'minimum specs' actually means, but I don't see that happening tbh.

Probably not really possible, due to the sheer number of combinations that are possible. Two computers might have superficially identical "specs" but due to things like drivers, motherboards, operating system version and update history and probably 100 other things - one might run the game ok and the other might not run it at all. GPU, CPU and RAM capacity are only 3 numbers that are trying to describe the capabilities of really quite complex systems.

Alternatively, one might have a modest CPU and RAM but you dropped all your saving on a top line GPU. Great! Now Im substantially above minimum specs! But because I cheaped out on CPU+RAM the GPU is waiting for the rest of the computer to catch up half the time and Im still getting 1-3 fps on Crysis XVII: CRYing over spilt milk.

If one doesn't like this, one can buy a console 

(Fun Fact: I cheaped out on RAM on my current system and boy do I regret it...)

Edited February 21, 2017 by p1t1o

[pxi]

26 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

Probably not really possible, due to the sheer number of combinations that are possible. Two computers might have superficially identical "specs" but due to things like drivers, motherboards, operating system version and update history and probably 100 other things - one might run the game ok and the other might not run it at all. GPU, CPU and RAM capacity are only 3 numbers that are trying to describe the capabilities of really quite complex systems.

Agreed.  Especially when you get into things like minor differences in capabilities of graphics cards using the same chipset from different manufacturers - some will overclock their cards slightly compared to others and so forth.

The last attempt I remember at trying to formalise any sort of standard was the 'Windows Experience' rating Microsoft introduced with Vista, and that really didn't take off due to it really only providing the user with a number that has very little informational value.  Things were much simpler decades ago when the hardware options were much smaller and thus the number of possible combinations were orders of magnitude smaller.

The same issue occurs at the high end too, when you look at what gets stated as the 'recommended' specs - years ago you could all but assume this meant you could run the game with every bell and whistle enabled graphics-wise.  These days I don't find that to be the case so much.

Add to this the fact that things can change dramatically from one patch to the next, and a general sense amongst modern gamers that anything less than bleeding-edge hardware specs isn't enough in any case - not saying this is reality, just that it's the viewpoint that gets most loudly stated.

At least PC as a platform generally gives you the ability to disable some of the most demanding graphical features to get games running to an acceptable degree - but again we come back to the question of what is acceptable, which can be a very subjective thing.

48 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

If one doesn't like this, one can buy a console 

The horror....

49 minutes ago, p1t1o said:

(Fun Fact: I cheaped out on RAM on my current system and boy do I regret it...)

Probably one of the cheaper upgrades you can buy hardware-wise though.

 

[p1t1o]

59 minutes ago, pxi said:

Probably one of the cheaper upgrades you can buy hardware-wise though.

True, except now it is competing for my money with all of the other stuff I want to spend it on!

1 hour ago, pxi said:

but again we come back to the question of what is acceptable, which can be a very subjective thing.

Too true. Buy a new computer and play a few new games at max settings and it is SO. HARD. to go back to anything less!