Mass Effect: Andromeda looks significantly better on PC
Earlier this week, launched to a somewhat muted response. Beyond the interface issues and lackluster animations frequently cited by critics, the Xbox One and vanilla PS4 suffer from performance issues as well. Now, we have a better idea of how well the PC version holds up.
The Digital Foundry team gave the early stages a run-through on a high-end gaming PC, and found some substantial improvements. Not only can existing graphics cards handle the game at 30fps, but the 1080p60 option is solid as well. Compared with the 1080p30 target on the base PS4 and the 900p30 target on the Xbox One, both configs are superb if you have the hardware to handle it.
While playing the game doesn’t do away with many of Mass Effect: Andromeda’s major shortcomings, there are some noticeable improvements over the consoles. On high-end settings, the environmental poly-count is higher, the textures are much clearer, and the density of foliage in some areas is expanded. Add in sharper shadows and a much improved depth-of-field effect, and it’s clear that BioWare gave the PC version a lot of love.
Of course, all of these improvements hinge on your PC’s internals. If you’re stuck with an older GPU, limited RAM, and a spinning drive, you likely won’t see much of a difference. But if you meet or exceed the , you should be good to go.
For the last few days, we’ve been playing Andromeda on the with mixed results. It’s definitely a huge step up from our time spent with , but there’s plenty of room for improvement.
For the most part, performance has been acceptable. There are small hitches when exploring planets in the , and some conversations with your crew suffer from some stuttering, but the 30fps target is workable. We’re still waiting to see a full breakdown of the game running on the Pro, but we can safely say it’s not busted.
And on the upside, some of the most irritating issues on the PS4 Pro could be improved by a faster drive and a mild performance patch. Texture pop-in, menu lag, and pauses between dialogue triggers might be lessened with an . We’ll be testing that theory in the coming days, and will report back if we see a huge difference.
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