Attention, monsters: we come for you. After a day with Monster Hunter: World on PC, we had the chance to test four different versions and compare notes on performance and reliability. The most exciting news is that World has an unblocked framerate on PC so it's not limited to 30 fps as it's on consoles, or even 60 fps.
On most of our systems, Monster Hunter: The world worked pretty well, but we experienced some infrequent crashes and stuttering, plus some quirks in the way Monster Hunter translates from a PC to the # 39; another. Here are our impressions of the performance, graphics options and features of the PC.
System Requirements
Quick Summary: This is what Capcom lists as the minimum and recommended system requirements for Monster Hunter: World
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 (VRAM 3GB), or AMD Radeon RX 570X (VRAM 4GB)
DirectX Version : 11
Storage: 20 GB of available space
Sound card: DirectSound compatible (DirectX 9.0c or higher)
Additional notes: Mouse, keyboard and game pads (DirectInput and XInput) are supported. 30FPS in 1080p on HIGH Graphics
Performance
Wes: I play MHW on a PC with an i7-7700K at 4.5 GHz, a GTX 980 Ti (performance similar to a GTX 1070) and 16 GB of RAM. The game is installed on an SSD.
To see if 4K performance is handy, I tried the game on the "Highest" preset at the 3840×2160 resolution on the borderless windows. You will definitely need a more powerful card than mine – probably a GTX 1080 Ti – to play the game at these maximum settings and get better than 30 fps. On my hardware, I have about 20 frames per second at Astera, the home base of World. It was mostly consistent when I came out on a quest in the open world – the 4K framerate fluctuated between 15 and 20 fps.
I've also tested Monster Hunter World at 5K resolution: 5120×2880 – but I've encountered a strange graphic error a shadow on one part of the screen, both on the menu and in the game. Either the game is not able to support resolutions higher than 4K, or it was a strange problem. Either way, it was a non-go.
What about practical performance? I switched to my native resolution of 2560×1440 and I changed the settings to the "High" preset, but I disabled the variable resolution option to keep the game locked at 1440p. With this configuration, the game looks and works well. The difference between Highest and High is minor, and I got between 45 and 60 frames per second, which even seemed to me perfectly responsive on my G-Sync monitor.
By adjusting some settings, I'm expecting to get stable performance 60 fps. From what I've seen so far, I think Monster Hunter: World is a superb game, with dense foliage, detailed animations and character models, but I'm a little surprised by the complexity of textures the character armor and the ground I noticed in a few hours of play. But the textures usually have very little impact on performance; Most of these effects come from resolution and post-processing effects.
I played the first three quests of MHW and I experienced a random crash on the desktop and a moment of heavy stuttering that lasted for about two seconds. Otherwise, the game went perfectly well for me, but that was not the case for all of us.
Parameter Comparison
James took these screenshots comparing the "Mid" and "Highest" presets. Note that there will be some small differences, such as the materials on the blacksmith's counter in this first comparison, which changed when we changed the settings and reloaded the game.
Full size image: Intermediate settings | Full-size image: Highest settings
Full size image: Intermediate settings | Real size image: Highest settings
Full screen image: Intermediate settings | Full-size image: Highest settings
As you can see, outside the time and NPC positions, it is difficult to notice a difference between the two parameters. But, if you play on medium, you will not miss many things.
Graphics Options
Monster Hunter: World offers a variety of graphics options including resolution, screen mode (windowed, full-screen, windowed without border), V-Sync, 30/60 / unlimited framerate locks, and a host of advanced settings.
The resolution, the screen mode and the graphic presets can only be changed from the title screen. Once you load in your game, these are grayed out. This can be frustrating, since too can not save or return to the title screen when you are questing (more details later). Changing the resolution or screen mode requires a restart of the game.
Many advanced settings can be adjusted in the game, but not all. These advanced settings can only be changed from the title screen, but do not require restarting: texture quality, ambient occlusion, LOD bias, subterranean scattering, screen space reflection, dynamic range
All other advanced settings can be adjusted flying in the game. You can also switch between V-Sync and the framerate limit in the game, no problem.
Here is a great option: there is a simple HUD option in the display menu, which is ideal for taking screenshots. It will get rid of your minimap and objective text that otherwise will remain on the screen. However, it does not hide the names that float above the characters, or the pop-up dialogs of your manager that likes to send you bugs on the missions, so it will not completely eliminate the text and icons of your screen.
Graphics options, 3D audio support and speaker adjustment, home theater setup or headphone, support full key binding.
Is there any support 21: 9
? , no. I've tested MHW in full screen mode, windowed without borders and windowed, and so it makes it at a resolution of 2560×1080.
Resolution Views 21: 9 pillarboxed. , online game, and thoughts up to now
Monster Hunter: World still has the same incredible cooperative as when it was released on consoles earlier this year. While the PC version seems to miss loads of free DLC, the console version has accumulated in the meantime, everything else seems to be intact. If you want more insight into its features, check out our impressions of when the PS4 version launched in January or wait for our review for when it will be launched on August 9th.
That being said, we have
Crashing
Everyone, except for James, suffered at least one random crash at the office in the middle of a mission. . During an hour play test this morning, Steven had two almost back-to-back crashes. Each crash is preceded by a momentary pause before the game ends on the desktop. In the case of World, it is particularly frustrating because there is no way to save the mid-mission, so it is possible to lose half an hour or more in case of crash. This is not something you want to risk when you come to attack a deadly Kirin and have him almost defeated.
PC controls and options
We will have a more in-depth analysis of the mouse and keyboard controls tomorrow, but those who do not have a controller can breathe a sigh of relief because Monster Hunter: World controls very well with a keyboard. The menus are fully supported by the mouse, which greatly facilitates the management of your inventory and allows you to aim at projectile weapons like bow
That said, accepting the nuances of the keyboard layout can to be difficult at first. A particularly confusing area was the radial quick menu, which allows you to select items on the fly instead of flicking through the menu of regular items. For some reason, Monster Hunter: World defaulted to the radial menu on Game Pad, which rendered it unusable, as it made the radial menu selector WASD controlled instead of the mouse. You have to maintain Q and move a virtual analog stick with WASD. It's disconcerting.
Fortunately, there is a solution. At first I thought the radial menu was just a neglected feature for the PC port, but under the menu 'Items and Equipment & # 39; I found the option "Radial Menu Type". which allows me to change from gamepad to keyboard. This completely removed the radial menu and allowed me to use an MMO style hotkey system where pressing F1 – F4 would bring up the items I could select by pressing the corresponding number key. The picture below shows in more detail.
This is not an ideal setup because the radial menu is even easier to access, but at least you can still customize a pop-up menu for facilitate
Save and Quit
In what must be a concession to the online multiplayer framework, Monster Hunter: World will not allow you to save or quit the game when you have embarked on a quest. Not being able to save, I understand, but it is strange that the game literally grayens the option of returning to the title or leaving the office when you are on a hunt; your only option is to open the task manager and force to leave the game, or abandon a hunt, reload in the hub of the home base, and then close the game. Seriously: Alt-F4 does not even work.
You also can not save when you have accepted a quest but you have not done so yet. All this is solo, without other connected human players. For comparison, we started the PS4 version of Monster Hunter: World, launched a quest, and then opened another application from the PS4 dashboard, suspending the game. When we restarted the game a few minutes later we found it exactly in the same state and it was not time: we did not have to start the quest again and we were able to resume where we left off. You can not leave the title on PS4, but you can easily pause and resume. There is no similar way to pause on PC. Alt-Tab should not give us this option?
Connected Player
Monster Hunter: World offers a great option in his menu: "Copy Session ID" This drops a code like "3pseaHNaZrB" in your clipboard, which you can share to invite other players to your hunt once you have set up an online session. We tried this and it worked easily, although some elements of MHW's online structure remain confused. Even when using the session ID to join a friend, the menu option to invite friends directly was grayed out, without indication of the reason.
Once together, the game went perfectly, with no gaps or other issues. We found that the vocal chat in the game was quiet and of poor quality, and after a few minutes we went on to discuss Discord. Much better.
Here's another good idea: you can choose a Steam group to display, and it will display the icon of that group next to your name. PC Gamer
Wrapping up
For more information on Monster Hunter: World Approaching Launch: Tips for new PC gamers, better understanding of performance as we continue to test, how it translates to mouse and keyboard controls, and more.