Great games for your nongaming laptop

CNET/Josh Miller

There's no doubt that we're living in a golden age of PC gaming. The 4K, HDR graphics on games like Metro: Exodus and The Division 2 put their console counterparts to shame, and amazing new hardware from Nvidia and AMD, led right now by Nvidia's new RTX graphics cards, are blowing away previous performance benchmarks.

But most of us are stuck with basic integrated Intel graphics. That's what's found on most laptops without a dedicated GPU, which is pretty much any work laptop. If that's your scenario, the options narrow considerably. Trying to run a high-end game on a pedestrian laptop is like watching Doom played via PowerPoint.

Fortunately, there is hope. Many recent games, especially creative, critically hailed indie games, play just fine on your work laptop, and we've collected some of the best here. Below are five of our current favorites, plus a link to a further lis t of 25 more. 

Thimbleweed Park Giant Bomb

A throwback 2D mystery/adventure, think of Thimbleweed Park as a Twin Peaks episode set in a county fair. If you get hit with some deja vu for lost LucasArts classics like Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion, that's because some of the same team worked on this.

See at GOG

Scythe: Digital Edition Asmodee Digital

One of the best tabletop games of the current board game revival has an excellent digital version as well. Scythe is a deep game of resource management and conquest set in a sci-fi-tinged, alternate history 1920s. Other key tabletop games, like Pandemic and Ticket to Ride, now have PC game versions as well.

See at Steam

Into the Breach Subset Games

In our previous roundup, FTL, or Faster Than Light, was our pick for a simple, easy-to-run game that even serious PC gamers could get into. The developers have made an entirely different, but still familiar-feeling game in Into the Breach, which trades the engineering diagram of a spaceship in trouble for an isometric view of a city under alien siege.

See at HumbleBundle

Cuphead

A game that earned a huge fan base long before it was released, Cuphead is notable for having an incredible hand-drawn art style, and for being insanely difficult. Originally found only on the Xbox One, the PC version has the added benefit of being very forgiving of low-end PC hardware. It's still not any easier, though. 

See at Amazon

Gris Devolver Digital

Nominated by my colleague Lori Grunin, Gris is a side-scrolling adventure from the Limbo school of moody, evocative design. Instead of Limbo's monochromatic shadow world, Gris is painted with muted pastels, but that doesn't mean it's any more cheerful in the end.  

See at Steam

Bonus: Fortnite (Obviously)

Why is Fortnite so incredibly popular? Probably because you can play it on anything this side of a scientific calculator. Besides Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo Switch consoles, iOS and Android devices, and the all-important Monopoly platform, Fortnite is also extremely forgiving of your low-end laptop, as pointed out in our original games for nongaming laptops feature. That means it's probably playable on your work PC, but keep in mind your screen refresh rate and frames-per-second aren't going to be much help against serious competition. But at least you'll have an excuse as to why you suck. 

If sneaking a few games onto your work or school laptop isn't enough, then check out our ranking of the most powerful gaming laptops today. Or, for about two dozen more great games for nongaming laptops, see our entire collection in the gallery below. 

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AMD RX 580 8GB review: still the best-value graphics card you can jam into your gaming PC

The AMD RX 580 is now the smart elder statesman of the current Radeon lineup, but when it first arrived the mildly updated Polaris GPU was actually a bit of a disappointment. Not only were we hoping the 500-series cards would herald a new world of Vega-based graphics cards (which ended up being their own unique brand of disappointing), it was barely any different from the RX 480 that had landed a year earlier.

But a year and a half, and one crypto mining boom later, the RX 580 has managed to deliver on the 'fine wine' promise that AMD attaches to all of its silicon. It's now the graphics card that we would recommend as the best GPU to drop into your gaming rig… unless you have an infinite money tree and can spend $1,200 on an RTX 2080 Ti anyways.

It's an impressively powerful, well-priced graphics card, with a comparatively huge pool of video memory and an aptitude for dealing with modern graphics APIs. And at just $190 (£197) it has very little competition in the market, with Nvidia's GTX 1060 only giving it pause in a few DX11 titles and still being more expensive on the whole. Even the new GTX 1660 Ti struggles against its genuine value proposition.

It does have a little more competition in the mainstream market right now, with AMD launching its 'new' RX 590 graphics card. That's just a moderate 12nm die-shrink of the Polaris GPU at the heart of the old RX 580, but it's also a timely reminder that AMD's mainstream graphics cards are your best bet for great-value gaming performance right now.

Even with the GTX 1660 Ti being unveiled its GTX 1070-level gaming performance keeps it another pricing tier above the RX 580. The straight GTX 1660 might have something to offer, however, with its slightly chopped TU116 GPU and $220 price tag.

AMD RX 580 specs

Polaris Enhanced. That's what AMD called the updated 500-series of graphics cards, but they were never expecting to encourage anyone that spent their cash on a last-gen Polaris card to upgrade. Despite calling the GPUs at the heart of both the new RX 580 and RX 570 Polaris 20 it is still really the same 14nm Polaris 10 chip they used, to great effect, in the RX 480 and RX 470 cards.

The 'enhanced' bit comes from the fact that 12 months on from the initial Polaris release both the 14nm FinFET technology and the 4th Gen GCN architecture used in the latest AMD Radeon cards had a full year to mature. That means the production process and yields improved and the resulting GPUs were more robust.

AMD RX 590 AMD RX 580 Nvidia GTX 1060 Manufacturing process 12nm 14nm 16nm Die size 232mm2 232mm2 200mm2 Stream processors 2,304 2,304 1,280 Texture units 144 144 80 ROPs 32 32 48 Memory size 8GB GDDR5 8GB GDDR5 6GB GDDR5 Memory bus 256-bit 256-bit 192-bit TDP 225W 185W 120W Price $279 | £250 $210 | £195 $250 | £220

That's the main reason AMD have been able to release RX 580 cards with a higher base clock speed than the reference RX 480 cards saw at launch. The base/boost clocks of the original RX 480 were 1,120MHz and 1,266MHz respectively, while the reference spec of the RX 580's Polaris 20 chip is set at 1,257MHz and 1,340MHz. With the general tightening up of the GPU's manufacturing process AMD can ship out cards using pretty much the previous chip's peak performance as a starting point to work up from.

Though if you were hoping for the same 40 compute unit, 2,560 core, Polaris GPU Microsoft shipped with the AMD-powered Xbox One X you'd be disappointed. Outside of the reference clock speed bump the RX 580 is the same GPU beast as the RX 480. The core configuration is identical – the 14nm Polaris 20 in the new card is still sporting 36 compute units (CUs) with 2,304 stream processors spread out across them. Alongside that are the same 144 texture units and 32 ROPs.

The memory system is the same too, with 8GB of GDDR5 delivering a full 256GB/s of memory bandwidth. And, like the 400 series cards, there are both 4GB and 8GB versions of the RX 580, as well as the RX 570.

All that seems to have really changed then, clockspeed hike aside, is the new RX 580 cards have a higher TDP to allow for the enhanced clockspeeds the new designs are shipping with. Those clockspeeds above are just the suggested reference design specs, but the fact AMD never created any reference samples for the new cards was indicative of their refresh/rebadge status, and also that most RX 580 cards would be expensive factory overclocked ones even if the prices weren't being artificially boosted by the gluttonous mining community.

Our XFX sample runs at 1,366MHz, while the Asus STRIX card hits a heady 1,411MHz out of the box. The original STRIX edition of the RX 480, on the other hand, runs at a default 1,330MHz. That itself was a pretty hefty boost in factory-overclock terms, but the new variant from Asus is almost 100MHz ahead of that.

AMD RX 580 benchmarks

PCGamesN Test Rig: Intel i7 8700K, Asus ROG Strix Z370-F Gaming, 16GB Crucial Ballistix DDR4, Corsair HX1200i,Philips BDM3275

AMD RX 580 performance

The RX 580 is only a little behind the newer RX 590 in terms of overall gaming performance, and generally there is only ever a few frames per second on average between them. That's something of a surprise given the significantly higher clock speeds offered by the updated, 12nm cards.

That's not really the key battleground for the RX 580, however. How it performs against the Nvidia GTX 1060 is where the real fight is, and that's far more interesting. On the whole the AMD Graphics Core Next architecture has the edge in overall gaming performance. There are a few instances where the Nvidia GPU holds sway, but that's only ever in last-gen DirectX 11 games. In the more modern APIs, and DirectX 12 in particular, the AMD silicon has the GeForce card beat.

When you take a step up in gaming resolution the improved memory subsystem of the AMD card comes to the fore. With another 2GB of GDDR5 memory, and a wider 256-bit memory bus, the RX 580 in 8GB trim is better able to deal with the rigours of high-res textures and the extra overall pixel count.

That's not to say the GTX 1060 isn't still a great performer at this end of the market, it most certainly is, but when the performance is so close pricing becomes an even bigger consideration. And when the RX 580 just has the edge on gaming frame rates overall, and the edge in pricing, it doesn't look good for the GeForce card.

Where the Nvidia GPU does have a significant edge, however, is in the classic GeForce efficiency. Back in the Maxwell days Nvidia made a play for efficiency when it was unable to action a silicon die shrink, and that move is still paying off. The GTX 1060, outside of its reference cooler design, often runs cooler than the RX 580, but definitely draws far less power to game at almost the same level.

AMD RX 580 verdict

The RX 580 is hands-down the best-value graphics card on the market today. With the pricing problems of the mining boom times a distant memory, the RX 580 8GB cards can be picked up for as little as $190 (£196), and that's a comparative bargain. Given the fact the closest Nvidia competitor card is often well over $250 it's actually quite tough to recommend the more expensive GeForce GPU despite its better overall gaming performance.

That's still a huge amount of money for most of us to spend on a single component for our gaming PCs. Sure, we'd all love to be able to spend RTX 2080 Ti money without pause, but in the real world even ducking under that $200 mark can be daunting. And at the $200 level AMD has the market sewn up, though maybe the GTX 1660 will have something to say about that…

AMD RX 580 8GB

The AMD RX 580 8GB card is the best-value gaming GPU around right now. It's a little quicker overall compared with the GTX 1060 and only the tiniest bit behind the new RX 590 - but significantly cheaper than them both. The GTX 1660 Ti does far outstrip its gaming performance, but is still a lot more money.

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Nvidia's GeForce GTX 1650 is a $150 graphics card built to plug-and-play in any PC

Gamers on a strict budget can finally get a taste of the improvements found in Nvidia's Turing GPU architecture. On Tuesday, Nvidia launched the GeForce GTX 1650, a $150 graphics card built to slip easily into pre-existing PCs and start playing 1080p games with minimal fuss. It joins the more powerful GTX 1660 and GTX 1660 Ti in the current GTX 16-series lineup.

Like those cards, the GeForce GTX 1650 will be available only in custom designs by Nvidia's board partners—there won't be a Founders Edition version. But unlike its cousins, the GeForce GTX 1650 will be available in some boards that consume a mere 75 watts of power, avoiding the need for a supplemental power connector from your power supply. That unique capability helped make its predecessors, the GTX 1050 and GTX 1050 Ti, such popular gaming options. Graphics cards that don't need extra power connectors can turn even cheap prebuilt PCs into proper gaming rigs.

Nvidia's radical new Turing architecture helps the GeForce GTX 1650 deliver plenty of game, though this particular GPU lacks the real-time ray tracing and machine learning capabilities of the far pricier RTX 20-series hardware. The GTX 1650 "is 2x faster than the GTX 950 and up to 70 percent faster than the GTX 1050 at 1080p resolution," Nvidia says.

The GTX 1650's bigger, more powerful brother EVGA GeForce GTX 1660 XC Ultra

Nvidia's GeForce GTX 1660 and EVGA's superb XC Ultra custom design result in a new mainstream gaming champion. This is the graphics card you want for 1080p gaming at 60 frames per second.

Working drivers weren't provided to the press prior to the launch, so we weren't able to verify the claim independently. We'd expect the best results to come in more modern titles that can leverage Turing's newly separated integer and float point pipelines. Games that respond well to asynchronous compute capabilities, such as the ever-popular Rainbow Six Siege, play especially nice on Turing compared to Nvidia's previous Pascal-based GPUs.

Here's a high-level look at the GeForce GTX 1650's tech specs:

CUDA cores: 896

Base clock: 1,485MHz

Boost clock: 1,665MHz

Memory: 4GB of GDDR5 memory with a 128-bit memory bus

Memory bandwidth: 128GB/sec.

TDP: 75W

Price: $149

The GeForce GTX 1650 comes with 256 more CUDA cores than the GTX 1050 and 128 more CUDA cores than the GTX 1050 Ti. That alone would give the newer card a performance bump. Factor in the more potent Turing architecture in the new GPU, along with significantly higher boost clock speeds, and the GTX 1650 should pummel its predecessors despite sticking to the same 75W TDP.

Nvidia's latest card also ups the VRAM capacity from the GTX 1050's scant 2GB. Instead it offers the 4GB that's become the de facto minimum for decent 1080p gaming these days.

This should be a huge upgrade, in other words—though as with the other graphics cards in Nvidia's current lineup, it comes at a price. While the GTX 1050 launched at $110, and the speedier GTX 1050 Ti cost $140 before 2018's nasty cryptocurrency-fueled pricing crunch, the GeForce GTX 1650 starts at $150.

Brad Chacos/IDG

Nvidia's GeForce Experience software can automatically optimize your games for your hardware, enhancing the plug-and-play experience of the GTX 1650.

Mentioned in this article

It'll be interesting to see whether this card outpunches AMD's Radeon RX 570. The RX 570 launched for $180 two years back, but now you can regularly find models with 4GB of memory on sale for $130. You can also find models with a lofty 8GB, like the ASRock Phantom Gaming D Radeon RX 570 8GB OCRemove non-product link, for $140—$10 less than the 4GB GeForce GTX 1650.

Note, however, that AMD's graphics card requires an 8-pin power connector. If the GTX 1650 fails to match its rival—again, Nvidia didn't provide reviewers with drivers to test these cards prior to release—than it's clear that the company prioritized the plug-and-play nature of a 75W card over beating the Radeon RX 570's performance. Stay tuned for reviews.

Speaking of design decisions, there's a sizeable price gap between the $149 GeForce GTX 1650 and the $220 GTX 1660. There's a big gap in CUDA core counts, too, with a mere 896 in this new GPU compared to a whopping 1,408 in the GTX 1660. Nvidia didn't announce a GeForce GTX 1650 Ti today, but rumors of one have been swirling. We'd be shocked if one weren't announced in the future to fill in those gaps.

Look for a wide variety of custom GeForce GTX 1650 graphics cards from the usual manufacturers, on store shelves today in the usual places. If past releases are any indication, some overclocked variants may require an extra 6-pin power connector. Be sure to check the fine print before you buy if you need a model that can be powered by your motherboard alone. 

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The Best Graphics Cards 2019

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To RTX or not, that is the question. By josh norem

Note that if you click on one of these links to buy the product, IGN may get a share of the sale. For more, read our Terms of Use.

The GPU market is in a pretty interesting place right now. After what felt like eternity, Nvidia finally launched its highly anticipated RTX GPUs based on the new Turing architecture in September to much fanfare. The GTX 10-series cards? They're going the way of the dinosaurs. Stocks are drying up and Nvidia's CEO said it won't be long until all its 10-series cards are gone.

AMD finally introduced its Radeon VII, shaking things up a bit and giving gamers an alternative to Nvidia's RTX line-up for 4K gaming.

So what's the best graphics card right now? That answer depends on your needs and budget, which is why we put together this guide to the best GPUs on the market.

These are the best graphics cards in 2019:

Best High-End Nvidia Graphics Card – Asus ROG Strix GeForce RTX 2080Ti OC

The Asus ROG Strix GeForce RTX 2080Ti OC GPU is neck-and-neck with the Zotac RTX 2080 Ti we reviewed in terms of performance. But the Asus is a better looking card and its overclocking goes a step further than the Zotac, putting it at the top of our ratings. Seriously, this is an amazing card. If you want to run the latest games at blazing framerates in full 4K on Ultra, look no further.

While this is the absolute best, most powerful consumer GPU you can get, the power increase doesn't march lock-step with its price. You will pay significantly more for a 2080 Ti over a 2080, with only a slight jump in performance. If you absolutely require the best of the best, by all means, but if you don't see the value in it, consider any of the other GPUs on our list.

Best AMD Graphics Card – Radeon VII

The newest GPU from AMD is also its best GPU. The "world's first 7nm gaming GPU" delivers great 4K and stellar 1440p performance, and its list price is unsurprisingly better than a comparable card from Nvidia. You don't get the fancy ray-tracing promised in the new RTX series cards from Nvidia, but given just how few games take advantage of the new technology, it's probably not worth the trouble.

In our Radeon VII review, we called it a "great GPU for both gaming and compute tasks." If you're an AMD diehard, or you're just looking for a great way to dive into the world of 4K gaming without paying the Nvidia tax, the Radeon VII is a great choice and the best AMD card around right now. It's also arguably the best graphics card for the money.

Best Overall Graphics Card for Most Gamers – EVGA RTX 2080 8GB FTW3 Ultra

The EVGA RTX 2080 8GB FTW3 Ultra has an 1860 MHz boost clock, three big, whisper-quiet fans to keep it running cool, but perhaps most importantly, it has the power of RGB lighting. If you're going to spend a bunch of money on a graphics card to make your gaming PC into a 4K powerhouse, you're going to want to show it off, so why settle for anything less than flashy lighting? Beyond the flashy presentation, the FTW3 Ultra comes with EVGA's X1 overclocking software, so you can push it beyond its factory limits. And really, isn't that the true heart of PC gaming? To give you an idea of what the EVGA is capable of, you can check out our RTX 2080 Founder's Edition review, and then imagine it with RGB lights and overclocking.

Best 1440p Graphics Card – Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2070 Gaming

The RTX 2070 is the creamy middle of the current 20-series family. It has the 8GB DDR6 RAM of the 2080, and beats the performance of last-gen's GTX 1080 GPU. If you don't need to run your games on Ultra at 60fps in 4K, the 2070 can easily run them on Ultra at 60fps in 1440p. But the real promise for the 2070 over last gen's 1080 is the ray-tracing. No matter how great your current 1080 might be at running games at 1440p, it will never have that magical RTX designation.

Best Midrange RTX Graphics Card – ZOTAC Gaming GeForce RTX 2060 AMP

This is another GPU category that is uncontested, and is occupied by the fantastic GeForce RTX 2060. For just a little more than the price of a GTX 1060, you get a much better card. And unlike its 10-series predecessor, there's no 3GB model: the 2060 comes with a standard 6GB GDDR6 video memory.  In our benchmarks, we had no problem getting over 30 fps in 4K with everything turned up in games like Monster Hunter World, and games like Battlefield 1 and Far Cry 5 almost hit 60fps at the same settings. Impressive for a card running near the $350 mark. At 1440p, the RTX 2060 knocks it out of the park, crushing the 60fps mark and surpassing it in our benchmarking.

We reviewed the Nvidia RTX 2060 Founder's Edition, a.k.a. the reference version of this card, and you can expect similar or better performance from one of Nvidia's partner cards.

As always there are several variants of this GPU and they largely perform similarly. The differences between them come down to clock speeds, styling, cooling apparatus, and warranty terms. Below are a few of the best current options:

Best 1080p Graphics Card – XFX RX 590 Fatboy

The RX 590 replaced the RX 570 GPU from AMD, and is a great card for 1080p gaming. The price is good too, coming in under $300 in most cases. With 8GB of memory, it actually out-performs the GTX 1060, and beats it in price and availability, too. If you want a graphics card giving you fantastic full HD gaming experience without breaking the bank, the RX 590 is a superb choice.

GTX to RTX

The remaining 10-series cards in the wild are selling out, and their stocks will not be replenished. That's not the worst thing in the world, but it definitely pushed the price of any remaining 10-series cards back up to the days of the crypto-mining craze. Thankfully, RTX prices aren't facing upward pressure from miners, but they still (not surprisingly) have a higher MSRP than their last-gen cards. We could argue about whether or not it's TOO high, given their benefits, but time will tell.

At CES 2019, AMD announced the Radeon VII GPUs, making them the most recent addition to the AMD family, and one that's long overdue. For the full rundown of what we think of AMD's 7nm graphics card, be sure to check out our Radeon VII review.

For the near future we can expect Turing prices to remain a little high, but if you're lucky you can still find Pascal cards being sold. You can always buy a GPU (which was probably used for mining) on eBay as well, if you're brave enough. If you go the used route, just make sure you can transfer the warranty.

One of the best ways to get yourself into the world of PC gaming without having to spend a lot of time and frustration is to just go ahead and buy yourself a prebuilt gaming PC. Not only do you save yourself from the potential headaches that can accompany a DIY build, you also get a warranty. Prebuilt PCs have come a long way, too. They aren't proprietary machines with randomly soldered-on components. They're mostly as upgradeable as anything you might put together on your own.

Another choice for graphics cards are gaming laptops. In fact, there are still plenty of 10-series gaming laptops out there right now. The new RTX gaming laptops are just starting to hit the streets, so there are some good chances to save on an older GTX-powered gaming laptop.

There are some rumored GTX cards, referred to as the GTX 1660, as well as rumors of a GTX 1060 Ti update, which would give gamers more choice in how they power their PC graphics. The rumored cards remove the ray-tracing features Nvidia cooked into the RTX cards, but keep the Turing architecture of the 20-series. If these rumors pan out, it will be a boon to gamers not yet sold on ray-tracing and its effect on new GPU prices.

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Best PC for Playing Anthem in 2019

Pound for pound, the best gaming PC you can buy for Anthem is the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC. Since it packs an NVIDIA RTX 2070 graphics card, an Intel Core i7-9700K processor, and 16GB of RAM, you'll be able to play Anthem on high settings and resolutions without any problems at all.

Our pick

iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC

Huge bang for your buck

Between its beefy GPU, monster processor, and excellent RAM, the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC offers everything you need in order to take your Anthem experience to the next level.

Who should buy the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC?

If you want to up your PC in regards to intensive games overall and don't want to bother building a rig or purchasing separate parts, there are plenty of pre-built PC options. Ideally, you should buy the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC if you want to play Anthem at its highest settings and use a high resolution like 1440p, or even 4K. Anthem is a processor-intensive game, so this PC's top-of-the-line CPU is a huge help when you begin to push the game's higher settings.

Is it a good time to buy the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC?

Absolutely. As far as gaming PCs go, the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC is excellent value. You pay $1,450 for high-end specs like these, which is already a good deal, so there's no reason to wait on buying this computer.

Reasons to buy

Powerful RTX GPU

Amazing CPU that you can overclock

Free mouse and keyboard included

Awesome appearance

What makes the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC great?

The best thing about the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC is that it comes with high-end hardware at a pretty good price. Both the NVIDIA RTX 2070 graphics card and Intel Core i7-9700K processor are among the best pieces of kit you can get in gaming PCs, and the processor, in particular, is important because of how CPU-intensive Anthem is. The fact that it's unlocked and overclockable, then, is a huge benefit because you'll be able to get extra performance out of the hardware that matters most for Anthem.

In addition, the PC comes with a keyboard and mouse included with every purchase, so you won't need to buy those accessories separately if you don't already have your own. Lastly, the case for the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC is sleek and snazzy, featuring beautiful angular edges and some sweet RGB lighting.

Alternatives to the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC

If the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC isn't quite right for you, there are some great alternative options available. The first one is a monster gaming PC that will allow you to push 4K resolution, the second is a system with much less GPU power and a slightly worse CPU, and the third is a budget PC with specs that are good enough for Anthem, as long as you don't mind turning a few settings down.

Elite 4K gaming choice

MSI Trident X

Go big or go home

The MSI Trident X is a heavy-hitting gaming PC that will give you the power you need in order to play in 4K. You're just going to pay a lot to get it.

Anthem, like most games, requires a huge amount of horsepower in order to run well in 4K. For that, you're going to need something like the MSI Trident X, which comes equipped with a hardcore NVIDIA RTX 2080 graphics card, an unlocked and overclockable Intel Core i7-9700K processor, and 16GB of RAM. It costs a very pretty penny, but it will give you the power you need to take Anthem to that 4K territory.

Prioritizing processing

MSI Trident 3

Save where you can

The MSI Trident 3 features a much less powerful GPU, but only a slightly worse CPU when compared to the iBUYPOWER PC. This is a great way to save on an Anthem PC while still prioritizing processing power.

If you want to save a little money while still getting great performance for Anthem, the MSI Trident 3 is a great choice. It has an NVIDIA GTX 1060 graphics card and an Intel Core i7-8700 processor. This GPU is far behind the aforementioned RTX 2070, but it's good enough to handle Anthem at high settings and it won't bottleneck the i7-8700 CPU, which is almost just as good as the i7-9700K you get with the iBUYPOWER Pro. You can't push any further than 1080p resolution, but if that's not much of a flaw to you, then this is is a great option.

Budget choice

CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme

Not great, but good

Despite being the weakest system on this list, the CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme is good enough to run Anthem well, though you'll have to turn some settings down.

If you're a gamer on a budget, the CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme is your best bet for getting a good PC for Anthem. Like the MSI Trident 3, it has an NVIDIA GTX 1060 GPU. However, it has just 8GB of RAM. It also has a weaker Intel Core i5-8400 processor, and that's the hardware that matters most for Anthem. However, even despite the downgraded specs, this PC is capable of running Anthem on medium settings and in HD quite well, making it perfect for players looking to save money.

Bottom line

Overall, the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC is the best gaming PC you can get for Anthem, offering a wealth of both GPU and CPU power that can be used to play the game at its highest settings and in higher resolutions. It's a little pricey, but overall it's a great deal.

Our pick

iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC

Huge bang for your buck

Between its beefy GPU, monster processor, and excellent RAM, the iBUYPOWER Pro Gaming PC offers everything you need in order to take your Anthem experience to the next level.

Credits — The team that worked on this guide

Brendan Lowry is a Windows Central writer with a burning passion for video games, of which he's been an avid fan since childhood. He's relatively new to the writing scene, but he counters that lack of experience with a rock-solid work ethic and a desire to improve at every opportunity. You'll find him doing reviews, editorials, and general coverage on everything Xbox and PC. Follow him on Twitter.

This post may contain affiliate links. See our disclosure policy for more details.

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Up For Debate - Are You Ready for the Huge Leap in PC Game System Specs When PS5 Launches?

As surely as night follows day, the arrival of a new console generation means a big, big change for PC gamers - a dramatic rise in system requirements. The initial reveal of the PlayStation 5 and its specs will essentially set a new minimum benchmark for AAA gaming. We saw it with Gen 8, Gen 7, and Gen 6, and we’re barreling toward the same situation with Gen 9.

It’s not all doom and gloom for you and your trusty rig though. This sweeping change usually takes around 6-18 months after a new console generation’s launch to really take effect. All those cross-platform titles straddling PS4 and PS5 will mean games are geared towards current hardware just as much as they are next-gen goodness. For the short term at least.

While we don’t have the confirmed specs for the 7nm Navi GPU, many of you with high-end hardware will also no doubt have graphics cards and processors that are already a match for the 2020 console. The very nature of evolving hardware means Sony and Microsoft have to stick a flag in the sand at some point, finalising the specs before mass production can begin. Between then and the console launches, PC gaming tech will advance and leave it behind.

The only problem is if we’re not prepared to advance with it. If we take a look at 2013, before the PS4 launched, for example, all of the biggest AAA titles had reasonable specs. The trusty GeForce 8800 GT was still going strong and could play just about anything you could throw at it, along with a small 2GB stick of DDR3 RAM and a modest dual-core processor. That system could let you play Metro: Last Light without an issue.

Fast forward 18 months to early 2015 and suddenly you have The Witcher 3, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Dying Light, and, shudder, Batman: Arkham Knight. The system requirements for these games are nearly unrecognisable compared to the likes Bioshock Infinite, Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, and Saints Row IV.

It’s because every 5-7 years in step with the new consoles, we get a major step up in technology. A rising tide lifts all boats, as the old saying goes. PC gaming will leave these consoles in the dust within a few years, but those few years are the shortest, sharpest jolt you can experience as a PC gamer on a budget. Your options are pretty open here, whether that’s splashing out shiny new hardware now, or holding on until a year into the console generation where you can begin to buy far faster GPUs and CPUs than those available in in the consoles, ensuring you stay one step ahead.

The very nature of console generations means that right at the end of a console generation is where PC gaming’s light shines brightest. Right now, at this moment, high-end PC gaming is so far beyond even the mid-step upgrade consoles like the PS4 Pro that it’s a night and day difference. Higher frame rates, stronger graphical fidelity, and more reliable support at high resolutions. Once the hardware ceiling is raised though, in early 2020 or whenever it happens to be, we’ll enter a mad season in terms of PC upgrades. Games will no longer be developed in mind of your GeForce GTX 1060, they’ll be built towards the PS5’s 7nm Navi GPU. Console gaming is still big business for AAA publishers and it’s here where a lot of attention will be focused.

Back in 2014, Felix said the best time to upgrade and overhaul your PC is around one year after a new console generation launches. What do you think though, are you going to plan ahead and get a beefy upgrade now? Or are you going to wait until we’re a bit deeper into the 9th Gen before taking the plunge? Let us know what you think of the situation below!

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Best gaming PC for UK buyers

Prebuilt gaming PC manufacturers have really been stepping up their game since the dawn of the RTX era, and sorting out which is producing the best gaming PC can be somewhat of a challenge. While any of these builders can theoretically stuff a bunch of blazing fast performance parts into a case and come away with a mighty gaming rig, the devil, as they say, is in the details. You need to pair that performance with excellent heat management, for instance, intelligent sinking and ventilation that doesn't cause your fans to kick out noise at the level of a V2 rocket launch. Price is king, of course, you really want to avoid paying too much of a premium versus the cost of building a machine yourself, but there are other critical features too, like cable management, inclusion of quality proprietary parts, and warranty. To sort out how we figure out which machines make the cut, check out our gaming PC testing guide.

What should you be looking for when you start shopping for the best gaming PC? Obviously, the best graphics card should be top of mind, and that can mean different things for different people. Gamers obviously will need something at least relatively capable to handle the best PC games, but there are additional considerations, like whether or not you're sold on Nvidia's predicted ray tracing future. If you are, you'll like want to invest in one of their RTX cards (while ray tracing support is coming to GTX Pascal architecture, it'll never match the performance derived from the RTX line's dedicated ray tracing cores). However, if ray tracing isn't a priority, you can save yourself some cash and invest in a machine built around a GTX or one of AMD's card. 

Given how increasingly important main processing is for games, you'll also want to avoid bottlenecks with one of models from our best CPU for PC gaming roundup. You'll want something in the Core i5 range as a baseline, but if you plan on doing any significant amount of productivity work on your machine you should really opt for a higher end CPU, something in the Core i7-8700 to Core i9-9900K range. 

Best gaming keyboard | Best gaming mouse | Best controller for PC gamingBest gaming chair | Best graphics card | Best gaming monitor

1. HP Omen Obelisk | 2080 spec

The best gaming PC right now - balances price and performance

CPU: Intel Core i7-8700 | GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 | RAM: 16GB DDR4-2666 | Storage: 256GB M.2 SSD, 2TB HDD

Trim, sleek machine that cuts frills to save money

Performance powerhouse

None of HP's hot swappable storage bays

When it comes to pre-built PCs you need to find a reputable brand that will fill your new gaming rig with the best parts, in the best configurations. For us, HP's Omen range are the best gaming PCs, not because they offer incredible power, or because they're the cheapest, but because they balance everything you need from a gaming PC. Let's start with the chassis - the Obelisk is a mid-tower case, with a lovely glass panel on the side for displaying all your innards. It has tasteful lighting inside, but nothing too excessive. There is sufficient cooling for even the highest end builds, and the case isn't too massive either. It's a nice balance.

Inside, we recommend the spec with the 2080 graphics card, if you want to keep this gaming PC for the long-term. The top end of Nvidia's new Turing cards all handle ray tracing, which is very much the future of visuals in games, and while the 2080 is super expensive (probably about 40% of the cost of this whole PC), they will last. The supporting specs perfectly compliment the card - an i7-8700 6 core CPU, 16GB of 2666 RAM, and a dual storage solution with a 256GB SSD and a 2TB HDD. Ok, in a perfect world, you'd have a 500GB SSD, but this is still more than enough to make Windows booting quick and easy.

There's tool-less access to the case, so you can dive in there and swap out parts if you feel like some quicker RAM or a bigger SSD. In all, it's an impressive machine, and one that's flexible enough for easy upgrades if you need. There are few frills - custom RGB lighting aside - which is why the price is so reasonable, for a 2080 build. Thoroughly recommended.

2. Corsair One i160 | 2080 Ti spec

The best small-form gaming PC, with incredible power

CPU: i9-9900K | Graphics: RTX 2080Ti 11GB | RAM: 32GB DDR4 | Storage: 2TB HDD + 480GB SSD

Super powerful 2080 Ti GPU

Lovely, compact design

Runs almost silent

You're going to need a bigger bank balance

No way for users to upgrade without going through Corsair

If money is no object, then the Corsair One series is our pick of all gaming PCs. While the i140 is more than capable of handling games at 4K, we prefer the i160 for sheer power and gaming prowess. What's truly remarkable about the Corsair One PC line is that they pack in such power components into such a small, custom-built case, and still allow everything to run quiet and cool. The case itself has holes on each side, and fans under the unit to allow adequate airflow, along with several other cooling systems inside. As a result, the machine is whisper quiet and small enough to fit into a typical living room set-up without hogging too much space.

Inside, everything is thoughtfully built. There's a quick i9-9900K CPU, meaning the One is perfect for multitasking, so can handle video editing and art tools extremely well, along with gaming. The 2080 Ti GPU inside is top of the range, and will smash any game at 4K, while the 32GB of RAM keeps the whole system held together rather nicely. There's a big enough SSD / HDD combo (480GB SSD / 2TB HDD) to ensure you have plenty of storage for games, although, again we'd expect a slightly larger SSD for the money. You can swap components into the One, but that will invalidate the warranty, so you'd need to be confident about doing so. It's easy enough to do.

As small form-factor gaming PCs go, this is a monster, and thoroughly recommended for gaming. If you want to shave a few £s off your budget, the i140 is a great performer too, but given that you'd expect this PC to last you for years, we'd definitely pick the slightly higher-spec machine.

3. MSI Trident 3 | 1050 Ti spec

The best budget gaming PC

CPU: i5-7400U | Graphics: GTX 1050Ti 4GB | RAM: 8GB DDR4 | Storage: 1TB HDD

Decent price for the spec

Plenty of storage

Will run most games at 1080p

Not a great GPU

No SSD storage

Not VR ready

If money really is tight, you should consider the MSI Trident 3 range of gaming PCs. While the innards won't win any awards, they're reliable pieces of kit that are well put together and often found at £700+ prices, which is really good for a gaming-ready PC. They come with smartly designed cases, and decent cooling tech to prevent your components from overheating if you stress them and boost the CPU clock to 3.5Ghz. 

The 1050 Ti graphics card is the weakest link here, and while you'll run most games at 1080p, you'll likely struggle to reach decent fps with top titles, and won't be able to achieve ultra settings in many cases. Does that matter to you? After all a machine like this is perfect for Fortnite and will run Apex Legends with few problems. It comes with a decent-sized 1TB HDD, and 8GB of DDR4 RAM, which is plenty for most games. The i5 processor is actually a decent one for a build of this price.

You also sacrifice things like glass side-panels on the case, and RGB lighting, but you can easily open up the Trident to add new components if you feel up to it. What's more, the Trident is quite portable, and it will operate stood up, or lying on its side, if space is a concern. It's not a powerhouse, but is a competent gaming PC for a super reasonable price. Just don't pay more than £700 for it.

4. PC Specialist Vanquish Zen Fury | 2070 spec

The best AMD gaming PC out there

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2600X | Graphics: RTX 2070 8GB | RAM: 16GB DDR4 | Storage: 256GB SSD / 1TB HDD

Great value for a 2070 spec PC

Generous storage

Looks lovely, performs well

Not really a 4K machine

Not as powerful as most 2080 machines

While Intel is the biggest and best name in CPUs, AMD - its main rival - has several comparable chipsets which perform equally well, and come much cheaper. So, we've included an AMD build here, to help you save a bit of cash on a great spec gaming machine. If you're looking to use your PC primarily for gaming, with maybe a little work and other media usage, you'll be more than fine with an AMD processor powering everything.

Elsewhere inside this PC Specialist build you get a lot of powerful components for your money. Whereas the RTX 2070 graphics card is neither the most powerful, nor the cheapest of the new ray tracing GPUs, it does offer great performance for games, while keeping the overall price of the unit down. It's complimented here by 16GB of DDR4 RAM and a standard 256GB SSD / 1TB HDD combo. For the price, that seems about right to us.

PC Specialist uses decent components too, so you won't be sold the cheapest parts in these machines. This gaming PC will easily handle the best games at 1080p, and bring decent frame-rates to most (60fps+ in most cases). Well recommended for pure gaming.

5. Do it yourself!

Normally, this is the point where we recommend another couple of pre-built PCs and end the article. However, that's no fun, and quite frankly we've got a better alternative for you. Over at UK-based site, PC Specialist, you can create your own PC from a series of easy to understand options, which guide you through the process if you're curious about it all, but don't have the confidence to literally build your own gaming PC from scratch. We'd recommend experimenting with some parts, like storage and cases, based on your own needs and budget  but we've listed a couple of suggested builds below, based on our expertise. The top one is a budget gaming PC, that will get you the best spec for less than £1000. The lower one is a high-spec gaming machine that we'd use ourselves, with sensible (but not excessive) components inside. Take a look with confidence - the website will actually warn you if certain components are incompatible.

PC Specialist in the UK

Budget build - total cost: £1001

Select your gaming PC from the Intel Z370-Z390 menu.

PCS CYCLONE GAMING CASE (Red LED Fans)

Intel® Core™ i5 Six Core Processor i5-8500 (3.0GHz) 9MB Cache

ASUS® PRIME Z370-P II: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs

16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2400MHz (2 x 8GB)

6GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2060 - HDMI, DP - VR Ready!

2TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 256MB CACHE

CORSAIR 550W VS SERIES™ VS-550 POWER SUPPLY

Everything else as per PC Specialist standard

Full gaming PC build - total cost: £3452 

Select your gaming PC from the Core i7/i9 Extreme computers menu.

CORSAIR OBSIDIAN SERIES™ 750D FULL TOWER CASE

Intel® Core™ i9 12 Core Processor i9-9920X (3.5GHz) 19.25MB Cache

ASUS® ROG STRIX X299-E GAMING: ATX, USB 3.1, SATA 6 GB/s, WIFI - RGB Ready

32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3000MHz (2 x 16GB)

11GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2080 Ti - HDMI, 3x DP GeForce - RTX VR Ready!

2TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA PRO 3.5", 7200 RPM 128MB CACHE

500GB WD Black™ SN750 M.2 NVMe SSD (up to 3470MB/s R | 2600MB/s W)

CORSAIR 750W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET

Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler

2x 50cm RGB LED Strip

NZXT GRID+ V3 Fan Controller with up to 5 Fitted Case Fans

3x Corsair LL120 RGB LED Fan + Controller Kit

ASUS PCE-AC88 AC3100 2100Mbps/5GHz, 1000Mbps/2.4GHz

Everything else as per PC Specialist standard

Some online stores give us a small cut if you buy something through one of our links. Read our affiliate policy for more info.

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Best PC for Playing Metro Exodus in 2019

Overall, the best gaming PC you can buy for Metro Exodus is the MSI Trident X. Between its beefy NVIDIA RTX 2080 graphics card, monster Intel Core i7-9700K processor, 16GB of RAM, and the included mouse, keyboard, and game codes you'll get with this bundle, the MSI Trident X is the best of the best if you're planning on exploring Metro's Russian wasteland — or any modern game for that matter.

Our pick

MSI Trident X (RTX 2080, 2 TB)

Huge value, huge power

With its top-of-the-line hardware specs and the bonus accessories and games that it comes with, the MSI Trident X is the best gaming PC you can buy for Metro Exodus.

Who should buy the MSI Trident X?

If you want to play Metro Exodus on its best settings and at a high resolution and don't want to spend the time building your own PC rig, the MSI Trident X is the PC for you. It's very pricey, but you get what you pay for, and if you have a 4K monitor you'll even be able to push 4K comfortably.

Is it a good time to buy the MSI Trident X?

Overall, it's a good time to buy the MSI Trident X. Since both the GPU and CPU in the MSI Trident X are among the best products on the PC gaming market, there's not much of a chance that the price for the PC is going to change much in the future. There's really no reason to wait on buying this PC.

Reasons to buy

Ridiculous power

Won't need upgrades for a very long time

Sleek, stylish case.

Comes bundled with accessories

Different storage options

Why is the MSI Trident X such a good PC?

The main reason that the MSI Trident X makes the top of our list is that it's packing some of the strongest PC gaming hardware under the hood. The NVIDIA RTX 2080 is a beast of a graphics card that makes it possible to play Metro Exodus with ray tracing, which is an overhaul to normal lighting that makes it look more realistic, while the Intel Core i7-9900K is an equally-awesome processor that can handle whatever you throw at it.

The MSI Trident X packs some of the strongest PC gaming hardware under the hood.

Add the 16GB of RAM, which is more than enough for every game out right now, and you've got yourself a truly fantastic gaming PC that can even push 4K if you've got the monitor for it. In addition, the case is pretty stylish too, with angular edges and RGB-lit accents that will make your setup look snazzy.

In addition to the PC itself, you also get a ton of free stuff with your purchase of an MSI Trident X because of a special promotional offer. Every purchase comes with an MSI gaming keyboard, mouse, and three free games: Battlefield V, Anthem, and — you guessed it — Metro Exodus. This is an incredible amount of value, and people that want to play Metro Exodus won't even have to pay for it separately.

You can also buy the PC in several different configurations depending on what your needs or preferences are when it comes to storage space and power. However, I recommend choosing the version of the PC with the RTX 2080 GPU and the full 2 TB hard drive because it gives you superb graphics power and a ton of storage to work with, which is perfect for people who play a lot of games.

Alternatives to the MSI Trident X

While the MSI Trident X bundle listed above is fantastic, its steep price may not be something everyone can afford. Thankfully, there are alternative options out there that can handle Metro Exodus well. The first option is a less expensive bundle of the MSI Trident X with some reduced quality, the second is a mid-range pick that's cheaper and runs the game solidly, and the third alternative is a budget choice that'll work provided you don't mind turning a few settings to medium or low.

Less expensive powerhouse

MSI Trident X (RTX 2070, 512 GB)

Similar power at a lower cost

This bundle of the MSI Trident X has slightly lower power and significantly lower storage, but also is less expensive, making it a good choice if you don't want to blow out your wallet completely.

If you don't need the massive 2 TB of storage and don't mind downgrading the power of your GPU a bit, then this version of the MSI Trident X is best for you. The RTX 2070, while not as great as the RTX 2080, is still an awesome GPU, and you still get the same great processor, keyboard, and mouse. However, you won't get all three games included in the bundle, and instead you'll have to choose just one of them.

Mid-range choice

Alienware Aurora R7

Middle of the pack

For a much lower price, the Alienware Aurora R7 offers solid power and a huge 2 TB hard drive, making it a great mid-range choice.

If you're happy to settle for playing Metro Exodus on high settings in normal resolution, the Alienware Aurora R7 is a great mid-range pick that can save you some money. Its NVIDIA GTX 1070 graphics card and Intel Core i7-8700 processor aren't the best pieces of kit, but they're pretty good. While you won't be pushing games to higher resolutions with this rig, you will be playing them on high settings with smooth frame rates. In addition, you get the same 2TB hard drive that the first MSI Trident X bundle has, which is a nice bonus.

Budget pick

CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme

Low riders still take the high road

While it has lower specs then the other two PCs on this list, the CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme is also significantly less expensive, making it a great choice if you can't afford to break the bank.

If you're on a budget, then we recommend the CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme. At $800, you get a system equipped with an NVIDIA GTX 1060 graphics card, an Intel Core i5-8400 processor, and 8GB of RAM. By far, this PC is the least powerful on the list, but it's still capable of handling Metro Exodus well as long as you don't mind turning settings like texture quality, lighting, and shadows down.

Bottom line

Ultimately, when it comes to pure power and value, the MSI Trident X takes the cake as the best gaming PC you can buy for Metro Exodus. Between its extremely powerful hardware, sleek look, and promotional bonus products, you can't go wrong with it.

Our pick

MSI Trident X (RTX 2080, 2 TB)

Huge value, huge power

With its top-of-the-line hardware specs and the bonus accessories and games that it comes with, the MSI Trident X is the best gaming PC you can buy for Metro Exodus.

Credits — The team that worked on this guide

Brendan Lowry is a Windows Central writer with a burning passion for video games, of which he's been an avid fan since childhood. He's relatively new to the writing scene, but he counters that lack of experience with a rock-solid work ethic and a desire to improve at every opportunity. You'll find him doing reviews, editorials, and general coverage on everything Xbox and PC. Follow him on Twitter.

This post may contain affiliate links. See our disclosure policy for more details.

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Enter the pages of an interactive tech-noir graphic novel with Liberated, coming to PC, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 in 2019

Warsaw, Poland - April 8th, 2019 - Independent developer Atomic Wolf, in collaboration with L.inc and publisher Walkabout Games today announced its playable tech-noir graphic novel, Liberated, with a brand new trailer. Liberated launches later this year on PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Leap into the frame of a graphic novel, where classic motion comic storytelling transitions into fully playable action sections in a story about technological surveillance squeezing society's freedom away. Liberated was honoured as a finalist at the 2019 SXSW Gaming Pitch Competition.

 

 

Players will experience a story about a world where government authorities use advanced technology to manipulate the population. Civil rights are a thing of the past, with the government engaging in complete surveillance of every citizen in the world. Social media activity, online payments, and GPS location tracking from mobile devices are just some of the ways every single person is being monitored. In this world, there are insurgents resisting this oppression, fighting for their freedom, while government agents try to maintain order and control. In Liberated, players will experience both sides of this conflict, with every choice they make changing the course of the story.

 

Told over the course of four chapters, with each issue focusing on a different character, Liberated is an interactive graphic novel that combines the experience of a motion comic with a videogame. Liberated transitions seamlessly from choice-based branching story sequences to fully playable action sequences as the action moves from panel to panel. By combining a motion comic with 2.5D platforming, stealth mechanics, and shootouts, and quick-time events, Liberated brings the story to life like nothing else.

 

"The way technology is being used to aid government control has changed drastically in the 21st century and we wanted to explore the dangers of where it's seemingly headed," said Marek Czerniak, Creative Director at Atomic Wolf. "Liberated explores this in a nuanced, pragmatic way, with a stylish blend of motion comics and gameplay that keeps things brisk, stylish, and on the edge of your seat!"

 

"When we first saw what Liberated was up to we were instantly hooked!" said Robert Purzycki, co-founder of Walkabout. "It's exploring real issues that we grapple with every day as we wrestle with both the advantages and perils of technology, social media, and the stranglehold corporations have over us. We think it's one of the most thought-provoking games on the horizon and can't wait to hear players discuss it!"

 

About Atomic Wolf:

Atomic Wolf was founded in 2017 with the purpose of creating games based on amazing stories and unforgettable characters. Atomic Wolf is a team of talented individuals, creative professionals and promising enthusiasts from many different backgrounds with experience in game development, project management, marketing and sales. Our people are our greatest asset and we're passionate about what we do.

 

About L.inc:

The developer of the innovative Playable Graphic Novel framework. The tool allows video game designers to blend the narrative with gameplay on the pages of fully interactive comic books. L.inc's mission is to craft new gaming experiences inspired by everything best about comic books: the visual language, flexibility, and the pride in owning your own very special collection.

 

About Walkabout:

Walkabout is a Polish-based developer of aspiring independent game studios. It supports ambitious projects full of new, exciting, and risky ideas that evoke the kind of amazement that we all love video games for.

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RTX on GTX: Nvidia's latest driver unlocks ray tracing on GeForce GTX graphics cards

It was promised at GDC last month, and now it's here. On Thursday, Nvidia released Game Ready drivers that unlock DirectX Raytracing support on the GeForce GTX 1660 and 1660 Ti, and on GTX 10-series graphics cards from the 6GB GTX 1060 on up. You read that correctly: You no longer need a pricey GeForce RTX 20-series graphics card to experience ray tracing in games that support it. Nvidia and its partners also released a trio of new tech demos that allow gamers to see the power of ray tracing for free.

Mentioned in this article

If you want to experience the best possible ray tracing, you'll still want to upgrade to an RTX graphics card. (Our guide to the best graphics cards can help you choose one.) Those GPUs feature dedicated RT cores that accelerate ray tracing, paired with dedicated tensor cores that leverage Nvidia's supercomputers to make games run faster via AI-enhanced supersampling.

While Nvidia coaxed ray tracing into working on non-RTX GPUs with this driver, the experience won't be optimal. Nvidia's blog post announcing the new Game Ready driver says it's "giving gamers a taste, albeit at lower RT quality settings and resolutions, of how ray tracing will dramatically change the way games are experienced."

Nvidia

Not all ray tracing is created equal. Complicated effects like Global Illumination put much more stress on graphics cards than, say, real-time reflections, and the quality level matters too. Cranking ray tracing effects to Ultra will melt GTX GPUs much faster than Low or Medium options, which typically cast fewer rays. As such, Nvidia says GeForce GTX gamers should expect to run ray tracing at Low quality, perhaps paired with a reduction in other graphics effects, and probably at 1080p resolution. Some games with particularly intense implementations, like Metro Exodus, might not hit playable frame rates on GTX GPUs if you enable ray tracing.

Still, if you want to see ray tracing with your own eyes, even a Low quality implementation is better than no ray tracing whatsoever, provided the game runs well enough to play.

But we don't have a firm grasp on how well GTX graphics cards will run ray tracing workloads at playable settings yet. Nvidia provided journalists with performance graphs for a handful of games, but they were run at 1440p resolution with ray tracing settings at Ultra to allow the full range of DXR-compatible GeForce cards to be tested, from the GTX 1060 to the fearsome RTX 2080 Ti. (The performance-boosting Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) feature, represented by the darker green portion in the results for RTX GPUs below, only runs at specific resolutions on specific cards, depending on the game.)

As you can see from the results, GTX GPUs simply don't play well under those conditions. We'll need to test these games at far lower visual settings and 1080p resolution.

Nvidia Nvidia Nvidia

Nvidia's graphs provide some insight even if they aren't realistic use case scenarios for GTX gamers hoping to get a taste of ray tracing.

Mentioned in this article

With the exception of Metro Exodus's intense Global Illumination, the newer GeForce RTX 1660 and 1660 Ti deliver roughly as much performance as Nvidia's older GTX 1080 flagship with ray tracing enabled. GeForce product manager Justin Walker says that's because the modern Turing architecture implements concurrent execution, which allows floating point and non-floating point instructions to run simultaneously. That processes ray tracing tasks more efficiently. The Pascal GPUs in the older GTX 10-series cards lack the ability and need to run all instructions in a single, long queue.

Nvidia

How Nvidia's various GPU architectures process ray tracing frames.

Your mileage may vary depending on which GeForce GTX graphics card you're using, in other words. Download the new driver, give ray-traced games a whirl, and see how well your card does!

Nvidia

Battlefield V, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and Metro Exodus currently support real-time ray tracing. If you don't have any of those games, Nvidia is also releasing a trio of tech demos that show off RTX's chops. You'll find demos for Justice, Atomic Heart, and that awesome Star Wars Reflections scene available on Nvidia's RTX 20-series landing page. Be warned: All three leverage multiple ray tracing techniques, and Nvidia's numbers show them chugging hard on GTX graphics cards using the same strenuous settings mentioned above.

If you're a GTX graphics card owner with a taste for trying ray tracing, an adaptive sync monitor should help significantly. GeForce graphics cards work with Nvidia's G-Sync monitors, and as of earlier this year, AMD FreeSync displays as well.

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Best Capture Cards for Video Game Streaming in 2019

If you're looking to get into live streaming, you'll want a capture card for your video games. Whether you're playing on a console or PC, it's possible to stream your gameplay online for the entire world to watch.

Live streaming your video game experience can be rewarding and serves more than just one purpose, and it's a trend that has become infectious and infested every hardcore gamer.

Best Capture Cards for Live Streaming Reviewed

Streaming your video games is all the craze nowadays. In fact, many people believed the world had gone completely mad, opting to watch others play video games instead of playing them themselves.

Regardless of what the world thinks, it's undeniable that live streaming video games have become a hugely successful practice that has created many internet gaming personalities. Furthermore, live streaming videos are a chance for the community and fans of that particular game to get together, and being social (even if it's online) is mostly a good thing.

Capture cards come in two main forms: external capture cards that are more portable and internal ones that fit into your PC and are much faster. Each type has its perks and disadvantages. We've reviewed our personal favorite capture cards available right now from famous companies like Elgato and AverMedia. Let's get started.

Our Top Pick Elgato Game Capture HD60 S Excellent capture quality at a good price

Elgato's Game Capture HD60 S is their best selling capture card available right now, and for all the right reasons. It has everything you want from a reliable capture card in an elegant, modern design. The card is essentially a plug and play device, and this convenience makes it the most popular capture card among streamers and recorders.

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Elgato's products are the best when it comes to the capture card niche, and the HD60 S is their top-selling and flagship product.

Resolution: 1080p

Frame-rate: 60fps

Interface: USB 3.0

Elgato is the leading manufacturer of capture cards in the market right now. From their set of high-end internal PCI Express capture cards to the portable ones, they dominate the industry with their extensive knowledge of what makes a great capture card.

From a specs point of view, the Elgato Game Capture HD60 S looks fairly standard. It's a 1080p capture card that runs at 60fps. The USB interface is the modern standard USB 3.0. So what sets it apart from every other competitor with the same specs? The reliability and ease of use.

Simply put, the Elgato Game Capture HD60 S is just a tried and tested piece of hardware. It's reasonably priced for how elegant and efficient it is, and it's an ideal starting and intermediate point for every streamer out there. The 1080p recording is crisp and smooth at 60fps. USB 3.0 connectivity is built into the device, and there's also a Type-C connection available. The capture bitrate reaches up to 40Mbps on this card.

It's important to note however that despite USB 3.0 being backward compatible, this card is a little sensitive to the technology variation. For many users, it tends to struggle to run effectively on USB 2.0 because of the lower power available on the older generation. While this can be considered a glaring con of this device, it's actually not, as USB 3.0 is found in all modern PCs, and the card relies on the additional power and faster speeds to minimize latency during live streaming.

The HD60 S also automates the footage capturing process. It does this with the built-in YouTube and Twitch stream capabilities. The card can also capture your voice on the go, so there's no need to overlay it in post-recording editing.

One thing you'll have to keep in mind with the Elgato Game Capture HD60 S is that its software compatibility is very strict. You should download only the latest software for the operating system you're running on. The features available in the software are fairly limited, but if you're a streamer, chances are you'll be looking at more advanced video editing software to rely on anyway.

Best Portable Capture Card AverMedia Live Gamer Portable 2 Plus Pocket-Sized 1080p Capture Card

The AverMedia Live Gamer Portable 2 Plus is a small portable capture card that streams at a resolution of 1080p at 60fps. The card is small and doesn't require any PC to use as it has a microSD card slot in it to record directly on.

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We're fans of the AverMedia Live Gamer Portable 2 Plus capture card for several reasons. It's a small card that is ideal for capturing gaming content for those who don't want to connect to a PC all the time.

Resolution: 1080p

Frame-rate: 60fps

Interface: USB 3.0

The design may make you question AverMedia's intent with this capture card and its build quality, but don't let the aesthetics fool you. Yes, AverMedia has decided to make its Live Gamer Portable 2 Plus capture card rather excessively flashy. The use of the gamer-esque red and black color scheme speaks volume as a card dedicated for gamers.

Some may consider it tacky, while others would claim it suits their currently existing setup. Regardless, from a purely functional standpoint, the Liver Gamer Portable 2 Plus is an excellent 1080p capture card. One of the key points of the card is just how easy capturing with it is. Whether you're connected to your PC through its USB 3.0 interface or using a microSD card in it to record, the process is extremely simple, and you'll know the card is doing its job thanks to the giant flashing lights on it.

The quality is what you'd expected from a modern 1080p card. At 60fps, everything runs as smooth as you'd expect with a card like this. With the inclusion of a microSD card, the AverMedia Live Gamer Portable 2 Plus offers great PC-free recording. It's not the only card out there that requires no PC to function, but it's far better than most 1080p independent cards due to the great quality.

Additionally, the included RECentral software is intuitive for overlaying text and utilizing useful streaming functions such as picture in picture setups. RECentral is AverMedia's proprietary player and is highly intuitive and easy to use. You can use it with your consoles and record your party chat without having to add an extra cable.

Best PCIe Capture Card Elgato 4K60 Pro A Monster Internal PC Capture Card

Elgator4K60 Pro is a PCI Express capture card capable of recording at 4K video resolution at 60fps. Integrated into your PC build, this card is designed to be used by PC gamers and advanced users only. However, it is by far the best-integrated capture card in the world for this very reason thanks to its great quality capture and usability.

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For anyone building a PC for streaming video games, the Elgato 4K60 Pro is the best option, provided you have a large enough motherboard to accommodate both a beefy graphics card and this PCIe x4 capture card.

Resolution: 4K

Frame-rate: 60fps

Interface: PCIe x4

4K gaming is definitely the future. Heck, some may even say it's the present. If you believe it's the present and want to stream your gaming experience in 4K, you'll want to consider the Elgato Game Capture 4K60 Pro.

It's easy to confuse this beastly capture card with a graphics card. Like some of the premium and high-quality graphics cards, it has a back plate. Additionally, the front is fully encased, with vent holes to allow heat to dissipate. The card is designed to be combined with a beefy graphics card, because not every card currently available can comfortably run games at 4K resolution.

For capturing video on 4K resolution and the highest settings for most modern games, you'll want a GTX 1080 Ti or the newer Nvidia RTX 2080 Ti. Additionally, since video processing and streaming is a CPU intensive task, you'll want to pair it with a powerful multi-threaded processor such as the Intel Core i9 9900K or even a Ryzen Threadripper 2950X.

Because you'll be packing such a beast of a computer to play and stream video games, you'll need more than just an average motherboard. Conservative spacing between the PCIe slots will cramp this capture card too close to comfort with any beefy high-end graphics card, greatly affecting the thermals of your system. For this reason, you'll want an ATX or even eATX motherboard with multiple PCIe slots that are generously far apart.

When it comes to actual performance, few cards can match this beast. Thanks to the PCIe connection (which is much faster than USB connection), the card can capture 4K footage at 60fps at up to a whopping 140Mbps.

Of course, capturing at 4K resolution with such frame-rates means you'll need a butt-load of storage space. Thankfully, this capture card assists in that too, as it also encodes the capture while recording to save space.

To avoid lag, you'll want to take advantage of the ports on this device and use a lag-free HDMI pass-through to send the live feed to a second 4K monitor. This means an expensive setup, but it's also the only sure-fire way of experiencing your live stream with no latency whatsoever.

4. AV.io4K

Resolution: 4K

Frame-rate: 30fps

Interface: USB 3.0

If for some reason you want 4K live streaming in a portable format, you should get ready to pay close to what you would for a high-end graphics card, as the AV.io4K costs almost $500. However, this thing no slouch. It's one of the most complete portable capture cards yet is deviously compact.

The card is primarily designed to capture gameplay of PS4 Pro and Xbox One X consoles running at 4K resolution. The AV.io4K offers 1080p streaming at 60fps comfortably but limits its 4K capture to 30fps. This is fine for the PS4 Pro as most 4K video games are locked at 30fps on it, but you may find it troublesome with the Xbox One if your games run at higher frame rates.

Regardless, it's hard to deny that this pocket-sized capture card makes like incredibly easy for console streamers – particularly ones who lean towards Sony's platform. The card is essentially plug and play as there's no installation software required. The output is almost completely lag free even at 4K resolution. Of course, this card costs as much as the console itself, which is an expensive investment. That's the price you have to pay for portability and 4K capturing though.

5. Hauppauge HD PVR Rocket

Resolution: 1080p

Frame-rate: 30fps

Interface: USB 2.0/3.0

HD PVR is a sleek and simple game recorder that is small enough to fit in your pocket. One of the highlight features of the HD Rocket is that it doesn't actually need you to plug it into a PC to capture from your gaming console. Instead, it can be powered directly from your console or TV via the included USB cable.

The process of recording game videos is also pretty straightforward. Attach a USB flash drive to your Rocket's USB port and hit the giant red button on the top to start recording. Whenever you want to stop the recording, simply press the red button again and it will stop.

The set up is equally easy for capturing via a PC. The HD Rocket includes the Haupauge Capture application for Windows that allows users to record, trim and upload their game plays to YouTube or stream their antics live.

Additionally, this game capture device has a built-in audio mixer that allows you to add commentary to the footage while you are recording to the thumb drive. Meaning, you don't have to wait to get into editing to add your dulcet tones.

The Rocket captures in MP4 for easy importing and editing, though the capture is stuck to 30fps. Despite the fact that it doesn't support 4K and 60fps, we still recommend the PVR Rocket to anyone looking for a portable device with simple-design and non-obtrusive video recording features.

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