ATi Radeon X800 XT & X800 Pro - Heart Burn For The NV40
Next up, the game from Crytek that everyone seems to have been buzzing about lately, Far Cry. It's definitely a cut above any first person shooter currently on the market, both in playability and its graphics engine.
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 Far Cry |
It almost goes without saying that Far Cry is easily the most impressive game and game engine to be released on the PC to date. While we peer at leaked versions of Doom 3 and video clips of Half Life 2, Far Cry gives us a taste of what is to come in next generation 3D Gaming on the PC. We benchmarked the graphics cards in our test, with a custom recorded demo run taken in the "Catacombs" area checkpoint, at various resolutions without AA or Aniso Filtering enabled and then with 4X AA and 8X Aniso. |
In retrospect, it seems as though game developers have been held back for years, without the proper tools or horsepower to render truly cinematic quality environments and characters in modern game engines. With the advent of the programmable pixel shader, came a whole new area of lighting, textures, physics and modeling. In the early days of DX8 and DX9, the quality level of the effects being rendered were mere novelties, when compared to what is available today. Far Cry is just the tip of the iceberg; an example of what can be done with the modern day Graphics Processor. Far Cry's game engine looks fantastic but game devs like Crytek are just now getting warmed up.
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While Far Cry looks impressive for sure, it has a few limitations that spoil the illusion somewhat for the gamer. Specifically, the characters in the game, although they are much more detailed than many we've seen in previous game engines, have odd lighting and shadowing effects in the head and facial areas. Humans in Far Cry almost look like they need a good night rest, with dark circles under their eyes. Actually, they are quite similar in appearance to our tired and run-down Editorial Staff here at HotHardware! Regardless, you can't knock this game engine too much. It looks fantastic overall comparatively and it's a whole mess-o-fun. We took the above screen shots on the Radeon X800 XT, with 4X AA and 8X Aniso turned on and the visuals are stunning, frightening and occasionally humorous as well. Somebody get that bad guy some dental work. We almost became ill when we saw that toothy grin.
Benchmarks? You bet...
At 1024X768, it's all ATi, with the Radeon X800 XT commanding a sizable 20+ fps lead over the GeForce 6800 Ultra and the X800 Pro taking an 11+ fps lead, when AA and AF are enabled.
The performance scales here at 1600X1200, with the Radeon X800 XT retaining its sizeable lead but the X800 Pro losing a bit of ground, due to fill rate limitations, although it still squeaks in front of the GF 6800U.
