I'm in the market for a new laptop. What specs/graphics card/options are optimal for VO overall?

This isn't an OS specific prompt, as I am willing and able to use either Windows or Linux.

Hoping the Devs might chime in with some suggestions...

(Also, may I suggest a HARDWARE forum be added?)

Hmm. So, I'm not up on the latest-and-greatest notebook chipsets.

So, first of all, you want a DirectX12 and Vulkan capable device, and specifically Vulkan. AMD, Intel and NVIDIA all support Vulkan on x86, so that's cool. But, Microsoft does not want anything other than DirectX in their new ARM64-Windows notebooks, which is definitely a bummer.

But, in general, something with a discrete (non-integrated) GPU is going to perform better, for the most part. Whether the GPU is NVIDIA or AMD doesn't matter much to VO, at the moment. We might eventually add some currently-RTX-only graphical tweaks, but by the time we do, there might be a more open-standard that AMD supports (by then) anyway. Plus, RTX-anything is going to be on the really expensive side of laptops, which may not be your target. Understand, I'm just talking about extra graphical fanciness too, not required features.

If you have to buy an integrated-GPU notebook, my gut-feeling is that AMD is probably a better bet, simply because their driver codebase and GPU expertise are stronger? But, I don't really have any strictly-current information to base that on, just a lot of history (also: getting into Linux and whatnot is whole other deal, I am definitely not up-to-date on whose X11 drivers are more stable in that world).

Intel's integrated GPUs have gotten better than they used to be, but they're still mediocre, and their track record is not the best. Their next-generation Xe stuff will come out in 2020, supposedly, but it remains to be seen how that will be. Understand, the game will "run" on any of this stuff, it's just a matter of "how well".

I would kind of expect the best price/performance to be a Ryzen of some kind, preferably with a discrete GPU; although an NVIDIA equipped Intel laptop would be fine too. Then run Windows 10, with the latest-and-greatest drivers (directly from the GPU manufacturer) at any given time, to give you the best overall driver stability.

A nice fast NVME SSD will also load sectors a bit faster, although pre-loading all textures into RAM will mitigate that either way.

Also, while the game will run pretty well, right now, on almost anything.. we plan to add a lot more graphical weight to things, when we start shipping updated assets (and having higher-density sectors) as part of the much-prolonged "universe redux" concept. I thought we'd be into that process by now, but it's look like 2020 at this point.

Anyway, the game will still run on mobile, but we're raising the bar pretty far there as well (hence all the multithreaded-rendering, ES3 + instancing updates on iOS and Android), so you still don't have to worry about whether the game will "run", but there will probably be a much bigger difference between "high end" and "low end" than there is right now.

I hope that helps..

*...we plan to add a lot more graphical weight to things, when we start shipping updated assets (and having higher-density sectors) as part of the much-prolonged "universe redux" concept.*

Inc, This is exactly the feedback I was looking for.

Being on the road quite a bit makes it less than desirable to buy an actual desktop/tower machine, or I'd just go out and buy a kick-ass video card and decent kit. Hence the laptop. Kind-of a feature vs. function tradeoff. The problem with "high end" gaming laptops is that they aren't laptops! They're large (desktop replacements) and heavy.

That said, a Ryzen based system seems to be an optimal choice based on your feedback, and it seems to be a good choice for general purpose use as well.

I noticed you talked about caching graphics assets but didn't dwell too much on system memory?

Plugging your tentative specs into Google, I'm now considering the Asus ROG Zephyrus G GA502 (or equivalent) which I was incredibly surprised has models that fall into the budget laptop pricing range! Ryzen 7, GeForce® GTX 1660 Ti, and upgradable to 32GB RAM and up to 512GB NVME SSD. 15" screen and pretty slim for portability.

If anyone has this laptop and actively plays VO, I'd be interested in your feedback.

stellajames942,

Thanks for your feedback. Your assessment seems to click with Inc's suggestions, however I'm going to spec the ryzen 7 for "future proofing"!

Again, thanks!

I noticed you talked about caching graphics assets but didn't dwell too much on system memory?

I didn't mention it, because the game isn't all that ram-intensive, and it would be surprising for anyone to buy a new machine with less than 8GB in it, at this point? I mean, there are a bunch of phones with 12GB. If you're willing to run the game as the sole app on the system, then 8GB should (probably?) be okay, even with pre-caching of assets? But, if you want to keep Chrome with a bunch of tabs running in the background, or something, you'll likely want more.

Ryzen 7, GeForce® GTX 1660 Ti, and upgradable to 32GB RAM and up to 512GB NVME SSD. 15" screen and pretty slim for portability.

That'll probably run the game, at a good visual spec, for a long time to come. If we get into graphics tweaks like mesh shading, raytracing or something similarly new-fangled, it might not be supported on that device. But it should still look pretty nice.

In terms of the portability-vs-performance tradeoff, there's also one other, kind of unusual option: the externally connected notebook GPU. Basically, this is where you have a full-sized desktop GPU that's in an external case, and plugged into the laptop via some kind of high-speed bus, like Thunderbolt. This concept was largely started by Razer, but now a number of OEMs offer some kind of external case.

It means that one can have a super-light, power-friendly laptop that's trivial to carry around, and then "at home" or some such you have your giant beefy GPU that you plug into for gaming purposes. It's kind of an interesting option. Of course, "on the road" you'd have to use whatever integrated GPU solution your laptop had available.

I imagine it's considerably more expensive (the initial Razer thing definitely was), and I have no idea what the driver ramifications are. There have been other "GPU switching" systems in the past, like NVIDIA Optimus, that sometimes had various unforeseen ramifications. I have no idea if this kind of "external GPU" apparatus might have software or driver limitations of some kind.

Still researching... man, I'm out of date on hardware...

As far as VO is concerned, any words of wisdom regarding Quadro RTX and GeForce RTX implementations? Or, setting performance aside, is it safe to say "RTX is RTX"?

Obviously greater $ = greater performance, but I LOL at the system reviews recommending a $3k laptop over a $2k laptop because you get +2 fps on the benchmarks.

RTX is probably RTX. It's an architectural difference, and not a "performance" difference, which is why it's hard to measure value the way we did with previous generations of GPUs, based purely on the framerate of this or that (at least, for most existing games).

It's more like "RTX can do Mesh Shading, and Everything Else Can't". Same with Raytracing, etc.

However, a relative minority of available games actually support this kind of advanced feature-set, and sometimes those that do support it are not always doing so in the most compelling ways.

Part of the problem is that these features are proprietary to one PC GPU vendor, and can't be re-used by a developer on a Console port, for instance (AMD is in the graphically-intensive consoles). In other cases, some of these features are architecturally complicated for some developers to integrate.. like ourselves and Raytracing, because we use a hybrid "forward" renderer (like Valve and some others), and not a "deferred" solution (like Unreal, Frostbite and some other big AAA engines). The initial raytracing implementation was only really structured for deferred renderers.

Honestly, it also takes a while for the game industry to really "figure out" how to use advanced new features. Usually a few years.

So, basically, the difference in laptops is purely based on whether you think the investment in RTX graphical features is worth having for "now" and/or for "down the road". It's possible? That's a subjective call you'd have to make.

The Tensor cores in the RTX GPU do make for a lot of interesting potential functionality, but whether it's worthwhile to spend that kind of price differential (or to do so now) is a whole other discussion.

I'm unwilling to commit, at this point, to saying we'll even definitively support RTX-specific features. We're interested, particularly in advanced geometry stuff like mesh shading, and other features like variable rate shading, which are more about increasing perceivable detail at the same level of performance. But, I'm not 100% sure if we'll actually implement any of that.

As a result, I'm not going to tell you that it's going to be a "must-have" or something, let alone to spend an extra grand on a laptop.. that's a lot of money. These things are on our radar, and it's possible, but I'm not entirely sure what we're going to do there, yet.

Whoof. Yeah, I've seen the video in that first link. Give me an asteroid field that looks like that, and I'll go back to mining just for the scenery!!

Ok, I get what you're saying. I've taken your input into consideration. Evaluated my wallet (blew the dust out), considered my personal compute and usability needs, looked at my steam account to see what types of games I play (Homeworld, Elite Dangerous...) and decided to forgo Ryzen and stick with the ol' trustworthy core i* processor, and throw some cash at the video card, memory, and display.

I also visited a couple of stores to "lay hands" on several laptop models I was considering (HP, MSI, Acer, Lenovo, Asus, Razer, Eluktronics, Sager, etc.)

I ended up ordering an Asus ROG Zephyrus M, 15.6” 240Hz IPS, w/ GeForce RTX 2070, i7-9750H, 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD

... that Razer Blade tho... soooooo tempting. My wallet did protesteth.

I figure that, barring an accident or outright theft, will be my workhorse for the next three to five years (my usual laptop refresh cycle.)

Inc, thanks for the data points and feedback. You were immensely helpful, informative and, frankly, entertaining to read. Hey! On top of all your other projects, deliverables, and obligations, you should put together some tech briefs... these were quite good. :-)

Thanks, again!

for anyone interested in the forward/deferred rendering incarnate was talking about but is too lazy to go to google. Hrmmm, interesting...

Inc, thanks for the data points and feedback. You were immensely helpful, informative and, frankly, entertaining to read.

Hey, I'm glad to hear that :). I hope your new machine works well for you.

for anyone interested in the forward/deferred rendering incarnate was talking about..

Yeah, there's obviously a lot to unpack in that discussion, if people choose to read more. Game rendering / engine technology is a constantly moving target, as everyone is trying to solve slightly different problems, in slightly different ways, while optimizing for continuously-evolving hardware (plus, in our case, supporting the entire range from mobile phones to gaming desktops).

There are few solutions in that world that end up being absolutely "better" or "worse", everything is a varied blend of engineering, performance and visual tradeoffs, and sometimes advantages for particular hardware (like consoles).

Recent discussions about this aren't simply in terms of "forward" vs "deferred" rendering anymore, as there are a number of variations, some of which may start to blur the lines in between the two. Common discussions reference AMD's tiled "forward+" (covered in Luxen's link above) and Forza's "clustered forward", and so on and so forth. This post has some descriptions of the trade-offs.

Anyway, happy this was helpful. Hopefully useful to anyone else thinking about a computer upgrade as well, at least for awhile.

"Ryzen 7, GeForce® GTX 1660 Ti, and upgradable to 32GB RAM and up to 512GB NVME SSD. 15" screen and pretty slim for portability."

This setup would be able to run most modern games. PUBG, Rust, Red Dead 2, etc. It is however absolutely overkill for a game like VO.
I'm able to pull 50-60 frames which all of the video settings maxed out on my Core i-3 7020U, 4GB RAM, Intel HD integrated graphics laptop. The only time it struggles is in the high density test sectors, like Latos F12

This setup would be able to run most modern games. PUBG, Rust, Red Dead 2, etc. It is however absolutely overkill for a game like VO.

Right, but most of the content of the discussion on this thread is about what Vendetta Online is going to do, graphically, not what it is right now.

The only time it struggles is in the high density test sectors, like Latos F12

Yes, exactly. This "universe redux", that I keep mentioning, is going to have much higher density sectors; aside from potentially a number of other technology changes I've mentioned in the course of this thread.

Incarnate, is there some chance that a while before the release of this "universe redux" you could put out a news post with the expected system requirements?

A stickied forum thread, probably on the General forum, plus the OS specific forums would probably be a good idea too.

Maybe a big red bold link to the newspost on this page https://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/ just to the right of where it says "forums" at the top.

Incarnate, is there some chance that a while before the release of this "universe redux" you could put out a news post with the expected system requirements?

Like I wrote in my first post, at the start of the thread:

Anyway, the game will still run on mobile, but we're raising the bar pretty far there as well (hence all the multithreaded-rendering, ES3 + instancing updates on iOS and Android), so you still don't have to worry about whether the game will "run", but there will probably be a much bigger difference between "high end" and "low end" than there is right now.

This is not really about new "system requirements". You shouldn't have to buy a new "system" to run VO. But you may not be able to run the game at the highest-possible-detail settings anymore, on your dated machine with a slow GPU.

If you want to know what kind of system will be able to utilize higher detail settings, then I suggest reading this thread. Because I just wrote a ton of stuff about that, above.

Ok, thanks. I was looking more at minimum specs. I take it those will remain largely unchanged?

I have generally run the game with a lot of the effects turned off or down anyway, as I find they distract me in combat. They do look cool when just flying around though.

I received my new laptop and it is glorious! I've been working on setting it back up, and tweaking the video settings within VO.

I turned everything up to the highest setting, but I'm not sure what some of them do LOL.

Normally I turn off the background imagery; it seems to be pretty but fairly static and interferes with seeing the dots of ships in the distance.

I'm glad that Inc and the gang are able to keep backward and portable compatibility and still achieve some awesome rendering. I'm looking forward to seeing what they come with next.

I've moved from a 13" Lenovo Yoga to a 15.6" Asus. My portal into the universe is so much bigger and brighter! Now if only I could get my 3d SpaceMouse to work...

I skimmed this and think this topic deserves consideration of 2 additional points (apologies if I missed them):
1) Make sure your gaming rig can disipate the heat it will generate when it is under heavy load. This can be a real bummer when your laptop that should be able to handle the game you are playing suddenly starts chugging because the system is throttling performance to avoid an internal metldown. Also pay attention to where the heat vents and intakes are located (or case if it's a low power box that just uses the metal case as a heat sink.) Will those locations have adequite ariflow in the position you will be playing?
2) Keyboard tech. For VO, if you are trying to roll and fire and thrust and strafe left+down simultaneously using keys, you'll want a keyboard that can send all those at the same time (I think it's called anti-ghosting or something like that???) If you aren't planning on using the keyboard for all inputs or if you want to enhance your laptop experience and have to sacrifice on the keyboard specs, there is a thread on these forums somewhaere that had some suggestions for alternate input devices.

Hope this helps!

Ok, thanks. I was looking more at minimum specs. I take it those will remain largely unchanged?

The current minimum specs are so excessively minimum, that our raising them is not likely to be a problem for players. The system requirements still talk about a GPU with hardware T&L and 32MB of ram, basically a GeForce 256 from 1999.

We're likely raising the minimum on mobile to ES 3.0, which includes hardware instancing support, and we'll probably do the same on PC. Possibly DirectX 9.0c hardware (Vertex Shader 3.0), or perhaps DX10. So, basically, instead of being able to use a 21-year-old GPU, you might need a 14-16 year old GPU.

We already require an SSE2 capable CPU on Windows, although not on Linux-32. We'll probably continue to support ancient stuff on Linux32 (like OpenGL 2.0), so people can (try to) run it on an unsupported toaster there if they want.

Hey, I ran Vendetta on a GeForce 256 (well, technically a GeForce 2 MX, but it's the same chip with a different sticker on it) and it was great. Don't knock on the 256!

Not at all, it was by far the biggest "breakthrough" GPU of the era. I had an original GeForce 256.

But, that was a long time ago :).