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Redfall Review – A Bloody Awful Mess

Mario Vasquez — Mon, 01 May 2023 20:00:00 +0000

Redfall : Redfall provides some great gameplay elements to sink your teeth and time into but it also lacks direction and its vision is muddied with formulaic systems and some glaring issues. Editor's Note: After completing this review-in-progress, without spoilers, the full experience does not improve and the ending is extremely disappointing. We have changed the score from a 6 to a 5. – Mario Vasquez

von 10

2023-05-01T20:00:00+0000

Vampires are a horror genre staple so it’s quite shocking we haven’t really had an amazing game release featuring them as the central villain in quite some time. So when Arkane, the makers of amazing games like Prey and Dishonored, announced Redfall in June of 2021, it captured my bloodlust. Xbox’s current weak place in the market is begging for a great release which puts a ton of extra pressure for Redfall to exceed expectations.

The excitement for Redfall’s hero-based looter-shooter gameplay centering around vampires has such a high ceiling because of this atmosphere. Microsoft needs a win. It’s Arkane, so we know they have a history of hitting it out of the park with combat, stealth, and a great story. But after delays, the announcement that consoles would be locked to 30fps at launch, and after a quiet launch week, some concern set in.

The press embargo was set right before tomorrow’s release at 8:01 PM ET today. A red flag went up instantly. This is a review-in-progress as we were provided a key close to release and have not had time to complete the entire story but have completed the majority of its major missions. In fact, a 69.4GB patch dropped this morning adding DLC.

After playing, I understand the fear of reviewers about gameplay spoiling major elements of the latter half of the game. For FPS fans, Redfall provides some great gameplay elements to sink your teeth and time into, but it also lacks direction and its vision is muddied with formulaic systems and some glaring issues. Let’s take a deeper look at Redfall in our review of the PC version for Steam. Thank you to Nvidia and to Arkane for providing a review copy for our coverage!

Characters

Redfall has you choose one of four main characters which is one of the biggest draws for me upon release. Going in with friends to experience a 4-player massacre of vampires and their minions could be a real blast. Central to Redfall is its first person and hero shooter design. The four playable characters at launch are cryptozoologist inventor, Devinder Crousley; telekinetic student, Layla Ellison; combat engineer, Remi de la Rosa; and special forces sniper, veteran Jacob Boyer. Redfall has more character releases planned later.

Each character has a trio of upgradable special powers, two are useable for limited times, and an “ultimate” that recharges more slowly over time. Each power has its own unique spin on combat and abilities to play with. Vampires invade the area known as Redfall, and after some opening events, there is no physical way to escape from the area. You and the town’s citizens are fish trapped in a bucket being saved for feeding time.

The opening sequence is pretty great and sets the tone well. The massive cascade of frozen water serves as an ominous foreshadowing of the immense power our enemies hold. Our characters had previous run-ins with the main antagonists that provided them with their abilities.

I really disliked that Bungie made us go to their website to read “grimoire” cards to understand the lore. The same thing is done here with Redfall – most of the backstory ends up by being briefly told in side conversations, and if you want more, you need to read one of the many, many notes strewn across the world or by gathering 100 items that provide more exposition from a central character. It is hard to describe how grandiose the game can be and yet so small at the same time before you actually jump in to play.

Disappointingly, Redfall at times can feel paper thin, and I believe it could have been truly great with more time in the coffin until it was ready to withstand the heat of the sun and its place in the current landscape. Gamers will notice.

We want the deep world-building and narrative that Arkane is known for, and if more time was needed for a sophisticated presentation, I would have begged for it. Without going into later story spoilers, Redfall’s premise is that a biotech corporation known as Aevum was working with a scientist seeking immortality, an experiment went wrong and the vampire hoard was unleashed. Almost immediately, many of the town’s residents became cultists who wanted this same immortality and began to worship and defend the vampires with the promise that once they die they would be reincarnated as all-powerful beings.

A once idyllic island town is now the center for survivors, and you are someone luckily granted special powers that you have right off the bat. Conceptually, its a great setting for this game and it was very interesting to explore. With vampire nests to destroy, bosses to defeat, safehouses to set free, and so much loot to gather for upgrades – the base systems are there for a great time.

But while Redfall’s premise does an amazing job of setting up some great missions, the presentation feels extremely dated. So much so I am not sure that most players will stay long enough to experience the latter half of the game which begins to feel incredible at times.

Let’s take a deeper look at the gameplay.

Gameplay

After the opening sequence, your first mission is to approach a surrounded firehouse with survivors inside. Cultists are standing outside, literally, not banging on the walls or trying to break in – they are standing there in groups just waiting to pick survivors off. This is the same immersion-breaking feeling most of the encounters have in the game. Something feels like it was missed or changed in development.

Most gamers won’t care about small details as they may just care about the overall story and the gunplay. Well, after first picking off the cultists, you meet your first set of survivors for your new home base. There is little to no backstory for the characters without reading interactable letters, and they sort of just fall into place as expert base builders with a doctor, a gun expert, a clergywoman, and more. Redfall is shockingly light on explanations and barebones in so many other similar places that lowered our expectations for the rest of the game.

This base is never attacked and is literally just a place you come back to get supplies, make occasional small talk, and interact with a missions table to get photo cutscenes between your custom character and the survivors. I believe the reason for this is because of only having four characters and it may have been easier to just replace their skin for the cutscenes. I understand that the visuals needed to be presented, but with such barebones characters it would have made me care more about them if they actually talked to you.

Between missions, they will talk to each other and then later you get in-game conversations with dynamic character movements and interactions that I really enjoyed especially near the end of the first half of the game. If this was more fleshed out, I would have cared much more about these characters and saving them.

However, none of it matters as once a major defeat occurs, in order to progress the story you have to leave the main island and can never return. I’d prefer to go back and experience those levels again when I want to and have fun in the sandbox that was created, but its completely shut off.

The second area feels more like the real main game in almost every way. Characters are more vocal, the area feels more dense and packed with hidden items and more enemies to fight. The story is finally fleshed out and its vast world is begging to be explored. Only in the second half is where Redfall shines and becomes extremely fun.

Gunplay

We suggest not playing the healer characters during single-player as they won’t offer much utility. Some of the abilities become extremely powerful with later unlocks like Jacob’s raven damaging anyone in its path. However, the AI needs some serious work and I often found myself ignoring gun perks and upgrades as a necessity to improve my experience.

None of it is truly fundamental to the experience and most hero’s abilities would help multiplayer sessions. However, story progression is not shared due to the nature of the game’s design but the loot and levels you gain are.

Flawed AI is one of the biggest issues we ran into. It’s bad. I mean really bad especially for the poor cultists who get the short straw. They funnel in the same path, get stuck on rocks, have clunky animations, and have no real cognition or ability to flank and outsmart you while at the same time having god-aim. It’s a bad combo especially when being sniped at from a distance.

I am not sure any patches can address this, but with Jacob at launch, AI is broken and basically stuck in easy mode. Even on higher difficulties and with later invisibility unlocks, I could cycle between walking directly into a large group of enemies, grabbing the quest item, and then going invisible again, and they would just go on their way. The same could be said about shooting from a specific area – the AI just funnels directly to you and poses no real challenge ala Deathloop.

Other characters have similar “cheese” but I would recommend increasing the difficulty of the game for a better challenge. The shooting experience is still fantastic – from sniper rifles to UV lasers that petrify the enemy vampires – it is a blast to play.

In some well-designed areas like the vampire nests, it reminded us of entering the Elder Scroll’s Oblivion Gates. These moments however are few and far between if you love to fully explore the world. Some missions are surprisingly good but getting there is such a slog that some may never progress to experience them. The moment-to-moment gameplay constantly clashes badly with each other. It is tiring especially when combined with performance issues.

Speaking of vampire nests, these are some of the best gameplay areas in Redfall. They pack strong vampires in large numbers that can overwhelm you quickly even with Jacob’s invisibility and it requires careful planning. Conversely, there is little punishment for dying as progress does not reset and there are typically no timers, so if you can go in gun blazing.

Vampire nests reached another level that let me see the vision for Redfall which makes it hurt to see it ignored for the rest of the gameplay. The tone, the atmosphere, and with your back against the wall fighting off vampire hoards is such an amazing concept!

In one mission, you go to investigate a boat and as soon as the quest item is picked up it triggers an angry mob that immediately surrounds your only exits with deadly red mist, a mini-boss, and a mob of bloodthirsty vampires. You can see this all unfold beneath you from the boat’s windows. Your only option is to bite back and fight your way out. The game is filled with these bursts of incredible and stunning moments with fantastic and engaging gunplay that is then mixed with poor performance, bad lip-syncing, and horrible AI.

I am really reminded of Destiny 1’s live service launch which was obviously a victim of a large form of rewrite and rebuild. Perhaps Redfall had a similar fate but we will never know. Arkane has promised gamers that this will be their most supported game yet and we really hope so. The core gameplay is incredible but it reminds us of Cyberpunk 2077’s promise of a better future when all we need now is the vampire killing fun we have been salivating for.

The loot, the loot, the loot, the loot, the loot

Let’s talk loot. Vampire bosses keep repeating “the blood, the blood, the blood, the blood” but all I care about is if they will give me fun weapons to kill them with. Loot and gameplay can keep a game alive for a long time especially if there are fun quests or some great special weapons or “exotics” to chase. A community can grow quickly when secrets are found or the best load-outs to defeat bosses are found.

Redfall’s weapons scale with your level and just pump out higher numbers of damage. Pistols, shotguns, automatic rifles, UV lasers, stake launchers, snipers, and flare guns round out a fun and worthwhile experience. Unfortunately, as the game fleshes out you see how exploration is broken by other reward types. So build-crafting with the right perks and skill point selections doesn’t make much of a difference now.

Pistols are often one-shot minions, flare guns burn and stun lock vampires, and stake launchers massively chunk any boss or special vampire. It’s all amazing fun and the combo load-outs you run can really allow for great gameplay loops. Although the cultists are really bad enemies, they serve little to no threat until much later when their level just means their incredible accuracy can health-chunk you within a second or two if you get careless. I died a lot early being overrun in confined space by the fast vampire attacks as they surrounded me. Some enemy abilities can also one-shot you. This would not be much of an issue in multiplayer but it felt bad in single-player mode.

That said, you don’t have to worry about dying in a mission because no progress is lost and you have so much junk loot currency that you will likely never spend. You do not lose any progress from dying, any damage or defeated enemies stay dead, and your mission status is retained. Most of the world’s junk loot like bleach, toilet paper, water bottles, etc. that you pick up gets converted into a currency for purchases back at the home base.

Things like med kits, better guns, and lock picks can be purchased with converted drop currency. However, most of the rewire/hack kits just lead to more junk loot or heals, which enemies drop, and are strewn literally everywhere. Most of the lock picks do the same.

There was no master sword moment or a huge loot drop that I was super excited for. This is because they aren’t necessary because vampire nests and a later world event granted me the best loot in the game. Most of your old loot is junked as you move on to the next mission anyway.

The combos are fun though as you need to either stake, petrify, or burn vampires. You can mix using a UV gun to petrify groups of vampires and then shotgun them one by one to dispatch a large group easily. If you take too long as Jacob, you can just go invisible with no real danger. I did this for the first big boss and didn’t even lose 50% health because a large power weapon pumps out such large chunks of damage the boss gets health gated and frozen before they can even react. I broke the game rather easily. Balancing needs to occur and much more AI work is needed. There was a huge patch today that hopefully addresses some of these woes.

PC Performance

I am beginning to call DLSS 3 a godsend but it should not be necessary just to enjoy a major release. The industry has lately given PC gamers the short end of the stick, but that is a topic for another day. We started our playthrough with our Ryzen 7800x3D build with an RTX 4070 Ti and 32 GB of DDR5-6000mhz RAM on our TeamGroup 2TB NVMe drive. Ours is far beyond a typical system, but from the onset we had massive crashes, stuttering, bugs, and large frame dips. Microstutters and texture problems also occurred.

The latest Nvidia driver helped and DLSS 3 almost doubled our performance. This still did not address some areas of town where we would dip into the low teens. Entering the menu could often cause the game to crash. Glitches like this ruined some major moments of our playthrough but with patches this may be resolved soon.

DLSS looks incredible and is a must-have feature. It nearly doubled performance on the RTX 4090 which was already performing great except for the 1% lows. The same could be said for our RTX 4080 and 4070 Ti. The newly released RTX 4070 also performs well but the game really needs some serious performance improvements.

There was a large 69.4GB patch today so we redid our benchmarks. Here are our numbers using maxed/Epic settings:

Testbed 1:

Intel 13900KF/RTX 4090 FE/2x16GB DDR5 6400/Win 11 – 3840 x 2160

TAA high/No DLSS – 124.3 av / 42.1 1% low

Quality DLSS 3 – 178.0 av / 72.7 1% low

DLSS 3 in particular allows for stunning gameplay and steady framerates with comparable image quality to native. Unfortunately, Redfall is sadly locked at 30FPS for the console launch with 60 FPS mode coming soon but now we can understand why: It just needs more time in development.

Testbed 2:
Post-Day 1 Patch with AMD Ryzen 7800x3D, 2x16GB DDR6 6000, TeamGroup 2TB NVMe, Win 11.
3840×2160, Epic Preset DLSS comparison:

Post-Day 1 Patch	Avg. FPS DLSS 2/3 OFF	Avg. FPS DLSS 2/3 ON
RTX 3070	59.6	89.4
RTX 3080	77.2	105.7
RTX 4070	76.8	110.6
RTX 4071 Ti	90.1	122.8
RTX 4080	112.5	137.3

Redfall by Mario Vasquez

Conclusion – try if you have Game Pass

We can not recommend Redfall at launch. I was very excited for Arcane Austin’s Redfall, despite the console war chatter, the state of Xbox, and red flags coming out from the game development cycle. I still loved my time with it, and in many moments I was having a good deal of fun, but most of the time the world proved to be empty or uninteresting.

I would not have continued as far as I progressed if I did not enjoy some of the big set pieces so much. I believe anyone with Game Pass should play it, even at 30fps on console. However, it’s a messy mix of RPG, looter shooter, and a multiplayer game that lacks a cohesive and consistent presentation. Couple this with terrible AI and a plethora of bugs and there are very high highs and very, very low lows.

Redfall can technically be played solo, but we recommend the experience with friends as it is much better. It is also not going to be the major release to start the Xbox renaissance that we so desperately need. This review score is going to be low, but I am still rooting for it. There is something there at the core that is clawing at the surface to come out and be enjoyed. It is your choice if you want to power through the mud to get to the meat of it.

If you can withstand some glitches, read the story in text form with barebones character development, and have friends to play with then you will have a decent time. That said, the world is already so empty that traversing its many roads with no vehicles or large enemy population it can feel lonely walking large swaths of areas as a solo player. At times, I grew so frustrated with the experience I found myself begging for a story, begging for those cool moments, and I often felt unrewarded and angry.

Redfall releases later today on Xbox Series consoles, PC, Game Pass, and is Steam Deck verified.

The RTX 4070 brings DLSS 3’s Amazing Potential for a Reasonable Price

Mario Vasquez — Wed, 12 Apr 2023 08:00:00 +0000

The $599.99 RTX 4070 FE Gaming Performance Review

We recently received an RTX 4070 Founders Edition from Nvidia and we have been testing it for the past week by using 11 PC games plus hybrid benchmarks. The Founders Edition will be available at $599 starting tomorrow. Nvidia is touting this GPU as a great upgrade to the seven-year-old 10 series cards – and while it is true that its value proposition is undeniable – you will have to decide if it is worth the price of admission.

Thankfully, Nvidia has kept pricing sane as the RTX 4070 arrives with multiple new features, including DLSS 3, which brings an incredible performance uplift. For this reason alone, this new entry in the 40 series is extremely exciting. The higher-priced RTX 3080 is hard to find new in stock so we will compare them to find the best value.

The RTX 4070 further cements its new value role as it supports impressive new features including Displaced Micro-Meshes and Nvidia DLSS 3 technology, all while using less power than the RTX 3070 Ti. Additionally, for broadcasters, the RTX 4070 supports AV1 encoding which in and of itself is a good enough reason to upgrade from older generations of cards.

The RTX 4070 Feature set

Right out of the gate, many will be concerned about being bound by the RTX 4070’s 12GB VRAM capacity as modern games skyrocket in their usage. While it may not age the best in 5-6 years, its VRAM is more than enough for current needs. Compared with buying a used RTX 3080, the RTX 4070 is a new card with a warranty, and it includes the latest leaps in DLSS/AI technology.

Comparing generation-to-generation there is a giant leap thanks to TGP/power improvements. There is also no price category competition from AMD, and FSR 2.0 is well behind DLSS 3 in performance. Again, the value proposition in comparison to the rest of the rather expensive 40 series is obvious, but the RTX 4070 may not offer the raw GPU power upgrade that those with RTX 3080s are looking for at this price range.

Today, there are over 400 games and applications that have RTX support which includes over 50 announced titles with DLSS 3. According to Nvidia, DLSS 3 has the fastest adoption of any of their technologies to date, with DLSS 3 being adopted 7x faster than DLSS 2. DLSS 3 is featured in some of the hottest current and upcoming titles including Forza Horizon 5, Diablo IV, Redfall, and The Finals. This value alone may be enough to move the needle for potential buyers.

GeForce RTX 4070 Founders Edition Board

The GeForce RTX 4070 Founders Edition graphics card incorporates many of the new design elements that are also found on NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 4070 Ti, RTX 4080, and RTX 4090 Founders Edition boards. The RTX 4070 Founders Edition board is crafted with premium materials and components including a die-cast aluminum body and dual axial fans. It looks fantastic in our PC and especially for ITX enthusiasts, this may be a go-to card with its perfect compact size.

The RTX 4070’s new design also provides about a 20% increase improvement in airflow compared to the RTX 3070 Ti Founders Edition.

Our Plan

Nvidia is in an interesting spot with the RTX 4070 delivering outstandingly efficient performance. For this review, we are planning to benchmark the RTX 4080, RTX 4070 Ti, RTX 4070, RTX 3070, and RTX 3080 within an average build that most gamers today would be able to complete on a reasonable budget.

We think comparing the RTX 4070 performance against current family and iconic cards from Nvidia’s previous RTX generation of GPUs may be worth it for Turing or Ampere users considering an upgrade to Ada Lovelace.

The GeForce RTX 4070 is based on the AD104 GPU and equipped with 5,888 CUDA Cores providing 29 FP32 Shader-TFLOPS of power for rendering traditional rasterized graphics. It also boasts 184 Fourth Generation Tensor Cores offering 466 Tensor-TFLOPS (with Sparsity) for AI processing and DLSS, 46 Third Generation Ada RT Cores capable of 67 RT-TFLOPS for powering next-generation ray-traced graphics, and 12GB of GDDR6X memory.

We want to test if it really can hold up with 12GB of VRAM to deliver a potential amazing value proposition compared to the RTX 3080 launched at $699 two years ago and the RTX 2080 Ti which launched at $99 MSRP four years ago. We want to especially compare the $599 RTX 4070 with the $849 ASUS Tuff Gaming 4070 Ti OC to determine its place in the current lineup.

Features & Specifications

The RTX 4070 technological innovations include:

New Streaming Multiprocessors (SM) – The new SM delivers up to 2x performance and power efficiency
4th Generation Tensor Cores and Optical Flow – Enable and accelerate transformative AI
technologies, including the new frame rate multiplying Nvidia DLSS 3
3rd Generation RT Cores – Up to 2x ray tracing performance, delivering incredibly detailed
virtual worlds like never before
Shader Execution Reordering (SER) – SER improves ray tracing operations by 2x, boosting FPS up to 44% in Cyberpunk with RT: Overdrive Mode
DLSS 3 – A revolutionary breakthrough in AI-powered graphics that massively boosts
performance using AI to generate additional high-quality frames
Nvidia Studio – Unmatched performance in 3D rendering, video editing, and live streaming
AV1 Encoders – The 8th generation Nvidia Encoder (NVENC) with AV1 is 40% more efficient than H.264, enabling new possibilities for streamers, broadcasters, and video callers

Key Features from ASUS

Dedicated 3rd generation ray tracing cores (46)
Dedicated 4th generation Tensor cores (184)
Nvidia DLSS 3 support
Game Ready and Nvidia Studio drivers
Nvidia GeForce Experience
Nvidia Broadcast
Nvidia G-Sync
Nvidia GPU Boost
PCI Express Gen 4
Microsoft DirectX 12 Ultimate support
Support for Vulkan RT APIs, Vulkan 1.3, and OpenGL 4.6
HDCP 2.3 support
DisplayPort 1.4 support: up to 4K at 240Hz or 8K at 60Hz with DSC, HDR
HDMI 2.1 support: up to 4K 240Hz, Gaming VRR, HDR

Specifications

Nvidia’s MSRP price for RTX 4070 Ti GPUs is $799, and ASUS’s price for the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC Edition is $849.99. So it’s exciting to get back down to Nvidia’s MSRP for the RTX 4070 FE at just $599.

Here is the RTX 4070 in GPU-Z:

According to GPU-Z, the RTX 4070 has the default GPU clock of 1920Mhz compared to the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC’s 2310MHz, about an 18.4% difference, and a boost GPU clock of 2475Mhz compared to the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC’s 2730MHz which is around a 10% difference. So for $350 less, you will have a very competitive performance with the latest 40 series feature set.

Below is the advanced general information on the RTX 4070 FE as reported by the GPU-Z tool.

As you can see from the GPU-Z screenshots, you can even increase both power and temperature limits to some degree, and while there is little room for overclocking, there is some additional potential performance for gamers looking to get more from their builds. RTX 4070 partner boards should be interesting to see based on their cooling methods and pricing.

Our Benchmarking PC

We benchmark using FrameView on a recent install of Windows 11 Pro Edition 22H2, at 3440×1440 using an Intel Core i7-12700K with stock clocks and 32GB of DDR4 Corsair Vengeance RGB PRO 3600MHz memory on an ASUS PRIME Z690-P D4 motherboard. All games and benchmarks are the latest versions, and we use the latest GeForce 531.42 press drivers for our testing. The games tested, display driver, settings, and hardware are identical except for the GPUs we compare.

Fair warning – We lost our RTX 4080 during benchmarking due to a faulty power cable and PSU when swapping out video cards, so this is why the card is missing from some tests. We are in the process of getting them replaced.

Let’s unbox and take a closer look at this graphics card.

A Closer Look at the RTX 4070 Founder’s Edition

Packaging

The box cover highlights a sleek approach to the packaging. I am a huge fan of the presentation Nvidia has been providing for its FE line. It offers a very premium unboxing experience. The graphics card image for the recent RTX cards is iconic and that shape is also shown on the box.

Accessories

As we open the box, it folds out beautifully displaying the brand new RTX 4070 FE. Beneath the card are the new standard 16 PIN (12VHPWR) PCIe connector and an installation guide with a QR code to visit Nvidia’s website for more guides and information if needed.

The Card

The RTX 4070 FE is a small dual-fan graphics card with classic RTX aesthetics that are still refined and look great. The logo sadly does not light up on the RTX 4070 FE so that is one downside of its lower price range.

For comparison here are some photos of our 4070 Ti:

The IO panel connectors are 3 DisplayPorts and 1 HDMI connection.

Inside the case

The RTX 4070 FE looks subtle and classic inside a case. I would personally love to build an SFF PC using this card. It is the perfect size offering a powerful small gaming rig at a reasonable price compared to the sky-high prices we have seen these last few years. We like that it is small and discrete but some may not like the unlit logo

Next is our testing configuration, methodology, and more.

Test Configuration

Benching Methodology

Test Configuration – Hardware

12th Gen Intel Core i7-12700K (Hyper-Threading/Turbo boost on; stock settings)
ASUS PRIME Z690-P D4 motherboard (Intel Z690 chipset, v.1008 BIOS)
CORSAIR Vengeance RGB PRO 32GB DDR4 (2×16GB, dual-channel at 3600 MHz XMP)
RTX 4070 FE 12GB, stock clocks; supplied by Nvidia
ASUS TUF GAMING GeForce RTX 4070 Ti OC Edition 12GB, stock clocks; supplied by Nvidia
RTX 3080 FE 10GB, stock clocks
RTX 3070 FE, stock clocks
1 x TeamGroup 1 TB NVMe M.2 SSD
2 x WD Blue 1TB SATA SSD
Corsair RM850x, 850W 80PLUS Gold power supply unit
ALIENWARE 34″ CURVED QD-OLED GAMING MONITOR – AW3423DWF

Test Configuration – Software

NVIDIA GeForce 531.42 game-ready press drivers; ‘Prefer maximum performance’ (on a per-game profile basis); Shader Cache Size ‘Unlimited’ (globally); fixed refresh rate (globally).
We enable Resizable BAR
‘V-Sync application controlled’ in the control panel; V-Sync off in-game.
We note and specify the main in-game display, graphics, AA, and scaling settings in the performance summary charts.
Windows 11 64-bit Pro edition, latest updates v22H2, High-performance power plan, HAGS & Game Mode are enabled, Game DVR & Game Bar features off, Control Flow Guard (CFG) off on a per-game basis, Hypervisor and Virtualization-based security are disabled.
We do not install ASUS tools.
Latest DirectX
All games are patched to their latest versions at the time of publication.
3DMark suite, the latest version
RivaTuner Statistics Server (RTSS), the latest version
FrameView, the latest version
Display Driver Uninstaller (DDU), the latest version; always uninstall drivers using DDU in safe mode, clean, and restart.
ISLC (Purge Standby List) before each benchmark.

GeForce Driver Suite-related

We use DCH Game Ready drivers.
The display driver is installed.
We install the latest version of PhysX.

Hybrid & Non-Synthetic Tests-related

Single run per test.

Game Benchmarks-related

We use the corresponding built-in or custom benchmark sequence.

Frametimes Capture

We use FrameView for capturing frame times and analyzing the relevant performance numbers obtained from each recorded built-in or custom benchmark sequence.

Benchmark Suite:

PC Games

DX11 Games

Total War: Warhammer III (DX11)

DX12 Games

Chernoblyte (DX12)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (DX12)
Cyberpunk 2077 (DX12)
F1 2022 (DX12)
Far Cry 6 (DX12)
Resident Evil 4 (DX12)
Red Dead Redemption 2(DX12)
Horizon Zero Dawn (DX12)
Metro Exodus PC Enhanced Edition (DX12)
Dirt 5 (DX 12)

Vulkan Games

DOOM Eternal (VK)

**Hybrid Tests (3DMark)**

DLSS Feature Test
Fire Strike Extreme
Fire Strike Ultra
Time Spy
Time Spy Extreme

Nvidia Control Panel settings

Here are the global Nvidia Control Panel settings:

NVIDIA Control Panel Global 3D Settings (RTX 4070 FE & all cards tested).

Noise, Temperatures, and Power Consumption

Unfortunately, we did not have time to check out the overclocking potential, but temperatures were controlled and the RTX 4070 runs very cool.

The RTX 4070 FE is quiet, and its fans never spin up at idle, even under a heavy or full load to be irritating or noticeable. When gaming it spins up to full often under very heavy loads – like Metro Exodus with all features turned on. It is as silent as the RTX 4070 Ti we tested previously.

Below is our thermal and approximate power consumption analysis on idle (Windows desktop, no user interactions.

Idle conditions

We ran into issues testing under load (our PSU died during near the end of our testing) but throughout our testing overall, the GPU was very efficient and in-line with our expectations. There is no heater meme to be found here.

Nvidia Performance Graphs and information

The biggest selling point for the RTX 4070 FE at $599 has to be DLSS 3. This is a gigantic leap – while some purists may not like frame generation – the performance increase and quality retention is simply stunning. On our QD-OLED display, we could barely see any image quality differences but performance increased dramatically. BTR plans on doing a full DLSS 3 gaming suite test in the near future.

In our testing, the RTX 4070 FE with DLSS 3 is almost 3 times faster than the RTX 2070 Super and it nearly doubles the performance of the RTX 3070 Ti while using less power.

Let’s head to the performance charts to compare the graphics performance of the RTX 4070 FE.

Gaming Performance Charts

Main Performance Gaming Summary Charts

Here are BTR’s summary charts of 19 games, six hybrid, and three non-synthetic tests. We note and specify the main in-game display, graphics, AA, and scaling settings on the performance summary charts below. The benches were run at 3440×1440.

4070 by Mario Vasquez

Game	RTX 3070	RTX 3080	RTX 4070	RTX 4071 Ti
Shadow of the Tomb Raider	115	157	159	197
Forza Horizon 5	94	113	125	153
Forza Horizon 5 + DLSS 2 Quality	99	116	128	152
Forza Horizon 5 + DLSS 3 Quality	0	0	161	192
Cyberpunk 2077	68	89	81	103
Cyberpunk 2077 + DLSS 2 Quality	49	63	62	84
Cyberpunk 2077 + DLSS 3 Quality + RT			117	146
Chernoblyte Ultra + RT + DLSS	56	118	121	152
Chernoblyte Ultra + RT	33	62	61	76
F1 2022 Ultra + RT	49	53	56	84
F1 2022 Ultra + RT + DLSS 2/ 3	81	88	108	157
Resident Evil 4 Ultra	77	97	101	131
Resident Evil 4 Ultra + RT	73	92	94	116
RDR2 – Ultra	71	83	87	103
RDR2 – Ultra + DLSS	83	99	102	138
Dirt 5 Ultra + RT Vehicle Shadows	80	101	98	120
Call of Duty: MW2 Extreme + DLSS	96	121	124	142
Doom E. Ultra N. + RT Off + DLSS Quality	205	247	266	321

FireStrike Graphics Score:
3070: 16807
4070: 21121
Timespy Graphics Score:
3070: 6611
4070: 17881
4070Ti: 22467
Averaged Framerates & Relative GPU Performance

Averaged Game Framerates

We averaged the aggregated FPS of all games and testing scenarios, and we represented the total game average FPS for each tested graphics card by the following chart:

RTX 3070	RTX 3080	RTX 4070	RTX 4071 Ti
78.1	99.9	113.9	142.61

On average, the RTX 4070 is faster than the RTX 3080 at 3340×1440. However, owners of this card can likely hold off on an upgrade unless they want lower power consumption, DLSS 3, and better ray tracing performance at a reasonable price. DLSS 3 is a game-changer for the games that have it. For games that do not and that are on DLSS 2 the RTX 3080 loses narrowly or wins in some older games in rare cases.

The 4070 Ti is a clear improvement but at a significantly higher buy-in price. In comparison to the rest of the 40 series lineup, the RTX 4070’s performance is unmatched for budget/value gamers.

Final Thoughts & Verdict

This has been an enjoyable exploration evaluating the new RTX 4070 FE. Overall, it is the best 40 series value for your money if the current adoption rate of DLSS and DLSS 3 continues. The performance gain is stunning. Without this technology, we can compare the RTX 4070 to the RTX 3080 from the previous generation with very distinct differences. Nvidia has improved performance with supplemental tech like DLSS 3, the architecture, cooling, and most of all, the pricing.

The RTX 4070 is compact and amazingly efficient compared to the RTX 30 series and its 40 series brothers. The idle fan stop is huge for us, and support for AV1 encoding is stellar for a lot of streamers at this price.

The RTX 4070 performed above the RTX 3080 in most cases and well above the RTX RTX 3070. The gap widened significantly with frame generation/DLSS 3 – So much so that this is a no-brainer. However, this is not a “wow” with the raster performance jump over the previous generation. Instead, the RTX 4070 is more efficient, more compact, and has much better features especially if you are still on a 10-series card. This is a worthy point in time with a card that is finally available at a reasonable price as a poster child for the generational leaps Nvidia is making with its technology and DLSS 3.

There is no early adopter woe here as there are many AAA titles to enjoy – right now – with DLSS 3 enabled, unlike with ray tracing at its launch. However, If DLSS 3 means little to you, we would hesitate to recommend upgrading from an RTX 3080 to an RTX 4070. However, the RTX 3070 user base will see enough significant performance gains to be able to make this a worthwhile consideration.

For a couple hundred dollars more you could buy an RTX 4070 Ti or a current AMD offering – but there is no card currently in this class and price that comes close to competing. The value of your dollar here will make any gamer happy. Especially at 1080p and 1440p, this card is a beast ready to serve your needs.

We do implore you to look at our upcoming DLSS 3 comparison of the current generation. This technology is finally allowing Nvidia to realize the dream that has been ray tracing. We can now maintain great performance while having the full suite of RTX features on an mid-level card. Safe to say, we give the RTX 4070 Founders Edition our Editor’s Choice award.

–Happy gaming! Per Audacia Ad Astra. Rest in Peace to Lance Reddick – our Commander Zavala.

RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC Edition Review

Rodrigo González — Wed, 04 Jan 2023 22:53:15 +0000

The $849.99 TUF GAMING RTX 4070 Ti OC Edition Gaming Performance

We recently received an ASUS TUF GAMING RTX 4070 Ti OC Edition 12GB from Nvidia and we have been testing it for the past ten days by using 19 PC games plus hybrid and non-synthetic benchmarks. This time, there will be no production nor distribution of Founder Edition models for its RTX 4070 Ti GPU (AD104) by Nvidia, and AIBs will be the only ones assembling and distributing custom models of this Ada Lovelace GPU. Although these GPUs arrive with multiple new features, including DLSS 3, this review will focus mainly on testing raw performance, not upscaling.

Our Plan

Nvidia touted the RTX 4070 Ti as a card delivering an outstanding efficient performance that can be up to 3x faster than the RTX 3090 Ti in specific games which offers a tremendous upgrade for GTX 1080 Ti or RTX 2080 users. Although for this review, we have not been able to use those same Pascal, Turing, and Ampere GPUs, we have been able to compare our RTX 4070 Ti versus an RTX 3080 (Ampere micro-architecture, 2nd RTX generation) and RTX 2080 Ti (Turing micro-architecture, 1st RTX generation).

We think comparing the RTX 4070 Ti’s performance against two iconic cards from Nvidia’s previous two RTX generations of GPUs may be worth it for Turing or Ampere users considering an upgrade to Ada Lovelace.

The RTX 4070 Ti features 7680 CUDA Cores, 40 Shader TFLOPS, 93 RT-TFLOPS, 641 Tensor FLOPS, and 12GB of GDDR6X memory, so we will see how it performs and compare with raster games and ray-tracing/DLSS games. We will focus on RTX 4070 Ti raw performance as well as consider whether the new RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC Edition at $850 delivers a good value as an upgrade from the RTX 3080 that launched at $700 MSRP two years ago and from the RTX 2080 Ti which launched at $1000 MSRP four years ago.

Features & Specifications

Key Features from ASUS

Dedicated 3rd generation ray tracing cores (60)
Dedicated 4th generation Tensor cores (240)
NVIDIA DLSS 3 support
Game Ready and Nvidia Studio drivers
Nvidia GeForce Experience
Nvidia Broadcast
Nvidia G-Sync
Nvidia GPU Boost
PCI Express Gen 4
Microsoft DirectX 12 Ultimate support
Support for Vulkan RT APIs, Vulkan 1.3, and OpenGL 4.6
HDCP 2.3 support
DisplayPort 1.4a support: up to 4K at 240Hz or 8K at 60Hz with DSC, HDR
HDMI 2.1a support: up to 4K 240Hz or 8K 60Hz with DSC, Gaming VRR, HDR

Specifications

Nvidia’s MSRP price for RTX 4070 Ti GPUs is $799, and ASUS’s price for the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC Edition is $849.99. This is approximately $50 over Nvidia’s MSRP price for a quality well-cooled tri-fan custom model with a factory GPU overclock of 120 MHz over the Nvidia reference 2610MHz boost clock.

Graphics Card Information provided by GPU-Z (Performance VBIOS mode).

According to GPU-Z, the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC has the same default GPU clock of 2310MHz and boost GPU clock of 2730MHz – 120MHz higher than the reference – using both VBIOS modes, so the only difference between VBIOS modes is the fan curve.

We will show GPU-Z data and test the card using the Performance VBIOS mode only, as the factory overclock doesn’t change between VBIOS modes, and the card is silent under full-load when in Performance Mode, so it is not worth having higher GPU temperatures with slightly worse performance.

Below is the advanced general information on the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC reported by the GPU-Z tool.

Advanced General Information, provided by GPU-Z (Performance VBIOS mode).

NVIDIA BIOS Information, provided by GPU-Z (Performance VBIOS Mode)

As you can see from the GPU-Z screenshots above, you can even increase both power and temperature limits to some degree, so there is still some room for GPU overclocking, but not very high or extreme, at least without taking other risky modding procedures.

The Test Bed

We benchmark with CapFrameX and FrameView tools on a recent install of Windows 11 Pro Edition 22H2, at 2560×1440 and 3840×2160, using an Intel Core i9-12900K with stock clocks and 32GB of T-FORCE XTREEM ARGB WHITE DDR4 3600MHz memory on an ASUS PRIME Z690-P D4 motherboard. All games and benchmarks are the latest versions, and we use the latest GeForce Game-Ready 527.62 press drivers for games and hybrid and non-synthetic tests. The games tested, display driver, settings, and hardware are identical except for the GPUs we compare.

Let’s see the unboxing and take a closer look at this graphics card.

A Closer Look at the ASUS TUF GAMING RTX 4070 Ti OC Edition 12GB

Packaging

The box cover highlights the graphics card image, adding the TUF GAMING logo, the GeForce RTX GPU name, and references to AURA SYNC, OC Edition, 12GB of GDDR6X memory, and DLSS3, ray tracing, Reflex, and Studio.

The back of the case touts the strengths of this model in terms of cooling, durability, aesthetics, and ASUS software. It also includes a list of key features like its dedicated ray tracing and tensor cores, PCI-E Gen 4, Display Port 1.4a, HDMI 2.1a, and HDCP 2.3, and support for DirectX 12 Ultimate, DLSS 3, and G-Sync.

However, on the back of the box, there is no mention of the minimum system requirements. Only a QR code that leads to a table of recommended PSUs is added. The minimum system requirements are only shown on one lateral side of the cover and only mention the need for a 1*16-pin supplementary power connector.

Accessories

We open the box and note there are parts for a card stand. The card stand is height adjustable, and its thinner upper part can also be separated and become a small screwdriver for card disassembling purposes. Also, the card stand has a rubber band at one end, and the support base has a magnet to fix the card stand inside the chassis.

ASUS includes a PCIe Gen5 power cable adapter to two PCI-E 8-pin cables to connect the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC to most PSUs. While the power connector adapter requires two Molex wires from the PSU to operate, newer PSUs may offer the new PCIe Gen5 single cable connector instead of massive double cabling. They also include a Velcro cable management strap with TUF GAMING branding.

Above, you can see the card stand fully assembled. Some may not feel the need to use the card stand, given how relatively heavy the 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC is. However, for safety and given the little volume it occupies inside the case, we think it is a worthwhile addition.

Also, you will find a small detachable black cardboard box, which includes the quick start guide, the warranty card, the certificate of reliability, the graphics card holder manual, an ASUS promotional detachable cardboard holder for your mobile phone, and a collectible card advertising this model.

The Card

The RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC is a large tri-fan and three-slot graphics card with sober aesthetics and solid and quality design.

Turning it over, we see a sturdy metal backplate featuring the TUF and GeForce RTX logos and branding.

Heat pipes and heatsink fins cover the entire PCB, and there is a switch to choose between the Performance and Quiet VBIOS modes. We didn’t bother using the Quiet VBIOS mode as the card is silent anyway, and the factory overclock is the same, but it is good to have in case a flash procedure fails.

The IO panel connectors are 3 DisplayPorts and 2 HDMI connections.

Below is the other card end.

Plugged in & Inside the case

The RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC looks beautiful inside a case. We liked that only the TUF logo has RGB lighting to match our RGB-lite gaming rig.

The specifications look promising, and the card, itself, looks solid and quality.

Next is our testing configuration, methodology, and more.

Test Configuration

Benching Methodology

Test Configuration – Hardware

12th Gen Intel Core i9-12900K (Hyper-Threading/Turbo boost on; stock settings)
ASUS PRIME Z690-P D4 motherboard (Intel Z690 chipset, v.1008 BIOS)
T-FORCE XTREEM ARGB WHITE 32GB DDR4 (2×16GB, dual-channel at 3600 MHz CL14 XMP), supplied by TeamGroup
ASUS TUF GAMING GeForce RTX 4070 Ti OC Edition 12GB, stock clocks; supplied by Nvidia
Gigabyte AORUS GeForce RTX 3080 MASTER 10GB (rev. 1.0); v.F4 VBIOS, stock clocks
EVGA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti BLACK EDITION GAMING 11GB, stock clocks
1 x Samsung 500GB SSD 960 EVO NVMe M.2
2 x WD Blue 1TB SATA SSD
1 x TeamGroup MP33 M.2 PCIe 1TB SSD
Corsair RM850x, 850W 80PLUS Gold power supply unit
ASUS TUF Gaming VG289Q 28? IPS UltraHD (3840×2160) 60Hz 5ms FreeSync Monitor for testing games at 2160p resolution.
ASUS ROG Swift PG279Q 27? IPS QuadHD (2560 x 1440) 165Hz 4ms G-Sync Monitor for testing games at 1440p resolution.

Test Configuration – Software

NVIDIA GeForce 527.62 press drivers; ‘Prefer maximum performance’ (on a per-game profile basis); Shader Cache Size ‘Unlimited’ (globally); fixed refresh rate (globally).
We enable Resizable BAR (disabled with RTX 2080 Ti due to the lack of full support).
‘V-Sync application controlled’ in the control panel; V-Sync off in-game.
We note and specify the main in-game display, graphics, AA, and scaling settings in the performance summary charts.
Windows 11 64-bit Pro edition, latest updates v22H2, High-performance power plan, HAGS & Game Mode are enabled, Game DVR & Game Bar features off, Control Flow Guard (CFG) off on a per-game basis, Hypervisor and Virtualization-based security are disabled.
We do not install GIGABYTE or ASUS tools.
Latest DirectX
All 19 games are patched to their latest versions at the time of publication.
3DMark suite and UNIGINE Superposition benchmark, the latest version
Basemark GPU benchmark, v.1.2.3
UNIGINE Superposition, v.1.1
CapFrameX (CX), the latest version
RivaTuner Statistics Server (RTSS), the latest version
FrameView, the latest version
Display Driver Uninstaller (DDU), the latest version; always uninstall drivers using DDU in safe mode, clean, and restart.
ISLC (Purge Standby List) before each benchmark.

GeForce Driver Suite-related

We use DCH Game Ready drivers.
The display driver is installed.
We install the latest version of PhysX.

Hybrid & Non-Synthetic Tests-related

Single run per test.

Game Benchmarks-related

We use the corresponding built-in or custom benchmark sequence.

Frametimes Capture & Analysis tool-related

We use CapFrameX for capturing frametimes and analyzing the relevant performance numbers obtained from each recorded built-in or custom benchmark sequence.
We use FrameView for capturing purposes only when DLSS 3 is enabled for maximum reliability.
We always perform consecutive runs until detecting three usable runs (no outliers) that can be aggregated by CapFrameX using the following method:
- Aggregate excluding outliers:
  - Outlier metric: Third, P0.2 (0.2% FPS percentile).
  - Outlier percentage: 3% (the % the FPS of an entry can differ from the median of all entries before counting as an outlier).
We compare and evaluate the results and aggregated records in terms of percentages of gain/loss and set the following thresholds to consider a % value as significant (not within the margin of error) for our benchmarking purposes:
- Score/Avg FPS > 3% when valuing hybrid and non-synthetic benchmarks;
- Avg FPS > 3% when evaluating raw performance.

Benchmark Suite: 19 Games, 6 Hybrid & 3 Non-Synthetic Tests

PC Games

DX11 Games

Days Gone (DX11)
God of War (DX11)
Total War: Warhammer III (DX11)

DX12 Games

A Plague Tale: Requiem (DX12)
Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla (DX12)
Call of Duty: Vanguard (DX12)
Cyberpunk 2077 v.1.61 (DX12)
F1 2021 (DX12)
Far Cry 6 (DX12)
Forza Horizon 5 (DX12)
Hitman 3 (DX12)
Horizon Zero Dawn (DX12)
Metro Exodus PC Enhanced Edition (DX12)
Spider-Man: Remastered (DX12)
The Callisto Protocol (DX12)
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt v.4.00 (DX12)

Vulkan Games

DOOM Eternal (VK)
Quake 2 RTX (VK; v.1.6.0)
Wolfenstein: Youngblood (VK)

Synthetic Tests

AIDA64 GPGPU benchmarks
Blender 3.4.0 benchmark
Geekbench 5
Sandra 2021 GPGPU Benchmarks

**Hybrid Tests (3DMark)**

DirectX Raytracing feature test
Fire Strike Extreme
Fire Strike Ultra
Port Royal
Time Spy
Time Spy Extreme

Non-Synthetic Tests

Basemark GPU
GPUScore: Relic of Life
UNIGINE Superposition

NVIDIA Control Panel settings

Here are the global NVIDIA Control Panel settings:

NVIDIA Control Panel Global 3D Settings (RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC & AORUS RTX 3080 MASTER).

NVIDIA Control Panel Global 3D Settings (EVGA RTX 2080 Ti Black).

Noise, Temperatures, and Power Consumption

Unfortunately, we did not have time to check out the overclocking potential, but temperatures were slightly higher than the AORUS RTX 3080 MASTER. So BTR plans to follow this review up with a VR review – conducted by Mark Poppin, BTR’s PC VR specialist – and an overclocking and creative and pro apps performance analysis – done by the author of the current article.

The RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC is quiet, and its fans never spin up, even under a heavy or full load, to be irritating or noticeable. It is as silent as the AORUS RTX 3080 MASTER. This model also supports a 0RPM fan mode on idle or light load conditions.

This card is factory clocked 120MHz higher than the reference version at 2610MHz using both BIOS modes. According to its specifications, the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC boost can clock up to 2730MHz out of the box. From our testing, we generally see it boosting even higher and typically settling in 2820MHz with peaks above 2850MHz under full or heavy load conditions.

Below is our thermal and approximate power consumption analysis on idle (Windows desktop, no user interactions) and full-load (UNIGINE Superposition Stress Test, 2160p resolution, highest settings, 10 minutes).

Idle conditions

Idle temperatures & power consumption metrics, provided by GPU-Z (Performance VBIOS mode)

On idle conditions, we see a maximum GPU clock of 210MHz, a Memory Clock of 50.6MHz max, a GPU temperature of 23 Celsius degrees (room temp at 19 Celsius degrees) max, an average board power draw of approximately 9.0W, average power consumption of 3%, and a maximum GPU voltage of 0.88V.

Full-load conditions

Full-load temperatures & power consumption metrics, provided by GPU-Z (Performance VBIOS mode)

Under full-load conditions, the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC peaked at a maximum clock of 2880MHz, but after some minutes running the Superposition stress test, it slowed down progressively, step by step, and stabilized at 2820MHz when GPU temp stays in the mid-60s C. Also, the maximum memory clock was 1312.7MHz, the GPU peaked at 65.50 Celsius degrees max (room temp at 21 Celsius degrees), the approximate board power draw was 272.8W max, a maximum power consumption peak of 95.7%, and the GPU voltage reached a maximum of 1.10V.

Finally, the reported PerfCap reason (performance limited by different factors) during our full-load GPU stress test was either the intended VBIOS power or reliability limits.

So taking into account all the above, we consider that our ASUS TUF GAMING RTX 4070 Ti OC Edition sample works great and as intended in terms of frequencies, noise level, temperature, and power consumption. Overall the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC is quiet, well-cooled, and power efficient.

Let’s head to the performance charts to compare the graphics performance of the RTX 4070 Ti TUF GAMING OC with two other graphics cards; an RTX 3080, based on the Ampere architecture, and an RTX 2080 Ti, based on the Turing architecture.