Is my video card ok?Follow

well the game is designed for the highest end video cards. I have a Radion X300 which isnt spectacular but i have the X800 being delivered. It runs fine on the X300 on balanced settings, with just a little lag during big fight sequences. So i doubt that card u have will hold up. Not to mention your ram shortage. You need at least 500mb's more.

Saddly these folks here are correct. There isn't a single Intel (or S3, or Sis, etc.) integrated chipset that can do Vertex or Pixel Shading. I dont think any of them can even do Hardware Transform and Lighting properly (which is a related function).

If you plan on playing games like this, xKnightfallx and Sir Kastigir have the scoop: Get yourself more powerful video card with as much ram on it as you can afford.

One side note however: Buy an Nvidia GeForce of some sort and avoid the ATI Radeons. This isnt personal preference on my part (although I use a Geforce), but simply the fact that Sony and Nvidia worked together in the creation of the program.

Sony has flat out stated (in the installer splash screens, no less) that the Nvidia GeForce series of cards are the "Platform of Choice" for this game.

Somehow they did some further optimization for the GeForce cards beyond what was done for any ATI chipsets.

Ok, side note number II: Make sure you do not go for something like the GeForce MX series (such as the 'GeForce 4 MX 440'). These are stripped down versions of the chipset/card, and as far as I know, cannot do the Vertex or Pixel Shading needed. Aim for an FX card (the later releases were better than the early ones), a GeForce 4 Ti series card (a great choice despite the age, and my weapon of choice) or one of the new GeForce 6 cards (new and likely expensive).

Hope this helps.

Edited, Wed Nov 10 13:19:11 2004 by Rishaka

Just to clarify. Although Sony has stated the Nvidia cards are the "platform of choice", that is almost totally a MARKETING thing.

Nvidia has spent the last 3 years getting a TON of publishers to say this about their games. They have been spending lots of money getting publishers to put the Nvidia name and their splash screen on boxes and in games (respectively), but 90% of the time the ENTIRE arrangement is handled by the MARKETING DEPARTMENT of Nvidia. Yes, they do give the developers the newest cards and drivers to help them make the games compatible, but what they don't tell you is that ATI does the same thing as well with the drivers, and sometimes with the cards, even if they don't get their name on the game.

Not counting the 6800 and X800 series of cards, when comparing similarly priced cards about 70% of the time in "Nvidia" branded games the ATI card will be faster (This is primarily because ATI had one and a half generations of cards that $ for $ were just plain faster than Nvidia cards). Things are MUCH more even on the 6800 vs X800 front, about 50/50 across all games, and across Nvidia branded games as well.

Now I am NOT saying to buy ATI over Nvidia. I am saying please understand that just because the Nvidia marketing machine has gotten a publisher to say Nvidia is the preferred video chip does NOT mean that it is really the best one for that game. Sony may have done some tweaking specific to Nvidia cards, but considering ATI now has a larger share of the video card market than Nvidia Sony would be cutting their own throats not to put in top quality support for ATI cards as well.

Just so you know I am not biased, I bought Nvidia back when 3Dfx was king because I truly believed Nvidia would be king of the game soon. I then switch to ATI for 2 generations and now I am pretty much waiting on the next generation to see who will win out in the long run. Personally though I have an ATI X800XT-PE and it is plenty to run this game at some pretty high settings. I also have a Nvidia 6800 Ultra coming in the mail and will probably put that one in my primary PC and put the X800 in my wife's PC. Either way I expect both computers to smoke this game and any others that come out in the next year or so.

Edited, Wed Nov 10 18:38:58 2004 by arentolfourtwo

Yes the 6800's are out and not cheap. I believe there are 3 versions, plain, GT, and Ultra (havent seen to many of the plain). There is also the 6600 which is abit cheaper but looses a good amount of performance.

~BrightMorn