Bloober Team has now lifted the review embargo for its new third-person survival horror game, Cronos: The New Dawn. The game runs on Unreal Engine 5 and supports both Ray Tracing and DLSS 4. As such, we decided to test those features first before doing our full PC performance review.
For these Ray Tracing and DLSS 4 benchmarks, I used an AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D, 32GB of DDR5 at 6000Mhz, and NVIDIA’s RTX 5090. I also used Windows 10 64-bit, and the GeForce 581.15 driver.
Cronos: The New Dawn does not feature a built-in benchmark tool. So, for our tests, I used the first building you find in the game. From what I could see, this was one of the most demanding areas early in the game. So, it should give us a pretty good idea of how the rest of it runs.
Cronos: The New Dawn takes advantage of Software Lumen by default. Once you enable its Ray Tracing setting, the game switches to Hardware Lumen. This is similar to what we saw in Silent Hill 2 Remake. Thus, you’ll get higher quality AO and reflections.
At Native 4K/Max Settings with Ray Tracing, the NVIDIA RTX 5090 pushes a minimum of 33FPS and an average of 36FPS. For comparison purposes, the same GPU pushes 50-54FPS at Native 4K/Max Settings without Ray Tracing.
By enabling DLSS 4 Quality, we were able to get to a VRR territory. In other words, our framerates were between 55FPS and 59FPS. Then, by enabling Frame Gen, we were able to get to 100FPS. For most gamers, this will be the best way to play the game. Owners of an RTX-50 series GPU can also use MFG X3 and X4. With MFG X3, we got to 138-154FPS. Then, with MFG X4, we went over 175FPS at all times.
The DLSS 4 MFG implementation is quite good. Since this is a slow-paced game, you won’t notice a lot of visual artifacts. I was able to create numerous artifacts by moving the camera as quickly as possible. However, you won’t be moving the camera as wildly as I did in the following screenshots. To be honest, MFG looks fine here. It’s not among the best implementations I’ve seen, but it’s also not among the worst. Personally, I believe the best option is MFG X3 as it can provide a smooth gaming experience with minimal visual artifacts.
For those wondering, I did not experience any major input latency issues. Let’s not forget that the base game was running with 55-59FPS. Not only that, but this is a slow-paced game. So, if you own a high-end RTX-50 series GPU, you will be able to enjoy MFG X3 and MFG X4.
Our PC Performance Analysis will go live later this week. So, stay tuned for more!
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
Contact: Email