Focus Home Interactive has released its off-road trucking adventure, SnowRunner, on the PC via Epic Games Store. As such, it’s time to benchmark this new driving game and see how it performs on the PC platform.
For this PC Performance Analysis, we used an Intel i9 9900K with 16GB of DDR4 at 3600Mhz, AMD’s Radeon RX580 and RX Vega 64, NVIDIA’s RTX 2080Ti, GTX980Ti and GTX690. We also used Windows 10 64-bit, the GeForce driver 445.87 and the Radeon Software Adrenalin 2020 Edition 20.4.2 drivers. NVIDIA has not added any SLI profile for this game, meaning that our GTX690 performed similarly to a single GTX680.
Saber Interactive has added a respectable amount of graphics settings. PC gamers can adjust the quality of Terrain Draw Distance, Grass Density, Objects, Simulation, Shadows and Textures. There are also settings for Ambient Occlusion, Water, Volume Fog, Lightshafts and Mirrors. Additionally, gamers can adjust the quality of Anti-aliasing, and there are also FOV sliders.
SnowRunner does not come with a built-in benchmark tool. As such, we’ve decided the starting area which appeared to be the most demanding area of the game. And although SnowRunner uses DirectX 11 and does not take advantage of more than four CPU cores/threads, it does not require a high-end CPU.
In order to find out how the game scales on multiple CPU threads, we simulated a dual-core, a quad-core and a hexa-core CPU. Without Hyper Threading, our dual-core system was able to push an minimum of 50fps and average of 56fps at 1080p/Ultra settings. With Hyper Threading enabled, we were able to get a constant 60fps experience.
Unfortunately, and due to the DX11 API, our RTX2080Ti was used to its fullest at 1080p. Moreover, the performance on our older Intel i7 4930K was significantly slower. However, we were still able to get a constant 60fps experience, even on that system.
SnowRunner is a GPU-bound game on Ultra settings. The only GPUs that were able to run the game with 60fps at 1080p were the AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 and the RTX2080Ti. The GTX980Ti was unable to offer a smooth gaming experience.
At 2560×1440, the only GPU that was able to offer a constant 60fps experience was the RTX2080Ti. The AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 was able to offer a smooth experience, though we did notice some drops to 57fps. As for 4K, the only GPU that was able to run the game smoothly was the RTX2080Ti. Still, NVIDIA’s most powerful GPU had some minor drops to 53fps.
Graphics wise, SnowRunner looks stunning. Saber has used a lot of high quality textures, and the deformation effects look great. The lighting system also looks great, though it’s nowhere close to what other triple-A games offer. Still, its environments are well crafted and for the most part, the game looks amazing. While it’s not as technically advanced as Forza Horizon 4, SnowRunner is easily one of the best looking driving games.
In conclusion, and despite some optimization issues due to the DX11 API, SnowRunner runs great on the PC. Owners of older CPUs will not have any trouble at all running the game. However, PC gamers will need a somehow powerful GPU in order to max it out. Thankfully, SnowRunner is a looker on Ultra settings so it somehow justifies its GPU requirements.
Enjoy!
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.”
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what are exactly the settings ? some screenshots of the actual settings menu on games , may be helpful
cause we have no idea if did you use fxaa or msa or both …
i have a 2080TI with a 9900K oc and when i max out the game at 1440p i some areas in the first map fps can get even lower to 60fps
its not only the settings … its also the time of the day . during the night the game runs good . as soon as shadows start to pop up your fps will drop to half . ( if you dont use Vsync ) . i been playing this for too long … like …. i might be addicted … so help me some one …..
Ousama Bouassab if you want good FPS all the time just reduse the draw distance to low . it wont change in your game anyhing cuz you only see whats colse to you anyway … and you can put shadows to medium you wont notice the difference
hhhhh same here , the game is so buggy especialy in coop but i can’t stop playing
i play nothing but snowrunner since the day i bought it i m already at +130h
for now i just stoped msi afterburner so i don’t get frustrated with the fps counter 😀 but if things keeps stuttering i ll do like you said
Wheels or K+M?
Are you playing with wheels?
Nope. I have a wheel with Force feedback but i would not play all day with that sh.t. It would be ao hard pulling your sh.t out from the mud and going left right every second for 5 min xD xD
I might try when i finish the game. I am in Alaska and i did almoste half of the quest.
Oh, ok.
Was wondering cause I need to know how’s the support for wheels going on with this game.
Thanks anyway.
There are screenshots of the settings used :P. Anti-aliasing was set to TAA.
my bad sorry i didnt pay attention to it i skipped to the graphes
Eh, not out for PC yet… When it’s released for PC, I’ll give it a whirl.
It is on PC.
No it’s Not!!!
Is it out on Steam/GOG? Because I can’t find it.
No need to pay for this as Epic paid for you. Grab the free version.
Epic, make piracy great again.
So we just gonna skip the whole Pascal lineup of GPUs more importantly the 1080ti lol its like Nvidia tells sites not to include it since the damn card wont go away.
@JohnDio:disqus Did you test it with some wheels or just K+M? Cause I’m waiting for it to have a proper support for those. Ain’t no fun driving in such challenging environments using a keyboard.
Sorry, only tested it with K&M 🙁
I can’t believe these traitor (Focus Home Interactive) releasing this on Epic Game Trash Store, with all the sales they made on Steam with the 2 first games… Such a shame…
Same. 8700k with 1080ti running at 2560x1440p and it’s averaging 90-144 fps. Runs great.