2020 is almost over and it’s time for our annual awards. So, today we are presenting the top 10 best PC games graphics of 2020. For this list, we are focusing purely on the most visually impressive PC games of 2020.
Do note that we are not focusing on a game’s overall optimization. In other words, the following games looked absolutely amazing on the PC, no matter how they were running. And yes, some of them had (and still have) some optimization issues.
So, without further ado, here are the top 10 best PC games graphics of 2020.
Top 10 Best PC Games Graphics of 2020
10) Godfall
Godfall is a next-gen game that recently came out on PS5 and PC. And, graphics-wise, it looks gorgeous. While this game does not take advantage of Ray Tracing, it can push amazing visuals. There are a lot of reflective surfaces, a lot of particles effects, and some truly amazing lighting effects. Furthermore, Counterplay Games has used a lot of high-resolution textures, making everything look crisp and sharp.
9) Mafia Definitive Edition
Mafia Definitive Edition was a pleasant surprise. Powered by the enhanced version of the Mafia 3 Engine, this Mafia Remake features great 3D models with some truly amazing facial expressions. Furthermore, its global illumination solution is stunning. To be honest, this is one of the best remakes we’ve seen to date. Everything looks on par with what you’d expect to see in a modern-day/current-gen game.
8) Resident Evil 3 Remake
Similar to last year’s Resident Evil 2 Remake, Resident Evil 3 Remake sports amazing graphics, and among the best we’ve seen in 2020. All of its characters are highly detailed, and there are some pretty huge explosions. The volumetric lighting effects are also great, and most of its textures are of high-quality. RE Engine is a beast and we can’t wait to see what Resident Evil 8: Village has in store for us.
7) Watch Dogs Legion
While Watch Dogs Legion does not scale that well on older hardware, it does push great graphics. This is easily the game with the best graphics from Ubisoft, as it tops Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Hyper Scape and Immortals Fenyx Rising. Watch Dogs Legion features a great lighting system, better NPCs, and a more lively city. On Ultra settings, the pop-ins of various objects are also minimal (and not as in your face as in Valhalla). Furthermore, it comes with some cool Ray Tracing reflections.
6) Horizon Zero Dawn
Horizon Zero Dawn is easily one of the most beautiful open-world games to date, and looks better than other open-world titles like Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. Guerrilla and Virtuos have used a lot of high-resolution textures in the PC version, and players can now interact with all foliage/grass. While the game had major issues on the PC at launch, Guerrilla Games was able to fix most – if not all – of them. Anisotropic Filtering works fine, there are proper snow deformation effects, and Aloy’s hair now animates correctly with high framerates.
5) Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War
Well, it comes as no surprise that Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is on this list. The game features highly detailed character models, and packs numerous modern-day graphical effects. Most objects cast dynamic shadows, and there are some cool scripted events with great explosions. Beenox has also added some cool Ray Tracing effects for Sun Shadows, Local Shadows and Ambient Occlusion.
4) Doom Eternal
Powered by id Tech 6, Doom Eternal looks incredible on the PC. All of its enemies have more polygons and details than their counterparts in Doom 2016. Not only that, but the game can finally display more enemies on screen. Doom Eternal also features better and bigger levels, as well as more particles effects. Furthermore, id Software has used a lot of high-resolution textures, something that will please a lot of PC gamers out there. Players can also dismember enemies in glorious and gory ways. Doom Eternal looks and runs incredibly well, and deserves to be in the Top 5 of our list.
3) Death Stranding
Death Stranding features, undoubtedly, some of the best graphics we’ve ever seen on the PC. Kojima Productions has outdone itself, and we have to congratulate it for offering this kind of graphics in a game that can also run great on modern-day hardware. Mads Mikkelsen’s performance, in particular, is simply unbelievable in this title. You really need to see those facial animations. All characters look incredible, and the environments look stunning. Death Stranding is a graphical showcase on the PC.
2) Cyberpunk 2077
Cyberpunk 2077 has just been released on the PC and looks absolutely gorgeous. The game features highly detailed characters, and one of the best cities we’ve ever seen. CDPR was able to capture the sci-fi atmosphere of Blade Runner and Ghost in the Shell. Furthermore, the lighting system in Cyberpunk 2077 is amazing. The game does suffer from some issues (like pop-ins of objects and lights), which is why it could not top our next title. Still, and alongside its Ray Tracing effects, Cyberpunk 2077 is a game built for next-gen hardware.
1) Microsoft Flight Simulator
And, we’re pretty sure that most of you saw this coming a mile away. After all, we’ve shared a lot of screenshots and videos that showcase the truly next-gen graphics of Microsoft Flight Simulator. Everything, from the planes to the volumetric clouds and the amazing weather effects, is exceptional in this game. Ironically, this game does not use any next-gen graphical features like Ray Tracing, Variable Rate Shading, or a newer API like DX12/Vulkan. And despite that, Microsoft Flight Simulator is the most visually impressive game of 2020 on all platforms.
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
Great list.
doom eternal lighting was downgraded from quakecon not top 3
Idk about doom but solid list
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla better than Horizon Zero Dawn
Watch Dogs Legion really deserves de fourth or third spot, the city and NPC quality is mind blowing.
Also, Cold War doesn’t deserve a place on this list. Looks like a step back from Modern Warfare, with OK aesthetics and the return of the ice skating animations
No love for Half-Life Alyx?
If this game got no vr option everybody is going to talk about for years to come. outherwise 2 years or 3 from now is going to be forgotten. Downvote me.
OK.
Have you tried VR yet or had stuck your phone VR experience?
No one here talk about VR experience, Read my comment again.
I remember talking to you in March about VR and you said you had limited experience correct?
Dude i don’t wanna talk about VR. Just forget about.
Try a VR games list. This one is for desktop PC games.
I’ve played … 1 of these games. The rest I’ve left to be cooked in the oven some more.
Interesting.
I notice that 8 out of these 10 games have abysmal gameplay.
No wonder I barely play big games anymore, and I prefer 2D indie games.
Retro games are the real games.
Lmao what a double poser, that is, posing as a real GAMER!1! and as a woman.
This guy admitted to playing under 3 hours of games per week and he calls himself a gamer lol. Grandmas play more Candy Crush than that.
Those israeli hormone blockers ain’t gonna paid for themselves you know? lmao.
Speaking of which, do you like your new vagina?
You told me you tried gang bang + b**kake last week in Skid Row.
How did it go?
Pictures! Pictures! Pictures! ?
wtf?
i love dis website *.*
Nice bait. 7/10
I think you’re mistaken me for somebody else, sandnigg*.
Nah it’s you wh*re. Shut your filthy mouth.
I think I missed something here.
What’s your problem exactly?
And do you have anything relevant to say?
Lmao STFU.
Oh look, another 40 year old virgin who hates all women. How original.
You are def. not a woman.
lol…
Is that really the problem?
Hmmmm how can I prove it ?
I feel like it’s a bait so that I post pictures, as usual…
I highly doubt it too. No offense Delphine.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/db43781be8ee3488ff1be7da82c5576aaa396447eee7ba39ab3e1443cd59a671.jpg
hello john is there a giveaway this year
and about the list cant say anything well done
HL Alyx? AC Valhalla? Ori WOTW? Ghostrunner?
Subjective thread but games from 2017 shouldn’t even be listed here. Horizon looks and runs worse than Witcher 3 from 2015.
HL Alyx deserves a spot imo. The rest not so much.
Seriously it wouldn’t matter what was in this list, you would of complained anyway!
It’s a good list but not good enough. Also Godfall deserves #1 spot in this place. I pirated it and it beats everything here (visually of course). https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1c90b0e3d24ad3ddeacc53490fd8a601370fab6ad93957dbc004012d7a41d5a1.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/cca37aac2a5ab38b0d0ecb6f451b79e19b1c9b9922cfd726f8d7387366fd8adf.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c57645ce04e71a92cdd67bd36aafd0a96cc9580920a82c64089304948d092e39.png https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/350161d6725c576ed406dcb62c130e89a017b57739f0346be34f7b18ac7e2bf0.png
Godfall has horrible visual design though. You can’t see sh*t with the visual design
It looks alright, but not all that impressive compared to big open worlds like MS Flight Sim.
Go play Cyberpunk on a PC maxed out and tell me Godfall looks the best lol.
God, it looks so generic it makes me wanna puke!
Easily the most unimaginable AAA title to date
Hmm that is kinda harsh, the graphics were the best thing about the “game”.
So posting one’s own thoughts or opinion about any Game’s graphics is now called as “complaining” ? get a life dude !
Hzd runs perfectly fine with a 2020 rig morron.
I got 120 fps locked in 1440P every single thing in ultra + reshade.
And 60 FPS in ultra 4K + HDR, just return stealing for a better rig romanian gypsy ))
https://ibb.co/DLzhcWD
https://ibb.co/fN0jhzg
https://ibb.co/RTTv3zt
https://ibb.co/R7wMN3Y
Ac Valhalla is a copy paste of a 2017 game.
1440p120?
And what is a “2020” rig.
I can’t get 1080p120 with a 5700 XT, lol.
5700XT is 2019.
You can get 120 fps at 1440p with a 3080.
On a 2017 PS4 game your statement sounds more like a joke to be honest, no offense
My statement sounds like a joke? Why, what do you mean? I just said that RTX 3080 (a “2020” card) will get you 120 fps at 1440p. Where am I wrong?
A 2017 console title should run on 4K 120 fps easily with such a card, especially when you see how dated are some of visual elements, i thought you were defending it, if you just had the intention to give an information so my bad
Only with DLSS on Performance or Ultra Performances maybe, and that without RT.
Easy to find out, my friend, if you have a computer and access to the Internet. I just checked out benchmarks on several websites, and the results vary (different CPUs) between 117 and 125 average fps. All benchmarks with DLSS off (and RT off, of course).
As for your 5700 XT, even though it was launched last year, its performance is actually on par with my 1080 Ti, and I bought my card almost 4 years ago.
So here’s the thing. A 3080 is more or less twice of a 5700 XT.
And my 5700 XT CANNOT hold 1080p60 at max settings at native 100% rez scaling.
So no, without DLSS, a 3080 cannot achieved over twice the performance I’m getting AND at a higher resolution as well.
With the exception of the environments that look gorgeos for the most part, HZD is a an average looking game, dated human models/facial animations, and a standard lighting system, some stuff look really awful like the rivers and the non-robot animals, and while i agree AC Valhalla is a copy/paste of a 2017 game, HZD IS an actual 2017 game, that uses 75% of the mechanics of AC…
It also doesn’t justifie its requirements at all, Death Stranding is using the same engine, and it looks and runs far better, there is nothing to be proud of running a 2017 PS4 game with a 2020 rig
2017 PS4 game ran at locked 30, huge difference.
High end 2020 hardware is x10 more powerful than a PS4, huge difference too
Ghostrunner was dope as f*ck. People slept on that game when it’s amazing. Best swordplay ever in a game
Meh, Microsoft Flight Simulator looks good until you get close to the ground.
You wanted them to detail whole Earth???
You can’t exactly model air, so…
I expected textures that don’t look as flat as GTA: San Andreas.
1.2.3.4 very good, but Black Ops CW? really man? that pos of a dump looks worse than MW, even the Treyarch fanboys admitted. BOCW should be last.
For me: Doom Eternal, Half Life Alyx and Cyberpunk 2077.
Three great games
lol.
RE3 remake is an awful remake. They rushed it and it was obvious.
It was decent, but RE2 is better with better graphics and peformance.
Performance wasn’t bad in RE3, 3 hours of gameplay was.
It was for me, some serious hiccups on my end. Gameplay was the same as RE2, did you hate that one as well?
I liked RE 2 and RE 3 gameplay, RE 2 had a lot of it and didn’t erase like 4 hours of stuff. RE3 was rushed and Gene is right. It was obvious. They needed to pour onto the Village project half point in development imo.
A blind playthrough of RE3 cost me around 8 hours, and i kind of cheated with DLC stuff (key items already on my chest). After you know the game from the back of your hand, you can finish the game around 2-3 hours like the ancient RE titles.
I was done in 4:43 by checking the progress menu. Totally blind, no youtube or anything. I tend to be very speedy lately tho. Finished whole CP minus police encounters in like 40-45 hours.´, mid diff.
I guess i played too conservative with ammo.
Mafia:DE on 9th place…is this a joke right? Sure it has a glitch here and there, but it runs well, looks fantastic and has great mocap performance and voice acting.
Still manages to be worse than the original.
We are talking graphics here.
We do, still how can you be worse than 2001 game with a fracture of your budget? Only Hangar can achieve that.
It’s sad that Illusion dissolved. They were talented as heck. And I don’t talk about Vavra here btw.
cyberjoke on second place john? are you joking?
I think Assassins Creed Valhalla should have been on the list.
Excellent list!
Terrible list!
Denuvo got removed from Death Stranding thankfully.
Total BS Game list complied by an insult/JOKE of a Journalist, aka JOHN papa ! lol
Mafia definitive edition should be number 1. The quality of assets and lighting was just outstanding
First place totally deserved.
Where’s Yakuza 7 and Disaster Report 4 though?
Ghostrunner?
And I’m sure some racing & simulation games like TramSim and The Bus and Snowrunner have better max graphics than most games here.
Watch Dogs Legion? Are you kidding me?
Player and NPC models, look like saints raw. Absolute trash.
No love XD
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/hNXebih5vb3osgw2tcmCcj.jpg
Game of the year, every year.
Technically Crysis was always a tech demo, never a game.
Technically, you are wrong.
Disappointed that Alyx wasn’t on the list, it has the best visual feedback.
This is a PC games list, try one with VR games.
Alyx is a PC game. All the games on this list require a GPU at least to play, effectively making them PC games. You can’t just say ‘oh you need a VR headset so it’s not a PC game.’ I heard that people were balking at the fact they required a video card to get the best out of Quake 2, does that mean Quake 2 is not a PC game?
“All the games on this list require a GPU at least to play, effectively making them PC games.”
You stupid @ss, every game requires a GPU to run, what do you think those consoles are made of, pudim?
You must have never experimented with hardware from the early to late 90’s, where you had run games in software mode and it wasn’t a requirement to have a video card, until Quake 2 came along and it was a night and day difference
Aren’t you a genius? Games also need processor to run, if only people knew… s/
What I am getting at is that games and technology move forward hand-in-hand. Games have ultimately stagnated in the AAA market and while Indie games are a lot of fun, they aren’t ground breaking. Alyx on the other hand is a game-changing experience and I’m happy that I have experienced it in all of it’s glory.
If you wanna go the innovation route, boneworks is the better VR game.
Boneworks is innovated yes. But’s also clunky as hell to, with janky WMR support and wishy washy oculus bounding(I had a WMR headset and a CV1, so massive enthusiast here). I love both for different reasons. Alyx has polish and worthwhile story to tell with some breath taking set pieces that I can’t imagine being enthralled like I was if they were on a screen. Boneworks has the moment-to-moment experiences but has issues, but both are ground-breaking imo.
But you can’t play the game on a pc. With a mouse and a keyboard. Can you? Valve is trying to push hardware no one even wants and ignores millions of fans in the process.
Could Alyx be done as a non VR game? Of course. Why would Valve do it tho? They mocked their fanbase for 10 years, what’s a couple more?
You literally need PC components to play Half-Life Alyx, Recommended specs are a Ryzen 5 1600 and a RX 580 with 16GB of RAM. Just because it doesn’t need a mouse and keyboard doesn’t mean it isn’t a PC game. The Batman Asylum games pretty much required a controller, would you consider them PC games?
You clearly haven’t played Alyx if you think it can be done as VR game. There is a enemy in the game that requires you to throw items around the room and holding your breath to sneak past it, one of the most hair-raising experiences I never had when pancake gaming.
“There is a enemy in the game that requires you to throw items around the room and holding your breath to sneak past it”
So you needed to hold your breath in real time? Man, that explain so much, you deprived your brain of oxygen, those Valve devs are criminals…
No, you need to hold the controller up to your mouth so that Alyx can hold her breath. There are also masks in the area that can help in the short term.
Next time i gonna put the sarcasm tag… s/
“Pretty much required”. Could you play it on a keyboard and mouse? Easily. Can you play even Dark Souls on a k+b? Sure if you want to. Alyx is a VR REQUIRED game.
Sure, holding your breath gimmick changes your experience forever, just as me playing Farpoint on PS VR totally changed mine.
Kappa. I literally have two VR sets at home, and still won’t put gimmick on a pedestal.
But would you play those games with KB&M though? I wouldn’t and that’s why I have a Xbox controller to play those games. This is common sense, you want to play games optimally. Alyx is VR required due how game-changing it is, and if you never played VR then you’re missing out. You also don’t need to be rich, as you can pick up used VR headsets/Controller for 150 bucks if you want to play Alyx for 90% of experience for 25% of the price.
“This is common sense, you want to play games optimally.”
What if the optimal way to play these games is in not having to pay for hardware and upgrades. Don’t think you know other people priorities bro.
So play Cyberpunk 2077 on a FX-8130 and a GTX 750, but you can’t if you want to actually play it at a decent framerate. Looks like you need to pay for better hardware.. Do you get what I am saying? At some point you will need to upgrade hardware and you will need to pay for it.
This is actually a solid point, games nowadays requires too much hardware without having too much to show for it, CP is a great example with it’s braindead AI and lack of interactivity, but they somehow makes the game runs worse than GTA5.
Exactly, games have been stagnate for far too long and they used to be the drive for upgrading tech. I didn’t upgrade my CPU from 2011 until 2019 and my GPU from 2015 to 2019 as well. I upgraded my tech to start playing VR and I actually been wanting to upgrade again, even though it’s been only a year! I don’t feel excited for gaming in general unless it’s VR, it’s fantastic to feel that way again.
But I also can’t wait for game companies to f*k it up as well, like how Respawn did with MoH this week.
No, you want to play the games the way you want you to play and are glad when developers will allow you to.
I have nothing against people playing Souls games on K+B or dance pad if they want to. Let them, more power to them.
Agreed with fnd, stop apologizing for the lazy devs.
I think Souls games are actually superior on K+M, after playing several souls like games on this setup, i didn’t adapt too well playing Demon’s Souls on a pad.
I am gamepad conditioned, but defo think you might be right and might even try to play Elden Ring on a keyboard.
K+M will always be better at camera control, with the only exception being the first Dark Souls atrocious port.
That’s a f*king lie. I remember playing Chaos Theory on keyboard and mouse and it was awful compared to controller. Yakuza even recommends a Controller with a quote before the game starts “Real Yakuza play with Controllers.” Just because it’s optional doesn’t mean it’s the best way to play it, stop acting like devs need to kowtow to you.
You don’t seem to understand, I am not selfish, I want every Valve fan to be able to experience new HL game without the hardware paywall bullcrap.
Valve actually owes them a lot throughout the years. They just shown what they think about people who don’t want to hold their breath using a controller to feel like they just experienced a second coming of Christ.
“You don’t seem to understand, I am not selfish, I want every CD Projeckt Red fan to be able to experience CyberPunk 2077 game without the hardware paywall bullcrap.”
I don’t know why gamers act shock when game companies go full r**ard like CDPR did with C2077, the writing was on the wall with the same management from TW3. Valve legit couldn’t find a way to move the game industry forward with a Half-Life game, hence that’s why we haven’t seen one until this year. Hell they went through 4 Half-Life 3 prototypes before scrapping them because the felt similar to other games coming out at the same time.
Gamers are extremely hard to please and look at CP2077. The game is raw as f*k and people are pissed, the same people that were mad that the game was pushed back from May to November to December. Meanwhile the only people who are mad at Alyx are people who also say VR is stupid and they think it’s a gimmick, who are also the same people that is mad at CDPR. Imagine what gamers would if a Half-Life game came out and it wasn’t revolutionary?
“Gamers are extremely hard to please” They are? Judging by what they consume, they just want bug free experience, no matter the game is crap. See how Ass Creed copy paste is selling.
They are, because Valhalla actually lost 70% of returning players and in-game revenue is down. Just because a game sells well initially doesn’t mean it’s good or doesn’t have issues. Case in point: CP2077
This video alone show convince anyone with a brain how trash CP is:
https://www(dot)youtube(dot)com/watch?v=PsBrkLq31eM&lc=UgwNAvPFN9lKg8Sp2zp4AaABAg.9HDl85cF1oz9HQaG9nUBD7
From the games i played on the list (not all) here’s my rank:
1- Mafia
2- Doom E
3- RE3
The more realistic you make a game, the more people will notice the little details and that’s where CP fails, Rockstar devs gets it.
Go play San Andreas then, nothings stopping you.
lol I already watched yesterday a video proving that GTA V was better, but I didn’t expect somebody to dare to compare with San Andreas.
But all of his points are valid!
It seems that they definitely spent more time on making the characters ugly af instead of adding more gameplay mechanics!
“The ones I really respect are Resi 3 & Doom eternal. KUDOS to Capcom & Idtech. They just nailed the balance between performance and graphics.”
Agreed when it comes for Doom, but RE3 was downgraded from RE2 in some aspects and even then, peformance took a hit.
the best
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Beat cyberpunk the other day and still playing. Im at 90hours and still hooked on the game. The graphics are incredible.
Half-Life: Alyx
Doom Eternal
Cyberpunk
were best graphics for me. I played Mafia.. it looked good but I didn’t think it was mega wow. As for the comments.. LOL why do people get so triggered by lists? It’s just a personal opinion. Everybody has them. Whatever
Graphics in CP reminds me of pre-rendered PSx era games like RE2: Looks great, better than it’s 3d counterparts, but you can’t really interact with the scenery or even the camera.
When gamers say things like “graphics are incredible”, you always think about the rest, because no one talks about it.
Because there is not much to talk about it except memes like peanus type. And graphics are not even that great, GTA5 beats this game by a mile.
Hmm, I liked the city geometry with ultra and RTX On. Human animations and AI were terrible. Story was like some 10 year old polish student wrote it.
Overall I think the best thing about Cyberpunk was the marketing, they nailed it. Poor people ate it up.
The game is pretty to look at, but the game world is hollow, AI is on the level of PSX games like Driver, and interactivity and physics on PS2 level.
Agreed, expect even worse at places. Still they made nice money on it. Because guilible gamers will buy anything these days.
Short and spot on analysis of Cyberpunk 2077 which I wholeheartedly agree with
Last year bruh.
Glad to see Death Stranding making the list, it’s also good on the technical side as well, runs well on my entry level gaming laptop perfectly, and the gameplay is top quality.
Far Cry: New Dawn:
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/2a951b8dfda1ec947cb26d239f4831e0bbb1994423e5e502944e62dd9bc41d3b.jpg
Wrong, it’s powered by id Tech 7. I suggest to learn stuff before you write such articles.
Next,you should do Top 10 best nude mods in 2020,John…
Flight Simulator has amazing weather and cloud effects but to say it looks better than Cyberpunk is ridiculous. This game maxed on PC is, hands down, the best looking PC game ever made, period.