Battlefield V PC Performance Review

Conclusion

Battlefield V has left us with mixed feelings, with many issues and annoyances that could be addressed by patches before the games official launch on the 20th. As it stands right now, Battlefield V isn’t a finished product, and by this, we are not just referring to the game’s lack of DXR support and its lacklustre DirectX 12 implementation. It is also worth remembering that the game’s “Firestorm” Battle Royale Mode and its final “The Last Tiger” War Story isn’t available yet, leaving the game in a state that feels unfinished and in need of a few patches. 

DICE can be forgiven for releasing Battlefield V without DXR, after all, Microsoft has only just launched their Windows 10 October Update, preventing DXR from functioning, even with compliant hardware. That doesn’t move around that fact that Battlefield V’s DirectX 12 mode isn’t worth using in its current state, with frequent stutters and other issues that are reminiscent of Star Wars: Battlefront II, a game that uses the same engine. These DX12 problems should have been fixed before the game’s “early access” launch, though at least we can be content in knowing that this issue should be addressed before the game’s DXR patch, which is set to release before November 20th. 

Outside of these annoyances, we are happy to report that Battlefield V remains as stunning as other entries in the series, especially at high resolutions. Sharp terrain details at High and Ultra settings in conjunction with factors like wind/explosion swept leaves to create a stunning picture in motion, especially at higher framerates. Sadly, however, some of these effects can combine to form a dissatisfying whole. 

I have mentioned that the windswept leaves are a graphical highlight of Battlefield V, but in conjunction with screen space reflections, they are a recipe for disaster, causing major reflection artefacts. The cynic in me thinks that this design choice is intentional, as this will create a situation where DXR Raytraced Reflections will overcome the shortcomings if DXR, but I honestly believe that the levels that make heavy use of Battlefield V’s falling leaves should have been designed with fewer puddles, eliminating this SSR issue. This only impacts a few areas of the game, but it is worth taking note of. Performance-wise the game runs as expected.

On the CPU-side, the game runs without any apparent issues. The only setup we used which presented problems was an Intel CPU with two cores and four threads, sitting below the game’s minimum system requirements while maintaining 60+ FPS average framerates. If you have a processor with four strong cores or more, you will have no trouble keeping the game at over 60 FPS, at least on the CPU side of the equation. 

When it comes to cores, we found no benefit of using a CPU with more than four strong cores and eight threads, both on the AMD and Intel side. That being said, we are getting to the limits of the GTX 1080 at 1080p Ultra settings, and DirectX 12 could add the parallelism needed to push framerates higher if/when the API’s bugs are addressed. 

On the GPU side, Battlefield V has shown that it can be an extremely demanding game at its highest settings, with our lower-end R9 380 and GTX 960 being relegated to 900p Medium settings for 60FPS gameplay. We recommend graphics cards with 4GB or larger frame buffers, though 2GB cards are still usable.

For 1080p 60FPS framerates at Ultra settings, we recommend AMD’s Radeon RX 580 8GB and Nvidia’s GTX 1060 6GB, as both graphics cards will maintain 60+ FPS framerates on most occasions, granting users high framerates without graphical sacrifices. 

If you desire a 1440p resolution and 60FPS framerates at Ultra settings, we recommend the Nvidia GTX 1080 and the Radeon RX Vega 56, both of which achieve 60+ FPS framerates without much issue, with the Nvidia GTX 1070 being able to produce 60+ FPS framerates under most situations at High settings. 

Cranking things up to 4K, you will need a graphics card that is significantly more powerful than what we currently have available for testing, something that sits in the GTX 1080 Ti or RTX 2080 territory if not a RTX 2080 Ti, making the prospect of 4K 60FPS with DXR unlikely this generation, especially given Battlefield V’s lack of support for Multi-GPU systems under DirectX 12. We are currently working on updating our GPU test suite to cover higher-end graphics cards, though it will take time for this process to happen. 

So, how’s Battlefield V’s performance? Well… while we can easily say that it could be better the game honestly has very little to complain about. While its DirectX 12 mode needs improvement, its DirectX 11 mode is more than usable. On the CPU side, all you need is a decent quad-core for 60+ FPS gameplay, and while some graphical sacrifices are necessary to maintain 60FPS on low-end GPU setups, the game’s visuals don’t look as bad as some other titles under these situations. 
 
If DICE can address Battlefield V’s lingering DirectX 12 issues, we will be left with only minor complaints, as small annoyances in the game’s graphical options menu and it’s lack of resolution scaling options aren’t deal breakers. We will be back at a later date with some more Battlefield V testing once DXR support is enabled, which should be within the next week given Microsoft’s official release of their DXR enabling Windows 10 October Update. We look forward to giving this game another spin under DX12 with DXR in the near future. 

Update – Battlefield V has been updated to add DirectX Raytracing to the game, refining the game’s DirectX 12 support while also delivering a new feature called Ray Traced Reflections to the game. While DX12 support has improved, our initial testing has found that some stuttering issues remain, though they are far less prevalent. DirectX 11 remains the most stable option at this time and we stand by our current results. 

We hope to have benchmarking data for RTX series graphics cards and DXR Raytraced Reflections early next week. 

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