DRAGON QUEST XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age PC Performance Review

At 1080p we can finally see how demanding Dragon Quest XI can be, with everything below an RX Vega 56 and a Nvidia GTX 1060 failing to achieve a steady 60FPS in our demanding test area. 

This result sits in line with Dragon Quest XI’s PC system requirements, which recommend both of these graphics cards for 1080p 60FPS gameplay, though it is worth noting that our RX 580 Strix can maintain a solid 60FPS in many areas within the game, with 1440p 30FPS gameplay also being easily possible. 

On the low-end, we can see that the R9 380 is the minimum GPU that is required to run Dragon Quest XI at 1080p 30 FPS at max settings. After playing the game for a while with this setup, we found that locking the game to 30FPS provided an ideal gaming experience, as Dragon Quest’s turn-based nature makes many of the downsides of 30FPS gameplay disappear, especially when the game is played using a gamepad/controller.  

For context, Dragon Quest XI runs at 900p 30FPS on PS4, making anything above that a win for PC. The only real downside of the PC version is its AntiAliasing, as shimmering around grassy terrain and other assets can sometimes ruin what can otherwise be a fantastic looking game.  

Most areas of Dragon Quest XI will run at around the average framerate of our test scene, though it is worth noting that there are also areas that are more demanding than this, but these areas are so rare and specific that some players may never encounter them.