Just Cause 4 PC Performance Review

Graphics Comparison – Low to Max  

When playing Just Cause 4, our recommendation is to play the game using what we call Medium settings or higher, details of which are available on the previous page.  

SSAO is an option that should be turned on for most systems, as the extra shading adds a lot of extra depth to the scene, resulting in the more monotone appearance of the landscape at low settings. At Medium, we can also see that the nearby vegetation is more detailed and that some nearby texture are notably improved, with the easiest example to spot being Rico’s rocket launcher. 

In most scenes, high-end effects like Bokeh Depth of Field and Global Illumination do not have a large enough impact on the game’s visuals to be worth their performance cost, with effects like Ocean tessellation and Edge Fade (makes the edge of your screen darker) having a minimal impact on game performance. 

(Low VS Medium)
  

 
Cranking Just Cause 4 to high settings will result in increased shadow render distances and some geometry loading in at a distance, though in this case, it has no impact on the distance foliage on the mountainside. The only notable change is that the roadside crash barriers are loaded in at an increased distance. In other scenes, foliage draw distance appears to be unaffected, which means that PC players are unable to increase foliage draw distances effectively, making pop-in very noticeable. 

At high settings, higher resolution textures are loaded in for nearby grass and on Rico’s weapons and clothing, though many textures maintain a low-quality appearance. 

Square Enix plans to improve Just Cause 4’s vegetation rendering and increase the quality of other game assets in a future update. 

(Medium VS High)
  

 
Without looking closely at the images below you will be hard pressed to see the difference between our high and maximum settings in most cases, with the most notable difference being the increase in texture detail to Rico’s clothing.  

Sadly, Just Cause 4 at maximum settings can still present a lot of graphical weakness, with aliasing being extremely noticeable at 1080p, textures using low-resolutions LODs at near camera distances and frequent vegetation pop-in. A vegetation distance scaling option would be welcome here, as well as the ability to load in higher-resolution textures at greater distances. High-end PCs should be more than capable of handling this. 

(High VS Ultra)