NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Review: Does Maxwell Bring Maximum Gameplay?

When the original Crysis dropped in late 2007, it took no time at all for pundits to coin the phrase, “Can it run Crysis?“, almost to the point of self-parody. At the time, the game couldn’t have its graphics detail maxed-out on even top-of-the-line PCs, and in reality, that’s a great thing. I’d imagine few are opposed to knowing that a game could actually look better down the road as our PCs grow into them. As the series continued, Crytek knew it had a legend to live up to, and fortunately, Crysis 3 (our review) lives up to the original’s legacy.

Manual Run-through: There’s no particular level in Crysis 3 that I could establish was “better” for benchmarking than another, but I settled on “Red Star Rising” based on the fact that I could perform a run-through with no chance of dying (a great thing in a challenging game like this one). The level starts us in a derelict building, where I traverse a broken pipe to make it over to one rooftop and then another. I eventually hit the ground after taking advantage of a zipline, and make my way down to a river, where I scurry past a number of enemies to the end spot beneath a building.

Can it run Crysis 3? The answer would be “yes” to all four of these cards, with resolutions up to 1440p being no problem at all when using the High detail settings. If you wanted to use Very High, you’d have to opt for a second GPU, or keep to 1080p. At 5760×1080, the Medium detail setting gives us playable results on all of the cards, with the 980 and 780 Ti interestingly performing the same there.

GRID 2

For those who appreciate racing games that are neither too realistic nor too arcade-like, there’s GRID. In GRID 2 (review), the ultimate goal is to build a racing empire, starting from square one. Unlike most racing titles that have some sort of career, the goal here isn’t to earn cash, but fans. Whether you’re racing around Abu Dhabi’s Yas Marina or tearing through a gorgeous Cote d’Azur coastline, your goal is simple: To impress.

Manual Run-through: The track chosen for my benchmarking is Miami (Ocean Drive). It’s a simple track overall, which is one of the reasons I chose it, and also the reason I choose to do just a single lap (I crash, often, and that affects both the results and my patience). Unlike most games in the suite which I test twice over (save for an oddity in the results), I race this one lap three times over.

Even the “lowly” GTX 780 manages to deliver 100 FPS at 1080p here, so that resolution is good for little more than a laugh. The same could really be said with 1440p, and perhaps 5760×1080 – the 980 there comes 6 FPS ahead of the 780 Ti, with AMD’s 290X creeping very close behind.