Battlefield 3 Beta: First Impressions

As you probably know, the official start of Electronic Art's Battlefield 3 beta test is drawing near and we had a chance to try the game a bit sooner than most other players. Apart from playing, we also performed the short test in order to know what to expect from hardware when it comes to this game. We tried playing with the configuration Electronic Arts specified as a minimum to play this game comfortably. What we had is a 3.2 GHz dual-core Phenom II X2 555 processor combined with 2GB of RAM and a Radeon 3870 graphics card. Although it might not be expected due to impressive in-game trailers with pimped up visuals, you can actually play the game comfortably using Radeon 3870 in full HD resolution, albeit with minimal graphics settings. Of course, here and there the framerate drops below 30 frames per second, but considering the fact that 3870 is four years old video card, we think that engine optimization is more than good. Even on low settings, the game looks quite decent, so if you have a relatively old hardware, you shouldn't completely give up the game.

As for the recommended configuration, Electronic Arts hasn't exaggerated at all. With Phenom II x4 955 quad-core processor, 4GB of DDR3 memory and good graphics card such as the AMD Radeon HD 6950 or GeForce GTX 560 (non-Ti), you shouldn't worry at all. In full HD resolution and on Ultra level of details, which include 4xAA and 16x anisotropic filtering, the game works perfectly with minimal drop in framerate. Most likely it will perform even better in the final version since it will be more polished, as well as video drivers.

It should be noted that both AMD and NVIDIA released special versions of their driver software optimized for this game, and we used them for this test. More or less, both AMD and NVIDIA give the same picture quality, excluding noticeably less "blur" effect on the GeForce. This has resulted in a slightly faster action on the screen, so Radeon owners will have something more Crysis-like feel, while those with GeForce cards get "cleaner" image that is a tad less blurry in motion.

All in all, EA has shown how a visually impressive game may not be restricted to ultra-high-end hardware owners, but can be perfectly playable on middle-class video cards. Of course, if you have weaker hardware, you are doomed to miss certain visual effects, but it sould not be a concern - in the battlefield, it's skill that counts, not maxed out graphics.