The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim Performance Test

The fifth installment in Bethesda's long-running Elder Scrolls series took the industry by storm last Friday, earning an impressive aggregated review score of 95/100.

Based on early estimates, Skyrim has shipped seven million copies worldwide across all platforms, including digital stores such as Steam. During a peak hour last Monday, Valve's platform alone recorded some 287,000 Skyrim players -- greater than the combined peak activity of MW3, Counter-Strike, Football Manger 2012 and Team Fortress 2.

We usually don't open our performance reviews with sales figures, but we felt compelled to illustrate the magnitude of Skyrim's launch because role-playing games rarely garner this type of attention. Although its popularity is undoubtedly aided by the cult-like status of the Elder Scrolls franchise, Skyrim isn't just a clone of its predecessors (we're looking at you MW3). Bethesda has made many gameplay refinements, especially to the graphics and animations -- our area of interest.

For its day, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion had incredible visuals, leveraging advanced lighting and shader techniques such as HDR and specular mapping. In fact, before Crysis launched in 2007, Oblivion was arguably the most taxing PC game available. You'd have been lucky to see 50fps while exploring the expansive realm on high quality with a pair of ATI Radeon X1900 XTs (a $1,200 proposition at the time). We don't expect Skyrim to be that stressful, but we do have high hopes for its graphical fidelity.

While it may not bring your PC to its knees, Skyrim promises to be the best-looking Elder Scrolls title to date with its newly developed game engine, called the "Creation Engine." Among other things, the framework lets Skyrim display greater draw distances and produce a more realistic world overall. Shadows can be created by any object or structure, tree limbs and the flow of water can be affected by wind, and other weather effects have been introduced, such as dynamic snow fall.

As fun as it is to chat about Skyrim's graphics, we're dying to get a little more "eyes-on"...

Image Quality Comparison

Below are three sets of in-game screenshots that compare the low, medium, high, ultra and maximum quality settings. Click the pictures for a full-res 2560x1600 image.

The low and medium quality settings are very similar. There is slightly more detail when using the medium quality settings and the textures are improved. Oddly, the high quality preset looks much better than the ultra quality in our opinion. High offers more details overall, while ultra has softer shadows and lighting.

Unlike the previous set of pictures, there is a significant difference between low and medium here. The foliage off in the distance is softer when using the medium quality preset and there are small 3D rocks on the ground. Shifting from medium to high significantly improves texture quality and adds considerably more detail, such as the large rocks in the distance and the crisper textures.

Again, when going from high to ultra the overall image quality seems to be reduced, especially when comparing textures. Ultra only seems to improve the shadow quality while adding a few shrubs and rocks, while maximum offers a noticeable boost in detail. There's foliage on the distant mountain, while the mountains themselves have sharper, more detailed peaks. Shadows are also improved.

Skyrim's water quality was very similar when comparing the low and medium quality settings. Likewise, while there is a noticeable difference when shifting from medium to high, it's not drastic. Yet again, ultra seems to be a downgrade as it sacrifices texture quality for softer shadows and more foliage. Maximum restores the higher quality textures and improves most other visuals as well.

Testing Methodology

We tested Skyrim with 17 graphics cards spanning all price ranges and we installed the latest drivers available -- neither AMD nor Nvidia updated their drivers for this game. Fraps was used to measure frame rates during a minute of gameplay from the first level. The performance was measured from the beginning of the level, having played through the first few levels the frame rates here seemed to be about as low as they go.

We tested the game at three resolutions: 1680x1050, 1920x1200 and 2560x1600 using the high, ultra and maximum presets.

High quality options

Ultra quality options

Maximum quality options

Test System Specs
- Intel Core i7 2600K
- x2 4GB G.Skill DDR3 PC3-12800 (CAS 8-8-8-20)
- Asus P8P67 Deluxe (Intel P67)
- OCZ ZX Series 1250w
- Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB (SATA 6Gb/s)
- GeForce GTX 580 (1536MB)
- GeForce GTX 570 (1280MB)
- GeForce GTX 560 Ti (1024MB)
- GeForce GTX 560 (1024MB)
- GeForce GTX 550 Ti (1024MB)
- GeForce GTX 480 (1536MB)
- GeForce GTX 470 (1280MB)
- GeForce GTX 460 (1024MB)
- Radeon HD 6970 (2048MB)
- Radeon HD 6950 (2048MB)
- Radeon HD 6870 (1024MB)
- Radeon HD 6850 (1024MB)
- Radeon HD 5870 (2048MB)
- Radeon HD 5830 (1024MB)
- Radeon HD 6790 (1024MB)
- Radeon HD 6770 (1024MB)
- Radeon HD 6750 (1024MB)
- Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-bit
- Nvidia Forceware 285.62
- ATI Catalyst 11.11

Using the high quality preset at 1680x1050, we were surprised by how well the relatively inexpensive Radeon HD 6750 performed (45fps), not to mention the GeForce GTX 550 Ti (65fps). When playing on high, Nvidia's graphics cards seemed to perform much better, as the GTX 560 managed 89fps versus the HD 6850's 77fps.

Increasing the resolution to 1920x1200 had a slight impact on performance as the HD 6750 dropped to 37fps, while the 6770 earned 40fps. The HD 6790 was garnered 50fps, which was only 3fps behind the GTX 550 Ti. The HD 6850 was able to match the GTX 460's performance with 67fps, while the GTX 560 hit 76fps.

Now at 2560x1600, the HD 6750, HD 6770 and GTX 550 Ti were unable to deliver playable performance. Furthermore, the HD 6790, 5830 and GTX 460 only provided borderline playable results. The GTX 560 and HD 6850 surprised us with an average of 36fps and 42fps -- not perfect, but tolerable frame rates.

The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim Review

B

The tantalizingly brief Skyrim teaser trailer debuted by Bethesda Softworks late last year filled my mind with visions of titanic battles between man and beast; of shining steel bathed in ancient flames; of a champion rising from humble origins, prepared to sacrifice everything for the fate of the world. After 60+ hours with the game those visions have been fully realized — and rendered largely inconsequential.

In the frigid northern province of the continent of Tamriel the legendary dragon god Alduin rises, bringing with him a plague of ferocious flying lizards and the promise of the end of the world of Nirn. Only one being stands between this malevolent force and the people of the eponymous province Skyrim: Dovahkiin, the Dragonborn, a figure blessed with the ability to absorb the very powers these terrible creatures seek to unleash upon the land.

It's the sort of tale that fuels ancient epics and trashy fantasy novel trilogies alike, certainly sufficient enough to serve as the plot for the average role-playing game.

This is not your average role-playing game. In The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, this titanic tale is merely a framing device for a much larger story.

My story.

Battling a dark dragon god is merely an excuse to plunge the player headfirst into this immense Nordic-themed fantasy sandbox, much like the murder of Emperor Uriel Septim VII served as a gateway into Cyrodiil in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. In grand Elder Scrolls tradition the players begins the game as a prisoner, confined to an exciting but linear introduction before being set free from the cages imposed by more structured role-playing experiences. You can return to the cage at any time, but there's a whole wide world to be explored, and what the hell, it's not like Alduin set a date for the destruction of everything; overwhelming evil's flexible work schedule is one of my favorite aspects of the series.

Unhampered by a ticking doomsday clock, the player is free to reconnoiter the beauteous countryside of Skyrim to their heart's content. Far-removed from the alien landscapes of Morrowind, its neighbor to the east, Skyrim's rolling hills, frigid tundra, and towering mountains wouldn't be out of place in a real-world nature documentary. I could easily see myself climbing its peaks, delving its depths, and crossing its streams (sometimes that's okay), and when the dragons make their appearance this realism serves to make those encounters all the more terrifying.

But those dragons, so immense and impressive at first, soon became nothing more than an occasional interruption in my personal tale, dropping out of the sky just as I was about to enter a mysterious dig site at the behest of the Mage College or worse, bringing an early end to high-spirited games of Herd the Moose.

I never said my story made sense.

I'm not sure if it's a testament to Bethesda's open-ended game design or my own frivolity that in a world filled with thousands of built-in activities I spent several hours making up my own. I earned no skill points for relentlessly pursuing elk across the frozen wastes, cliff-diving into shallow pools, or attempting to cross entire towns using only rooftops, but I felt just as fulfilled as I did when I was swiping a valuable trinket for the Thieves Guild, deterring a rambunctious bard from pursuing an unwilling maiden, or battling Dark Elf racism with my bare fists. Skyrim is the ultimate OCD adventurer's playground, packed so full of entertaining new experiences that you can barely complete before the next appears on the horizon.

When all was said and done my 60+ hours of adventure consisted of perhaps seven hours with Alduin and company, ten hours of random exploring, and the rest of my time spent devouring just a small portion of the side quests—the real meat of the game. Ranging from short fetch missions to adventures so lengthy and memorable they rival the core story, it's almost insulting to call them side quests. They are the beating heart of Skyrim.

Traditionally a single-player game, Skyrim has spawned its own social multiplayer component.By stocking the game with so much content that only the most dedicated player (or those armed with strategy guides) could hope to see it all, Bethesda has created an ever-growing community of storytellers, each eager to hear the unique tales of others while sharing their own. It's happening on internet message boards. It's happening on Facebook and Twitter. It's even happening in game stores, where the mere mention of the game's name evokes spirited conversation between total strangers. As I write this I'm actively resisting launching into tales of my mage's exploits. He's really rather keen.

Skyrim is not a flawless game by any measure, but where fans of other titles might rise up against rampant glitches and shoddy programming, this impassioned community has embraced it. Thrown into the air by a giant's club? That's hilarious. A horse that mysteriously blinks in and out of existence? He's our legendary steed. An overall lack of proper combat targeting? Damn those stupid non-player characters for jumping in front of my fireball. I've seen accusations since the game's release that reviewers are giving Bethesda a pass because their games are always flawed, but it's not the reviewers. Hell, I'd take ten points off right now if a) we used a point system and b) I wasn't afraid of being trampled by an angry mob.

In the early hours of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim a single word is heard, echoing from the heavens. "Dovahkiin" exclaims a mysterious voice, urging you to embark on a heroic quest to save the world. "Dovahkiin" is also Bethesda's call to arms, beckoning any gamer that's ever dreamt of traversing a magical land armed with spell and steel to an unforgettable role-playing experience. Ignore it at your own peril.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim was released on Nov. 11 for the PlayStation 3, Xbox, and PC. Bethesda Softworks provided Kotaku with a copy of the game. Played 20 hours of the game on Xbox 360 before switching to PC. Played through full single-player story on PC. Tested both melee and magic-only characters. Chased a hell of a lot of elk, moose, whatever.