Mass Effect: Andromeda on PC – Not a Port and Well Optimised

Ashley Allen March 13, 2017Last Updated: March 13, 2017

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Mass Effect: Andromeda launches next week and copies of the sci-fi action RPG are already in reviewers’ hands. Those lucky enough to get an early copy of the PC version have some good news: BioWare’s official system requirements were indeed conservative, and the game is capable of running on high graphics settings with just an Intel Core i5 processor and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970.

According to Redditor GamingTrend, Mass Effect: Andromeda is so well optimised that it can run at high settings on his GTX 980M-powered laptop:

“I don’t have an i5 (my laptop has an i7 desktop processor in it — it’s an OriginPC) and a 980M which is approximately the GTX 970 in power, so I should be able to cover that. I can tell you that I’m playing on High and a few Ultras without a hitch. I’m sure there will be a driver update that probably adds even better support. If you’ve got an i5 and a 970, you won’t need to play on Medium.”

GamingTrend added:

“I’ve got good news… This is my laptop, for comparison’s sake: http://www.gamingtrend.com/reviews/origin-eon15-x-review-an-incredible-desktop-replacement/

I decided to pump up to the Ultra default (no tweaks) and measured with MSI Afterburner. With that and Nvidia’s capture stuff (used to be Shadowplay? I don’t know what they are calling it these days) running in the background, I was hitting between 45 and 60fps. For the vast majority of people, that’s probably going to be fine. I’ll be tweaking the settings moving forward to see what it takes to get the framerate to lock at 60, but even before NVidia’s inevitable day-0 driver update, this is already well optimized from what I’ve seen so far. And to answer your question, that’s at Temporal AA settings.

For clarity – this is at 1080p at 60hz.”

One reason the game seems to be running so well on PC is that, according to Mass Effect: Andromeda director Michael Gamble, it is not a port of the console version, and thus is built specifically to run on a home computer: