So what kind of graphic cards and machines do game creators use?

I was just wondering about this and wanted to get your input on this one.

So we see all these trailers and stuff. The new FarCry2, Crysis before it came out, etc, and they all run so smooth, but the funny thing is, even a 2x 8800 desktop is still having issues with Crysis. Even a 3x SLi.

So my question is this: What kind of computers do the developers code their games on that they look so smooth?

Do they have huuuuge towers with 20x 8800 cards, and 16 processors, and 1Tb of RAM or what the hell?

You know what I'm saying??

 

I'd imagine that for large companys like that they aren't useing consumer cards like we have access too that are mass produced, rather much more powerful and certaintly more costly.

 

Try a Quadro in a 4x system, dual Core 2 Extreme Quad core procs, maybe 16 GB RAM, throw in 15K RPM hard drives, and you are getting there....

 

They use professional card that cost way more than consumers can afford, and the comps are certainly not any home desktops

 

Right but then again, a $15,000 computer with 5 graphic cards, 16Gb of RAM, and 15k RPM HDDs would be a hell of a future-proof gaming rig, right?

 

Depending on what a "gaming artist" is working on,

For 3D modeling and rendering:
- quad-core... sometimes dual quad-core
- 4GB+ RAM
- high-end (256-bit mem interface) ATI FireGL's or Nvidia Quadro's
- fast SATA/SCSI 10k+ RPM drives

For 2D work, CAD, wireframing, textures:
- dual-core or quad-core workstation
- 4GB+ RAM
- at least mid-range (128-bit mem interface) ATI FireGL or Nvidia Quadro

Most of the time, there is a massive farm or server to do final rendering to test scenes (for 3D)

 

http://www.nvidia.com/page/quadroplex.html

 

Lotof misinformation in this thread. (Probably caused by some confusion about who "game creators" are.)

For 3d modelling and such, the artists might use workstation GPU's like FireGL or Quaddro, but most likely off the shelf hardware. They have no need for anything more. They aren't doing prerendered CGI (which tends to require big server farms and all that). They're just making models and animations and textures, they don't need to render them.

For running the game: definitely off the shelf hardware, and nothing else. It just runs like crap until very late in development.
Sure, they most likely use a beefy PC (a good CPU and a high end GPU), but nothing really different from what a gamer might buy when he buys a high end gaming PC.

They don't need a PC that can run their game at max settings at full speed throughout development. It's only near the end that they have a full game to play anyway, and near the end, they can get basically the same hardware as will be available at launch.

Of course there are people using extreme hardware. 16GB RAM, multiple workstation GPU's, and multiple quadcore CPU's. But they aren't in game development. Pixar and Disney use some beefy machines like that, of course, and a lot of other prerendered 3d work does.

Game development? regular consumer hardware. That's what it has to run on in the end, so that's what they need to test on anyway. Also, even if they got "special" hardware, it wouldn't help them. What good would a workstation GPU do them? It'd be slower (because of extra precision/accuracy requirements of the workstation drivers), and it'd be somewhat incompatible. It might render things correctly that'd fail on normal GPU's, or vice versa.

Which CPU should they get that's faster than what you have available? It wouldn't be an x86 CPU running Windows then, and then it'd be unable to run their game.

There is no better PC-compatible hardware than what you can buy in the shops. Big game developers may occasionally get preview samples of new GPU's, sure, but those are the exception rather than the rule. (Only a few companies get that, and only when GPU companies are gearing up for a big new launch)

No huge amounts of RAM, no render farms, no Quaddro GPU's, no dual quadcore. Remember that the 3d modellers don't have to render anything. Games aren't prerendered.

 

umm. game dev's do use workstation graphics and they do have systems that outperform a gamer's desktop. i don't know why you think they don't...

obviously not every person in the dev studio is using a machine like that. even most people in the development and design process in the studio probably get by with a beefy desktop. but some jobs require more than that. i think i remember iD showing off doom 3 running on TWO macintosh towers with workstation graphics and heavy processors, back before it was released several years ago.

 

Jalf nailed in on the head. Having actually worked at game studios, I can verify that the devs use mid to high end off the shelf PCs. The artists usually have Quadro type cards because some functions in 3DSMax etc don't play nice with gforce-type cards, and some things are pre-rendered (like cut scenes), but as Jalf said, it would be stupid to develop on machines that don't have consumer grade stuff on them. It's hard enough to test for hardware compatability, why would they willingly make it more difficult?

 

Exactly. The requirements come from tests on specific systems,and even more,most of the games are optimised for certain GPUs and above.