I have noticed a curious pattern in many of the newest (and not even so
new) games: They will often list as "minimum requirements" specs which are
much higher than what would be sufficient to run the game. Especially this
seems to be the case with the CPU.

  As I understand it, "minimum system requirements" should mean "if you
want this game to run and be playable at a decent frame rate, you should
have at least this kind of system". However, you can often play the game
at decent framerates with a much poorer system, at least if you turn down
the graphical quality.

  For example, I recently bought the game "The Last Remnant", and it lists
as minimum CPU requirement an Intel Core 2 Duo or an AMD Athlon X2.

  Note that both of those processors are 64-bit and with two cores. So
the "minimum system requirements" is telling me that I *need* at least a
two-core 64-bit processor to run the game.

  However, the game runs just fine with my single-core 32-bit Pentium4.
I have even maxed up all graphical settings and I'm getting pretty good
framerates (something like 20 FPS and up). Of course this is mostly thanks
to my GPU, but at least the CPU isn't getting badly in the way.

  The minimum system requirements list, in fact, doesn't make at all clear
whether the game will work with a 32-bit processor at all. But it does.

  Incidentally, the game "Assassin's Creed" lists the same two CPUs as
a minimum requirement, yet also runs on my P4. (Although this one is so
much heavier that I have to run it in low-to-medium settings if I want
to get any decent framerates. Especially higher-quality shadows clog the
system quite badly, especially at the bigger cities which have hundreds
of buildings. In the biggest cities I have to turn shadows completely off.
But it runs, nevertheless.)

  Perhaps the idea is simply "yes, it will run on an older CPU, but in
that case you will need a much faster GPU to compensate", and what they
are listing is some kind of "average minimum" hardware settings to get
the game running ok. However, it would still be nice if they were a bit
more specific, especially about whether the game is 32-bit or not. And
maybe give a few example "minimum" hardware assemblies which will run
the game.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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