Middle-earth: Shadow of War (DX11)

Next up is Middle-earth: Shadow of War, the sequel to Shadow of Mordor. Developed by Monolith, whose last hit was arguably F.E.A.R., Shadow of Mordor returned them to the spotlight with an innovative NPC rival generation and interaction system called the Nemesis System, along with a storyline based on J.R.R. Tolkien's legendarium, and making it work on a highly modified engine that originally powered F.E.A.R. in 2005.

Using the new LithTech Firebird engine, Shadow of War improves on the detail and complexity, and with free add-on high resolution texture packs, offers itself as a good example of getting the most graphics out of an engine that may not be bleeding edge. Shadow of War also supports HDR (HDR10).

Shadow of War - 3840x2160 - Ultra QualityShadow of War - 2560x1440 - Ultra QualityShadow of War - 1920x1080 - Ultra Quality

Shadow of War is one of the more favorable games in terms of the 20 series' performance gains over Pascal, and this carries over to the RTX 2070. The resulting situation is rather favorable for the RTX 2070, as it creeps up on or even overtakes the GTX 1080 Ti, while the RTX 2080 Ti and 2080 perform comfortably above. So even when the RX Vega outperforms the GTX 1080, the RTX 2070 is a tier above.

Regardless, at 1080p we start to see the flagships reach the CPU bottleneck.

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  • thestryker - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    I feel much the same as you, and honestly I'd bet most people who buy the upper-mid range feel the same way. I also have a GTX 970 and as I told a couple of my friends while laughing at the new RTX pricing "this makes it so much easier to wait for 2020 to see if Intel can compete". I stick by that statement and barring a pricing revolution or my 970 dying here's to 2020.
  • Lazlo Panaflex - Friday, October 19, 2018 - link

    @thestryker, same here. I got a 970 a couple years ago, and won't be upgrading any time soon. I'm sure it'll run Doom Eternal just fine...thanks Vulcan ;-)
  • Targon - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    New consoles have been hitting $600 at release, and then come down after a year or two. So, $600 for a new card is still in that range of being the price of an entire console. When I see $700+, that is when I really question how much faster the card is to justify the higher price.
  • cfenton - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    The most expensive console launch recently was the Xbox One X at $500. The PS4 and PS4 Pro were $400 at launch.
  • eva02langley - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    The thing is that MS, Sony or Nintendo can sell their consoles at a lost because they are going to get it back on software... a GPU doesn`t work this way.

    @cfenton, 599$? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOHqG1nc_tw
  • wr3zzz - Wednesday, October 17, 2018 - link

    Count me the same as well. With AAA developers no long pushing technology beyond console envelops, instead of a new GPU every other gen I am likely going with just one GPU (980) for this entire current console cycle.
  • colonelclaw - Thursday, October 18, 2018 - link

    Completely agree. For the cost of the most expensive games console you should at least get the most powerful gfx card. Have Nvidia forgotten that you basically need to spend the same amount again to get a working computer? $500 for a 'mid-range' card is utter lunacy.
  • adlep - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    Used, 2nd hand market price breakdown for both 1070ti and 1080 are going to be a major headache for Nvidia. I bought my MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X for the "buy it now price" of $320.00 and 1070ti cards go for less than $300.00 on the 2nd hand market such us ebay, facebook marketplace, and FS/FT sections of AT Forum.
  • The_Assimilator - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    1080 Ti as well - the fastest cards from the previous gen usually get the largest % discount.
  • brunis.dk - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link

    i get dizzy from turning my head to read the labels. i loved that you made the AMD bar in the compute benches red, helps me identify red team. maybe make a repeating bg with barely discernible logo's. Just saw i dont get dizzy, help an old man out :) If you need help with the web dev, let me know.

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