Gaming Tests: GTA 5

The highly anticipated iteration of the Grand Theft Auto franchise hit the shelves on April 14th 2015, with both AMD and NVIDIA to help optimize the title. At this point GTA V is super old, but still super useful as a benchmark – it is a complicated test with many features that modern titles today still struggle with. With rumors of a GTA 6 on the horizon, I hope Rockstar make that benchmark as easy to use as this one is.

GTA doesn’t provide graphical presets, but opens up the options to users and extends the boundaries by pushing even the hardest systems to the limit using Rockstar’s Advanced Game Engine under DirectX 11. Whether the user is flying high in the mountains with long draw distances or dealing with assorted trash in the city, when cranked up to maximum it creates stunning visuals but hard work for both the CPU and the GPU.

We are using the following settings:

  • 720p Low, 1440p Low, 4K Low, 1080p Max

The in-game benchmark consists of five scenarios: four short panning shots with varying lighting and weather effects, and a fifth action sequence that lasts around 90 seconds. We use only the final part of the benchmark, which combines a flight scene in a jet followed by an inner city drive-by through several intersections followed by ramming a tanker that explodes, causing other cars to explode as well. This is a mix of distance rendering followed by a detailed near-rendering action sequence, and the title thankfully spits out frame time data. The benchmark can also be called from the command line, making it very easy to use.

There is one funny caveat with GTA. If the CPU is too slow, or has too few cores, the benchmark loads, but it doesn’t have enough time to put items in the correct position. As a result, for example when running our single core Sandy Bridge system, the jet ends up stuck at the middle of an intersection causing a traffic jam. Unfortunately this means the benchmark never ends, but still amusing.

AnandTech Low Resolution
Low Quality
Medium Resolution
Low Quality
High Resolution
Low Quality
Medium Resolution
Max Quality
Average FPS
95th Percentile

All of our benchmark results can also be found in our benchmark engine, Bench.

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  • just4U - Thursday, November 5, 2020 - link

    There were some issues early on as the review came out (obviously got hammered..) good now tho..
  • MDD1963 - Saturday, November 7, 2020 - link

    The pages were indeed VERY slow to load the hour or two after they were posted....; overloaded, perhaps.
  • NA1NSXR - Thursday, November 5, 2020 - link

    What are you talking about, have you seen the prices? We got a big leap but we also got a value-destroying price hike. 5800X is in line with 10900K throughout the suite, but is newer and no cheaper!
  • catavalon21 - Thursday, November 5, 2020 - link

    Agree. The 10850 hands the 5800x it's backside in a great many contests, at about the same price point, yeah.
  • just4U - Thursday, November 5, 2020 - link

    It's just launch prices (..shrug) I'd pay the premium for the 5900x and the 5950x but the 3800? Hmm no.. I'd either opt in for the 3900x or a Intel 10core part first at that price. Needs to be priced $10 cheaper than the 10900 (non K) which brings it closer to the 8core 10700K price.
  • just4U - Thursday, November 5, 2020 - link

    err (should read 5800x) not 3800.
  • yankeeDDL - Friday, November 6, 2020 - link

    The 10850 peaks at 140W *more* than the 5800x. It's, literally, half as efficient as the 5800x. Running the 10850 will on a daily basis will cost you easily much more than the CPU's cost itself over its lifetime.
  • LithiumFirefly - Friday, November 6, 2020 - link

    Especially if you live in a climate that's warm part of the year paying more for AC cuz that Intel chip is hot AF
  • dagobah123 - Friday, November 6, 2020 - link

    This is so much more important than people realize. I think they should include a cost of ownership when discussing these prices like they do with cars.
  • lmcd - Monday, November 9, 2020 - link

    it wasn't important when AMD was behind so why is it important now?

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