Mass Effect 3 PC Requirements Revealed

[Andy Chalk]

Mass Effect 3 PC Requirements Revealed

System requirements for the PC version of Mass Effect 3 have been announced and I'm happy to say that I am going to crush this thing out of the park.

If you're a console gamer, the only thing you really need to know about your system is where you keep it. If you can remember where your living room is, you're pretty much good to go. Those of us who prefer to keep it real, however, need to pay a little more attention to what's going on inside our boxes. And now, having finished with my obligatory button-masher zing, I present to you the PC system requirements for Mass Effect 3:

Minimum spec:


OS - Windows XP SP3/Vista SP1, Win 7
CPU - 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (equivalent AMD CPU)
RAM - 1GB for XP / 2GB RAM for Vista/Win 7
Disc Drive - 1x speed
Hard Drive - 2.5 GB of free space
Video - 256 MB* with Pixel Shader 3.0 support (Supported chipsets: NVIDIA 7900 or better; ATI X1800 or better. Please note that NVIDIA GeForce 9300, 8500, 8400, and 8300 are below minimum system requirements, as are AMD/ATI Radeon HD3200, HD3300, and HD4350. Updates to your video and sound card drivers may be required.)
Sound - DirectX 9.0c compatible


Recommended spec:


OS - Windows XP SP3/Vista SP1, Win 7
CPU - 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (equivalent AMD CPU)
RAM - 2GB for XP / 4GB RAM for Vista/Win 7
Disc Drive - 1x speed
Hard Drive - 2.5 GB of free space
Video - AMD/ATI Radeon HD 4850 512 MB or greater, NVidia GeForce 9800 GT 512 MB or greater
Sound - DirectX 9.0c compatible


The minimum spec isn't too terribly outrageous, but I think this is a good time to point out that if you're still rocking a gig of RAM and a GeForce 7900 series video card, you don't actually have a gaming PC anymore - you have a word processor. Stop spending your money on games you can't properly run and upgrade your hardware instead.

[It's also kind of sweet that they still include minimum drive speed requirements. 1x? Seriously?]

UPDATE: As some of our readers have pointed out, the above specs reference the demo, not the full game. The full game, according to snfonseka [http://www.gameranx.com/updates/id/4539/article/mass-effect-3-pc-specs-released---shouldn-t-need-too-many-calibrations/] for the heads up.

Mass Effect 3 [http://www.amazon.com/Mass-Effect-3-Collectors-Xbox-360/dp/B0050SYZS0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1326997291&sr=8-1] comes out on March 6 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC.


Permalink

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

That seems awfully [sub]small[/sub]...

2.5 Gig? Is that all? I've map folders larger than that.

I wonder if they'll have 4 distinct areas between start and finish again. One icey, one fire, one spacey, one industrial...

Edit: Hold on, that HAS to be a mistake...ME1 is 10 gig install.

 

[sir.rutthed]

2.5 gigs. Wow. Gotta say I was expecting more than that. I think the original Starcraft is about that size. Either they didn't actually put in much content or they somehow managed to compress it all like crazy.

 

[Rad Party God]

Well, it still uses the Unreal Engine 3, so I doubt the requirements boosted a lot since Mass Effect 2. In fact, they should've copy-pasted the ME2 reqs and call it a day.

And for HDD space... seriously? 2.5gb?, I wasn't born yesterday, you know?. I'm expecting that's what the demo will weight, or some DLC. I think somebody dropped the ball in this one.

 

[teh_Canape]

>Core 2 Duo
does nobody even care about Intel Dual Core anymore?
oh well, my PC will handle it nicely anyway... even though the processor apparently shouldn't, but eh

 

[BloodRed Pixel]

That seems awfully [sub]small[/sub]...

2.5 Gig? Is that all? I've map folders larger than that.

I wonder if they'll have 4 distinct areas between start and finish again. One icey, one fire, one spacey, one industrial...

Edit: Hold on, that HAS to be a mistake...ME1 is 10 gig install.

it´s a missquote. It should be 25GB.

 

[DeadDodo]

I believe these are the system specs for the ME3 DEMO.

2.5GB for a demo isn't too bad though.

 

[VladG]

I don't think there's any major difference between ME1, ME2 and ME3. It's the same engine probably maxed out for console hardware.

Though I must say it's one of the better looking games out there, with a distinct aesthetic that works very well with the setting.

It's also nice to see they are at least taking porting to PC serious, not like other, horribly optimized games (coughGTAIVcough)


The hdd space req is a bit weird.. hope they won't pull a DA2 on us and have 4 rooms for the whole game. Or maybe they want to do the old trick of running some game files directly from the disk

 

[VladG]

I believe these are the system specs for the ME3 DEMO.

2.5GB for a demo isn't too bad though.

That seems likely. Well, the hardware specs are going to be the same either way, it's just the HDD space that's off

 

[Callate]

Minimum requirements:

OS - Windows XP SP3/Vista SP1, Win 7
CPU - 1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (equivalent AMD CPU)
RAM - 1GB for XP / 2GB RAM for Vista/Win 7
Disc Drive - 1x speed
Hard Drive - 2.5 GB of free space
Video - 256 MB* with Pixel Shader 3.0 support (Supported chipsets: NVIDIA 7900 or better; ATI X1800 or better. Please note that NVIDIA GeForce 9300, 8500, 8400, and 8300 are below minimum system requirements, as are AMD/ATI Radeon HD3200, HD3300, and HD4350. Updates to your video and sound card drivers may be required.)
Sound - DirectX 9.0c compatible
Willingness to forgo legal action should EA fail to live up to its responsibilities
A touching faith that software that reports back other software running on your system "isn't spyware"
Acceptance that any act in multiplayer or message on a forum that an administrator who's having a bad day decides is a violation of extremely vague terms of service may lock you out of your legitimately purchased software
...

I'm sorry, I'm not even a little bit ready to let this Origin bullshit go.

 

[ph0b0s123]

Missed the biggest requirement: Origin

My system does not support Origin, so I don't even meet the minimum requirement.

 

[achilleas.k]

[It's also kind of sweet that they still include minimum drive speed requirements. 1x? Seriously?]

Actually, it's not sweet, it's wrong.
I don't even have an optical media drive on my gaming PC. Every game I buy gets the image treatment because I couldn't be bothered to get a SATA DVD drive and my old one is still an IDE.

EDIT: Also, I meet the Origin requirement because you get so much in return when you sell your soul to EA. It's totally worth it.

 

[Zagzag]

Unfortunately my computer doesn't meet the "Origin" requirement, just like so many other people in this thread. Looks like I won't be playing it after all...

 

[Andy Chalk]

Good call folks. The specs are for the demo, so the HDD requirements for the full game will presumably be much more demanding. Post has been updated to make note of it.

 

[Richardplex]

Now, everyone who's surprised that most of the posters are just here to ***** about origin please raise your hand, don't be put off that no-one else is raising theirs...

Also, minimum drive speed? That's the first I've heard of such a thing.

 

[DeadDodo]

I buy all my games online (yes even origin), so I no longer have a DVD drive in my PC, :'(, does this mean I can't play ME3?

considering it's a demo, I doubt they're going to bring that to retail, so the disc drive spec HAS to be in error.

 

[antipunt]

Mass Effect 3, you will be my computer's new *****

 

[MercurySteam]

Wow, those specs are low. The recommended requirements for ME3 are basically the minimum requirements for Anno 2070. Anybody with a decently new computer won't have an issue running that on at least high.

 

[ph0b0s123]

I love when everyone says 'yay, low specs', rather than 'boo, low specs because it is a primarily console game.' Of course it is going to have low specs, it's a DX9 game FFS.