Are game specifications just guidelines?

[Gingerbread Demon]

I usually check these while buying games but lately one or two titles said I couldn't run them well and yet they are actually running well for me.

ME Andromeda runs smooth and fast and according to "Can you run it" I couldn't but I am. Graphic settings on high.

Agents Of Mayhem, below spec slightly on my CPU but the game is running fine on medium settings.

So are specs a definitive guideline? How can you tell if a game definitely won't run unless you try it? Pity devs don't do more in the way of actual demos you can try.

Even Dishonored 1 and 2 run fine on my hardware. I think both are set to high.

I have very modest budget hardware. I'm looking at Mafia III and told it won't work well so downloading the demo to see for myself.

AMD FX6300
MSI 970 motherboard
16gig DDR3 ram
Radeon R9 380 4gig.

 

[Haggis and tatties]

You will find with most games these days min specs are usually higher simply because the game devs are covering all their bases when it comes to the unfinshed and unoptimised games, so they can throw it out the door and hope that sheer brute force from the increased min specs required will carry the game through sales before they finish and patch it later.

All you can really do these days is never pre-order and never buy at launch, and wait until the reviews are out, only real way these days to know what you are getting beforehand.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

You will find with most games these days min specs are usually higher simply because the game devs are covering all their bases when it comes to the unfinshed and unoptimised games, so they can throw it out the door and hope that sheer brute force from the increased min specs required will carry the game through sales before they finish and patch it later.

All you can really do these days is never pre-order and never buy at launch, and wait until the reviews are out, only real way these days to know what you are getting beforehand.

I usually do.... AOM is the only game I have purchased as a preorder ever, and that was because I'm a supporter of Voltion's older games like the Saints Row series. The trailers and early gameplay videos had me hooked for this game and so far I have to admit I'm having a fun time.

The company though seems to have changed. They used to be focused on the players and loved modders but not so much now.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

As noted, minimum specs are higher than they used to be. Once upon a time, minimum specs would guarantee you little more than "the game will run," with no regard to playability. Now, the minimum specs should guarantee you a respectable frame rate on the lowest settings (if it has adjustable settings).

But they are not and will never be an exact science because of the effectively unlimited combinations of PC hardware out there. They cannot account for everything. However, Can You Run It is a very nice tool for determining how any specific game should run on your system based on its requirements.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

As noted, minimum specs are higher than they used to be. Once upon a time, minimum specs would guarantee you little more than "the game will run," with no regard to playability. Now, the minimum specs should guarantee you a respectable frame rate on the lowest settings (if it has adjustable settings).

But they are not and will never be an exact science because of the effectively unlimited combinations of PC hardware out there. They cannot account for everything. However, Can You Run It is a very nice tool for determining how any specific game should run on your system based on its requirements.

Yeah... There's so much variation in PC hardware. It's very hard to account for everyone's individual systems. I suspect for me it's been a bit of luck with the hardware I have.

 

[SPCTRE]

But they are not and will never be an exact science because of the effectively unlimited combinations of PC hardware out there. They cannot account for everything.

yeah, this - if you think about it for a minute, no company on earth is physically able to give out more than general guidelines simply because they can't test all possible hardware configurations on the planet