You still Need a Powerful PC to Run Blade & Soul at Max Settings

What kind of PC is needed to play Blade & Soul? NCsoft did announce the system specs for the upcoming CBT3. The game requires you to have at least a GeForce 8600GT or Radeon HD4600 to run the game while it recommends GeForce 8800GTX or Radeon HD4850. Does that mean a computer bought in 2006 has no chance to play Blade & Soul?

The developer team is keeping testing the game on thousands of computers with different specifications and they just shared more information. According to Hong Suk-Geun, chief programmer of Blade & Soul, the game offers 5 levels of graphics, allowing players to choose based on the specs of their PCs.

He told that the dev's primary concern was on level 3-4 which most players will choose. He reassured that even the 2006 computer can play Blade & Soul, and he had a computer with GeFore 7600GT and 2GB RAM running the game at the lowest graphics setting (level 1) at 30~35 fps.

What if you have a computer that just meets the recommended specs? You can play Blade & Soul at medium settings, according to Hong Suk-Geun. He had a PC with Intel Q8300, Radeon HD 4850 512MB and 4GB RAM which can run the game at level 3 at 23~30 fps and level 5 at 14~23 fps. And then he showed the game on a better PC that had Intel i5 760, GeForce GTS 450 1GB and 4GB RAM and got 29~34 fps for level 3 and 20~25 for level 5.

That means if you want to play the game at level 4 or above can got optimized experience, you may need a GeForce GTX 460 or above. Since the game is still in closed beta, there's still room for further optimization.