Step 2

Step 2 of 5

Working out whether your computer will run it

This is the one step with numbers in it. You need five of them, they are all on a screen your computer already has, and once you have written them down you never need to look again until you change machines.

The five numbers you need

Every set of published system requirements, whatever the game, is built out of the same five facts about your machine. Write them on a scrap of paper or in a note on your phone, because you will use them every time you consider a game from now on.

A sixth fact is worth having beside them: whether your internet plan has a monthly data allowance, and how much is left. It is not a system requirement, but it decides whether a sixty-gigabyte download is sensible this week.

How to find them on your own computer

The wording differs between systems but the information is always one or two clicks away. Follow whichever of the three applies to you.

On Windows

1. Open the Start menu and choose Settings.
2. Go to System, then About. This screen gives you the Windows edition and version, the processor, the installed memory, and whether the system type is 64-bit.
3. For the graphics chip, press the Windows key together with R, type dxdiag and press Enter. Choose the Display tab. The Name and Display Memory lines are the ones you want.
4. For free space, open File Explorer, choose This PC, and read the bar under the drive marked with the Windows logo.

On macOS

1. Click the Apple menu in the top-left corner and choose About This Mac.
2. The panel lists the chip or processor, the memory and the macOS version. On Apple silicon machines the graphics are part of the chip, so the chip name covers both.
3. Choose More Info, then Storage, for the free space on the startup disk.

On Linux

1. Open your desktop environment's Settings and look for About or System Details, which usually lists the processor, memory, graphics and distribution version in one place.
2. If you prefer a terminal, lscpu reports the processor, free -h the memory, lspci | grep -i vga the graphics chip and df -h / the free space on the root filesystem.

None of this changes anything on your computer. These are read-only screens; you are looking, not configuring. Nothing in this course ever asks you to install a tool to find out what your own machine is, and you should be sceptical of anything that does.

Graphics: the number people get wrong

Of the five numbers, the graphics chip causes the most confusion, so it is worth a few paragraphs.

Computers have graphics in one of two arrangements. Integrated graphics are built into the same chip as the processor and share the computer's main memory. Dedicated or discrete graphics are a separate chip with memory of their own. Office laptops, most thin-and-light machines and the cheaper end of desktops usually have integrated graphics. Machines sold for gaming, and some creative workstations, have dedicated graphics.

This matters because a published requirement naming a dedicated graphics card is telling you something specific, and integrated graphics of a similar vintage are generally not equivalent. A game may still start — it may simply run slowly, or at a small window size, or with the visual settings turned down.

Apple silicon Macs complicate the vocabulary slightly, because the graphics are integrated into the same chip while still being considerably more capable than older integrated graphics. If a game publishes separate Mac requirements, read those rather than translating the Windows ones.

Some laptops have both: integrated graphics for everyday work and a dedicated chip that switches in for demanding programs. If dxdiag shows two entries, you have one of these, and the game should use the faster one automatically. If it appears not to, the graphics driver's own control panel is the place that decides, and that is a per-machine setting outside the scope of a general course.

Minimum against recommended

Most publishers list two columns. They are not two opinions about the same thing.

Minimum describes a machine on which the game is expected to start and be playable, usually at a low resolution with the visual quality turned down. Recommended describes a machine on which the publisher expects a comfortable experience at ordinary settings. Neither is a promise, and neither accounts for everything else your computer happens to be doing at the time.

A reasonable way to read them, if you are new to this: if your machine is below the minimum on any line, expect disappointment. If you are between the two, expect it to work with the settings lowered. If you are at or above recommended, you can stop worrying about it.

Requirements change over the life of an online game, because the game itself changes. A title that ran well on your laptop two years ago may ask for more now. That is normal for the category and not a sign anything is wrong.

Laptops, heat and the mains cable

A laptop that meets the stated requirements on paper can still behave differently from a desktop with the same numbers, for two ordinary physical reasons.

The first is heat. A laptop has very little room to move air, so when a demanding program runs for a long time the chips get hot and deliberately slow themselves down to stay within a safe temperature. The game may therefore start smoothly and become less smooth twenty minutes later. Keeping the vents clear and the machine on a hard surface rather than a doona helps more than any software setting.

The second is power. Many laptops run their processor and graphics more slowly on battery to extend runtime. If you are testing whether a game is playable, test it plugged in.

Neither point means a laptop is unsuitable. It means the comparison with published requirements is a little less exact, and that a borderline result deserves a cautious reading.

Your connection and your data allowance

Online games need a connection that is steady more than one that is fast. A high download speed helps with the initial install; what matters while you are playing is latency — the delay between your computer and the server — and whether the connection drops.

Three practical points, all general rather than specific to any game:

• A wired connection is steadier than wireless. If the computer is near the router, a cable is the single cheapest improvement available.
• Australian players connecting to servers on the other side of the world will see higher latency than players near those servers. Some games publish their server regions; where a game does not, the vendor does not state it and you will find out by playing.
• The initial download is the big one. If your plan has a monthly allowance, check what is left before starting a download measured in tens of gigabytes, and remember that a half-finished download that restarts may use the data twice.

Desktop only means desktop only

Some games are published for desktop and laptop computers and nothing else. Enlisted, the game used as an illustration later in this course, is published for Mac, Windows and Linux computers; the network promoting it does not state a phone, tablet or console version, so none should be assumed.

If the computer in your house is actually a tablet with a keyboard attached, this is the point to find out which operating system it really runs, before you spend an evening on a registration that leads nowhere.

A worked example

The hypothetical Adelaide household opens About This Mac on the five-year-old laptop and writes down four lines in under a minute: the macOS version, the chip, eight gigabytes of memory, and 38 gigabytes free on the startup disk. The graphics are part of the chip, so there is no fifth line to find.

Against a published minimum that asks for eight gigabytes, they are exactly at the line rather than above it — which, read honestly, means lowered settings and a cautious expectation rather than a refusal. The 38 gigabytes free is the number that actually causes a decision: a download of that size would leave the disk almost full, so somebody spends twenty minutes clearing old video files first. The data allowance has 60 gigabytes left in the month, which is enough for one install and not for two.

Nothing here is a verdict on a product. It is a household finding out what its own machine is, which is all this step asks of you.

Before you move on

You should now have five numbers written down somewhere you can find them, and a rough sense of whether your machine sits below, between or above a typical published pair of requirement columns. You do not need to act on that yet.

Step 3 moves away from hardware entirely and looks at the paperwork: the Australian classification, the agreement you accept at registration, and what the game sells once you are inside it.