Mirror's Edge Catalyst Beta Preview, Performance, And Impressions


ME Catalyst Performance and Conclusion

The Mirror's Edge Catalyst beta looked great, especially at higher resolutions. The beta did not, however, feature a complete set of textures. So, the final product could be more demanding on systems in exchange for the added visual fidelity. Though, performance can also optimized between now and the final release.  Regardless, on Ultra settings, everything looked good with the beta.

The game leverages EA DICE’s own Frostbite 3 engine, which shows its versatility here with the pristine environment and rich bright colors. It’s a Spartan looking world of glass high-rises that has a decidedly different tone than the dusty battle-torn environments of the Battlefield games.

And now, lets take a look at the performance numbers. All testing was conducted using the in-game "Ultra" preset.

1080p true

1440p bench

4K bench

Mirror's Edge Catalyst performs well on the mid-range cards, at resolutions of 1440p and below. With the resolution cranked up to 4K, however, you will need a GPU with at least 4GB of video ram and ample horsepower, like a Fury X, 980 Ti or a Titan X. Please note, that we used a factory-overclocked EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti Classified here, which explains why the 980Ti outpaces the Titan X. We should also mention that the Radeon R9 390X offered unexpectedly low performance at 4K despite its 8GB of memory, so we didn't include it in the graph. Finally, multi-GPU support is not currently implemented, so we didn't include any numbers.

Conclusion
Mirrors Edge Catalyst3

That about wraps up our quick look at Mirror's Edge Catalyst.  We're excited by what we've seen so far. In truth, we would love a replay system with camera controls so we could get a more pulled-back view of our parkour shenanigans with a bit of cinematic flare. Regardless, the game, even in its beta state is fun, the control is tight and intuitive, and it all looks fantastic on mid-range hardware. Plus, virtually all of the gripes with the original seem to be addressed adequately in ME Catalyst. Watch for the full gameplay and more in-depth performance analysis when the final version of the game ships. 

Mirror's Edge Catalyst is set for a June 7th launch in North America and June 9th in Europe.

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