Benchmarks: Frame Rate, Frame Time, and Smoothness
Benchmark Sequence
For Honor features a built-in benchmark that lasts about 70 seconds. This is what we're using to test.
Some of the game's campaign missions (for example, Valkenheim in winter, which makes generous use of fog) are more graphics-bound than other scenarios, regardless of the detail options you choose.
Extreme Quality - 1080p, 1440p, and 4K
At Full HD, using the Extreme preset, a GeForce GTX 1060 6GB lands at the top of our charts. AMD's Radeon RX 470 represents the other end of the spectrum. The four cards between those two perform almost identically. From top to bottom, though, these six products achieve fairly smooth frame rates.
Not surprisingly, performance falls as we shift to 1440p (still at Extreme quality). While all of the cards average more than 40 frames per second, their minimum frame rates drop into the 30s during our benchmark sequence. Even the GeForce GTX 1060 6GB struggles, barely besting AMD's previous-gen Radeon R9 390.
Gaming at 4K just isn't viable on mainstream hardware, even in a title like For Honor that doesn't demand a lot of rendering horsepower. Our Radeon R9 390 simply refused to launch the benchmark at this resolution.
High Quality - 1080p, 1440p, and 4K
By pulling back a bit on quality, performance increases just as you'd expect. This time, all of the cards exceed an average of 90 FPS. The Radeon RX 480 and GeForce GTX 1060 6GB even pass the 100 FPS mark. Only the GeForce is able to keep its nose above 90 FPS throughout our benchmark run, though. Interestingly, the GeForce GTX 970 succumbs to AMD's Radeon RX 470.
At 1440p and High-quality settings, every card except for the GTX 970 achieves an average of 60 FPS or more. The game plays through smoothly on all cards, though.
Only the Radeon RX 480 and GeForce GTX 1060 6GB average more than 30 FPS. But with minimums in the 20s, you're not going to enjoy this game or most others at such a high resolution with a mainstream graphics card. What's more, you wouldn't be able to play multi-player mode, as the servers are supposed to boot you at under 30 FPS.
Once again, our Radeon R9 390 wouldn't run the test at this resolution.
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