Warhammer 40,000 Space Marine 2 review: Laptop and desktop benchmarks
Test systems
We currently carry out our gaming benchmarks with these devices. Clicking on the photos will take you to the respective manufacturer's website. More details on their specifications are listed at the end of the article.
Tech
From a technical standpoint, Space Marine 2 is absolutely state-of-the-art—be it its setting options or the quality of its graphics. In addition to detailed and highly textured environments and stylish effects (e.g. smoke), the video sequences also look impressive. The latter are superbly staged and create a very cinematic feel.
We also liked the content of the game during our play session. The motivating combat system—which forms the crux of the gameplay—has proven to be quite successful, striking a good balance between simple and complicated. The extremely exciting introduction to the game also helps. Moreover, the atmosphere of the Warhammer universe has generally been captured very well.
We also have nothing to complain about when it comes to the game's graphics options. At the top of the corresponding menu, there are various controls for image display—including resolution, V-Sync, an FPS limit as well as upscaling. In addition to the "in-house" TAA, DLSS and FSR are also supported. Unless specifically mentioned, however, we used the native resolution for our benchmarks.
In the lower section, there are almost 10 quality settings that can be changed in one fell swoop via presets. The game applies adjustments directly, i.e. without needing to restart it. Furthermore, the developers deserve praise for including explanatory texts and, sometimes, comparison images to go along with them.
With all that being said, not everything is (yet) perfect in Space Marine 2, as the game has to contend with CPU limiting and high VRAM requirements in places. Weaker GPUs in particular are confronted with reloading or even incorrectly loading textures at higher resolutions and settings. The Ultra preset is particularly tricky: according to the embedded warning, less than 16 GB of RAM isn't quite enough, even in Full HD.
The CPU dependency becomes noticeable, for example, in that the performance often barely increases when the resolution or settings are reduced and laptops with relatively weak CPU efficiency sometimes suffer a drop in their usual rankings (in our case, the RTX 4070 and RTX 4080 laptops couldn't fully make use of their usual potential). "Precreating shaders" when (first) starting up the game may not take all too long—at least on more powerful GPUs—but it usually takes quite a long time to return to the desktop when exiting the game.
Benchmark
As you can see in the video below, we chose a very demanding sequence with an extremely large number of characters and enemy units for our speed measurements. We used the CapFrameX tool to record a fixed route for just under 30 seconds. Our experience shows that you will likely be well-equipped for the game's brutal battles from an average value of 40fps.
Results
FHD (1,920 x 1,080)
iGPUs currently still struggle to run the game. Even more powerful models such as the Intel Arc 8 or the Radeon 780M don't have enough power to generate smooth frame rates in 1,280 x 720 and minimum settings. You would have to activate suitable upscaling for this. As soon as there is a reasonably modern dGPU inside your computer, the situation looks much more relaxed. With a GeForce RTX 4050 or better, maximum settings are no problem in Full HD.
Space Marine 2 | |
1920x1080 Low Preset AA:T 1920x1080 Medium Preset AA:T 1920x1080 High Preset AA:T 1920x1080 Ultra Preset AA:T | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080, i9-13900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-13900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU, i9-13950HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU, R9 7940HS | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Laptop GPU, i7-13700H | |
AMD Radeon 780M, Z1 Extreme | |
Intel Arc 8-Core iGPU, Ultra 7 155H |
QHD (2,560 x 1,440)
Owners of QHD displays (2,560 x 1,440 pixels) can also enjoy the game in all its glory from a GeForce RTX 4050 onwards (apart from the VRAM issue), which is still reasonably moderate in terms of system requirements.
Space Marine 2 | |
2560x1440 Ultra Preset AA:T 2560x1440 Ultra Preset + Quality DLSS 2560x1440 Ultra Preset + Quality FSR | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080, i9-13900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-13900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU, i9-13950HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU, R9 7940HS | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Laptop GPU, i7-13700H |
UHD (3,840 x 2,160)
Things really get down to business in the 4K range. Without upscaling, only Nvidia's top model, the GeForce RTX 4090, currently masters the Ultra preset adequately on laptops. However, if you activate DLSS or FSR Quality, you are already on the safe side with a GeForce RTX 4070 or higher.
Space Marine 2 | |
3840x2160 Ultra Preset AA:T 3840x2160 Ultra Preset + Quality DLSS 3840x2160 Ultra Preset + Quality FSR | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080, i9-13900K | |
AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, i9-13900K | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Laptop GPU, i9-13950HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, i9-13900HX | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU, R9 7940HS | |
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Laptop GPU, i7-13700H |
Overview
Test system details
Mobile | Graphics card | Processor | RAM |
---|---|---|---|
XMG Neo 16 E23 | Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 @175 W TGP (16 GB GDDR6X) | Intel Core i9-13900HX | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 |
Razer Blade 16 Mid 23 | Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 @175 W TGP (12 GB GDDR6X) | Intel Core i9-13950HX | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 |
XMG Pro 15 E23 | Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 @140 W TGP (8 GB GDDR6) | Intel Core i9-13900HX | 2 x 16 GB DDR5 |
Razer Blade 14 Mid 23 | Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 @140 W TGP (8 GB GDDR6) | AMD Ryzen 9 7940HS | 2 x 8 GB DDR5 |
Medion Erazer Scout E20 | Nvidia GeForce RTX 4050 @100 W TGP (6 GB GDDR6) | Intel Core i7-13700H | 2 x 8 GB DDR5 |
Lenovo Yoga Pro 7 14 | Intel Arc 8 | Intel Core Ultra 7 155H | 2 x 16 GB LPDDR5-7467 |
Asus ROG Ally Z1 Extreme | AMD Radeon 780M | AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme | 16 GB LPDDR5-6400 |
Tower PC | Graphics card | Processor | RAM |
---|---|---|---|
Asus ROG Strix Z790-F | Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 (16 GB GDDR6X) AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT (20 GB GDDR6) |
Intel Core i9-13900K | 2 x 24 GB DDR5 G.Skill |
4K monitor | Operating system | Nvidia driver | AMD driver | Intel driver |
---|---|---|---|---|
Philips Evnia 329M1RV | Windows 11 | 560.94 | 24.8.1 | 101.5989 |