Catacombs Level

“Catacombs” is a level that NVIDIA and Crytek demonstrated as one that benefits from the Shader Model 3.0 in terms of image quality. While right now there is no difference between SM 3.0 path and SM 2.0 path in terms of visual excellence, there is some performance benefit the newer path has.

Note: minimal fps are marked with white numbers on the diagrams, black numbers represent average fps.

Surprisingly, average fps decreased as a result of using the SM 3.0 path, however, we see a clear improvement of the minimal fps, something that affects game-play dramatically and which is perhaps even more important than average fps.

In the “Catacombs” demo we see a clear lead of the RADEON X800 XT over the GeForce 6800 Ultra. At the same time the GeForce 6800 GT still manages to slightly outperform the RADEON X800 PRO, while the GeForce 6800 easily beats the RADEON 9800 XT.