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Splinter Cell: Blacklist Benchmarked

Return of a stealth legend. Along with Thief, Dishonored and Hitman, Splinter Cell is one of the few stealth games on the market. With Blacklist, Ubisoft wants to rebound from their not-so-popular Conviction. We are here to analyze for you whether the title will run fluidly on your notebook.
Splinter Cell: Blacklist Logo

For the original German article, see here.

Graphics

Despite its cliché and rather uninspired terror story, Blacklist is a thrill from the first minute. However, the atmosphere is not the only reason the new Splinter Cell installment is interesting -- it plays nicely too. The game's controls function surprisingly fluidly and require a certain expertise, at least at high levels of difficulty. Ubisoft manages a good compromise between hardcore stealth and more widely accessible action components.

Like the recently reviewed The Bureau: XCOM Declassified, Blacklist also uses the extremely successful Unreal Engine. In this case not version 3, "just" version 2.5, but heavily modified by the developers. As a result, Blacklist has support for DirectX 11 and numerous graphics features.

These features include tessellation, parallax mapping and ambient occlusion (field AO, SSAO & HBAO), as well as anti-aliasing modes FXAA, MSAA, SSAA and Nvidia's exclusive TXAA. The expanded graphics menu also has controls for texture sharpness, shadow quality, texture filtering and vertical synchronization. With the exception of the DirectX option, all changes are adopted immediately, though you sometimes have to reload from the most recent save.

Basic settings like Display Mode, Resolution, Frame Rate and Aspect Ratio are located in the "Basic Options" menu. Here you will also find various presets, though we did not use them for our benchmarks. While some graphics options do not cost hardly anything in terms of performance, some of them make a considerable impact on the game's speed. Anti-aliasing proves to take an especially high toll on the performance.

Overall, the graphics make a good, though not phenomenal impression. For one thing, some textures aren't particularly sharp. For another, the game is plagued with a variety of bugs. During our tests, we ran across the following issues:

  • On a desktop system, the installation aborted with an error message ("missing files"). Verifying the game files solved the problem.
  • Every once in a while, the game crashed for no apparent reason.
  • The presets like to plug in strange values (e.g. 4x MSAA on High and FXAA on Ultra).
  • On Nvidia systems with Optimus technology, the driver/game launcher has to be set to "high performance", otherwise Blacklist will run with the Intel GPU.
  • In DirectX 11 mode, the game often fails to start properly. In our experience, changing the window mode, resolution or display can help.
  • High-end graphics cards sometimes work slower in DirectX 9 mode than under DirectX 11 (not necessarily a bug).
  • The frame rate varies more than it ought from one game situation to another.
  • The system brings up an error message when an Intel chip is in DirectX 11 mode ("out of memory").
  • The Radeon HD 8970M did worse with the beta driver Catalyst 13.8 than the weaker HD 7970M. Using Catalyst 13.4 instead brought the two cards' scores much closer together.
Low Settings
Low Settings
Medium Settings
Medium Settings
High Settings
High Settings
Ultra Settings
Ultra Settings
Low Settings
Low Settings
Medium Settings
Medium Settings
High Settings
High Settings
Ultra Settings
Ultra Settings

Benchmark

We used the beginning of the first campaign mission ("Safehouse") for our benchmark sequence. The sequence takes place in Benghazi/Libya. The high density of people and objects makes the passage good for speed measurements. You can see the nice light, shadow and mirror effects in the video below. As is true of most third-person titles, 30 fps proves to be enough for a decent gaming experience.

Results

Owners of low-performance office notebooks that lack a dedicated graphics card will have to make do with low resolutions and low levels of detail. While the HD Graphics 3000 cannot reach a fluid speed, in DirectX 9 mode (1024x768) the HD 4000 and the HD4600 manage just over 40 and 50 fps, respectively.

For medium settings and 1366x768 pixels, you will need a graphics card from the multimedia segment. Nvidia's popular GeForce GT 630M comes to about 30 fps in DirectX 11 mode. For high details, activated parallax and tessellation effects, ambient occlusion and FXAA, the game demands a high-end graphics accelerator (starting at the GeForce GTX 660M).

1920x1080 pixels, maximum settings and 4x MSAA make even today's top models break into a sweat. Only cards from the GeForce GTX 680M on up have enough power to handle that.

Benchmark Table: Splinter Cell: Blacklist
Benchmark Table: Splinter Cell: Blacklist

Verdict

In its current state, Blacklist seems to us like it is not quite a finished product. Ubisoft should have tested the engine a little longer and dealt with more of their bugs. If you are lucky and the game runs flawlessly, there is not quite so much to complain about. Powerful all-round or gaming notebooks will guarantee nice visuals.

Test Systems

Our primary test devices are courtesy of Schenker Technologies (mysn.de):

  • W503 (Core i7-4700MQ, 8 GB DDR3, GeForce GTX 765M, GTX 770M, GTX 780M, Radeon HD 8970M & HD Graphics 4600)
  • M503 (Core i7-4702MQ, 8 GB DDR3, GeForce GT 750M)
  • XMG P502 (Core i7-3610QM, 8 GB DDR3, GeForce GTX 660M, GTX 670MX, GTX 675MX, GTX 680M, Radeon HD 7970M & HD Graphics 4000)
  • Xesia M501 (Core i7-2630QM, 8 GB DDR3, GeForce GT 630M & HD Graphics 3000)

A further thank you goes to Crucial for providing the 480 GB M500 on which Windows 7 Professional 64-bit is installed.

GPU drivers used: Nvidia 326.80 Beta, AMD 13.8 Beta2 (13.4 @ HD 8970M), Intel 9.17.10.3223 and 9.18.10.3165.

From left to right: Schenker Xesia M501, M503, XMG P502 & W503
From left to right: Schenker Xesia M501, M503, XMG P502 & W503

Overview

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Qualcomm Adreno 304
AMD Radeon Pro 560
Qualcomm Adreno 302
AMD Radeon HD 6850M
AMD Radeon HD 6830M
AMD Radeon HD 6310
AMD Radeon HD 6320
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AMD Radeon 760M
AMD Radeon 680M
AMD Radeon HD 6775G2
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980M
NVIDIA RTX A5500 Laptop GPU
AMD Radeon Pro 455
AMD Radeon Pro 555X
AMD Radeon HD 6650M
AMD Radeon Pro 5500M
AMD Radeon Pro 5300M
AMD Radeon HD 6680G2
AMD Radeon HD 6690G2
AMD Radeon HD 6480G + HD 7450M Dual Graphics
AMD Radeon HD 6250
AMD FirePro W5130M
AMD Radeon HD 7430M
AMD Radeon HD 7350M
AMD Radeon HD 7370M
AMD Radeon HD 7340
AMD Radeon HD 7290
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Intel Iris Xe Graphics G7 80EUs
NVIDIA GeForce Go 6200
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 SLI (Laptop)
Intel UHD Graphics 64EUs (Alder Lake 12th Gen)
NVIDIA GeForce 9200M GS
Nvidia RTX 1000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU
Intel UHD Graphics 630
NVIDIA GeForce 920M
Intel HD Graphics 2500
NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX
NVIDIA GeForce 8700M GT SLI
NVIDIA GeForce Go 6250
NVIDIA RTX 3500 Ada Generation Laptop GPU
NVIDIA RTX 3000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU
NVIDIA RTX 2000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU
NVIDIA Quadro T2000 Max-Q
NVIDIA Quadro T1000 (Laptop)
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PowerVR SGX543MP3
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 880M SLI
PowerVR SGX535
NVIDIA RTX 4000 Ada Generation Laptop GPU
NVIDIA Titan RTX
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AMD Radeon HD 6730M
Qualcomm Adreno 225
AMD Radeon HD 6450 GDDR5
AMD Radeon HD 6480G
AMD Radeon Graphics (Ryzen 7000)
AMD Radeon 780M
AMD Radeon 630
AMD Radeon 625
AMD FirePro M8900
AMD FirePro W5170M
AMD Radeon 520
AMD Radeon HD 6630M
AMD Radeon HD 7500G
AMD Radeon HD 6450M
AMD Radeon HD 6290
AMD Radeon 740M
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AMD FirePro W4190M
AMD Radeon 540X
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950M
NVIDIA GeForce GT 520M
AMD Radeon Pro 460
AMD Radeon HD 6540G2
AMD Radeon HD 6545G2
AMD Radeon HD 6870M
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AMD Radeon HD 6530M
AMD Radeon HD 7640G
AMD Radeon HD 6950M
AMD Radeon HD 7640G + HD 7610M Dual Graphics
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AMD Radeon HD 6550M
NVIDIA T600 Laptop GPU
NVIDIA GeForce 920MX
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NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti Max-Q
NVIDIA Quadro P4200
AMD Radeon HD 6620G + HD 7670M Dual Graphics
AMD Radeon HD 6520G + HD 7450M Dual Graphics
AMD Radeon HD 6550D
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AMD Radeon Pro 555
NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600 GT
AMD Radeon Pro 5600M
AMD Radeon Pro 560X
AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16
AMD Radeon Pro Vega 20
AMD Radeon Pro WX 2100
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AMD Radeon Pro WX 3100
NVIDIA GeForce GT 445M
AMD Radeon HD 6990M Crossfire
AMD Radeon HD 6990M
AMD Radeon HD 6970M
AMD Radeon HD 6970
AMD Radeon HD 6970M Crossfire
ATI Radeon HD 5570
AMD Radeon HD 7660G + HD 7670M Dual Graphics
ATI Mobility Radeon X800
ATI Radeon IGP 340M
ATI Mobility Radeon X700
ATI Radeon IGP 320M
NVIDIA GeForce GT 435M
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NVIDIA GeForce GT 430
NVIDIA GeForce 8400M G
NVIDIA GeForce 830M
44.1
39
18.6
NVIDIA Quadro NVS 320M
NVIDIA GeForce MX450
NVIDIA GeForce GT 425M
NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada Generation
NVIDIA GeForce 825M
49.5
33.9
16.1
NVIDIA GeForce GT 420M
NVIDIA GeForce GT 415M
NVIDIA GeForce 8800M GTX
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960
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NVIDIA GeForce GT 625M
NVIDIA GeForce GT 745M
49.8
23.6
NVIDIA GeForce GT 740M
52.4
NVIDIA GeForce GT 730M
46.2
33.7
14.6
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 SLI (Laptop)
NVIDIA GeForce GT 735M
45.1
32.7
15.6
NVIDIA Quadro P5000
NVIDIA GeForce GT 720M
43.1
11.4
NVIDIA Quadro P3200
AMD Radeon HD 6720G2
AMD Radeon HD 6515G2
AMD Radeon HD 6510G2
PowerVR GE8300
NVIDIA Quadro RTX 4000 (Laptop)
Qualcomm Adreno 205
NVIDIA Quadro RTX 4000 Max-Q
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NVIDIA Titan X Pascal
NVIDIA Quadro RTX 3000 Max-Q
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PowerVR GXA6850
PowerVR GX6450
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PowerVR GM9446
PowerVR GE8322 / IMG8322
PowerVR SGX544
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AMD Radeon R5 M420
AMD Radeon HD 6520G
AMD Radeon HD 6470M
AMD Radeon HD 6750M
AMD Radeon HD 6490M
AMD Radeon 660M
AMD FirePro W4170M
AMD FirePro W2100
AMD Radeon HD 6370M
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AMD Radeon HD 6350M
AMD Radeon HD 6330M
AMD Radeon 620
AMD Radeon 610
AMD Radeon 610M
AMD FirePro W4100
AMD FirePro M5950
AMD FirePro M4000
AMD FirePro M6100
AMD FirePro M3900
AMD FirePro M4100
AMD Radeon 530
AMD FirePro M2000
AMD Radeon HD 6770M
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AMD Radeon HD 6790
AMD FirePro M6000
AMD Radeon Pro W6800
NVIDIA RTX A4500 Laptop GPU
AMD FirePro M5100
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NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M SLI
AMD Radeon HD 6645G2
AMD Radeon HD 6760G2
NVIDIA GeForce 8800M GTS
ATI Radeon HD 5850
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 (Laptop)
NVIDIA Quadro P3000 Max-Q
AMD Radeon Pro Vega 56
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980
AMD Radeon HD 6870
AMD FirePro W7170M
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AMD Radeon HD 6430M
AMD Radeon HD 6380G
AMD Radeon R6 (Kaveri)
21.1
15.7
7.6
AMD Radeon R6 (Carrizo)
AMD Radeon HD 7310
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 965M SLI
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 965M
88.5
109.6
77.1
35.5
AMD Radeon HD 6620G + HD 7450M Dual Graphics
AMD Radeon R5 M335
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AMD Radeon PRO W6600M
AMD Radeon R5 M430
NVIDIA Quadro NVS 150M
AMD Radeon HD 8970M Crossfire
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PowerVR SGX545
AMD Radeon HD 8970M
82.5
73.4
57.3
30.4
AMD Radeon HD 6640G2
AMD Radeon Pro 450
AMD Radeon HD 6620G
Intel Iris Pro Graphics P580
(-) * Smaller values are better. / n123 Number of benchmarks for this median value / * Approximate position

 

Legend
5Stutters – This game is very likely to stutter and have poor frame rates. Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, average frame rates are expected to fall below 25fps
May Stutter – This graphics card has not been explicitly tested on this game. Based on interpolated information from surrounding graphics cards of similar performance levels, stutters and poor frame rates are expected.
30Fluent – Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, this game should run at or above 25fps
40Fluent – Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, this game should run at or above 35fps
60Fluent – Based on all known benchmarks using the specified graphical settings, this game should run at or above 58fps
May Run Fluently – This graphics card has not been explicitly tested on this game. Based on interpolated information from surrounding graphics cards of similar performance levels, fluent frame rates are expected.
?Uncertain – This graphics card experienced unexpected performance issues during testing for this game. A slower card may be able to achieve better and more consistent frame rates than this particular GPU running the same benchmark scene.
Uncertain – This graphics card has not been explicitly tested on this game and no reliable interpolation can be made based on the performances of surrounding cards of the same class or family.
The value in the fields displays the average frame rate of all values in the database. Move your cursor over the value to see individual results.
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Florian Glaser, 2013-09- 2 (Update: 2021-05-18)