News Civilization VII recommends 16 cores and 32GB RAM for 4K gameplay — RTX 4070 or RX 7800XT is the minimum

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32GB DDR4-3200 is $50 and DDR5-6400 is $100, with some faster DDR5 being cheaper with sales. In 2024 no desktop system being used for anything over basic office tasks should be using less than 32GB, it's both too inexpensive and beneficial not to. Heck, even with office tasks get the 32GB, $25-$50 now over 16GB and not have to worry about it again.

The 16 core CPU is pushing it, though I imagine it's more for Intel's P+E core models since there are still way too many people ignorant of basic things like the difference between P and E cores.
 
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I really enjoyed Civ V. Civ VI was this long slog of doing things that seemingly had no real effect on the game within some of the shorter play options. Given my experience with that and these insane hardware requirements, I will just save myself some money and grief and skip this.
 
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Alvar Miles Udell said:
32GB DDR4-3200 is $50 and DDR5-6400 is $100, with some faster DDR5 being cheaper with sales. In 2024 no desktop system being used for anything over basic office tasks should be using less than 32GB, it's both too inexpensive and beneficial not to. Heck, even with office tasks get the 32GB, $25-$50 now over 16GB and not have to worry about it again.

The 16 core CPU is pushing it, though I imagine it's more for Intel's P+E core models since there are still way too many people ignorant of basic things like the difference between P and E cores.
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This even work laptops that I order for users in the office are all 32gb of ram standard.
 
I cannot imagine they mean 16core/32thread but rather 16t. The vast majority of games cannot address more than 2-4t. The few handful that can usually top out at around 8-16t. Who knows, maybe this is the start of really parallelizing games.
 
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helper800 said:
I cannot imagine they mean 16core/32thread but rather 16t. The vast majority of games cannot address more than 2-4t. The few handful that can usually top out at around 8-16t. Who knows, maybe this is the start of really parallelizing games.
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You mean graphics, but Civ VII is a strategy game. They probably use all the cores for simulation of AI opponents (and they do mean 16 cores).
 
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Alvar Miles Udell said:
The 16 core CPU is pushing it, though I imagine it's more for Intel's P+E core models since there are still way too many people ignorant of basic things like the difference between P and E cores.
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helper800 said:
I cannot imagine they mean 16core/32thread but rather 16t
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No need to speculate, they list specific CPU models in the recommended specs, not just thread/core counts. The recommended CPUs for "Ultra" (4k@60fps, high settings) are i7-14700F/R9-5950X.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GY-jzy6WQAA5XvH?format=jpg&name=large
 
salgado18 said:
They probably use all the cores for simulation of AI opponents (and they do mean 16 cores).
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They may use all cores to simulate scenarios and carry out a single AI's moves, but I hope they are not trying to simulate all AI opponents at once since it's a turn based game. If they are, it would mean they have pre-determined paths for AI behaviors within a turn which would suck. Ideally, if they are doing a true AI opponent then I would think the AI simulation would need to be serial so that each AI is reacting to what the players and other AI did during their turn.
 
salgado18 said:
You mean graphics, but Civ VII is a strategy game. They probably use all the cores for simulation of AI opponents (and they do mean 16 cores).
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No, I definitely mean what I said specifically. Am I missing the differentiation here? I didn't make that connection that Civ is more akin to a simulation than a game, so the background calcs for that sim certainly could use more cores than a traditional game.
TJ Hooker said:
No need to speculate, they list specific CPU models in the recommended specs, not just thread/core counts. The recommended CPUs for "Ultra" (4k@60fps, high settings) are i7-14700F/R9-5950X.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GY-jzy6WQAA5XvH?format=jpg&name=large
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I can very easily speculate how many threads the underlying code can address. Just because a game or application recommends a specific CPU that does not mean it's going to redline all of its threads or that its code can even address more than 1t at a time.
 
Elusive Ruse said:
I didn’t like Civ VI too much I might give VII a try if only to see whether it can fully utilise all cores.
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Like peg all 16C/32T at high usage? I very much doubt it. The CPUs for "Recommended" (1080p/60fps/medium) are 6C/12T, and there generally isn't much difference in CPU utilization from changing resolution (or most other graphics settings), assuming constant FPS. The map size/number of AI civs seems like it'd have a bigger impact on CPU requirements than graphics settings, but that isn't included as a factor in the published system requirements.
 
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helper800 said:
I can very easily speculate how many threads the underlying code can address. Just because a game or application recommends a specific CPU that does not mean it's going to redline all of its threads or that its code can even address more than 1t at a time.
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I mean yeah, anyone can make up a number for how many threads the game will use, but no one except the devs really know at this point (except maybe if they are using a game engine that has been benchmarked in other games). I never claimed the game is going to max out a 16C/32T CPU. Just clarified that they very much did "mean 16core/32thread [CPU]" in their published requirements, not a 16 thread CPU as you had assumed.
 
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TJ Hooker said:
I mean yeah, anyone can make up a number for how many threads the game will use, but no one except the devs really know at this point (except maybe if they are using a game engine that has been benchmarked in other games). I never claimed the game is going to max out a 16C/32T CPU. Just clarified that they very much did "mean 16core/32thread [CPU]" in their published requirements, not a 16 thread CPU as you had assumed.
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You can surmise how many cores a particular program can use with HWiFO and others by looking at core utilization while the application is being used.
 
TJ Hooker said:
Like peg all 16C/32T at high usage? I very much doubt it. The CPUs for "Recommended" (1080p/60fps/medium) are 6C/12T, and there generally isn't much difference in CPU utilization from changing resolution (or most other graphics settings), assuming constant FPS. The map size/number of AI civs seems like it'd have a bigger impact on CPU requirements than graphics settings, but that isn't included as a factor in the published system requirements.
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I’m always bound by my 3080 considering I game at 4K but I was referring to the devs throwing the 16 core recommendation out there and I figure they might be pointing to end turn simulations and AI decision making when things get more complex as the game progresses.
 
They probably meant 16 threads, since right now Intel CPUs with 16 P+E cores perform in the ballpark of 8 Core/16 Threads on Ryzen.

Why the CPU/RAM recommendation would go up with resolution? I'm not sure, since the only CPU intensive part of Civ is usually to compute the Enemy AI's turn, which has worked just fine on weak CPUs. It just takes longer.
Maybe 4k lets you zoom out and display more of the map at once, so it needs more RAM to hold the additional map tiles & units?

GY-jzy6WQAA5XvH
 
Giroro said:
They probably meant 16 threads, since right now Intel CPUs with 16 P+E cores perform in the ballpark of 8 Core/16 Threads on Ryzen.

Why the CPU/RAM recommendation would go up with resolution? I'm not sure, since the only CPU intensive part of Civ is usually to compute the Enemy AI's turn, which has worked just fine on weak CPUs. It just takes longer.
Maybe 4k lets you zoom out and display more of the map at once, so it needs more RAM to hold the additional map tiles & units?

GY-jzy6WQAA5XvH
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The real question is did they develop it for PC first. If they did then the specs do seem a bit high, although squarely in the mid-range category for gaming PCs. If they developed for consoles first then ported to PC then...They may seem a bit low.
 
I've seen the marketing going on and on about new graphics, the music score, some new features and all. But I have not heard the mention one word about the computer being a better player, which sucks to me as for actual fun in playing that is what matters.

Also I have to say on the new graphics. There is just a scaling problem which is made even more noticeable with the more detailed depictions of units - like seeing animated single soldiers the size of cities is just absurd and it adds zero to the game play.

Wanna play Civilization? - I recommend getting Civilization V with all the expansions and maybe experimenting with some mods (there is one which lets you construct canals sort of Suez style).
 
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