Paragon system requirements revealed

Paragon Sparrow

Epic kicked off the Paragon early access period today, but to get in you'll need two things. One, a willingness to pony up for a Founder's Pack, which come in three flavors ranging from $20 to $100; and two, a PC capable of actually playing the thing. I can't help you with the first part, but I can give you an idea of where you'll need to be with regards to the second.

As detailed in the Paragon FAQ:

The Baseline:

  • Nvidia GeForce GTX 460 or AMD Radeon HD 6870 equivalent DX11 GPU
  • 1 GByte VRAM
  • Core i5 2.5 Ghz
  • 4 GByte RAM
  • Windows 7/8/10 64-bit

The Exemplar:

  • Nvidia GTX 660 or AMD Radeon HD 7870 equivalent DX11 GPU
  • 2 GByte VRAM
  • Core i5 2.8 Ghz
  • 8 GByte RAM
  • Windows 7/8/10 64-bit

If your rig isn't quite up to snuff, Epic recommends that you avoid the early access release for now and “check back later as we complete more optimizations and improvements for lower machines.” The FAQ also contains a list of tested graphics cards and their average fps rates at different settings, ranging from the GeForce GTX 980 Ti, which manages 87 fps at “epic,” all the way down to the GeForce GT 540M, and its effectively unplayable 12 fps even on the “low” setting.

And now, if you've ticked all the boxes and determined that Paragon is something you can and want to play, only one thing remains: Hit up our analysis of what you need to know before playing Paragon. The title speaks for itself.

Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.