Assassin's Creed Valhalla loads quicker on the PlayStation 5 than the Xbox Series X, which is raising eyebrows owing to the fact that the latter is technically more powerful than the former.
Under the hood, the PlayStation 5 is boasting a 10 teraflop custom RDNA 2 GPU combined with an eight-core Zen 2 CPU, as well as a custom 825GB SSD. This leads to oh-so-buttery smooth visuals and almost-instantaneous load times on even the most demanding titles. Sony itself had to consider how to "slow" the PlayStation 5 down in some areas. "As game creators, we go from trying to distract the player from how long fast travel is taking - like those Spider-Man subway rides - to being so blindingly fast that we might even have to slow that transition down," said lead architect Mark Cerny.
This bombast is all very well and good, but it doesn't detract from the fact that the Xbox Series X is a mite more powerful than the PlayStation 5. It has a 12 teraflop custom RDNA 2 GPU, an eight-core Zen 2 CPU, and (here's the kicker) a beefy 1TB SSD which is expandable from launch. Though both consoles are capable of glorious 4K resolutions and 120 frames per second, this SSD affords the Xbox Series X the edge over the PlayStation 5. However, these numbers and acronyms may not be important to you if you're still on the fence. For example, no matter how hard it tries, the Xbox Series X won't run Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, as it is an exclusive. Same logic applies to Halo Infinite.
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Anyway, it is intriguing to discover that the less powerful console is able to load Assassin's Creed Valhalla quicker than the more powerful one. With its ginormous map of medieval England, the ability to visit Asgard and Jotunheim, and more weapons than you could shake a pointy, stabby stick at, running the software isn't a modest test of the hardware's capabilities. Yet, we see in this comparison video (courtesy of Digital Foundry) that the game performs differently across the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S.
For the PS5, it only takes 23.30 seconds to load into Alrekstad, a location in Assassin's Creed Valhalla. The Xbox Series X will have you waiting an astonishing 26.48 seconds to continue the journey with Eivor. Of course, I'm being sarcastic here. There's only three seconds between the two consoles, and that's hardly enough time to be significantly noticeable. However, it is interesting. What's more is that the Xbox Series S takes 27.17 seconds to load Alrekstad, which is only slightly slower than its big brother.
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Digital Foundry also reported that the PS5 and XSX suffer from screen tears, but the latter is much more obvious with its issues. These problems don't appear to have affected Assassin's Creed Valhalla's reception, because almost everyone thinks it's a corker of a Viking odyssey. However, if you aren't a fan of the "bigger is better" approach that the series has adopted, you'll probably struggle to find the fun in climbing ye olde towers. The cloak is cool, though.
Featured Image Credit: Ubisoft, SonyTopics: PS5, News, Assassin's Creed Valhalla