Homeworld 3 requires 12GB of RAM but only 40GB of storage space

[Daniel Sims]

In brief: Strategy games aren't usually known to have the most demanding graphics and system requirements, but the specs for Homeworld 3 suggest it could be a significant exception. Regardless of settings, playing the game will require a good amount of memory and a decent GPU.

Blackbird Interactive has revealed system requirements for Homeworld 3, one of our most anticipated upcoming PC games, and they are more demanding than any competing real-time strategy game. The specs appear more similar to those for recent AAA action games with detailed characters and environments rather than a game about managing fleets of spaceships from a bird's-eye view.

Even on low graphics settings at 1080p, Homeworld 3 requires at least 12GB of RAM. All higher settings recommend 16GB, but the recommended graphics card for 1080p is a GeForce RTX 2070 or AMD or Intel equivalents. To play the game in 4K, Blackbird suggests an RTX 3080, a Radeon RX 6900 XT, or another GPU with at least 12GB of VRAM. Thankfully, the game only requires 40GB of storage space.

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However, those specs are for playing Homeworld 3 without ray tracing. The feature isn't typically associated with strategy games, and Blackbird hasn't explained how the game employs ray tracing, but the spec sheet lists three settings for it. The lowest, at 1080p, is manageable on recent mainstream cards like the RTX 3060 or RX 6650 XT. It isn't clear whether the system requirements account for upscaling, but Homeworld 3 supports FSR 2.0, DLSS Super Resolution, and DLSS Frame Generation.

The game's specs are easily on another level compared to recent strategy titles like Total War: Pharaoh. Dune: Spice Wars is somewhat closer, but the most similarly demanding strategy game is Cities: Skylines II, which faced sharp criticism for its performance issues. Hopefully, Homeworld 3's graphics and performance justify its steep requirements.

Blackbird hasn't said whether the game will receive a macOS version, but all other Homeworld titles support Macs. The previous two releases – Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak and the Homeworld Remastered Collection – received macOS ports a few months after their Windows release dates.

Homeworld 3 launches in February 2024. It's the first new entry since 2016's Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak and the first numbered title since Relic Entertainment released Homeworld 2 in 2003 – two decades ago. One of Homeworld 3's primary additions is the co-op "War Games" mode, where players conduct randomized battles with a roguelike-inspired progression system.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/100999-homeworld-3-requires-12gb-ram-but-only-40gb.html

 

[KedsDead]

I think the requirements are mostly going to be related to the number of ships you can get into the game. The only draw back to the older Homeworld games, was the fact that it ran on a single core.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

I think the requirements are mostly going to be related to the number of ships you can get into the game. The only draw back to the older Homeworld games, was the fact that it ran on a single core.

Likely. I think it will do something similar to Sins of a Solar Empire, where it loads the entire map and all associated planets and assets at once so you dont have loading screens in game. Big RTS games like this gobble RAM.

 

[James Ryan]

Likely. I think it will do something similar to Sins of a Solar Empire, where it loads the entire map and all associated planets and assets at once so you dont have loading screens in game. Big RTS games like this gobble RAM.

Sins would get insane when you modded it with a bucket load of assets in play. Even on modern machines it can get a bit bogged down. But it's such a great game.

 

[Peter Farkas]

Those VRAM requirements again show the Achilles heel of nVidia. They really need to increase VRAM on their cards.

 

[KedsDead]

Sins would get insane when you modded it with a bucket load of assets in play. Even on modern machines it can get a bit bogged down. But it's such a great game.

The original suffers from the same fate that Homeworld suffered from. Single Core use.. They are both great games, even if Sins 2, is just Sins with a support for mutlti cores, and a slight grafix upgrade, I'd be happy..

 

[CMP01]

Those VRAM requirements again show the Achilles heel of nVidia. They really need to increase VRAM on their cards.

Fair enough. I just went from 16Gb at 3440x1440 to 24Gb at the same plus a fair chance at 4K. Not Nvidia cards btw (6800XT and 7900XTX) respectively but I've made this move for being more interested in keeping up with certain games/genres that I bother keeping a PC for being as demanding nm often having neither RT and/or upscaling (so far anyway) As for RT itself, I have little use for it nm it being often as ephemeral as the difference between DLSS and FSR (often only truly differentiated via screenshots etc)

But I agree absolutely. It's bad enough that devs have increasingly foregone even half respectable attempts at pre launch testing or optimisation of late (nm now using upscalers as a base requirement) Due to that I've seen last and current gen high end GPU's get written down faster than anything I've seen before. I'll add the fact that for twice the price of a card that often trades blows with it, the 4090's advantages in RT are often trumped by the fact running RT nerfs it. For all that price it still doesn't have the RT resources to break even nm this whole RT thing being Nvidia's hype baby. Going lower is no less a tricky choice, the 4080 has the same VRAM cap I already found increasingly wanting so why buy that either?

Last gen I said that this gen might be the one I'd jump on Nvidia for the RT (assuming correctly that AMD weren't there yet) but in truth RT isn't there yet either, nm ppl already talking up path tracing like it's doable. Roll on next gen and ppl talking about holodeck technology...

 

[Theinsanegamer]

The original suffers from the same fate that Homeworld suffered from. Single Core use.. They are both great games, even if Sins 2, is just Sins with a support for mutlti cores, and a slight grafix upgrade, I'd be happy..

The 5800x3d is the first CPU that could handle a 10 player vast map SINS late game while maintaining 60 FPS with no mouse lag. A decade after rebellion came out. It LOVES that 3d cache. Same goes for starcraft II if anyone still plays that. And factorio. I remember upgrading and OCing CPUs just to get that last few FPS out of sins....

I hope SINS II is good. I really do. The first game has been an obsession for 15 years now. I'm ready for something new.

 

[KedsDead]

The 5800x3d is the first CPU that could handle a 10 player vast map SINS late game while maintaining 60 FPS with no mouse lag. A decade after rebellion came out. It LOVES that 3d cache. Same goes for starcraft II if anyone still plays that. And factorio. I remember upgrading and OCing CPUs just to get that last few FPS out of sins....

I hope SINS II is good. I really do. The first game has been an obsession for 15 years now. I'm ready for something new.

Sins2 looks and feels like Sins.. but with multi core for late game stability..

 

[madboyv1]

The original suffers from the same fate that Homeworld suffered from. Single Core use.. They are both great games, even if Sins 2, is just Sins with a support for mutlti cores, and a slight grafix upgrade, I'd be happy..

I would absolutely give OG Sins a revisit with multi-core support, I played it a lot when it first came out but it would often bog down like many games of scale in the late 2000s/early 2010s. Despite Supreme Commander having multiple threads, the workloads were still often assigned to single cores or in reality, the simulation thread(s) would (could?) only be assigned to a single core and just become a slog after about 1000 total units on field, less if there were several UEF players in FA.

Too bad these issues will never be resolved, just gotta look towards the future for that proper scratch to each despite RTS and Real time 4X genres feeling kind of bare lately.