Why would a game that needs only 1 GB of storage need 8 GB OF Recomended RAM and 4 Gb of minimum RAM requirement?
In: 2
[removed]
As a simple explanation, I will tell you that they are launching, testing and experimenting with several platforms for cloud games (I have seen some well-known streamers testing them) with which your PC / Console only needs a minimum installation of data (and a quick connection with the server) but your graphics do need those 4 to 8 GB of RAM to move the game decently.
Like prepping dinner. All the individual components maybe small but get them out and prep them it takes a lot more space.
How big something is on the hard drive doesn’t say anything about how much RAM it uses when running. A lot of times things are compressed on a hard drive. The game needs to load all the textures, create the world environment, keep track of game stats, etc.
The game creates “stuff” dynamically while it’s running and needs somewhere to store that stuff so it can be accessed quickly. This goes double for any game that’s multiplayer or on the Internet. It has to keep track of your stuff and also some minimal information about the others’ stuff too.
The 1GB is ROM storage. It’s just a place for the computer to find the programme without having to use disposable media like a risk or a stick. The RAM storage is what is needed to run the programme. 4 GB will run it at a basic level. Low graphics but ok frame rate for example where as the recommended RAM is what the software engineers want you to have so that it runs, in the sense of a game, at the best graphics and performance level.
True ELI5 building Lego. The 1GB would be the box the Lego came in. Not a big box particularly but that’s where all the parts and instructions are. The RAM would be space needed to unbox and open the instructions and place the individual bags inside the box in the right order to build the Lego.
Think of it like buying a bed frame from Ikea. When you first get it home, you’ve got a relatively small box.
Once you unpack it, put it together, and start using additional components (i.e. mattress, sheets, pillows) your bed becomes a lot larger than the box that it’s frame came in.
Suppose you’re playing Starcraft, and you are building Zerglings.
In storage, you only need to store 1 Zergling — its base hitpoints, its damage, it’s visuals, etc. Every time you spawn a Zergling, the game looks up the Zergling “template” in storage and creates one in-game.
But if you have spawned 100 Zerglings in-game, you can no longer keep just one template. You have 100 Zerglings, each with its own HP, its own position, its own animation state, etc. This would take about 100 times more memory than just the template.
This is how it works with most of game’s data. In storage, you only keep the “templates” that can be used to regenerate the game’s state, but during play, you have to store the entire state with many entities.
Everyone provided the long explanation of this pretty well but to understand it more, understand storage and memory (RAM) are two completely different things.
Both are measured the same way (MB, GB, TB, etc.) but storage is used to keep the files that make up a game on your computer. Memory is used by a computer to do multiple things at a time without slowing down. So a game can *function* with 4GB. but to be able to run with a certain expectation of quality it would need more.
Latest Answers