Need Help for Game Dev Experiment Setup

M-Carrollz · August 1, 2019

Hey Guys,
Long time watcher of LTT but signed up to the forums as I'm struggling currently with budgeting for a project I'm working on. Hopefully you wonderful people can help

So I'm applying for a funding grant to test out some experimental FPS gameplay and map design concepts. I'm currently working on the budget for the application.

As part of the budget I need to work out specs and costs for a rig.

System Needs to:

To play pretty much any and every FPS game on PC (As during the initial phase I will need to test existing methods and try my planned methods on other games using rental servers etc)
Record gameplay footage in 1080P 60FPS or higher (I'm going to need 2 new monitors but looking at 144-240 hz, prefer 144hz 1440p and record at 1440p 60fps as I may have to zoom into footage on maps to understand how players move around the map on spectator few etc). TN Panels are fine as colour depth I have other options for any colour accurate work. VESA mounts are a must as I will have a sit stand desk due to back injury.
Capture Card (Currently trying to decide between Elgato 4K60 Pro or HD60Pro). As I will also have to record footage from PS4 Pro and XBONE X (on a Sony 4k TV). I don't need 4k footage however as it's only for analysis and not as a content creator or anything. I'd like 1440P again here but not sure how.
USB-C Front port (as I will be using SanDisk Extreme Portable USB-C SSDs as ISO back up of my data). The Lian Li PC-011 Dynamic (Razer Edition) is the case I've been looking at.
NVMe M.2 (Ultra M.2) for Samsung 970 Pro for bootup on (Windows 10 Pro).
Needs to be able to export small prototype/blocking levels and larger Battlefield style levels. Speed is important here but not sure if I can keep to consumer GPU or do I need to go workstation and still game on it? I'm probably going to stick with Unreal Engine for dev but maybe some unity and cry engine (just in case this changes the setup needed). RTX nice so I can test RTX lighting in my builds but not a deal breaker.

I also want to have NAS to back up from this PC and A Razer Blade 15 (2019) 240hz. As I'm going to do a lot of 1080p/1440p video scrubbing and 6x speed viewing of footage I'm not sure if I can still get away with Gbe and HDD NAS or I need 2.5/5/10Gbe and SSD NAS. any help here would be great.

The budget for the grant isn't huge (Max 50k AUD including my wages, rent and equipment for 6 months). So I can't just go overboard, I need to figure out what I will actually need to play, record, build and scrub through 1440p footage without no lag if possible. I'm assuming AMD is portably going to be the way to go as I need to record without high compression or artifacting as I need to be able to see details on spectator views of maps etc).

In terms of accessories I'm probably going a Razer Ornata for keyboard and Mamba w/ hyper flux for mouse, Elgato Mini Stream Deck for ease to start recording and a razer kraken headset. Nothing too random or too high tech (The Hyperflux is purely as I don't like cables but don't like normal a battery powered mouse.)

I'll also trying to keep the other storage on the build SSD's (Probably SanDisk 2.5" sata or more M.2 drives depending on the motherboard).

Cheers in advance, I know there's a lot going on which is why I'm asking for help as I kinda keep getting stuck on "do I need that for this though" as I know what I need for a good gaming or workstation but as an experimental platform I'm kinda struggling.

Cheers,
M-Carrollz

brob · August 1, 2019

You seem to have settled on the hardware so what advice are you seeking?

M-Carrollz · August 2, 2019

Well I know what I need in terms of outputs but I'm not sure what I can get away with and getting everything to work together. For an example knowing I want USB-c Front port and NVMe m.2 means anywhere from 200-1000 AUD motherboard etc.

So I need help with those sort of things and others like do I need a Titan RTX or can I get away with a 2070 Super or 2060 Super etc. or even lower.

My main problem is the Funding Grant is for a Max 50K AUD and that has to include office rent and wages, which isn't a lot when you realise the cost of living over here. So if I don't need to spend 4k AUD on a Titan RTX etc to be able to do what I need I'd be to use that funding elsewhere (like pay for my own rent etc). Basically I understand I'm not an expert so I'm coming to a forum with people who might be able to say yeah you've hit the nail on the head or actually don't worry about x get a y etc.

brob · August 2, 2019

Your "wants" are at odds with your budget and do not necessarily contribute directly to the work. The case for instance is significantly more expensive than needs be. As is the requirement for a front panel USB-C port and proposed data backup media. They offer convenience but nothing more. (There are other, less expensive options for data backup.)

If you simply want 60 fps @ 1080 gameplay an RTX 2070 is going to be more than enough.

For specific hardware advice you need to provide an actual budget amount.

M-Carrollz · August 2, 2019

See I get what you're saying, and I appreciate that for most people that their budget is number 1 way to work out what they are after.

But this setup would be funded specifically for me to test existing FPS games and their map design, record the footage for high speed scrubbing (with multiple redundancies as I won't get another chance at this so I can't have data corrupt), analyse player movement on various maps (which may require me to zoom into footage). And thats just the first Phase (Probably the first 1-2 months of 6-12 month project. After that using the same rig I need to build multiple prototype levels (At first just simple blocking out of the layouts to test as this would be for something never done in gaming before, then eventually more detail later in the experimental cycle.

Time is vital as I won't get any extensions to my funding for this experiment and once it's over I have to report my findings, hoping that what I find allows me to develop a cutting edge FPS.

So if I need to spend 10k of my 50k budget to have it set up then I will, I need the desired effect for the least amount possible, which is what I'm asking. I'm not trying to be difficult which I feel you think I am from the "wants" comment. I'm cautious by nature (as I've just finished 2 years of recovering from surgery) plus this is a great opportunity for me in general and to get my life back on track.

I'm struggling to figure out what I NEED and I am asking for help. Maybe this isn't the right place to ask... and that's on me but... I just don't want to fuck it up basically

A. Cole · August 23, 2019

Sounds like you have a large flexible budget, yet don't want to blow it unnecessarily.
I'm admittedly becoming an AMD convert so some biases (though I still have an intel system for now) but they are better bang for buck and probably meet your requirements better. if you go AMD though please do not forget the marvel of StoreMI (tiered storage system) its too perfect for your work type
CPU
Though intel has higher clock speeds (per clock) AMD's extra cores in there 3000 series will give you ample room to stream process and run more workstation like programs. also if your dealing with really big file transfers, NVME over PCI-e gen4 might also be useful to you which at the moment is an AMD only bonus (reported 5gb/s write speeds)
CAPTURE
To the capture card point, those are both good cards however if your wanting to capture Xbox and PS4 footage you might be better off with an external streaming card (in theme with razer, they have the razer ripsaw, but its at razers price not competitive)
GPU
A single RTX card would normally be enough, but if your planning on running both a 4k and a 240hz monitor you are going to need some juice, Unfortunately I don't have materials to test this for you but I'm guessing you will need a RTX2070 super or higher, or who knows once AMD sort drivers an RX 5700 might be enough.
someone on this forum might have a 4k and a high refresh rate monitor running of a 2070 or 2080 but you would have to ask them (I'm still running on my GTX 1060)
CASE
As much as I LOVE the lian-li razer edition, it is an unnecessary cost for what you need and beyond your build logs scope, fun fact the 011-D range was designed in collaboration with Der8auer specifically for high end water cooling systems, and quite frankly its borderline insulting to the very design of the case if your not high end water cooling.
Razer has there own case range coming out (check there site) and have done other collaborations in the past.
if front panel USB-c is a must I would recommend a fractal design or phanteks case, personal preference I would go for the phanteks P600s as it has plenty of extra hard drive support if you plan anything like a raid.
allot of motherboard come with a usb-c port now so if you can forgoe front usb then the variation in cases and prices goes up massively
MOTHERBOARD
As mentioned before, you could go for a new X570 motherboard with Ryzen 3000 series CPU's which has phenomenal m.2 speeds (if there gen4 m.2's) but if you don't want to go that much cost to speed then I would recommend an X470 or B450 board (you would need a bios update if running 3000 series cpu's but that can be done over a usb)
Storage.
Gen4 m.2 ssd's have shown to be an insane jump in performance, but at the moment is very pricey. but as a footnote I would always recommend Samsung 2.5" SSD's and there QVO series are high capacity as a decent cost plus quite stylish.
NAS
that's up to you, there's plenty of places you can buy a NAS box and populate it yourself, although if your dealing with large files I would recommend getting a motherboard with 10gb networking or a NIC card.
PERIPHERALS
in my opinion, other than technical information which you can get on most websites, peripherals should ALWAYS be a personal choice, what feels right for you, my advice is try and find a store that sells a bunch of different ones and just ask to test them out on your laptop.
MONITOR
this honestly has too many variables for one person to just list, colour density, backlight intensity, size, resolution, refresh rates, latencies, connection ports, curved or not curved, too many variables.
have a look on PCpartpicker and adjust the filters till you find a few monitors you like the look of then people have a better basis to help out on.