The purpose of this article is to provide benchmarking for StarCraft II (SC2) with NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti graphics card. StarCraft II has been a phenomenal success since its release. It has been largely credited as having brought esports to the world and was originally in its early days the largest esports game in the world. According to SC2 Pulse the average daily users still is about 93,000. In Comparison to other games being played it ranks somewhere in between Grand Theft Auto V and Team Fortress (see below).
Source: SteamDB
StarCraft 2 System Requirements
StarCraft II’s system requirements are relatively light compared to modern games. Even the lowest end new builds can play StarCraft II with recommended specifications. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti has no problem exceeding these system requirements. Therefore, benchmarking StarCraft II (SC2) with NVIDIA 1050 Ti can be done on ultra-graphics settings and still achieve above optimal FPS (60 FPS).
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti vs GTX 650
To put the system requirements of StarCraft 2 in comparison to the GTX 1050 Ti, it would be good to show the differences between the two graphics cards.
| Graphics Card | Base Clock | Memory Size | Memory Type |
| NVIDIA GeForce GTX 650 | 1 GHz | 1GB | GDDR5 |
| NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti | 1.29 -1.39 GHz | 4GB | GDDR5 |
Benchmarking StarCraft II (SC2) with NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti
Real-world Benchmarking StarCraft II (SC2) with NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti results show declining FPS over the course of game play. This is due to the continuous buildup of forces, which is different in a way from benchmarking games like Call of Duty that are first person shooters. As the game started, FPS was around 200. Towards the end of the battle when carriers were fighting marines and vultures that number dropped to around 60 FPS.
| Graphics Settings | Resolution | Low FPS | High FPS |
| Ultra | 1080P | 60 FPS | 200 FPS |
As long as you stay above 60 FPS in any game, you are not likely to experience any choppy-ness or stuttering. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti will play StarCraft 2 well.
Graphics Settings for StarCraft II (SC2)
The graphics settings used for this benchmark include a mix of settings ranging from High, Ultra, and Extreme.
- Display mode: Full screen
- Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (1080P)
- Vertical Sync: off
- Refresh Rate: Default
- Graphics Quality – Custom
- Shaders – Ultra
- Lighting – Ultra
- Shadows – Ultra
- Terrain – Ultra
- Reflections – On
- Effects – Ultra
- Texture Quality – Ultra
- Post-Processing – Ultra
- Physics – Extreme
- Models – High
- Unit Portraits – 3D
- Movies – High
- Indirect Shadows – Off
PC Hardware for the StarCraft 2 1050 Ti Benchmark
The PC hardware used for this benchmark is listed below with links to purchase on Amazon if you would like:
- Processor: AMD Ryzen 5 2600 Processor with Wraith Stealth Cooler
- RAM: T-Create Classic 10L DDR4 16GB Kit (2 x 8GB) 3200MHz
- Graphics Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Gaming, 4GB GDDR5
- SSD Drive: T-Force Vulcan G 1TB SLC Cache 3D NAND TLC 2.5 Inch