The price premium for high refresh PC games is quite painful. You need a decent CPU, a powerful GPU, and of course a high resolution display. Weaknesses are not acceptable. And all of this comes at a cost. Lots of them.

Fortunately, the same logic that works for higher refresh rates at the high end also works in reverse. If you choose a less expensive, lower-resolution display, you don't need an expensive graphics card to achieve high frame rates.

That's where the new AOC C27G2 comes in: it's a 1080p panel, so it puts less strain on the graphics subsystem. At about $260 (£240), this AOC looks like a pretty attractive proposition for a high-refresh 27-inch curved monitor.

Headline statistics include 165 Hz refresh, 1 ms response, and 4,000:1 static contrast. The latter figures suggest a VA panel rather than an IPS or TN panel, and indeed they are. It also supports both Nvidia G-Sync and AMD FreeSync. At this price point, G-Sync support is of the "compatible" type. It is unlikely that a monitor this inexpensive would have an Nvidia G-Sync module.

Still, quite a few important boxes are checked. However, digging into the details of the spec sheet raises questions. The statistic of most concern is a peak brightness of only 250 nits, which is not impressive in this age of HDR monitors with over 1,000 nits. It is not even great by the standards of SDR monitors, where at least 300 nits is the norm.

Even if this is true in theory, in practice the AOC C27G2 is quite a complex performer. In some respects, it is inevitable: the native resolution of 1080p, stretched across a 27-inch diagonal, equates to a mere 82 pixels per inch. In other words, big, fat, ugly pixels. Given that the brightness is 250 nits, it is not surprising that this monitor is not that vibrant; the C27G2 is clearly an SDR monitor, despite the inclusion of a rather ridiculous "HDR effect" option.

So far, so expected. Pixel response, on the other hand, is not at all what one would expect: the AOC C27G2 is blatantly unresponsive in the context of gaming, especially given its 1ms rating. The C27G2 has a configurable Pixel Overdrive setting in the OSD menu. However, even at the most aggressive settings, simply juggling windows on the desktop reveals blurring and blurring. Worse, with the overdrive setting at its highest, ugly reverse ghosting also appears.

If the overdrive is turned down one notch to "medium," the ghosting almost disappears without significantly affecting the rest of the response. If this is good news, the bad news is that it leaves blurring and blurriness in the game. One example is a noticeable problem in the dark, moody underground scenes of Metro: Exodus. Those who remember the poor response of VA panels in the past will find the C27G2's performance all too familiar.

However, that is not to say that this is a bad display at all; the 165 Hz refresh ensures not only fluid rendering, but also snappy response to operation inputs. The contrast claim of 4,000:1 appears plausible. Blacks are ultra-inky, with very little light blurring.

The C27G2 looks good. The plastic is a bit hard and easily scratched. The stand is stable and adjustable for height, rotation, and tilt, and the slim bezels on three sides of the display give it a modern, upscale look. A four-port USB 3.0 hub is also convenient for connecting peripherals and minimizing cable clutter.

Sadly, however, none of that can help this monitor's flawed performance with respect to what should be its core competence. Indeed, at this price point, you have to give up something. You don't get impeccable panel quality or a comprehensive feature set. But the combination of a fairly dim, dingy panel and mediocre pixel response at best is something you have to put up with for this amount of money.