The official PC system requirements for Borderlands 4 have been revealed and the community is raising their eyebrows at it. Do your 8 core processor and plenty of VRAM requirement mean your set up does not likely handle the cel-shaded carnage dropping this September?
Breaking Down the Official Requirements
Gearbox has revealed the full specifications on Steam which show that the minimum requirement is quite steep. You will need an 8-core CPU and either an Nvidia RTX 2070 or AMD RX 5700 XT with 8GB of video memory as a minimum.
Another requirement for the baseline is 16GB of system RAM and a compulsory SSD storage with the game requiring 100GB free. All you need is a Windows 10 64-bit Operating System.
Are These Specs Actually Necessary?
Even though they are described as minimum requirements, industry watchers feel that these specifications might be less than what is being sought in reality. Notably, the requirement for an 8-core CPU may disqualify some equally capable chips, like the AMD Ryzen 5 9600X, which is a great value for gaming performance.
The gap between RTX 2070 and RX 5700 XT raises eyebrows since only the Nvidia GPU has support for hardware ray tracing. The game may run properly even if your graphics card does not support ray tracing capabilities.
Recommended Specifications Paint a Different Picture
For those gamers looking to get the best out of their experience Gearbox recommends using an Intel Core i7 12700 or an AMD Ryzen 7 5800X processor along with RTX 3080 or RX 6800 XT graphics card.
The optimal setup doubles the RAM needs to 32GB and increases VRAM requirements to 12GB. SSD with 100GB available space is still required for the installation.
What Performance to Expect
The official specs don’t specify target framerates and resolution details, but it would be reasonable to assume the minimum requirements are intended to allow for 1080p gaming at medium settings with about 60fps performance. The suggested specs probably target higher resolutions or improved visual options.
The heavy use of VRAM and RAM hints that the textures and or the world of the game are pretty heavy.
Preparing for Launch Day
As Borderlands 4 is set to release on September 12, players have months left to check if their hardware meets these requirements. The new deadline will give those who are considering an upgrade time to plan.
Thanks to the game releasing at $70 as opposed to the rumored $80. Of course, you can expect the premium editions to cost more.
Hardware Flexibility Considerations
If we take a look back into gaming history, we can see that minimum requirements are often a conservative estimate, rather than an absolute requirement. Many titles run comfortably on hardware a little below official minimums if the player adjusts graphics settings suitably.
Gamers need solid-state drives (SSDs) as conventional hard drives (HDDs) can no longer keep the pace with the demand of today’s games sia loading and asset streaming.
For gamers who have a capable rig with at least a 6-core processor or a GTX 1070-class graphics card, it will run better than the requirements suggest. But the significantly higher requirement of VRAM and system memory seem more like real requirements for smooth gameplay.