Borderlands 4 is here, and performance is rough. Even the mighty RTX 5090 struggles to hit 60 fps at 4K. We tested GPU performance across presets to see just how brutal this game really is.
Borderlands 4 GPU Benchmark: Over 40 GPUs Tested
- Thread starter Steve
- Start date
WhiteLeaff
Posts: 1,050 +2,034
Somehow AMD is less terrible, but I feel that all GPUs should deliver twice the performance shown there.
godrilla
Posts: 2,277 +1,702
Devs, just buy a 5090 and 9800x3d lower down the settings, use upscaling and 4x frame generation for some optimal playable settings.
Great article by the way.
Also ps5 pro performance ( 60 fps) uses pssr upscaling and subjectively looks worse than Borderlands 3 maximum settings quality looks impressive but is locked to 30 fps and likely uses pssr as well.
FYI
Great article by the way.
Also ps5 pro performance ( 60 fps) uses pssr upscaling and subjectively looks worse than Borderlands 3 maximum settings quality looks impressive but is locked to 30 fps and likely uses pssr as well.
FYI
Well that's another game to avoid at launch then!
Perhaps play it in a few years when it's on sale and when performance has actually been optimised.
Perhaps play it in a few years when it's on sale and when performance has actually been optimised.
What's wild is how little lowering the resolution or upscaling sample resolution helps.
Something is definitely broken. I'm not sure if that gives us more or less hope for the chances of improvements.
But this is a perfect example of developers being able to use frame gen as an excuse.
Bad performance? Just keep adding fake frames until it looks good!
Something is definitely broken. I'm not sure if that gives us more or less hope for the chances of improvements.
But this is a perfect example of developers being able to use frame gen as an excuse.
Bad performance? Just keep adding fake frames until it looks good!
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Drops to 30FPS on PS5 and even worse PC performance... they dropped the ball so hard that they made this game a hard pass for me.
Neatfeatguy
Posts: 2,258 +4,559
Glad to see that you need DLSS/FSR/XeSS to run the game at 720p to get a "1440p" resolution with playable frame rates.
Holy step backwards, Batman!
What a terrific piece of crap this game has turned out to be and those that are happy with the game running well when they have to push all the software options to get a playable frame rate and then say there is nothing wrong with the game.....well, you are what is wrong with the game.
Perhaps Gearbox needs to unfuc this debacle and port the game to UE4 since UE5 seems to be just a waste of everyone's time with how poorly it functions. Or, if Sweeney is correct, maybe Gearbox needs to hire Sweeney's guys to show them how to properly use UE5 to make the game run a lot better.
Right now, this game's performance - along with so many other UE5 games that have launched the past year - is a joke. I won't support this travesty.
Holy step backwards, Batman!
What a terrific piece of crap this game has turned out to be and those that are happy with the game running well when they have to push all the software options to get a playable frame rate and then say there is nothing wrong with the game.....well, you are what is wrong with the game.
Perhaps Gearbox needs to unfuc this debacle and port the game to UE4 since UE5 seems to be just a waste of everyone's time with how poorly it functions. Or, if Sweeney is correct, maybe Gearbox needs to hire Sweeney's guys to show them how to properly use UE5 to make the game run a lot better.
Right now, this game's performance - along with so many other UE5 games that have launched the past year - is a joke. I won't support this travesty.
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kira setsu
Posts: 919 +1,122
At this point why even use UE5? So many other engines can crank out gorgeous visuals with good performance now.
Graphics-wise, it looks like 3 (I’m not talking about the style, which is always the same), but now you need a 5090 to run it. Nobody cares about optimization anymore—in fact, I think they’re doing it on purpose. I played for a bit and ended up asking for a refund. The game is a bore-fest: the same rehashed cycle of “go there, do that, shooting sequence, repeat.” Don’t get me wrong, it used to be fun when the story was engaging, the characters had quirky personalities, and the setting felt fresh. But now it’s just a generic shooter, milking whatever’s left of a chewed-up idea. Maybe it’s just me!
CapNemo72
Posts: 112 +176
As long as people pre-order and buy these games, they will not change.
You need to hit them where it hurts their CEO : money.
That is our only power. Unfortunately people can not control themselves.
You need to hit them where it hurts their CEO : money.
That is our only power. Unfortunately people can not control themselves.
Str8Shot
Posts: 408 +621
Disappointing to say the least, that cartoon graphics demand such CPU/GPU horsepower. If other triple-AAA titles like GTA can push their release deadlines indefinitely (looking at you Star Citizen), because they want to polish the game, then by all means. Since when do gamers exert pressure on release dates, give me a break.
Between Pitchford, 2k's spyware being forced in their EULAs, and this garbage performance, this game is an easy pass. If the story isnt as trash as 3 then maybe when it's $5 on sale.
Because a lot of these game companies run on contract workforces now, not internal teams. So said contractors are hired based on the engine they can work with. UE5 is the "in" engine, and the easiest to find worker ants for, so it gets chosen.
ChipBoundary
Posts: 156 +79
Even if the game were perfectly optimized, you'd see at best a few percentage points of improvement. People, including reporters are constantly throwing around "poorly optimized" when they clearly have no idea what that means. I play the game at 1440p and it runs buttery smooth at 140 fps with very little compromises on a 4080 standard.
Optimization doesn't result in hundreds of FPS improvement. Optimization is a 1-5% improvement AT MOST. Anything more than that and you're not dealing with optimization, you're sacrificing quality and fidelity. That's what other games are doing. Yes, there are other games that look good out there, but this game blows them all out of the water. There's nothing on the market even close in tears of visuals.
Optimization doesn't result in hundreds of FPS improvement. Optimization is a 1-5% improvement AT MOST. Anything more than that and you're not dealing with optimization, you're sacrificing quality and fidelity. That's what other games are doing. Yes, there are other games that look good out there, but this game blows them all out of the water. There's nothing on the market even close in tears of visuals.
Okay it's getting a bit silly now with the games with completely busted performance.
The internet likes to blame UE5 even though there's games that run fine with it as well (hint, it's the developers in that case - not the engine).
My guess is that NVIDIA boasting so loudly and proudly about upscaling and framegen has given developers the idea that it's okay to rely on it rather than use it as bonus. Well that, and I wouldn't be surprised if there's a lot of AI generated extremely un-optimized code in releases from the last 2 years or so.
The internet likes to blame UE5 even though there's games that run fine with it as well (hint, it's the developers in that case - not the engine).
My guess is that NVIDIA boasting so loudly and proudly about upscaling and framegen has given developers the idea that it's okay to rely on it rather than use it as bonus. Well that, and I wouldn't be surprised if there's a lot of AI generated extremely un-optimized code in releases from the last 2 years or so.
AnilD
Posts: 630 +877
You missed the part "with mid-range settings" ... which sounds reasonable for a $400 GPU... I also think the comment was directed at saying they are capable of doing that in other modern games, but not this unoptimized mess.
godrilla
Posts: 2,277 +1,702
What do you call 60% cpu utilization on a 9800x3d when nothing is happening on the screen?
DanteSmith
Posts: 197 +338
None of the others offer as many work-acceleration tools as UE5. It’s strange to me that people don’t recognize the real reason studios use this engine: to save time and money.
But the worst part of this whole mess is that people keep buying this garbage. Reviewers like TPU's W1zzard and famous YouTubers in general are saying "this is the best game in the franchise", it's a fu*** disgrace.
Borderlands 3 was released in 2019.
How is it possible to screw up so badly that makes in look worse and run worse than a game from 2019? Thought that UE5 was bad but with up scaling and frame gen just makes things worse it is a blurry mess.
How is it possible to screw up so badly that makes in look worse and run worse than a game from 2019? Thought that UE5 was bad but with up scaling and frame gen just makes things worse it is a blurry mess.
Alfatawi Mendel
Posts: 348 +591
I suppose if one were to take the gameplay in isolation it may be the "best" (or at least one of the better entries in the series).
My friends and I have enjoyed the Borderlands series over the years but... we consider performance a core feature of any such games so none of us are buying it until there are additional remediations for the well documented issues that seem to afflict this game.
passwordistaco
Posts: 699 +1,608
Which engines? And which are generally available to developers? Unity?
I'm not saying UE5 doesn't suck, but I don't think there are many options for devs that lack the resources to write their own engine.
I agree in principle that "optimization" has limits but there is clearly something amiss if you look at the various benchmarks and visual comparisons to date.
The most recent episode of Digital Foundry's DF Direct Weely (Ep. 231) adds to the pile of pretty damning issues that PC gaming/tech outlets have already compiled.
I disagree with visual fidelity "blowing other games out of the water". In my opinion, the comic book "cell shaded" aesthetic should also provide a more fluid experience over other titles that aim for more photo realistic look but that isn't proving to be the case.
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