In response to social media posts regarding a pre-release build of Borderlands 4 seemingly having poor optimisation for lower-specced PC hardware, Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford has noted that PC players should temper their expectations if their PC doesn’t meet minimum requirements. In a post on X, Pitchford said that those on PC hardware under the minimum specs should expect Borderlands 4 to be unplayable. He also noted that the planned day one patch for the game “does a lot!”
“The expectation for using a below min-spec machine should be that the game is unplayable,” said Pitchford. “That the game runs at all on your system is a miracle. That you can get 55 – 60 fps out of heavy combat is actually incredible given how the engine and what’s going on under the hood.”
“Your specification doesn’t indicate if you’re on SDD [sic] or HDD, but that could also explain some of the hitching. It’s a big, bold, new, seamless world and I’m sorry to say that older hardware may not provide buttery smooth performance for the latest gen AAA games, as has always been the case since the dawn of PC gaming.”
Pitchford came in response to a Borderlands 4 preview article by Destructoid’s Scott Duwe, who noted that his system – running on an Intel Core i7-12700K at 3.60 GHz, 16 GB of RAM, and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 – more than met the minimum required hardware for Borderlands 4. In his article, Duwe mentioned that he was playing the title on its Low preset at 1080p. This preview has also since been updated because of hardware issues faced by Duwe also causing their own problems with the game.
In updates, Duwe mentioned that his PC’s power supply unit had been discovered to be faulty, and after getting it replaced, “the worst issues I was having with [Borderlands 4] are no longer present, so it appears the PSU was causing the bulk of my problems.” Since these problems have been fixed, Duwe has noted that he is getting steady frame rates of between 58 and 61, with exceptions when fights get hectic.
Gearbox and publisher 2K had confirmed the PC specs that would be required to play Borderlands 4 back in June. According to the listed specs, the minimum requirements are either an Intel Core i7-9700 or AMD Ryzen 7 2700X CPU, 16 GB of RAM, and either an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2070 or AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT GPU. To get more out of the title, the studio recommends either an Intel Core i7-12700 or AMD Ryzen 7 5800X CPU, 32 GB of RAM, and either an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 or an AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT GPU.
Borderlands 4 is coming to PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on September 12, with a Nintendo Switch 2 release set for October 3. Check out our thoughts on how well the title is shaping up. If you’re already sold on the game and are waiting for its release, check out the global launch timings.
