Borderlands 4 Steam Deck performance analyzed

[Redaktion]

Borderlands 4 has finally launched, but early tests show the Steam Deck struggling to keep up. Popular YouTuber ETA PRIME put the handheld through its paces, and the results may disappoint fans hoping for smooth gameplay.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Borderlands-4-Steam-Deck-performance-analyzed.1114676.0.html

[papajon]

*Surprised Pikachu face*

Are you seriously telling me that framegen isn't a miraculous technology that can turn shitty 24 fps into smooth 40 fps?

[24fps_Survivor]

shitty 24 fps

Ehm, not trying to be an fps_nazi here but genuinely 24 fps isn't so bad.

The problem here is that in the deck videos it's dropping to as low as 10-17 FPS in gameplay, which is truly abhorrent and unplayable.

[Worgarthe]

smooth 40 fps?

Smooth? 🙄 You are 50% short of smooth, and that's just for 1% lows.

[GeorgeS]

I'm sorry but AMD and/or Steamdeck Fanboi's aside - while the Steamdeck CAN "run" almost anything, it CAN be rather debatable if the result is actually playable or not.
(or provide a "PC Gaming Experience")


However given that outside of Nintendo and their grossly under powered 'Switch' devices, Sony & Microsoft really don't have much (if anything) to bring to a hand held gaming table.

[Worgarthe]

That is correct, George, but it's worth to mention that Steam Deck was also never advertised to be capable to push heavy demanding games at a billion fps, and some people are doing specifically that just to complain how poorly performs.
 
Is it absolutely exceptional to play Blasphemous or Ori and the Will of the Wisps or Bramble The Mountain King or... you get the point - yes it is. Is it great to run UE5 games, or Battlefield 6 or even Noita (extremely demanding game despite pixel-art appearance, it can choke even the i9 14900K)? Of course not.

[Limestone]

That's the problem I've with the deck. All the lighter games that it can run reasonably well, can also run even better on Snapdragon devices with lower temps, no fan noise, high FPS -- despite being emulated.

So what's the point then?

I guess physical controls. It was difficult to beat some levels of ori using touchscreen. But aside from input issues, modern Snapdragon SoC's are far superior to Van Gogh hardware wise, even with the thermal throttling constraints.