by We've already covered how Gears of War: E-Day is shaping up nicely on console, but John and Rich spent some time in the PC multiplayer beta and had some thoughts to share for DF Direct #277 - while Oliver returned on console for some updated impressions. In short, while it serves as a technical showcase for developers The Coalition, there are performance concerns on PC.
The main takeaway is that the level of detail here is absurd, pushing current hardware to its limits - though you almost need to stop playing the game to notice some of the detail present in the game world. That bodes well for the single-player side of the game, which ought to give the player plenty of opportunities to admire the scenery in between bursts of action.
Likewise, the ultra-wide support (including cutscenes!) and HDR implementation provide a positive first impression, which is a relief given how often these features is fumbled on PC - though we need to do some proper HDR testing to verify those impressions.
The options menu is also as robust as you'd hope, with plenty of options extending to a "ludicrous" setting that should see the game's visuals improve slightly on future-gen hardware - but right now, this preset should be avoided given that John's high-end RTX 5090 + Core i9 13900K PC scored just 40fps in the integrated benchmark at 5K with DLSS Balanced. Moving to "ultra" produced around 60fps in the same benchmark.
On top of the relatively heavy performance, John also reported seeing some of the traditional artefacting common to ray-traced Unreal Engine 5 titles, with noise and shimmer in some elements - though relatively little of the "boiling" artefact that can be quite noticeable in some games. As usual, higher resolutions benefit from higher-quality RT calculations, so running the game at 5120x2160 produces better results than 1080p, for example.
Rich tested the game on a mainstream setup, using a Ryzen 5 5600 and RTX 4060. With a 1440p resolution, DLSS quality, dynamic resolution scaling and high settings, the game was more or less fully utilising both CPU and GPU during the integrated benchmark, while horde mode gameplay generally ran at between 48 and 60fps.
Combined with higher-than-expected latency figures evident throughout testing, which were around 80ms on the mainstream PC and around 40-50ms on a RTX 5090 PC, there is some concern that the game is might require some launch-time driver optimisation, continued performance refinements and settings tweakery to get a smooth result on PC.
Are you planning to buy Gears of War: E-Day or play it on Game Pass? (225 votes)
- Yes, for Xbox Series X/S
- Yes, for PC
- No, no plans right now
Our initial testing with the Xbox Series consoles wasn't sufficient to test the optional "eco", VRR and "performance plus" modes, so Oliver has now done just that and has results to share. In short, the VRR mode doesn't make any changes to settings, merely unlocking the frame-rate for each of the modes, but it does also allow the performance plus mode to be enabled on 120Hz displays for versus matches (but nowhere else), permitting frame-rates to run up to the 90s in some areas.
It's slightly confusing that some graphics modes are exclusive to some game modes, though the reasoning behind mandating 60fps or better for competitive play is sensible. The eco mode degrades performance as expected and doesn't really make sense to enable.
With all that said, there's not much now beyond waiting for the game to arrive on October 6th. It'll be fascinating to see how the full campaign shakes out, and whether the game's heavy CPU performance on PC can be optimised for launch. There's certainly plenty here to be excited about - this is a profound visual upgrade versus Gears 5 - but that final level of polish could elevate E-Day into the stratosphere of gaming greats.