Just curious what do people have in mind, when they say a game is “working great” or “perfectly”. I believe I’m in the minority, but I just can’t enjoy a game under 45 FPS, or if the resolution has to be under 720p and the UI/text is all blurry because of it. Perhaps it’s because I’m used to playing mainly on PC. Still enjoy my Steam Deck a lot though, even if it can’t keep up sometimes.
Consistent 40 FPS is the absolute minimum in most games for me. 45 FPS is pretty ideal, 60 FPS is a bonus. 30 FPS is not really enjoyable to me since I notice the low framerate too much.
I was amazed to see how big of a difference 30 to 40 makes. It feels much closer to 60 to me. It looks “normal” to me as opposed to 60 that looks extra smooth and 30 that looks choppy.
that’s because it’s basically the half way point between 60 fps and 30fps in frame times.
60 fps is 16ms per frame
40 fps is 25ms per frame
30 fps is 33ms per frame
Exactly this for me as well… I will add the caveat that if I had to lower the native resolution to boost performance, upscale/FSR artifacting needs to be minimal and not mess with legibility. Some games look phenomenal upscaled (like, 99% as good as native resolution) and it’s not an issue… others, not so much.
EDIT: phrasing, grammar is hard when typing I guess.
I can deal with somewhat blurry game if the UI is sharp. So games with built in upscaling are ideal but not very common sadly.
30 fps and low graphics ia good by me. I grew up with old consoles, having something like Cyberpunk running on a handheld is insane to me.
I honestly don’t get the whole “120fps 4K or literally unplayable” mindset. Ill notice the difference in a side-by-side, but other than that as long as theres little to no lag its perfectly fine.
I grew up with the previous gen consoles of whatever was new, so I get this sentiment in my bones. I just want to be able to play games. 30 fps is good enough for me for most games.
The technology is really incredible, I know that. And it still blows my mind sometimes what it can do. However I find it funny that the old consoles like NES or SNES were running at 50Hz/60Hz TVs and then we got to the point of 30fps gaming with the Playstation. But that’s just natural evolution of graphics I think. Still amazing what the smart people can achieve.
Depends on the game. Older games and 2D games I expect 60FPS at native resolution with a lot of the graphical options enabled. Morrowind, Stardew Valley, Doom 3, etc.
Newer games I don’t mind turning down the graphical options to try and score that 45-60FPS. Cyberpunk, Jedi Fallen Order, Skyrim, etc.
I know what you were trying to say with your comment but Skyrim is about 12 years old now lol. Not quite a newer game
If you play other games from that era they play a lot better than Skyrim
Sometimes I forget that Skyrim is that old.
I’m a simple man, no lags is all it takes with me.
I’m kind of with you. I’m playing Witcher 3 right now and it’s completely locked at 30 and I’m totally happy with it. I know I could getting it running higher with decreased visuals but this consistent frame time is good enough for me.
30 fps and a battery life of 3-5 hours are usually my standard.
Same, I can tolerate 30fps on a handheld in certain games. The Switch has already conditioned me to accept it.
60fps at native res. Settings can all be on low. That said plenty of games are playable at 30 or 40fps
I genuinely think it’s all dependent on the game. Very low frame rates can be quite playable on games that don’t require good reactions, think something like slay the spire, I’d argue Fallout works pretty well as well thanks to VATS. On the other hand, fighting games need to be at 60 FPS period. I am usually happy on the deck so long as I can hit 45 FPS.
I think I could agree with that. I play more action games than anything, so that’s why I’m mostly opposed to anything lower than 45 FPS I guess.
I’m perfectly fine with 30fps, my biggest concern is battery life. At 30fps I don’t really like to see a game go much higher than 15-16w of draw. Lower is even better.
Any game in that range can be pushed harder (higher fps, higher graphics quality, etc), but at that point it’s up to the player whether they want to prioritize battery, graphics, or smoothness. If you go above that threshold there usually isn’t much room for player choice in how they want the game to run.
Yeah I don’t usually play for more than 2 hours so the battery is not really that much of a concern for me like it is for others. But my sweet spot is usually 50 fps for more demanding games considering the battery/fps ratio. I don’t like to overheat my deck unnecessarily.
What games are you playing?
Some recent games I’ve played in that range are No Man’s Sky, Nier Automata, Doom Eternal, Yakuza 0, and Hades.
For demanding games, 40 fps synced at 40 hz refresh rate. Better than squeezing a few fps here and there without consistency. And you get some extra battery life. Its a handheld after all.
40fps @ 720p is absolutely fine for me but I need decent shadows, textures and anti-aliasing or it just looks really rough.
Frame pacing is also super important. It has to feel smooth and not inconsistent.
Depends on the game and whether I’m playing docked on my TV or handheld.
Docked I want at least a consistent 40, but a consistent 30 on slower games like Oblivion/Skyrim isn’t awful when playing handheld.
Are you locking to 40 fps on a 120Hz display? Or are you playing with variable framerates?
I have a hard time playing anything other than Indies on the Deck. Performance is pretty terrible with triple A games IMO.
I’d argue a game at 720p at a locked 30 FPS with good frame pacing is good enough for a portable console. If that game however isn’t optimized for small screen sizes (e.g. tiny text or requires precise UI touches) that can really suck experience wise.
Low to medium graphics settings, 60fps @ 720p or 30fps @ 800p.
Anything in that range or higher and I’m happy
Solid 40fps or better.
