We’re seeing a wave of promising PC games this year, titles that look stunning and surprisingly run well across various hardware configurations. Games like Crimson Desert, Resident Evil Requiem, and Forza Horizon 6 showcased impressive optimization. However, just like with Halo: Campaign Evolved last month, Star Wars: Zero Company highlights a recurring issue: the pitfalls of relying on Unreal Engine 5.
A Buggy Galaxy
I’ve spent around five hours with Zero Company, and while that’s early days for what is otherwise a fantastic game, I’m already encountering more technical problems than I care to admit. It’s frustrating because when the game isn’t throwing errors, it’s genuinely enjoyable. Our reviewer, Dan Stapleton, hasn’t reported nearly as many issues, which suggests my experience might be an isolated case – or a widespread problem waiting to happen.
What’s particularly odd is that the technical hiccups vary depending on the system I’m using. On my Razer Blade 16, equipped with an RTX 5090 and Ryzen AI 9 HX 370, I was getting a decent average frame rate at 1600p, but plagued by microstutters, especially during cutscenes. Even worse, I started experiencing driver crashes – the game would force my laptop to restart whenever I tried to load it, something that never happens with any other title.
I also spent time playing on the Lenovo Legion Go 2, running Bazzite. Anyone familiar with Unreal Engine 5 games on handhelds probably won’t be surprised: performance wasn’t great. To achieve a playable frame rate, I had to lower the resolution to 800p with the lowest settings, and even then, I was only getting around 25-30fps. While that’s not ideal, it’s manageable for a turn-based game. However, the game loves to crash right at the end of missions, forcing hard restarts and progress loss. This happened multiple times before I gave up. A similar problem occurred on my Steam Machine, where the game crashed consistently on the same level, but thankfully provided an error report that I could send to the developers.
Back home, I tested a high-end rig with an AMD Ryzen 7 9850X3D, 32GB of RAM, and an RTX 5090. Even with this level of hardware, the performance wasn’t stellar. I was only getting 70-80fps at 4K with Ultra settings, using DLSS Quality with frame generation disabled. While playable, halfway through my first mission, the game just froze during a turn.
Bit Reactor has already released a day-one patch addressing some of these issues, but I’m still encountering crashes, freezes, and frame drops frequently. I’m hopeful that the game will eventually become more stable, as Zero Company, along with Galactic Racer, have been two of my most anticipated titles this year.
Despite all the technical hurdles, I’m determined to keep playing Zero Company. There’s something about the Star Wars prequel era that captivates me, and the story has definitely hooked me. I just wish the experience wasn’t so headache-inducing right now. Maybe someday.
Jackie Thomas is the Senior Tech Editor at IGN and the PC components queen. You can follow her @Jackiecobra.
Source: IGN
Comments
Be the first to comment.