It is a shame to see so many games lately be released only to be plagued with a large number of issues. Control had fair amount of issues when it launched even after the recommended specs were quickly downgraded before its release. Grandia Anniversary Collection, a game that is 20 years old, suffers from a large amount of FPS drops when the game is played in its handheld form on the Switch leaving many fans unhappy. Now Borderlands 3 is suffering the same fate shortly after it’s release with PC players complaining about optimization issues and PS4 players unable to play the couch co-op comfortably with friends.
PC gamers were the first to share their frustration via a forum as it seems framerate drops and stutters appear to be the biggest issue facing users. One player on a Steam forum turned to Borderlands 2 forum hoping to get help from other Borderlands fans and wrote, “Need help! Regardless of the graphics settings, frequent reductions in FPS, CPU and GPU are only loaded at 60%, RAM at 70, but the hard drive jumps from 0 to 100% and hangs at 100% when FPS reduced. I already turned off all Windows services that might be the reason, I also checked the disks, fragmented them, can there be a reason that the game is installed on the same disk as windows?” It doesn’t just stop with PC users. Even console players who rarely have to deal with performance problems are having issues with Borderlands 3.
PlayStation 4 is also dealing with performance issues playing with framerates that drop in the ’20s during firefights. When playing split-screen with friends the game is so choppy, vanilla PS4 users have considered it unplayable with Pro users saying it’s not much better. Players have also reported numerous bugs and crashes to the game hindering their overall experience. It seems that PS4 Pro players using the “Resolution Mode” have found some saving grace in the meantime as it seems to stabilize the game much more over the performance mode ironically.
Fortunately, Gearbox Software’s official Twitter account has stated is that the studio is investigating all of these various issues, and users are being steered to 2K Games’ official support site to log a ticket for any other issues that may be recognized. Regardless, it is frustrating for players to jump into a new game they expect to be a finished product with maybe a few hiccups and find themselves wondering if developers actually played the game before it was released. Fans can only hope the issues will be fixed quickly and they can play the way it was intended.