Borderlands 4 on PC Stumbles: Digital Foundry Calls Out Badass Setting

Borderlands 4 has landed on PC with the kind of explosive fanfare you’d expect from Gearbox’s flagship looter-shooter, but the reception hasn’t been entirely celebratory. While the game topped Steam charts at launch, user reviews quickly slipped into the dreaded ‘mixed’ category.

The main culprit? Technical performance issues that have left even the most high-end rigs stumbling in frustration.

The discussion reached a boiling point after Digital Foundry (DF), the respected tech analysis outlet, dropped their first detailed look at the PC build. Their findings confirmed what many players suspected: Borderlands 4’s performance isn’t living up to expectations, especially considering it’s built on Unreal Engine 5. And for anyone tempted to crank the game up to the ‘Badass’ graphics setting – DF says, don’t.

The Stutter Saga: Unreal Engine Strikes Again

One of the most consistent complaints revolves around shader compilation stutter. If you’ve booted up Borderlands 4, you may have noticed the game takes its time compiling shaders before letting you loose in Pandora’s wastelands. That process doesn’t stop at launch, however. According to DF’s Alex Battaglia, whenever the game encounters a new action – like firing an unfamiliar weapon or triggering a new enemy death animation – the engine hiccups. The result: immersion-breaking micro-stutters.

It’s a frustration PC gamers know all too well. Unreal Engine titles have been dogged by shader stutter for years. Just last month, Epic boss Tim Sweeney shifted blame to developers, claiming they aren’t implementing UE5 efficiently. Regardless of who’s at fault, Battaglia is blunt: these issues make Borderlands 4 feel less polished than it should, especially for a blockbuster release.

Visual Oddities and Odd Choices

Performance isn’t the only sticking point. Vegetation in Borderlands 4 behaves strangely. Grass and plants don’t animate until you approach, causing them to “flip” into motion in a way that looks like traditional pop-in, even though technically it isn’t. Battaglia calls it a little weird looking, and the effect is jarring when wandering through areas dense with foliage.

Then there’s the matter of cutscenes. For reasons Gearbox hasn’t explained, real-time cinematics are capped at 30 frames per second. That’s particularly disruptive in a first-person game: imagine cruising along at 100+ fps only for a cutscene to yank you back down to 30 in an instant. DF’s Rich Leadbetter noted the drop was noticeable even on what he called the fastest gaming CPU money can buy, reinforcing the idea that this isn’t just a mid-tier hardware issue.

The Badass Preset Problem

Borderlands 4’s cheekily named ‘Badass’ preset sounds like a dream for PC enthusiasts – but DF’s verdict is grim. Battaglia warns players not to bother. The difference from the ‘Very High’ setting is minimal at best, while the performance penalty is steep. That’s placebo-level stuff, he argued, adding that the preset is woefully inefficient for what it delivers. In other words: stick to ‘Very High’ if you value smooth gameplay over bragging rights.

DF’s John Linneman summed it up starkly: This one does seem to be running worse than usual for an Unreal Engine 5 game. In his view, Borderlands 4 underperforms compared to other UE5 titles, suggesting optimization has a long way to go.

Patches, Fixes, and Gearbox’s Response

Gearbox has already rolled out a PC update, though frustratingly, it came without patch notes. According to DF, the update hasn’t made meaningful improvements. The developer insists more updates are on the way, but the clock is ticking. PC gamers are notoriously impatient when their expensive GPUs and CPUs fail to deliver the promised experience.

In the meantime, Gearbox has attempted to soften the blow with an Nvidia optimization guide on Steam. The guide encourages players to tweak their settings using the Nvidia app for more stable framerates. One notable line feels almost like a preemptive excuse: Please note that any time you change graphics settings, shaders will need to recompile. Please keep playing for at least 15 minutes to see how performance has changed. To some, that reads less like helpful advice and more like Gearbox asking fans to endure the bumps rather than judge too quickly.

A Community Divided

Reaction among players has been mixed, echoing the Steam reviews. Some are furious that such a high-profile title shipped in what they consider an unpolished state. Others argue the problems are worth enduring, since Borderlands 4’s ambitious shift to a seamless open world could pay off in the long run. A handful of fans have also pointed fingers at Epic’s Tim Sweeney, mocking his claim that developers – not Unreal Engine – are the weak link.

Still, for many long-time Borderlands fans, technical struggles sting less than the nostalgia the game inspires. Stories of LAN-party-like sessions from Borderlands 2 days, complete with trash talk and chaos, are resurfacing online. For some, the wait for fixes is bittersweet – a chance to honor old memories and lost friends while hoping Borderlands 4 eventually achieves the polish it deserves.

The Road Ahead

Borderlands 4’s launch demonstrates how much PC performance matters to modern gamers. No matter how ambitious or content-rich a title may be, poor optimization can overshadow its strengths. Gearbox has promised ongoing patches, but the verdict from experts is clear: avoid the Badass setting, brace for stutter, and hope the developers can close the gap between ambition and execution.

Until then, Borderlands 4 remains both thrilling and frustrating – a massive, chaotic shooter whose fun is sometimes buried under technical clutter. If Gearbox delivers meaningful fixes, the game could eventually be celebrated as the next big step for the series. But right now, it feels more like a work-in-progress than the definitive looter-shooter experience fans were promised.