The Stellar Blade PC system requirements are here and even an entry-level graphics card from 2016 can run it

The Stellar Blade PC system requirements are refreshingly light, meaning even a cheap rig from almost a decade ago can run Sony’s NieR ’em up. With the onslaught of Unreal Engine 5 (Stellar Blade uses UE4) games launching, we can’t expect every game to be as light, but my hopes are up that more Sony ports follow this trend.

As announced on the PlayStation blog, the full system requirements have gone live, ahead of the launch of the game on June 11. To run Stellar Blade on the Low graphics preset at 60 fps with 1080p resolution, you only need an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 or AMD Radeon RX 580 graphics card.

The former GPU is an entry-level card from 2016, and the latter is a mainstream card from 2017, though they perform roughly the same. Both cards sold for just over $200 MSRP and could be bought much cheaper after the fact. This means a budget rig from that era can still run Stellar Blade.

The CPU requirements for minimum (an Intel Core i5 7600K or AMD Ryzen 5 1600X) are also cheap choices from almost a decade ago. The hardest part of running Stellar Blade on an old rig would likely be getting the 75 GB of storage space to actually download it, or maybe the 16 GB of RAM.

Even running the game on the Very High preset in 4K doesn’t require a supercomputer. With an Intel Core i5 8400 / AMD Ryzen 5 3600X and an RTX 3080 / Radeon RX 7900 XT, you will be able to catch all the glossy rain as it runs down Eve’s hair. This is still a relatively beefy rig, and RTX 3080s sold for $700-800 when they weren’t being hogged by bitcoin miners in 2020.

Notably, the only difference between running the game on Medium versus Very High at 4K is the GPU. OS Steam Deck compatibility is currently unknown, though those low specs suggest it could run on there, especially when you consider the ROG Ally’s power is comparable to the 1060.

If you have a beefy rig, though, you will see the benefits in Stellar Blade as it has both Nvidia DLSS 4 and AMD FSR 3 compatibility, alongside an unlocked frame rate. Given that the game is an action-adventure, with hack-and-slash elements, it makes sense that the developers may want to deliver a high frame rate.

Of course, system requirements aren’t everything. The Last of Us Part 1 had woeful performance on PC, where The Last of Us Part 2 was a little better. Spider-Man 2 also performed miserably, though it has received support since. On the other hand, Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West perform great on PC, and so too does God of War. Sony has a generally impressive track record with its PC ports, and I hope Stellar Blade’s performance is as good as its system requirements.

We’ll know more about Stellar Blade’s performance when it launches on June 11.