Steam Machine and Halo: Campaign Evolved not a good match as official system requirements put Steam Machine in "Low" tier

Halo Studios has released the official system requirements for the highly anticipated Halo: Campaign Evolved. Halo: Campaign Evolved, which is scheduled to release on July 28, is a from-the-ground-up remake of the original Halo: Combat Evolved using Unreal Engine 5.

The good news here is that, despite looking like a true modern AAA game with excellent graphics, Halo: Campaign Evolved’s system requirements are reasonably tame. However, the bad news is that the game will leave a sour taste in the mouth of Steam Machine users.

For 4K@60 FPS gameplay, Halo Studios recommends:

• An AMD Ryzen 7 7700 or Core i7-12700K CPU
• A GeForce RTX 3080 Ti or Radeon RX 9070 GPU
• 12 GB of VRAM
• 32 GB of RAM
• 100 GB SSD space

The minimum system requirements are where things get truly depressing for Steam Machine users. To run Halo: Campaign Evolved at the “Low” performance tier of 1080p@60 FPS, you’d need:

• A Ryzen 5 3600 or Core i7-10700K CPU
• A GeForce RTX 2060 Super, RX 6600, or Intel Arc A580 GPU
• 16 GB of RAM
• 8 GB VRAM

Since we now know that the Steam Machine’s CPU struggles to even match the Ryzen 5 3600, and the console’s GPU is around the same performance class as the RX 6600, the Valve Steam Machine could struggle to hold a steady 60 FPS at 1080p. We are talking about a 2026 gaming console/PC that starts at $1,049. This is super disappointing, considering the Steam Machine is aiming to stay relevant for years to come.

So, if you were checking out the Steam Machine, it might be a better idea to take a look at some decent gaming laptops or prebuilt PC deals. You will likely find gaming systems that are either faster than the Steam Machine at the same price or cost less or both.

Halo Studios has also announced that Halo: Campaign Evolved will have FSR, XeSS, DLSS, and TSR upscaling at launch. So, Steam Machine gamers can smooth out some of the performance using FSR.

All in all, the full system requirements, which are linked below, inspire some confidence that the studio has put some effort into optimizing the game well. We just hope that there are no characteristic Unreal Engine 5 issues like microstutters in the final game.

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