On Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater‘s launch for PC, see a low effort from Virtuos. Virtuos should know better, as they have previously worked on other MGS games. Delta is the middle of the trilogy Virtuos is working on. Nevertheless, launching the game in this state is embarrassing.
The narrative shifted when the content creator NikTek put out a video on how to play MGS Delta. His so-called method required the use of a Radeon RX 9070 XT to be paired with an R7 9800X3D. That combination should be a beast of a rig by all means. Due to its popularity, his setup would scream top-tier hardware performance like no other. In 2025, the best hotfix anyone could come up with was to allow FSR performance mode in exchange for crippling the game to 720p. Yes, 720p in 2025.
The feedback from the community was both swift and negative. The new Metal Gear release wasn’t a low-budget indie project, it was a remake of a classic game with a full AAA budget, and all the graphical stutter was making the suggested specs a blurry mess so players could avoid consistent stuttering. Raios Rogue was scathing in his critique and went as far as to blame the optimization on Unreal Engine 5 and Virtuos Games. Virtuos Games is responsible for the optimization. Raios, deriving from the rage I perceive, I don’t think that nihilistic “bro it’s really demoralizing that the game is capped at 60fps because my RTX 5090 can do more” would have flown. Certainly, and if the RTX 5090 is struggling, there are deeper issues.
Not only are the owners of high-tier hardware struggling, but even the mid-tier users are feeling the pain. With an RTX 4060 Ti and Ryzen 7 setup, NOMVD_GG is worried if their machine would run the game properly even at medium settings. Users worrying about a remake running at medium settings with next-gen hardware is certainly damning for the port.
Then there’s the whole debate about engine blame. Is it Unreal Engine 5? Are the devs just not using it? Shankz___ called out “the irony of the industry hype UE5 if games just run like shit and also look like shit.” And Raios Rogue replied to this, explaining that Nanite can be demanding but a lot of the issues could be outdated engines (like 5.1) rather than the latest builds with performance fixes. So it’s some of both, really. The tools are complicated, but the effort looks half-baked.
Players, however, are stating that some are having far better experiences. Love & Respect said that with a 7900 XT and 7800X3D, they are getting a stable 60 at 1440p, which is baffling. This makes one wonder if there is a strange driver issue or if there is inconsistent performance across different hardware setups. PC gaming can be like that sometimes, a complete lottery.
Pacifist_Elk was the one who pointed out this odd detail. He stated that MGS Delta’s cutscenes are much better optimized than the actual gameplay. He stated that even if your gameplay is running at 40 fps, cutscenes in the same area would play at a smooth 60. That is a decision they made. He said they optimized the pre-rendered cutscenes to the extreme and the real-time scenes to struggle. It seems they had their priorities straight.
While discussing this topic, some users say AMD is to blame, and others come to their defenses. “Weak AMD trash,” Dean said, and others said that the problem is not exclusive to a single brand. When these games require this much tuning even on high-end machines, the blame is on the game and not the user’s PC.
Frankly, many of these issues cannot be anticipated in the case of older but iconic franchises; however, with this one botched port, it seems no one is eager anymore. Metal Gear, the beloved franchise, was the poster child of video games, and the excitement for this new release was and still is, palpable. Releasing a game that urges the users to either get a refund or lower the graphics resolution to below HD for it to be playable is disgraceful. It reeks of the classical ‘PC port is the last thing on the developer’s mind,’ which is unfortunate given the player base on PC. Hopefully, Virtuos considers this feedback for implementing swift fixes. Virtuos must prove me wrong by sorting this out as fast as possible; players want to revisit their beloved game, and currently, it is easier to give up on the menus than to deal with navigating them. MGS Delta’s enjoyment is so elusive, it’s almost as if players are trying to frustrate a game that is already unusable by design.
