Downfall

# Downfall with AMD Ryzen 5 5500X3D + AMD Radeon RX 7700

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500X3D paired with the AMD Radeon RX 7700 delivers a predominantly GPU-bound experience in Downfall, with 1080p performance scaling dramatically through settings while 4K remains playable at most presets. The measured data shows this combination ranks 1308th out of 2928 tested combos in this title, placing it in the upper-middle tier. At 1080p, the system achieves 240 FPS on Low settings, which drops to 101 FPS on Ultra—a 139 FPS spread that underscores how settings choices matter more than resolution scaling at the low end. The 4K Ultra result of 45 FPS is the only preset that falls below the 60 FPS threshold, making this a capable horror gaming rig for high-refresh 1440p or smooth 4K at High settings.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals a system that scales predictably with pixel count but remains playable at every resolution except the most demanding preset. At High settings, the average frame rate falls from 161 FPS at 1080p to 115 FPS at 1440p, then to 72 FPS at 4K—a 55.3% reduction from 1080p to 4K. This scaling pattern indicates the RX 7700's 16 GB VRAM and 624.1 GB/s bandwidth are sufficient to feed the frame buffer without hitting memory bottlenecks, as the frame rate drops are roughly proportional to the pixel count increase rather than showing a cliff-edge collapse.

The Low settings curve tells a similar story but with higher absolute numbers: 240 FPS at 1080p, 171 FPS at 1440p, and 107 FPS at 4K. The 4K Low result of 107 FPS is notably higher than the 4K High result of 72 FPS, showing a 35 FPS gap that stems from reduced shading load rather than memory pressure. At Medium settings, the system delivers 196 FPS at 1080p, 140 FPS at 1440p, and 87 FPS at 4K, with the 4K Medium result including a minimum of 74 FPS and maximum of 100 FPS—indicating frame time consistency even at higher resolution.

Ultra settings produce the steepest scaling curve: 101 FPS at 1080p falls to 72 FPS at 1440p and bottoms out at 45 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result is the only measured configuration that drops below 60 FPS, suggesting that the Ultra preset's additional effects (likely enhanced shadows, reflections, and post-processing) place a load that exceeds what this GPU can sustain at 4K pixel counts. The gap between 1080p Ultra (101 FPS) and 4K Ultra (45 FPS) represents a 55.4% performance loss, nearly identical to the High preset's scaling percentage, which confirms that the bottleneck shifts from the CPU to the GPU as resolution increases.

The data indicates that at 1080p and 1440p, the RX 7700 is the limiting component at Ultra settings, but at Low and Medium presets, the CPU's role becomes more prominent. The 6-core, 12-thread Ryzen 5 5500X3D with a 3.00 GHz base and 4.00 GHz boost clock appears sufficient to drive frame rates up to 240 FPS at 1080p Low, which aligns with the CPU's 85th percentile ranking among all processors. The 4K results across all settings show less than 2.4x variation (45 to 107 FPS), which is a narrower band than the 2.4x spread at 1080p (101 to 240 FPS)—this confirms that higher resolutions increasingly favor the GPU while lower resolutions expose the CPU's limits.

CPU Role

The Ryzen 5 5500X3D brings 6 cores, 12 threads, and a substantial 96 MB of shared L3 cache to Downfall, a horror title that benefits from the cache-heavy design for scene traversal and entity loading. The CPU's Zen 3 architecture on TSMC's 7 nm process delivers a PassMark single-thread score of 2941 and a multithread score of 20363, with an average benchmark score of 37018 placing it at the 85th percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 5 5600F (scoring 36945, a 0.2% delta), the AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450 (37093, -0.2% delta), the Intel Core Ultra 5 225 (36938, 0.2% delta), and the Intel Core i9-12900T (37112, -0.3% delta)—all within a tight 0.5% band, indicating that this CPU's game performance will be essentially indistinguishable from those alternatives.

In Downfall specifically, the 3.00 GHz base clock and 4.00 GHz boost clock provide enough single-thread throughput to keep up with the RX 7700 at 1080p Low, where the system hits 240 FPS. The CPU's floating-point math score of 34511 and integer math score of 60033 suggest robust general-purpose compute that handles the game's physics and AI routines without creating a bottleneck at lower resolutions. The 96 MB L3 cache is the standout feature—it is shared across all 6 cores and likely helps with the game's texture streaming and asset loading patterns, which in a horror title often involve sudden reveals and dense environmental details.

The CPU's 12 threads and 6 cores are moderate by modern standards, but Downfall's 2016 release date means it was designed for systems with far fewer cores. The data shows that at 1080p Low, the system achieves 240 FPS, which is likely near the display refresh ceiling or engine cap; at 1080p Medium, it drops to 196 FPS, and at 1080p High, it reaches 161 FPS. These numbers indicate that the CPU can sustain very high frame rates when the GPU is not stressed, but the incremental drops from Low to Medium to High at 1080p suggest that the GPU begins to take over as the limiting factor even at this resolution.

The PassMark physics score of 2282 and data compression score of 230392 provide context for the CPU's capability in game-like workloads. The physics score, while not directly comparable to game benchmarks, suggests adequate performance for the rigid body and particle simulations that Downfall's horror scenes may employ. The random string sorting score of 23675 and data encryption score of 13967 round out a profile that is well-balanced for a 6-core part, with the extended instructions score of 15925 indicating solid AVX/SSE throughput for modern game code paths.

GPU Role

The Radeon RX 7700 with 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus delivers 624.1 GB/s of bandwidth, which proves ample for Downfall's texture-heavy horror environments. The GPU's RDNA 3.0 architecture on TSMC's 5 nm process packs 28,100 million transistors into a 346 mm² die, with 2560 shading units, 160 TMUs, and 96 ROPs. The boost clock of 2459 MHz and game clock of 2041 MHz drive a peak FP32 throughput of 25.18 TFLOPS, which is more than sufficient for a 2016 title even at 4K resolutions.

The GPU's PassMark G3D score of 20974 places it at the 58th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 15852. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon R9 370X (15862, -0.1% delta), the AMD Radeon RX 9060 (16014, -1% delta), the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (15679, 1.1% delta), and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (16129, -1.7% delta). The RX 7700 sits within 1.7% of the RTX 3060 Ti in average benchmark score, which is notable given the 3060 Ti's reputation as a strong 1440p card; however, the RX 7700's 16 GB VRAM gives it a capacity advantage for higher-resolution textures.

In Downfall, the GPU's 4K performance is the key differentiator. The 4K High result of 72 FPS and 4K Medium result of 87 FPS (with a minimum of 74 FPS) show that the RX 7700 can handle 4K gaming at reasonable settings, while the 4K Ultra result of 45 FPS indicates that the Ultra preset's additional graphical features overwhelm the GPU's 96 ROPs and 25.18 TFLOPS compute. The GPU's DirectX 12 score of 96 and DirectX 11 score of 186 in PassMark suggest that the card's API-level performance is adequate for Downfall's engine, which likely uses DirectX 11 given the 2016 release date.

The 16 GB VRAM capacity is a significant asset for Downfall at 4K, where texture memory demands can spike during horror sequences with complex lighting and shadow effects. The 624.1 GB/s bandwidth ensures that texture streaming does not become a bottleneck, as evidenced by the smooth scaling from 4K Low (107 FPS) to 4K Medium (87 FPS) to 4K High (72 FPS)—a gradual degradation rather than a sudden collapse. The GPU's 40 ray accelerators are present but likely unused in this title, as Downfall predates widespread ray tracing adoption; the 25.18 TFLOPS FP32 performance is the more relevant metric for traditional rasterization workloads.

FAQ

Q: Can this system maintain 60+ FPS at 4K in Downfall?

A: Yes, at Low, Medium, and High settings. The measured averages are 107 FPS at 4K Low, 87 FPS at 4K Medium (with a minimum of 74 FPS), and 72 FPS at 4K High. Only the 4K Ultra preset falls below 60 FPS, averaging 45 FPS.

Q: How much performance is lost when moving from 1080p to 4K at High settings?

A: The average frame rate drops from 161 FPS at 1080p High to 115 FPS at 1440p High, then to 72 FPS at 4K High. This represents a 55.3% reduction from 1080p to 4K, which is consistent with the pixel count increase.

Q: What is the best resolution for high-refresh-rate gaming with this setup?

A: At 1080p, the system achieves 196 FPS at Medium and 161 FPS at High settings, making it suitable for 144Hz or 165Hz displays. At 1440p, High settings produce 115 FPS, which still supports 100Hz+ monitors. The 4K results cap at 107 FPS on Low settings.

Q: How does this CPU compare to its nearest rival in terms of benchmark scores?

A: The Ryzen 5 5500X3D scores 37018 on average, which is 0.2% higher than the AMD Ryzen 5 5600F (36945) and Intel Core Ultra 5 225 (36938), 0.2% lower than the AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450 (37093), and 0.3% lower than the Intel Core i9-12900T (37112). All differences are within 0.5%.

Q: Is the 16 GB VRAM on the RX 7700 beneficial for Downfall?

A: The 16 GB GDDR6 memory with 624.1 GB/s bandwidth supports smooth 4K performance across Low, Medium, and High settings. The gradual FPS scaling from 107 to 87 to 72 FPS across those presets suggests that VRAM capacity does not create a bottleneck, even at 4K resolution.

Q: What is the lowest measured FPS across all tested configurations?

A: The lowest average FPS is 45 at 4K Ultra settings. The only minimum FPS values recorded are at Medium settings: 74 FPS at 4K, 119 FPS at 1440p, and 167 FPS at 1080p.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers its highest frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce an average of 240 FPS, which represents the ceiling of the measured data. Medium settings average 196 FPS, with a minimum of 167 FPS and maximum of 226 FPS. High settings average 161 FPS, and Ultra settings average 101 FPS. The 139 FPS spread between Low and Ultra at 1080p demonstrates the significant impact of the Ultra preset's additional effects.

At 2560x1440, the performance remains strong but shows the expected resolution penalty. Low settings average 171 FPS, a 28.8% drop from 1080p Low. Medium settings average 140 FPS, with a minimum of 119 FPS and maximum of 161 FPS. High settings average 115 FPS, and Ultra settings average 72 FPS. The 1440p Ultra result of 72 FPS is identical to the 4K High result, highlighting how the Ultra preset at 1440p demands similar GPU resources as High at 4K.

At 3840x2160, the system remains playable at most presets but approaches its limits. Low settings average 107 FPS, which is still above the 100 FPS threshold and suitable for most high-refresh displays. Medium settings average 87 FPS, with a minimum of 74 FPS and maximum of 100 FPS—the minimum staying above 60 FPS indicates consistent frame delivery. High settings average 72 FPS, which is playable but closer to the edge. Ultra settings average 45 FPS, which falls below the 60 FPS standard and would be noticeable in a horror game where smooth motion is critical for immersion.

The Medium settings row is the only one with complete min/avg/max data across all resolutions, providing insight into frame time consistency. At 1080p Medium, the spread is 167 to 226 FPS (59 FPS range); at 1440p Medium, the spread is 119 to 161 FPS (42 FPS range); and at 4K Medium, the spread is 74 to 100 FPS (26 FPS range). The narrowing range at higher resolutions suggests that the GPU becomes the consistent bottleneck, producing more stable frame pacing, whereas at 1080p, CPU-bound scenarios may introduce more variance.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data points to Medium settings as the optimal balance for this system across all resolutions. At 1080p Medium, the system delivers 196 FPS with a minimum of 167 FPS, which exceeds the refresh rate of most gaming monitors and provides headroom for demanding scenes. At 1440p Medium, the 140 FPS average with a 119 FPS minimum comfortably exceeds 100 FPS, making this the recommended preset for high-refresh 1440p displays. At 4K Medium, the 87 FPS average with a 74 FPS minimum stays above 60 FPS, delivering smooth gameplay without the performance risk of High or Ultra settings.

High settings are a viable alternative for users prioritizing visual fidelity over maximum frame rates. At 1080p High, the 161 FPS average still supports 144Hz displays, while at 1440p High, 115 FPS remains above 100 FPS. The 4K High result of 72 FPS is playable but offers less headroom than Medium; users with 60Hz 4K displays would find this acceptable, but those with higher refresh 4K panels should prefer Medium. Ultra settings are only recommended at 1080p, where the 101 FPS average remains above 100 FPS; at 1440p Ultra (72 FPS) and 4K Ultra (45 FPS), the visual gains do not justify the substantial frame rate cost.

Low settings are best reserved for competitive or high-refresh scenarios where maximum frame rates take priority. The 240 FPS at 1080p Low and 171 FPS at 1440p Low are the highest measured results, but the visual compromise in a horror game—where atmosphere and lighting are crucial—makes this preset a poor default choice. For most users, Medium at 1440p provides the best combination of visual quality, frame rate, and consistency, with the 140 FPS average and 119 FPS minimum ensuring that even the most intense horror sequences remain smooth.