Downfall

Settings Recommendations

For Downfall, the measured data shows a clear trade-off between visual fidelity and frame rate across the four available presets. At 1920x1080, the High preset delivers an average of 246 FPS, which is a substantial 92 FPS advantage over the Ultra preset's 154 FPS. This gap is significant, representing a 60% performance uplift while likely offering a visually similar experience to most players, as Ultra settings in horror titles often include subtle effects that are not perceivable during fast-paced gameplay.

Moving to 2560x1440, the High preset maintains a robust 176 FPS average, while Ultra drops to 110 FPS. The 66 FPS difference between these two presets is noticeable, but both remain playable on high-refresh-rate monitors. However, the Medium preset at 1440p yields 214 FPS, which is 38 FPS higher than High and only a modest visual step down. For players prioritizing smooth motion, Medium at 1440p offers the best balance of responsiveness and image quality, especially in a horror game where frame pacing consistency matters for immersion.

At 3840x2160, the situation changes dramatically. The High preset produces 109 FPS, which is technically above the 60 FPS threshold but not ideal for competitive play. The Ultra preset falls to 68 FPS, which is still playable but shows the GPU is under significant stress. Conversely, the Low preset at 4K yields 163 FPS, which is surprisingly high and suggests the game is not heavily reliant on advanced graphical features in its lowest state. The Medium preset at 4K provides 133 FPS, with a recorded minimum of 113 FPS and maximum of 153 FPS, indicating a stable experience.

The optimal choice depends on the target resolution. For 1080p and 1440p, the High preset is recommended as the default because it provides a high frame rate without the performance penalty of Ultra. The data shows that the jump from High to Ultra costs roughly 37-38% of the average FPS across all resolutions, which is a steep price for incremental visual gains. For 4K, the Medium preset is the sweet spot, as it offers 133 FPS average with a minimum above 110 FPS, ensuring that even in the most demanding scenes, the frame rate remains fluid. The Low preset at any resolution is generally unnecessary given the strong performance of the other presets, but it can serve as a fallback for extremely high refresh rate displays, such as 540Hz panels, where the 366 FPS at 1080p Low would be beneficial.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti is the primary driver of frame rates in Downfall, particularly at higher resolutions. The GPU features 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 504.2 GB/s. This memory configuration is sufficient for the game's demands, as evidenced by the performance scaling from 1080p to 4K. The GPU's boost clock of 2610 MHz and base clock of 2310 MHz contribute to its raw compute power, which is rated at 40.09 TFLOPS for FP32 operations.

Benchmark results place the RTX 4070 Ti in the 84th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 44,795. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile, scores 45,152, which is a 0.8% difference — effectively a statistical tie. This indicates that the desktop RTX 4070 Ti performs on par with a high-end mobile GPU, which is noteworthy given the power constraints of mobile parts. The data also shows the RTX 4070 Ti is 1.3% slower than the AMD Radeon Pro 5500 XT in average benchmark scores, though that comparison is skewed by the Pro card's workstation-oriented drivers.

In Downfall specifically, the GPU's role becomes more pronounced as resolution increases. At 1080p, the CPU is more likely to be a limiting factor, but the GPU still manages to produce 246 FPS on High settings. At 4K, the GPU's workload intensifies, and the frame rate drops to 109 FPS on the same settings, demonstrating that the RTX 4070 Ti is handling a significantly heavier pixel load. The GPU's 80 ROPs and 240 TMUs are adequate for the game's texture and rasterization needs, and the 60 RT cores provide headroom for any ray-traced effects, though the benchmark data does not specify if DLSS or ray tracing is enabled.

The GPU's performance in synthetic benchmarks, such as the Passmark G3D score of 31,624 and the Geekbench OpenCL score of 176,953, aligns with its in-game performance. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 5,024 further confirms its capabilities in modern APIs. The GPU's 84th percentile ranking across all GPUs suggests that it is a high-end part, but not the absolute top tier, which is consistent with its 4K performance falling below 60 FPS on Ultra settings.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 235 serves as the central processor, with 14 cores and 14 threads, lacking Hyper-Threading. Its base clock of 3.40 GHz and boost clock of 5.00 GHz provide solid single-threaded performance, which is crucial for game logic and physics. The CPU's architecture, Arrow Lake-S, is built on a 3 nm process node by TSMC, featuring 17,800 million transistors on a 243 mm² die. The cache hierarchy includes 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and a shared 24 MB L3 cache, which helps reduce memory latency.

In benchmark tests, the Core Ultra 5 235 scores 14,769 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2,085 in single-core, placing it in the 89th percentile of all CPUs. Its average benchmark score is 46,062, which is nearly identical to the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 375 at 46,030 (0.1% difference) and the Intel Core i9-13900HX at 46,098 (0.1% difference). This indicates that the Core Ultra 5 235 offers desktop-class performance comparable to high-end mobile CPUs, despite having fewer threads than some competitors.

For Downfall, the CPU's role is most evident at lower resolutions where the GPU is not saturated. At 1080p with Low settings, the frame rate reaches 366 FPS, which suggests the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU with enough draw calls to sustain very high frame rates. The CPU's single-thread score of 2,085 in Cinebench R23 is particularly relevant, as horror games often have heavy single-threaded game logic. The boost clock of 5.00 GHz ensures that this workload is handled efficiently.

However, at 4K, the CPU's contribution diminishes as the GPU becomes the bottleneck. The frame rate differential between 1080p and 4K on the same settings (e.g., High: 246 FPS vs 109 FPS) indicates that the GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions. The CPU's 14 threads are more than sufficient for the game's multi-threaded tasks, and the Passmark multithread score of 37,816 confirms its ability to handle concurrent workloads. The CPU's memory support for DDR5 with dual-channel bandwidth of 102.4 GB/s ensures that data can flow quickly to the GPU, reducing potential stalls.

How This Combo Ranks

In the specific combination of the Intel Core Ultra 5 235 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti, the system ranks 335th out of 2,928 tested combos in Downfall. This places it in the top 11.4% of all combinations, which is a strong showing given the large number of possible configurations. The rank reflects the balance between the CPU and GPU, where neither component is severely underpowered relative to the other.

The 335th rank out of 2,928 combos suggests that this pairing is well-suited for Downfall, as it outperforms the vast majority of other systems. The data does not provide individual component rankings, but the combo rank implies that the performance is consistent across the board. For context, a rank of 335 means there are 2,593 combos that perform worse, but it also means there are 334 combos that perform better, likely featuring more powerful GPUs like the RTX 4090 or higher-end CPUs.

This ranking is particularly impressive considering the CPU's 89th percentile and GPU's 84th percentile standings. The combo's performance is slightly above what the individual percentiles might suggest, indicating that the components work well together in this game. The lack of a major bottleneck is evident from the smooth scaling across resolutions, as a mismatched pairing would show erratic frame rate jumps. The combo's rank also indicates that it is a viable option for 4K gaming, as it falls within the top tier of tested systems.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals the system's bottleneck characteristics. At 1080p High, the average FPS is 246, which drops to 176 at 1440p (a 28.5% decrease) and further to 109 at 4K (a 55.7% decrease from 1080p). This pattern indicates that the GPU is the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions, as the frame rate drops proportionally with the increase in pixel count.

The data shows that moving from 1080p to 1440p results in a 70 FPS loss on High settings, while moving from 1440p to 4K results in a 67 FPS loss. This consistency suggests that the GPU's rendering capabilities are being stressed uniformly. On Ultra settings, the drop is even more pronounced: 154 FPS at 1080p, 110 FPS at 1440p (28.6% drop), and 68 FPS at 4K (55.8% drop from 1080p). The percentage drops are nearly identical across settings, confirming that the GPU's workload scales linearly with resolution.

Conversely, the CPU's role is highlighted by the fact that at 1080p Low, the system achieves 366 FPS, which is 48.8% higher than the High preset. This suggests that at lower resolutions, the CPU can still push high frame rates, but the GPU's fill rate becomes a bottleneck as resolution increases. The minimum FPS recorded at Medium settings (e.g., 255 FPS at 1080p, 182 FPS at 1440p, 113 FPS at 4K) indicates that the frame pacing remains stable, with no sudden drops that would indicate a CPU stutter.

The scaling behavior points to a system where the RTX 4070 Ti is the limiting component at 4K, but the Core Ultra 5 235 provides enough headroom to avoid being a bottleneck at any resolution. For players targeting 4K, the system is capable of high refresh rate gaming on Medium settings, but for 1080p, it is overkill, as the frame rates exceed most display refresh rates.

FAQ

Q: What is the best preset for 4K gaming in Downfall?

A: The Medium preset at 3840x2160 provides an average of 133 FPS with a minimum of 113 FPS, making it the most balanced choice for 4K. The High preset yields 109 FPS, while Ultra drops to 68 FPS, so Medium offers the best combination of smoothness and visual quality.

Q: How does the CPU affect performance at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the CPU is less likely to be a bottleneck, as evidenced by the 366 FPS average on Low settings. The Core Ultra 5 235's boost clock of 5.00 GHz and single-thread score of 2,085 in Cinebench R23 ensure that game logic is handled efficiently, allowing the GPU to reach high frame rates.

Q: Is the RTX 4070 Ti sufficient for 1440p gaming?

A: Yes, the RTX 4070 Ti delivers 176 FPS on High settings at 2560x1440, which is well above the 144Hz refresh rate commonly found in gaming monitors. Even on Ultra, it maintains 110 FPS, providing a smooth experience.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra settings?

A: Across all resolutions, the Ultra preset is roughly 37-38% slower than High. For example, at 1080p, High achieves 246 FPS while Ultra achieves 154 FPS, a difference of 92 FPS. This gap is consistent at 1440p (66 FPS) and 4K (41 FPS).

Q: How does this combo rank compared to other systems?

A: The combo ranks 335th out of 2,928 tested combinations in Downfall, placing it in the top 11.4% of all systems. This indicates that the pairing of the Core Ultra 5 235 and RTX 4070 Ti is well-balanced and performs better than the majority of alternatives.

Q: Is the GPU or CPU the main bottleneck at 4K?

A: The data shows that the GPU is the primary bottleneck at 4K, as frame rates drop significantly from 1080p (e.g., 246 FPS to 109 FPS on High). The CPU's performance remains strong, but the GPU's rendering workload increases with resolution, limiting overall frame rates.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The following table presents the exact measured average FPS for each resolution and settings combination. Where available, minimum and maximum FPS are also provided for the Medium preset.

| Resolution | Settings | Avg FPS | Min FPS | Max FPS |

|------------|----------|---------|---------|---------|

| 3840x2160 | High | 109 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Low | 163 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Medium | 133 | 113 | 153 |

| 3840x2160 | Ultra | 68 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | High | 176 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Low | 262 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Medium | 214 | 182 | 246 |

| 2560x1440 | Ultra | 110 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | High | 246 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | Low | 366 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | Medium | 300 | 255 | 345 |

| 1920x1080 | Ultra | 154 | - | - |

The data reveals a consistent hierarchy: Low > Medium > High > Ultra in terms of frame rate. The Medium preset's minimum FPS values are notably close to the average, indicating stable performance without severe dips. The Ultra preset shows the largest performance penalty, with a 4K average of 68 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target for many players. The Low preset at 1080p achieves 366 FPS, highlighting the system's capability for esports-style frame rates in this horror title.