Hard West

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Hard West shows a predictable but steep curve as resolution climbs. At 1080p with High settings, the system delivers 155 FPS average. Moving to 1440p High drops that to 98 FPS, a 37% reduction. At 4K High, the average falls to 51 FPS, which is 67% below the 1080p figure. This scaling pattern points directly at the GPU as the primary limiter at higher resolutions.

Look at the Low settings tier for the clearest picture. At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 246 FPS. At 1440p Low, it drops to 155 FPS, and at 4K Low, it lands at 82 FPS. The gap between 1080p and 1440p Low (91 FPS) is nearly identical to the gap between 1440p and 4K Low (73 FPS). That linear degradation is classic GPU-bound behavior—the frame rate scales almost inversely with pixel count.

The Ultra settings tier tells a more dramatic story. At 1080p Ultra, the system manages 116 FPS. At 1440p Ultra, that falls to 73 FPS. At 4K Ultra, it collapses to 38 FPS. That 4K Ultra result is barely playable for most users, and it represents a 67% drop from the 1080p Ultra figure. The fact that Ultra costs so much more performance than High at every resolution—at 4K, Ultra is 25% slower than High—suggests the game's Ultra preset includes effects that hammer the GPU disproportionately.

The Medium settings tier offers the only complete min/max data in the pack. At 1080p Medium, the average is 201 FPS with a minimum of 171 and maximum of 231. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 127 FPS with a range of 108 to 146. At 4K Medium, the average is 67 FPS with a range of 57 to 77. The consistency of the frametime deltas—roughly 30 FPS spread at every resolution—indicates a stable experience without major hitches, even when the average frame rate is low.

What this scaling tells a builder: if you want to run Hard West at 4K, you are firmly in GPU-limited territory. The gap between 1080p and 4K performance is far larger than any CPU bottleneck could produce. The CPU is doing its job; the RTX 3080 is the component that determines whether you get 38 FPS or 82 FPS depending on your settings.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 is built on the Ampere architecture with a GA102 chip, fabricated on Samsung's 8 nm process. It carries 10 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit bus, delivering 760.3 GB/s of bandwidth. The base clock sits at 1440 MHz with a boost clock of 1710 MHz, while memory runs at 1188 MHz (19 Gbps effective). The GPU has 8704 shading units, 272 texture mapping units, and 96 raster output units, along with 68 ray tracing cores and 272 tensor cores.

For a turn-based tactics game like Hard West, the GPU's raw compute is more than sufficient. The FP32 performance is 29.77 TFLOPS, and the pixel rate is 164.2 GPixel/s. These figures explain why the card can push past 200 FPS at 1080p Medium settings. The bottleneck is never the GPU's compute capability at lower resolutions—it is the game engine's ability to feed the card enough work.

The VRAM situation is worth noting. Hard West released in 2015, long before the RTX 3080's 2020 launch. A 10 GB frame buffer is overkill for this game's textures and geometry, even at 4K. The fact that 4K Ultra only drops to 38 FPS—rather than tanking due to VRAM overflow—confirms that memory capacity is not the constraint here. The card's memory bandwidth of 760.3 GB/s is also far beyond what a 2015 tactics title requires.

The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 4407 and Geekbench Vulkan score of 33620 give context for the GPU's overall capability, but Hard West is not a demanding title by modern standards. The PassMark G3D score of 25086 places this GPU in the 68th percentile of all GPUs, which is respectable but not top-tier. The nearest rivals list shows the RTX 3080 is essentially tied with the NVIDIA P106-100 (deltaPct -0.3), AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 (deltaPct -0.3), AMD Radeon RX 6600M (deltaPct -0.4), and AMD Radeon R9 M290X (deltaPct -0.4) in average benchmark scores. These are odd comparisons—the P106-100 and R9 M290X are far older or lower-tier parts—but the data shows the RTX 3080 sits in a crowded performance band.

The practical takeaway: the RTX 3080 is the component that dictates playable settings in Hard West. At 1080p, it has massive headroom, hitting 246 FPS on Low and 116 FPS on Ultra. At 4K, it still manages 51 FPS on High, which is playable for a turn-based game where reaction time matters less than strategic planning.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus is a 24-core, 24-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake Refresh architecture, built on TSMC's 3 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.80 GHz, with a TDP of 125 W. The cache hierarchy includes 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and 36 MB of shared L3. It supports DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration with 115.2 GB/s bandwidth.

For Hard West, a turn-based tactics game, the CPU's role is less about raw frame rate and more about maintaining consistent turn processing, AI pathfinding, and game state updates. The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 51731 and single-core score of 7303 demonstrate that this CPU has both high multi-threaded throughput and strong per-core performance. The PassMark single-thread score of 4823 is particularly relevant—turn-based games often have a main thread that handles game logic, and a strong single-core result prevents that thread from becoming a bottleneck.

The CPU's 24 cores and 24 threads are far more than Hard West needs. A 2015 tactics title was designed for quad-core or six-core processors at most. The fact that the system still sees performance scaling from 1080p to 4K—with FPS dropping as resolution increases—confirms that the CPU is not the limiting factor at any resolution. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would see similar frame rates regardless of resolution, which is not the case.

The CPU's benchmark percentile is 96th among all CPUs, and its average benchmark score is 84003. Its nearest rival is the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K with an average score of 83807 (deltaPct 0.2), meaning the 290K Plus is essentially identical in performance. The AMD EPYC 4584PX (83090, deltaPct 1.1), AMD EPYC 9135 (82980, deltaPct 1.2), and AMD EPYC 7F72 (85072, deltaPct -1.3) round out the comparison group. These are all high-end server or desktop parts, underscoring that this CPU is near the top of the performance stack.

For Hard West specifically, the CPU's job is easy. Even at 1080p Low, where the GPU is producing 246 FPS, the CPU must feed it with draw calls and game state updates. The fact that the system achieves such high frame rates indicates the CPU's single-thread performance is more than adequate. The PassMark physics score of 3315 and the Cinebench R15 single-core score of 736 further confirm that the 290K Plus handles the kind of lightweight, logic-heavy workloads that Hard West presents.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 ranks 764th out of 2949 tested combos for Hard West. That places it in roughly the 74th percentile of all CPU-GPU pairings tested for this game. This is a solid but not spectacular ranking, and it makes sense given the game's age and modest requirements.

The ranking is more a reflection of the GPU than the CPU. The RTX 3080 sits in the 68th percentile of all GPUs, and its nearest rivals are mid-range or older parts. The CPU, by contrast, is in the 96th percentile of all CPUs. When a game is GPU-bound, as Hard West clearly is, the combo ranking will trend toward the GPU's percentile rather than the CPU's. The 764th spot out of 2949 combos aligns closely with where the RTX 3080's relative GPU performance would predict.

That said, the ranking does not tell the whole story. A 764th-place finish among almost 3000 combos still means this system outperforms the majority of tested configurations. For a game this old, the practical difference between 764th and 500th is likely just a few frames per second at 4K Ultra, where the system already struggles to hit 40 FPS. The ranking is a useful data point, but the measured FPS at your target resolution and settings matters more.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers excellent performance across all settings. Low settings produce 246 FPS average. Medium settings yield 201 FPS average with a minimum of 171 and maximum of 231. High settings drop to 155 FPS average. Ultra settings bring the average down to 116 FPS. All of these numbers are far beyond what a 60 Hz monitor can display, and even a 144 Hz monitor would be fully saturated at Low, Medium, and High.

At 2560x1440, performance remains strong but starts to show the GPU's limits. Low settings average 155 FPS. Medium settings average 127 FPS with a minimum of 108 and maximum of 146. High settings average 98 FPS. Ultra settings average 73 FPS. The 1440p numbers are all playable, with even the Ultra preset staying above 60 FPS. This resolution is the sweet spot for this combo if you want high settings with high refresh rates.

At 3840x2160, the GPU's workload becomes apparent. Low settings average 82 FPS. Medium settings average 67 FPS with a minimum of 57 and maximum of 77. High settings average 51 FPS. Ultra settings average 38 FPS. For a turn-based tactics game, 51 FPS at 4K High is perfectly acceptable—the genre does not require twitch reflexes. However, 38 FPS at 4K Ultra is below the threshold where most users consider gameplay smooth. If you want 4K, High settings are the practical ceiling for this combo.

The progression from Low to Ultra at each resolution shows a consistent pattern: Ultra costs roughly 50-55% of the Low-setting frame rate at every resolution. At 1080p, the drop from Low to Ultra is 130 FPS. At 1440p, it is 82 FPS. At 4K, it is 44 FPS. The proportional cost is similar, but the absolute cost shrinks as the GPU becomes more loaded, confirming that Ultra settings add GPU-intensive effects that scale with pixel count.

FAQ

Q: Is this system good enough for 4K gaming in Hard West?

A: Yes, if you stick to High settings or lower. The measured data shows 51 FPS average at 4K High and 82 FPS at 4K Low. At 4K Ultra, the average drops to 38 FPS, which is likely too low for comfortable play. Medium settings at 4K average 67 FPS with a minimum of 57 FPS.

Q: What settings should I use for a 144 Hz monitor?

A: At 1080p, you can run Low (246 FPS), Medium (201 FPS), or High (155 FPS) and stay above 144 FPS. Ultra at 1080p averages 116 FPS, so it falls short. At 1440p, only Low (155 FPS) hits the 144 FPS target; Medium averages 127 FPS and High averages 98 FPS.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the bottleneck in this game?

A: The GPU is the limiting component. The evidence is in the resolution scaling: frame rates drop significantly as resolution increases, which is the signature of GPU-bound performance. The CPU, with a 96th percentile ranking and strong single-thread scores, is not the constraint at any resolution tested.

Q: How does this CPU compare to its nearest rival?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus has an average benchmark score of 84003, which is 0.2% higher than the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K's 83807. It is also 1.1% ahead of the AMD EPYC 4584PX and 1.2% ahead of the AMD EPYC 9135, while trailing the AMD EPYC 7F72 by 1.3%.

Q: How does this GPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The RTX 3080 has an average benchmark score of 23172. It trails the NVIDIA P106-100 (23249) and AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 (23250) by 0.3% each, and trails the AMD Radeon RX 6600M (23273) and AMD Radeon R9 M290X (23276) by 0.4% each. These are essentially statistical ties.

Q: What frame rates can I expect at 1440p Medium settings?

A: The measured average is 127 FPS with a minimum of 108 FPS and a maximum of 146 FPS. This is a smooth experience with a consistent frametime spread of roughly 38 FPS between the minimum and maximum, indicating no major stutters or hitches.