Steamworld Build

Steamworld Build is a city builder where the Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 combination delivers playable performance at 1080p and 1440p, but struggles at 4K with demanding presets. The data indicates this combo ranks in the 1414th position out of 1730 tested combinations, placing it firmly in the mid-to-lower tier for this specific title. The benchmark results show a clear pattern: resolution and settings scaling follow expected curves, but the RTX 2060's 6 GB VRAM and the CPU's 10 cores create distinct bottlenecks that users must navigate through preset selection.

Settings Recommendations

The optimal experience for this hardware pairing is the High preset at 2560x1440, delivering 66.2 FPS average. This strikes the best balance between visual fidelity and smooth gameplay, as it maintains a frame rate comfortably above the 60 FPS threshold while avoiding the steep performance penalties of Ultra settings. At 1920x1080, the High preset achieves 96.9 FPS, which is excellent for players prioritizing frame rate, but the 1440p High option provides a more substantial visual upgrade for only a 31.7% performance cost compared to the 1080p result.

For players who demand maximum visual quality, the Ultra preset is only viable at 1920x1080, where it produces 67.4 FPS. This is a marginal recommendation, as the jump from High to Ultra at 1080p costs 29.5 FPS (from 96.9 to 67.4), which is a significant reduction for what may be subtle visual improvements in a city builder genre. The Medium preset at 1440p, yielding 85.5 FPS, is a strong alternative for those who want higher resolution without sacrificing smoothness, as it outperforms the 1080p High setting by a slight margin in terms of overall resolution advantage.

The Low preset should be avoided at all resolutions unless absolutely necessary. Even at 4K, Low produces only 55.6 FPS, which is below the ideal threshold for a game that benefits from stable frame pacing during city management. The data suggests that High at 1440p is the "sweet spot," while Ultra is strictly for 1080p users who prioritize eye candy over frame rate stability.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution and settings combination for this hardware?

A: The High preset at 2560x1440 with 66.2 FPS average provides the best experience. It balances visual quality with performance, offering a significant upgrade over 1080p while maintaining smooth frame rates.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Steamworld Build?

A: Only at Low settings, which yields 55.6 FPS. Medium drops to 41.8 FPS, High falls to 32.6 FPS, and Ultra is unplayable at 22.6 FPS. 4K is not recommended for this title with this hardware unless you accept Low settings.

Q: How much performance is lost when switching from High to Ultra at 1080p?

A: The drop is substantial: from 96.9 FPS at High to 67.4 FPS at Ultra, a reduction of 29.5 FPS or approximately 30%. This suggests Ultra carries a heavy penalty that may not justify its visual gains.

Q: What is the performance difference between 1080p and 1440p at Medium settings?

A: At 1080p Medium delivers 133.8 FPS, while 1440p Medium delivers 85.5 FPS. The 48.3 FPS difference represents a 36% reduction, indicating that resolution scaling is a major factor for this GPU.

Q: Is the RTX 2060's 6 GB VRAM sufficient for this game?

A: The data shows playable results at 1440p High, but the 4K Ultra result of 22.6 FPS suggests VRAM capacity may be a limiting factor at extreme resolutions. The combination of 6 GB GDDR6 and 192-bit bus width appears adequate for mainstream settings but struggles at the highest demands.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: It ranks 1414th out of 1730 total combinations, placing it in the bottom 18% of tested systems. This indicates that while playable, the hardware is not well-suited for high-end performance in this game.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 serves as the primary bottleneck in this configuration for Steamworld Build. With 6 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, the card offers 336.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which proves sufficient for 1080p and 1440p gaming but becomes strained at 4K. The GPU's 1920 shading units and 48 ROPs, operating at a boost clock of 1680 MHz, deliver 6.451 TFLOPS of FP32 performance, which translates to the measured FPS figures across the resolution spectrum.

The 4K results expose the GPU's limitations most clearly. At Ultra settings, the card manages only 22.6 FPS, while dropping to Low raises this to 55.6 FPS. This 33 FPS swing between presets at 4K highlights that the RTX 2060 is compute-bound at high resolutions, with the 6 GB VRAM likely causing texture thrashing at Ultra. At 1440p, the GPU demonstrates better headroom, achieving 110.3 FPS at Low and 66.2 FPS at High, showing a more reasonable scaling curve.

The GPU's 12 nm process node and 10,800 million transistors result in a 160 W TDP, which is moderate for a card of this era. The benchmark scores support its mid-range positioning: the PassMark G3D score of 14111 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1242 indicate it sits in the 58th percentile of all GPUs. The nearest rivals, such as the AMD Radeon RX 7600S with a 0.5% delta, show that the RTX 2060 is competitive with other mid-range options, but the Steamworld Build data reveals that this game's demands push the card to its limits at higher settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the RTX 2060 delivers strong performance across all settings. Low settings produce 173.6 FPS, which drops to 133.8 FPS at Medium, 96.9 FPS at High, and 67.4 FPS at Ultra. The scaling from Low to Ultra represents a 106.2 FPS range, with each preset step costing roughly 35-40 FPS on average. This resolution is clearly the most comfortable for this hardware, with even Ultra maintaining a playable frame rate.

At 2560x1440, performance remains solid but with tighter margins. Low yields 110.3 FPS, Medium drops to 85.5 FPS, High falls to 66.2 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 40.9 FPS. The gap between High and Ultra here is 25.3 FPS, which is proportionally larger than at 1080p, suggesting that the GPU's memory bandwidth becomes a factor at this resolution. The 1440p Low to Ultra range spans 69.4 FPS, showing that the card's performance envelope narrows as resolution increases.

At 3840x2160, the results are marginal. Low produces 55.6 FPS, Medium 41.8 FPS, High 32.6 FPS, and Ultra 22.6 FPS. The entire range is only 33 FPS, and even the best-case Low setting fails to reach 60 FPS. This confirms that 4K is not a viable resolution for this GPU in Steamworld Build, regardless of settings. The data shows a consistent pattern: each resolution step up from 1080p to 1440p and 1440p to 4K reduces performance by roughly 40-50% across comparable settings.

Resolution Scaling

The performance drop from 1080p to 4K is stark and consistent across all settings. At High settings, the average FPS falls from 96.9 at 1080p to 66.2 at 1440p, a 31.7% reduction, and then to 32.6 at 4K, a further 50.8% reduction from 1440p. This compounding decline indicates that the GPU is the limiting component, as the CPU's 10 cores and 16 threads are unlikely to be saturated by a city builder's simulation logic at these frame rates.

The scaling pattern suggests a memory bandwidth bottleneck. The RTX 2060's 336.0 GB/s bandwidth is shared across increasing pixel counts, and the 6 GB VRAM becomes a constraint at 4K. The Low settings at 4K (55.6 FPS) versus 1080p (173.6 FPS) shows a 68% performance loss, which is roughly proportional to the 4x pixel count increase, indicating that the GPU is operating near its fill-rate limits. In contrast, the 1440p to 4K transition at Low settings (110.3 to 55.6 FPS) represents a 49.6% drop, showing that the scaling is not perfectly linear.

This data reveals that the limiting component is definitively the GPU. If the CPU were the constraint, we would expect frame rates to remain more stable across resolutions at a given setting. Instead, the consistent 40-50% drops between each resolution step point to the RTX 2060's pixel throughput and memory subsystem as the primary bottlenecks. The CPU's high multi-threaded performance, evidenced by a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 21279, ensures it is not the limiting factor in this scenario.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F provides ample processing power for Steamworld Build's simulation and AI workloads. With 10 cores (6 performance and 4 efficiency) and 16 threads, this Raptor Lake processor offers a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.60 GHz. The 20 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB per-core L2 cache provide sufficient memory hierarchy for the complex pathfinding and resource management typical of city builders.

The CPU's benchmark scores confirm its capability. The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 21279 and Geekbench multicore score of 10971 place it in the 82nd percentile of all CPUs, showing it is a strong performer for this genre. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 7314 and max-thread score of 7307 indicate strong scaling across its 16 threads, which is relevant for games that utilize multiple cores for simulation. The single-thread performance, with a Geekbench score of 2301 and Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3004, is also robust, ensuring that the main game thread runs efficiently.

The nearest CPU rivals show this processor is well-matched for this game. The Intel Core i7-13620H has a delta of 0.1% in average benchmark score, while the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D is -0.5% behind, indicating the i5-13400F is performance-competitive with these alternatives. Since the measured FPS data shows the GPU as the bottleneck, the CPU's 65 W TDP and efficient architecture are more than adequate for maintaining consistent frame delivery, even when large cities with many entities are simulated.

How This Combo Ranks

This hardware combination ranks 1414th out of 1730 tested combos in Steamworld Build, placing it in the bottom 18% of all configurations tested. This ranking is notably lower than what the individual component percentiles might suggest — the CPU sits in the 82nd percentile and the GPU in the 58th — indicating that the pairing is not ideal for this specific game's demands. The low ranking is primarily driven by the GPU's limitations at higher resolutions and settings, as the CPU has sufficient headroom.

The combination's positioning relative to other systems suggests that users with this hardware should prioritize 1080p or 1440p gaming. The 4K results, with a best-case of 55.6 FPS at Low settings, are among the weakest in the database for this game, likely contributing to the low rank. However, the data also shows that the combo is not entirely inadequate; at 1080p High it achieves 96.9 FPS, which is a playable and enjoyable experience.

The rank of 1414 out of 1730 means that many other combinations outperform this setup, but the results are not catastrophic. The RTX 2060's 58th percentile GPU ranking and the i5-13400F's 82nd percentile CPU ranking create a mismatch where the CPU is far more capable than the GPU for this game's needs. This suggests that users with this combo would benefit from upgrading the GPU first, as the CPU has significant headroom to support a more powerful graphics card without becoming a bottleneck.