Steamworld Build

Steamworld Build is a city builder that rarely stresses a system the way a first-person shooter does, but the data collected for the Intel Core i5-9400 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 combination still reveals a clear performance hierarchy. The benchmark results show a system that is capable of high refresh rates at mainstream resolutions but begins to buckle under the weight of 4K Ultra settings. This pairing of a six-core Coffee Lake CPU with a Blackwell 2.0 GPU produces a spread of frame rates that shifts its bottleneck depending on where you point the resolution slider.

Resolution Scaling

The most telling aspect of this combo’s performance is how average frame rates collapse as resolution climbs. At 1080p with Low settings, the system pushes 182 FPS. That figure drops to 149.8 FPS at 1440p and then falls hard to 81.8 FPS at 4K. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p is a 17.7% reduction, which is relatively mild, but the jump to 4K costs a massive 45.4% of the 1440p performance. This indicates that the GPU is the primary scaling factor at higher resolutions, as the pixel count increases faster than the render throughput can keep up.

The pattern holds across settings tiers. Moving from High at 1080p (134.9 FPS) to High at 1440p (85.2 FPS) is a 36.8% drop, and then to High at 4K (45.8 FPS) is another 46.2% loss. The Ultra preset shows the steepest cliff: 94.8 FPS at 1080p, 56.2 FPS at 1440p, and just 29.7 FPS at 4K. The fact that the gap between Low and Ultra widens from 87.2 FPS at 1080p to 52.1 FPS at 4K suggests that the RTX 5060’s compute resources are being saturated by the higher fidelity settings, while at lower resolutions the CPU has more headroom to feed frames.

What this means for the limiting component is straightforward: at 1080p, the CPU is likely the ceiling for maximum frame rates, but at 4K, the GPU becomes the definitive bottleneck. The 4K Ultra result of 29.7 FPS is below the 30 FPS threshold often considered playable for slow-paced genres, but the 4K Medium result of 61.2 FPS shows that a single preset step down yields a playable experience. The data suggests that for 4K, users should stick to Medium or High, as the scaling from Medium to Ultra is a punishing 51.5% performance hit.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a six-core, six-thread processor from the Coffee Lake Refresh generation, with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.10 GHz. It lacks hyper-threading, which means it has to manage all of Steamworld Build’s simulation logic and draw calls with just six physical threads. The CPU’s benchmark scores are modest, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 7969 and a single-core score of 1125. Its average benchmark score of 2305 places it at the 50th percentile of all CPUs, meaning it sits exactly in the middle of the pack.

In the context of this game, the CPU’s role is most evident at 1080p. The difference between Low and High settings at 1080p is only 47.1 FPS, which is smaller than the 63.4 FPS gap at 4K between the same presets. This compression at lower resolution implies that the i5-9400 is holding back the RTX 5060 from reaching its full potential. The nearest rivals for this chip include the Intel Core i3-10305 and the Intel Core i3-1125G4, which score within 0.2% of the i5-9400, and the Intel Xeon E-2134, which is 0.4% faster. The Intel Core i7-8809G is the only rival that is notably quicker, at 0.6% ahead.

With only six threads, the i5-9400 is not a heavy lifter for modern titles, but for a city builder like Steamworld Build, the data shows it is sufficient to maintain 134.9 FPS at 1080p High. The architecture’s 14 nm process and 9 MB of shared L3 cache are dated, but the 4.10 GHz boost clock provides enough single-thread speed for the game’s core logic. The real limitation is that when the resolution drops to 1080p, the GPU has spare capacity, yet the CPU cannot push the frame rate past the 182 FPS seen at Low settings. This is a classic CPU-bound scenario, where the processor’s six threads are the bottleneck.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 is a much newer piece of hardware, built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a 5 nm process. It features 3840 shading units and 8 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 128-bit bus, delivering 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The boost clock is 2497 MHz, and the GPU has a TDP of 145 W. Its average benchmark score of 30109 places it at the 73rd percentile of all GPUs, which is substantially higher than the CPU’s 50th percentile ranking. This disparity in class is a key reason why the GPU tends to dominate the performance picture at higher resolutions.

The RTX 5060’s nearest rivals are the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT, which matches it exactly with a 0% delta, and the AMD Radeon RX 570, which is 0.2% slower. The NVIDIA Tesla M60 is 0.5% behind and the GeForce RTX 5070 Mobile is 0.6% ahead. This puts the RTX 5060 in a competitive mid-range position, but the 8 GB VRAM is a limiting factor for 4K Ultra textures. The data supports this: at 4K Ultra, the combo only manages 29.7 FPS, which is likely due to both the GPU’s compute limits and the memory bandwidth being stretched across the higher resolution.

The GPU’s strength is visible in the 1440p results, where it can still deliver 85.2 FPS on High and 118.7 FPS on Medium. These numbers show that the RTX 5060 has ample headroom for 1440p gaming, and the 4K Low result of 81.8 FPS proves that the card can handle 4K when pixel shading is not the main cost. The FP32 performance of 19.18 TFLOPS is respectable, but the 128-bit memory bus is a bottleneck for texture-heavy scenes at 4K Ultra. For a city builder with dense population and building counts, the 8 GB VRAM and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are just enough for High settings at 4K, but not for the maximum preset.

How This Combo Ranks

In the grand database of tested combinations, this pairing of the Intel Core i5-9400 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 ranks 982 out of 1730 combos for Steamworld Build. This places it in the lower-middle portion of the pack, which makes sense given the CPU’s age relative to the GPU. The combo’s rank is dragged down by the CPU’s 50th percentile standing, even though the GPU is at the 73rd percentile. The data suggests that the i5-9400 is holding back the RTX 5060 in scenarios where the CPU is the primary constraint, such as 1080p Low.

The rank of 982 out of 1730 means that roughly 56.8% of tested combos outperform this one. This is not a flattering position, but it is important to note that the rank is game-specific. In a CPU-light game, this combo would likely rank higher, but Steamworld Build’s simulation demands do tax the six-thread processor. The benchmark results indicate that the combo is balanced enough for 1440p gaming, where the GPU takes over the load and the CPU’s limitations are less apparent.

Compared to other combos, the deltaPct values for the CPU’s rivals suggest that swapping the i5-9400 for an Intel Core i7-8809G would provide a marginal 0.6% improvement in overall CPU benchmarks, which might translate to a few extra frames in CPU-bound sections. However, the GPU’s rival data shows that the RTX 5060 is already at parity with the RX 7700 XT, so the performance ceiling is more about the CPU than the graphics card. The 4K results are the weakest point, and the rank reflects that the combo is not optimized for high-resolution, high-detail play.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The full set of measured FPS data shows a consistent hierarchy across all resolutions and settings. At 1920x1080, the average frame rates are 182 FPS for Low, 165.8 FPS for Medium, 134.9 FPS for High, and 94.8 FPS for Ultra. These numbers indicate that the system is well-suited for 1080p gaming, with even Ultra settings clearing the 90 FPS mark. The gap between Medium and High is 30.9 FPS, which is the largest jump in the 1080p tier, suggesting that High settings introduce a significant graphical load.

Moving to 2560x1440, the results drop to 149.8 FPS for Low, 118.7 FPS for Medium, 85.2 FPS for High, and 56.2 FPS for Ultra. The 1440p Ultra result is playable but not smooth, and the transition from High to Ultra costs 29 FPS, which is a 34% reduction. At 4K (3840x2160), the averages are 81.8 FPS for Low, 61.2 FPS for Medium, 45.8 FPS for High, and 29.7 FPS for Ultra. The 4K Low result is surprisingly strong, but the Ultra setting falls below 30 FPS, making it the only preset across all resolutions that is not comfortably playable.

The data also shows that the scaling from 1080p to 4K is not linear. For Low settings, the drop is 100.2 FPS, while for Ultra, the drop is 65.1 FPS. This suggests that at lower settings, the CPU is able to push more frames, making the resolution increase more punishing. At Ultra settings, the GPU is already working hard at 1080p, so the relative loss to 4K is smaller. Overall, the measured FPS breakdown paints a picture of a combo that excels at 1080p and 1440p, but requires careful settings management at 4K to maintain a playable frame rate.