The PC system requirements for open world shooter Redfall have just been revealed, and there’s an ask for 32GB of system RAM here which may raise more than a few eyebrows.
Especially considering that this is the third PC game in a very short space of time (just over a week) to demand 32GB, at least in some form. The other two being Diablo 4 and Firmament (an adventure from the maker of Myst).
There certainly seems to be a RAM trend being underlined of late, then, but before you go thinking that your 16GB gaming PC can’t hack it and needs a memory upgrade pronto, don’t panic – not just yet.
Let’s break things down a little here. The hardware requirements for Redfall do indeed ask for 32GB of RAM, but that’s on the ‘ultra’ spec. Sadly, we aren’t told exactly what that means (yet), but clearly, it’s about maxing stuff – possibly at 4K resolution? Time will tell.
Diablo 4 just revealed its system specs too, and the stipulation for 32GB of RAM came with the ‘Ultra 4K’ spec, meaning max details at 4K resolution.
Firmament calls for 32GB of RAM as part of its recommended spec, but the dev has a caveat – that this is to let those looking for max details, or playing in VR, know what they might need at most. The developer says the adventure game will run ‘just fine’ on a gaming PC with 16GB of RAM.
Devil in the graphics details (and res)
To sum up this very recent trio of 32GB demands – which follows the likes of Hogwarts Legacy (32GB for ‘ultra’ details or 4K) and Forspoken (‘ultra’) – they are all about running the game at top details (often 4K), and possibly being very cautious about niche use cases (VR).
Most people aren’t gaming on a 4K display, let’s face it. Indeed, looking at the latest Steam hardware survey it’s 2% of gamers running at 4K resolution (or 3% from the survey before, which was more reliable for reasons we discuss here if you want to go off on a tangent). Whatever the case, it’s just a few percent, or a drop in the gaming ocean really.
How many gaming rigs have 32GB of RAM? 15% going by that previous survey (as mentioned, we’re regarding February’s survey as more accurate). Not far off one in seven gaming rigs, in other words – which is just why game developers can hardly get carried away with asking for 32GB of system RAM. Not if they want their games to run on the majority of PCs.
For the moment, 16GB of RAM remains a robust amount, and indeed the recommended spec for Redfall and the ‘high’ spec for Diablo 4 (which can cope with 8GB on its minimum spec, incidentally).
As mentioned, though, these 32GB mentions increasingly popping up is a signal for the future, and that certainly if you’re buying a new rig – looking at years of gaming ahead – this is the spec you want to go for. Don’t get 16GB in that case, if you can at all help it, because you want to future-proof yourself with a new PC, and the cost difference in doubling up to 32GB really isn’t all that much these days.
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