Returnal on PC First Impressions

Returnal is developer Housemarque’s third-person roguelike shooter that came out on April 30, 2021, for the PlayStation 5. The game is about Selene Vassos, who is an astronaut that lands on a planet called Atropos. She is searching for the “White Shadow” signal. The psychological horror game features the theme of getting stuck in a time loop and was received well on launch.

The game was PS5’s first exclusive title since the console’s release. News of it getting a PC version leaked numerous times before the eventual release. The developer finally confirmed the PC release at The Game Awards. The PC port is handled by Climax Studios, which has worked with Housemarque on Resogun and Dead Nation.

It is praised for being one of the best roguelike games around and even attributed to elevating the sub-genre. Finally, those who don’t own a PlayStation 5 will be able to experience Returnal on PC on February 15, 2023. The game is available on Steam and the Epic Games Store for Rs. 3,999 in India.

Returnal PC features

The PC version includes support for AI-powered upscaling technologies like the Nvidia DLSS and AMD FSR. Nvidia Image Scaling (NIS) is also added to the game, which will add some performance to setups with less powerful hardware. Returnal also features support for Ultrawide resolution at 21:9, and Super Ultrawide at 32:9 for a more immersive and objectively more stunning experience. This is, of course, complemented with the already present Dolby Atmos sound and immersive full 3D audio support from the PS5 version. The PC version also supports Sony’s DualSense and DualSense Edge controllers.

Gameplay on PC

In case you don’t know what a roguelike game is, it is usually a type of game where you explore a maze of levels and try to get as far as possible without dying. If you die, you have to start all over again from the beginning. The levels are procedurally generated, so that means each gameplay run is new even after multiple attempts throughout your playthrough.

It becomes apparent how this roguelike mechanic ties brilliantly into the story and gameplay of Returnal. When you as Selene die, she returns back to her crash-landed spaceship at the beginning of the level. You then must navigate the entire level all over again, but with each playthrough, the experience is a bit different.

As soon as the game begins, Selene notices that there is something strange going on. Right after landing on Atropos, she notices that she doesn’t have her sidearm anymore. Upon further exploration, she sees a corpse with her sidearm nearby. The corpse also has similar identifying markers as Selene’s spaceship. All of this happens within the first five minutes of the game, and Returnal tells players right off the bat how it’s going to be like. It appears that our main character is already stuck in a time loop, even longer than us, the player.

Returnal’s performance on PC

Sony suggested that players who want to run Returnal on PC should have at least 32GB of RAM. This is despite listing 16GB as the minimum required.

A minimum processor of Intel Core i5-6400 or AMD Ryzen 5 1500X, and for graphics cards at least an Nvidia GeForce GTZ 1060 or AMD Radeon RX580 is required according to the company. Returnal takes nearly 60GB of storage space on PC.

When it comes to recommended specs, Sony says that Returnal wants an Intel i7-8700 or AMD Ryzen 7 2700X processor and an Nvidia RTX 2070 Super or AMD RX 6700 XT.

In my playthrough, I used an Asus TUF gaming laptop with a Ryzen 9 5900HX and an Nvidia RTX 3060 6GB graphics card hooked to a 1080p monitor.

Right off the bat, in Returnal’s opening sequence, I found the audio to be very jittery. Hopefully, this gets fixed with updates. Other than that though, the game ran smoothly without any hitches.

Here are the benchmark results from Returnal’s in-game benchmark tool:

While playing the game, I first used the Epic preset settings. While doing the tests with ray tracing enabled, I used high presets and tuned the ray tracing shadows and reflections to also high. Despite Sony saying that the game needs at least 32GB of RAM, in my experience, the game can run just fine with 16GB, provided you’re playing on a 1080p display.