Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, Another Unreal Engine 5 Performance Nightmare
August 28, 2025
How many games made with Unreal Engine 5 do we have to go through before performance issues stop dominating the headlines? The long-awaited remake, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, has finally made its way into players' hands, but the game's poor optimization has turned excitement into frustration for some fans. The remake is unfortunately emblematic of a now longtime trend where ambitious Unreal Engine 5 projects prioritize barely noticeable graphical improvements, while struggling to deliver stable frame rates.
Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater isn't devastatingly bad in terms of performance, but it is a lot more taxing on systems than it has any right to be. The PS5 Pro, for example, gets humiliated by the game, unable to regularly hit its 60fps target. Considering that the remake has rebuilt the entirety of Metal Gear Solid 3 in a new engine, some issues are to be expected. Excuses for poor optimization aren't going to cut it anymore after all these years, though. Let's just be real about this, Unreal Engine 5 is unnecessarily bloated by default, but developers need to be held more accountable for not designing around low-end users.
The Performance Targets On Console Don't Hit Their Mark
Digital Foundry has already tested the game on the PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 5 Pro, so we'll be using their findings here. On PS5's Performance Mode, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater has a dynamic resolution range between 720p and 1080p, aiming to hit 60fps whenever it can. In Quality Mode, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater has a dynamic resolution range between 1080p and 1584p, targeting 30fps instead. These targets sound nice enough, but the frame rate isn't actually consistent.
Various sections, when playing in Performance Mode, actually see Metal Gear Solid Delta drop to 50fps and even 40fps. Considering that the mode sacrifices visual fidelity by a fair amount, with very apparent artifacting and flickering issues, that's just not acceptable. Quality Mode is an even worse experience. Even when it can sustain its 30fps target, the frame pacing is unstable. This leads to camera jitter and shaky movement. Quality Mode is also no stranger to frame dips. The Xbox Series X offers comparable performance in both modes, with many of the same problems. The Xbox Series S does manage to run the game, albeit at a sub-720p resolution with a non-negotiable 30fps cap.
The PS5 Pro, similar to the Xbox Series S, doesn't let you pick a mode. You are forced to play with a dynamic resolution range between 756p and 1152p. PSSR does clean up the visuals a good deal better, so it's not exactly an insignificant upgrade. The positives end there, though. You might expect a smooth 60fps on the more powerful console, but Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater actually performs worse on the PS5 Pro than it does in Performance Mode on the standard PS5.
PC Has Plenty Of Performance Issues, Too
On PC, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater doesn't exactly make a great case for itself either. Its bare-bones graphics options are especially notable. Shadows, textures, and global illumination, those are the only modifiable settings that will impact the performance. Even more absurdly, 60fps is the game's maximum frame rate. Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater has found a way to offer poor customization for both high and low-end users. That's impressive, honestly.
In terms of performance, the results are less than stellar on PC. 4K60fps is a dream, even for RTX 5090 owners. Spending over $2000 USD on a graphics card can't even give you a smooth 4K performance in Metal Gear Solid Delta with all settings on max. That's embarrassing, especially for a remake.
Going more toward the affordable range of graphics cards, the RTX 3060 can handle the game at 1080p with a ~45-55fps average on high settings. Performance hitches happen on all platforms, so these numbers do get worse depending on the environment. Still, this frame rate is disappointing when you have better looking games getting 90+ fps with this same card. There's nothing in this game that really validates this poor level of performance.
Does Unreal Engine 5 Deserve All The Blame? Will Things Ever Get Better?
Unreal Engine 5 often takes the full blame for frame rate issues, and there's no exception here with Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater. The engine makes for a great common enemy. Realistically, though, the developers are also at fault in this instance. The main consoles struggling to average 50fps through the whole game was a decision that someone at Konami intentionally made. The PS5 Pro providing a worse experience than the standard console was also another intentional decision. With different priorities, the overall experience could have been smoother across all platforms.
Unreal Engine 5 does need to shoulder some responsibility, though. It's a fact that it offers too much by default. Optimization shouldn't be so torturous for developers. While the immediate future doesn't look too hot, Unreal Engine 5.6 released in June 2025, and it significantly improves performance and stability. Games developed with that specific version should hold up much better to scrutiny.
Unfortunately, development teams can't just upgrade their game's UE5 version. Some features may be version-specific, after all. Moving a project to v5.6 would likely require months of work, which most teams won't see the value in. Unreal Engine 5 games will definitely get better, but we have some waiting to do.
