Gears of War: E-Day on PC: Ultra 4K calls for an RTX 5070 Ti and ray tracing is mandatory

The Coalition has laid out the definitive PC requirements for Gears of War: E-Day, with the October 6 launch just around the corner. As reported by Gamereactor España, based on information from VideoCardz, the studio sets out three very distinct tiers: a fairly friendly entry point for older rigs, a recommended level built around current mid-range hardware, and an Ultra ceiling that doesn't mess around, with a GeForce RTX 5070 Ti or a Radeon RX 7900 XT as the reference for playing at 4K.

Why does this matter beyond the spec sheet? Because E-Day is the return of a franchise that has always had a loyal competitive community on PC, and because the technical approach decides who gets to play comfortably from day one. Two details change the conversation: hardware ray tracing is mandatory, not optional, and every resolution listed, including 1080p, assumes you'll be using some form of upscaler such as DLSS, FSR, TSR or XeSS. This isn't a "turn off RT and you're golden" kind of game: global illumination, shadows and reflections all depend on it.

What you need to know

• Minimum: 1080p at 60 FPS on Medium quality, with hardware on the level of an RTX 2060 or an RX 6600.
• Recommended: 1440p on High quality with an RTX 5060, RTX 3060 Ti, RX 9060 XT or RX 6700 XT.
• Ultra: 4K at 60 FPS or more with an RTX 5070 Ti or RX 7900 XT, paired with a Ryzen 7 7800X3D or a Core i7-14700K.
• Mandatory ray tracing: you need a GPU with hardware ray tracing; there's no classic rasterized mode.
• Upscaling assumed: none of the figures are at native resolution; the game ships with support for DLSS 4.5, FSR 4 and XeSS 3.0, plus HDR and ultrawide displays.

Three tiers, three audiences

The structure The Coalition proposes is quite transparent. The minimum tier is designed so that nobody with a card from a few generations back is left out, as long as they accept Medium quality and an upscaler doing part of the work. The recommended tier targets today's most common mid-range, mixing the latest cards with older ones that are still very widespread. And Ultra is, quite simply, a showcase: 4K, high frame rates and all the ray-traced lighting switched on.

The fine print on upscaling

Here's the catch worth reading twice. The minimum profile promising 1080p at 60 FPS sounds great until you realize that 1080p is with DLSS, FSR, TSR or XeSS in the mix, meaning the game renders internally at a lower resolution and reconstructs the image. Same story at 4K: the 5070 Ti isn't pushing native 2160p. That's no sin, it's the industry norm these days, but it changes how you should read every row of the table and, above all, how sharp the picture is going to feel on screen.

Ray tracing with no off switch

The other line in the sand is the hardware ray tracing requirement. Gears has always been a technical flagship for Unreal Engine, and E-Day follows that path by moving global illumination, shadows and reflections entirely to RT. That takes any GPU without hardware RT support out of the equation, no matter how powerful it is in pure rasterization. The upside is that The Coalition confirms the latest versions of the three major upscalers, HDR, ultrawide support and a benchmark tool from launch, so at least you'll be able to measure your rig before suffering in a match.

Our take

Here at the Underworld Lordz editorial desk we see two sides to this. We like that the entry point is modest: an RTX 2060 or an RX 6600 are still very common cards in the community, and the fact that they can run the game at 60 FPS opens the door to a lot of people. We also like that the studio is upfront about upscalers instead of selling impossible native figures. That honesty is appreciated.

But for the competitive player it's a different story. Sixty frames is the floor, not the ceiling, and in a shooter as aggressive as Gears we want 120 or more with the lowest possible latency. Mandatory RT means there's no "clean" preset for squeezing out frames by stripping away the eye candy; and relying on an upscaler to reach 1080p adds an extra layer of latency and visual artifacts exactly where you can least afford it. Keep an eye on Ultra too: asking for a 7800X3D or a 14700K for 4K makes it clear the CPU is going to matter, and a processor from a few years back could become the real bottleneck.

For content creators the challenge is twofold: running the game at showcase quality while also encoding the stream. With a 5070 Ti as the target and RT always on, anyone wanting to stream at high quality should seriously consider a dedicated capture rig or settle for lower presets. Our recommendation: wait for the built-in benchmark, test with your actual streaming setup and don't trust the table until you've seen it on your own screen.

What do you think?

The debate is on: is it reasonable for a competitive shooter to demand ray tracing with no alternative, or would you rather have a rasterized mode to prioritize frames? Tell us what rig you'll be jumping into E-Day with and whether the minimum's 60 FPS is enough for you or you're going for more: we'll see you in the team chat and on our Discord.