Weekly Notes (Sep 08 – 14): Borderlands 4 Tests the Limits of Recommended Specs

Niklas Borglund

Author

2025-09-16

Borderlands 4 arrived this week with all the AAA(A?) fanfare you'd expect, but landed at just 64% positive on Steam. The familiar culprit: performance issues that persist even for players exceeding the recommended RTX 3080 requirement. CEO Randy Pitchford's defensive Twitter thread about the criticism added an unexpected layer to the story.

Meanwhile, Keep Digging proves there's still market demand for games about... digging holes.

Let's explore this week's releases!

Borderlands 4 by Gearbox Software

Largest audiences: ~73% English, ~9% Chinese (Simplified), ~5% Spanish

The big release this week is undoubtedly Borderlands 4. It got off to a rough start. Players seem to enjoy their trademark gameplay, the story, graphics and the humorous gameplay.

But it only has around 64% positive. The culprit is a well known one when it comes to AAA releases, namely performance!

Even with its quite high system requirements, players are complaining that they can't run the game smoothly even if they have high end rigs. At a 69.99 euro pricetag - lots of players feel that they can't recommend the game to others just yet.

Although, Gearbox's CEO Randy Pitchford wrote a long twitter thread/rant on the critical reception the game has gotten regarding this. I would guess they'd work on fixing the performance issues over time, but I'm not so sure after reading that thread.

It will be interesting to follow this game more going ahead.

Road To Empress by New One Studio

Largest audiences: ~90% Chinese (Simplified), ~4% Chinese (Traditional)

A full motion interactive fiction game which seems to be primarily aimed at a Chinese audience. We've seen these type of games gaining popularity there this year, which is interesting.

One that comes to mind is 情感反诈模拟器 which was one of the top games in Q2 2025 among the Simplified Chinese crowd.

Road To Empress actually has the game localized to a number of languages and is generally well received for its visual quality, engaging story and cinematic experience. The biggest criticisms are that they feel that many of the choices often lead to death, instead of branching out in another narrative thread. You have to do a certain amount of trial and error to find the "correct" choices of the story it seems.

Shape of Dreams by Lizard Smoothie

Largest audiences: ~42% Chinese (Simplified), ~30% English, ~11% Korean

A fast-paced action roguelite that mixes hack-and-slash combat with team-based gameplay in surreal dreamscapes. Players can tackle challenges solo or in co-op, customizing characters and strategies in chaotic dream battles.

Players praise the fun gameplay loop, high replayability, and fantastic visuals that create an appealing dreamlike atmosphere.

However, the grindy progression system frustrates many players, with some finding it excessively tedious. Performance issues detract from the experience, while difficulty spikes with instant-death bosses and controversial skill tree changes have divided the community.

Keep Digging by Wild Dog

Largest audiences: ~35% English, ~23% Japanese, ~18% Chinese (Traditional)

A very short game where you dig a hole with your friends. To me, it seems to take heavy inspiration from A Game About Digging a Hole released earlier this year and added online multiplayer.

Players find Keep Digging fun to play with friends. And since it's quite cheap, players feel like it's generally worth the cost for the casual nature and digging mechanics.

The most frequent frustrations are with the game length and performance issues. It's reported to be often completed under one hour of gameplay.

Firefighting Simulator: Ignite by weltenbauer. Software Entwicklung GmbH

Largest audiences: ~43% English, ~28% German, ~8% French

A firefighting simulation where players team up with friends or NPCs to face various fire-related challenges.

Players praise the immersive experience, fun factor, and realistic firefighting aspects. The variety of missions adds depth and engagement to the gameplay, with many enjoying it as a group experience despite some flaws.

However, AI behavior frustrates many players, often leading to poor performance during critical missions. Performance issues including lag and frame drops detract from the experience, while graphics quality disappoints some who expected more from promotional materials.

⚔️ Early Access Graduates

• Little Witch in the Woods - A simulation RPG. Players love the charming art style, cozy gameplay and story. They dislike that the dialogue is a bit wordy and that they have to go through lots of text. The controls are a common source of frustration especially if you are using mouse and keyboard.

Notable Mentions

Here are some games or DLCs that were on the top but didn't get its own section in the weekly notes.

• Star Birds - (Base Building. City Builder. Collectathon)
• Kingdom Come: Deliverance II Legacy of the Forge - (Action-Adventure. Open World. RPG)
• Trainatic - (Clicker. Idler. Management)
• Chrono Gear: Warden of Time - (2D Platformer. Metroidvania. Side Scroller)
• Dungeons of Eternity - (Action RPG. Dungeon Crawler. Hack and Slash)
• Dead Reset - (Choose Your Own Adventure. Interactive Fiction. Point & Click)
• Machick 2 - (Action Roguelike. Bullet Hell. Roguelite)

Full List: Top Releases for September 08 - 14 (2025)

And that's it! Thank you for reading!

Stay tuned! If you enjoyed this, feel free to share it with someone who you think it'd bring value to - or get your hands on the advanced & visual search (and other features) by supporting me on Patreon.