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Borderlands 4 Performance Issues – Is It Another Sign Cloud Gaming is the Future?

Borderlands is such a good game. If you haven't played it, it's a first-person looter-shooter with a science fantasy setting twist. In all four of the Borderlands games in the series, you play as a Vault Hunter, a badass mercenary hunting for alien Vaults, with different classes of mercenaries available.

Well, in the case of the much-anticipated Borderlands 4, hunting might not be as easy as you think. The performance issues seemingly plaguing the game are making it 'almost unplayable,' according to some players.

And, worst of all, Gearbox Software, the Borderlands game developer, released a patch that made things worse. Is this yet another sign that cloud gaming is the future? Read on to find out.

The Borderlands 4 Performance Issues

The actual Borderlands 4 game itself is amazing (minus the issues). Gearbox took a new approach but kept Claptrap on the edges, and the open-world option is incredibly fun.

The devs might have kept their promise of giving the game a new breath of life, but it comes with more issues than we feel any game has experienced. We're in 2025; there's simply no excuse for this level of performance issues. Constant crashes (especially on PC), with Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford even claiming 'it would be "unplayable" on anything below minimum specs.'

And then there's the poorly planned, awkward UI and the invisible walls that make it almost impossible to enjoy the game.

Experts are pinning it down to one, probably poor development and end-user testing protocols, but also the fact that it was made with Unreal Engine 5. If you didn't know, Unreal Engine 5 is behind several high-profile game releases that are causing havoc for PC gamers.

Even the gamers who have had a more positive experience with the game, mainly console gamers, mention issues such as input lag and stuttering.

For Gearbox, it's a mess they're struggling to resolve.

The Patches Making It Worse

The amusing thing is that the developers released two performance patches, and the most recent one, released last week, has actually made things worse.

The patch released at the end of last week should have helped reduce, if not remove, the stuttering and FPS drops (a noticeable drop in a game's frame rate). Looking at the reports online from Steam and Reddit, players instantly commented on how it made the issues worse, but if you actually look across multiple reviews, the consensus is that it has improved the game overall.

Only a small percentage are saying the game is unplayable, but we'd argue nobody should be saying that when Gearbox is two patches deep into trying to fix the issue.

Would Cloud Gaming Be Any Better?

Cloud gaming means that instead of downloading and running games on your device, the game runs on powerful remote servers.

In the context of the issues with Borderlands 4, would cloud gaming be any better? Yes and no. The issues are mainly coming from an update that caused stuttering across gaming platforms, not only PC, but it also seemed to diminish the frame rates for PC gamers. Hence, despite there being issues no matter the device players are on, PC gamers have it worse. There's also talk that a potential memory leak is causing performance issues to degrade as players move through the game.

Stuttering can happen whether it's cloud or normal gaming, but as the game isn't hosted on a device but is hosted on the cloud and their servers, we would argue that's less likely to be an issue.

If it is a memory leak that's causing the game to only get worse as players progress, then cloud gaming would definitely be the better option. The cloud has immensely powerful servers and unbelievable data storage capacity. If the cloud were causing issues such as memory data loss, hundreds of thousands of people would lose their data daily. It's just not an issue the cloud has. Does that mean cloud gaming might be the future? Potentially.

Mobile and PC cloud gaming is becoming more popular.

We are noticing that mobile and console cloud gaming is becoming more popular. User penetration is forecasted to be 5.8% in 2025 and is expected to increase to 6.2% by 2030, with Statista stating that, 'Worldwide, the cloud gaming sector is experiencing rapid growth as consumers increasingly prioritise flexibility and accessibility in their gaming experiences.' And it's not only mobile, console, PC, and cloud-powered gaming that is becoming more popular.

Some platforms are embracing it more than others. Casino platforms are the perfect example of on the go multi-device platforms, often using cloud technology to host their websites across multiple platforms. They're more stable, more accessible, and free from the performance issues of titles like Borderlands 4. There's no need for game installations, and updates, bug fixes, and new content can be rolled out simultaneously.

Is Cloud Gaming Free of Issues?

Cloud gaming is not free of issues. The main issue of cloud gaming is that players need to have a fast and stable internet connection. Anyone who plays games from their home Wi-Fi, especially when other people are in the house and using it, will know that fast and stable Wi-Fi is not always guaranteed.

It also required the consumption of massive amounts of data, which came to impact the visuals of the game as the video compressed. That said, cloud gaming is far more accessible and less likely to have issues.

Borderlands 4 is going through it right now. Or should we say, Gearbox is. We can't imagine the stress of the devs scrambling to fix all the issues. Let's wait and see what the next performance patch does.