Larian Studios has recently made significant progress with the Xbox Series S port of Baldur's Gate 3. This advancement is particularly noteworthy given the unique challenges the studio faced in adapting the award-winning game for the less powerful hardware of the Series S compared to its counterparts.
Known for its meticulous approach to game development, Larian has spent an inordinate amount of time optimizing it for the Xbox Series S even after Microsoft agreed to make certain concessions. The good news is that, as revealed in a series of screenshots posted by Larian Studios CEO and founder, Swen Vincke, lies in its considerable reduction of RAM and VRAM loads. The screenshots, shared over the past few months, highlight a reduction from 3.5GB to 2.3GB in VRAM usage and from 5.2GB to 4.7GB in RAM usage. This remarkable decrease in memory usage signals a major achievement for the studio, considering the Series S's limited high-bandwidth memory of 8GB.
The significance of this development extends beyond just technical metrics. For gamers, especially to the owners of the more budget-friendly Xbox Series S, this suggests that Baldur's Gate 3 will deliver a more efficient and potentially more optimized gaming experience. The initial concerns about the game's performance, especially in light of issues noted in the PS5 and PC versions, particularly in Act 3, are now being addressed with these optimizations.
