The First Descendant is an upcoming free-to-play third-person looter-shooter that complements a series of PvE co-op shooters (including Helldivers 2) which have seen a surge in popularity lately thanks to increasing player interest coupled with polished, yet dynamic content. The First Descendant is due to release on the 2nd of July, later this week, and offers plenty to talk about for users if early reviews are any indicator.

It also comes with Unreal Engine 5 backing its impressive visuals, which means some users will have to get new hardware (including an SSD) to get the most out of the title, which is expected to scale well with hardware upgrades with a particular focus on the GPU. It comes with Ray Tracing support as well as support for Nvidia's DLSS 3.5 with Ray Reconstruction and Reflex tech.

  • Lenovo Legion Pro 5i gaming laptop
    Lenovo Legion Pro 5i
    Best Overall Gaming Laptop For The First Descendant
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  • MSI Katana 144Hz FHD Gaming Laptop
    MSI Katana 15 15.6" 144Hz FHD Gaming Laptop
    Best Mid-Range Gaming Laptop For The First Descendant
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  • GIGABYTE G5 Series - 15.6'' 144 Hz IPS - Intel Core i7-13620H - GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU - 16 GB DDR5 - 1 TB PCIe SSD - Windows 11 Home 64-bit - Gaming Laptop (G5 KF5-H3US354KH )
    GIGABYTE 15.6" G5 Gaming Laptop
    Best Budget Gaming Laptop For The First Descendant
    $1000 at Newegg
  • ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 2024 (RTX 4060)
    ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 2024 (RTX 4060)
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    $1600 at Best Buy
  • Razer Blade 18 (2024)
    Razer Blade 18 (2024)
    Best Premium Gaming Laptop For The First Descendant
    $4500 at Amazon

The First Descendant PC Hardware Requirements Explained

The First Descendant System Requirements

The First Descendant is a free-to-play title, which means that it focuses on getting the title to as many gamers as possible on a variety of consoles and PC hardware alike. This makes playability on a majority of gaming PCs out there an ongoing concern for the publisher, NEXON Games.

This, coupled with the fact that the title is powered by Epic's UE5 engine, which also powers the battle royale juggernaut Fortnite, means that hardware requirements are modest. Performance, however, is scalable, and better hardware does offer significant benefits thanks to the added headroom in play for the game engine.

Users with a relatively recent quad-core Intel or AMD CPU should be able to play the title with ease that requires a minimum of 8GB of RAM (but recommends 16GB) while requiring a minimum of 4GB of VRAM on the GPU (while recommending a minimum of 6GB for higher graphics presets). It also requires at least Windows 10 x64 20H2 and 50GB of SSD space to install.

Playing The First Descendant On A Gaming Laptop

As is the case in general, modern gaming laptops, while much faster than their predecessors, still clock in somewhat slower than their desktop counterparts. This is due to smaller, more power-efficient CPUs and GPUs in play and thermal and power restrictions that are often hardcoded due to limited headroom on offer.

This means that users looking at gaming laptops should generally aim for a higher tier of hardware (in terms of nomenclature) to avoid performance issues. The team at Game ZXC has made a tiered list of some of the best gaming laptops users can grab to play The First Descendant in all its glory when it releases early next week below:

The Best Gaming Laptops For The First Descendant

For users looking to crank up the settings reasonably high while being able to play at a high refresh rate, the Lenovo Legion Pro 5i offers it all, leveraging a fast 24-core Intel Core i9 CPU paired with a high TGP (140W) RTX 4070. The Legion keeps most of its key ports located at the back, something that helps power users and gamers alike when faced with potential cable clutter.

Its QHD IPS display offers up to 500 nits of brightness, a high 240Hz refresh rate, and support for Nvidia's G-Sync. This coupled with a generous 32GB of fast DDR5 RAM and 2TB of SSD storage in 2-drive configuration makes for an exceptionally fast gaming laptop that holds its own even as it is priced reasonably well versus the competition. This balanced configuration and value for money at the sub-$1800 price tag it can be found at makes it Game ZXC's recommendation as the best gaming laptop one can pick to play The First Descendant.

For users looking at a lower budget than the Legion gaming laptop above, the MSI Katana 15 also offers an RTX 4070 laptop while cutting things down to a 10-Core 13th generation Intel Core i7 CPU that still holds its own versus the competition for gaming use cases. It offers a large 1TB SSD with 16GB of DDR5 RAM, making it a relatively standard offering versus current-generation alternatives.

The Katana 15 does cut corners, however. This is not surprising given its penchant to deliver value at a lower price tag while offering a GPU that is miles ahead of most competing laptops at the same price. It cuts down heavily on its battery which clocks in at just over 50WHr of juice and has an FHD display that does do 144Hz but pales versus most of its higher-refresh rate, better quality, or higher resolution alternatives that its peers, including some of MSI's own laptops offer.

The Katana is an excellent gaming laptop for its price range, however, and makes for a great performance-centric alternative versus gaming laptops that can clock in closer to $2,000 to match its internals. This makes it both a great alternative to Game ZXC's primary recommendation and a standalone mid-range gaming laptop for The Final Descendant.

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The GIGABYTE G5 KF Gaming Laptop is an excellent budget-friendly gaming laptop that offers both, a relatively recent 13th generation Core i7 CPU with 10 cores on offer and a mid-range RTX 4060 GPU to power what is a 144Hz FHD display. The G5 KF clocks in just under $1000, but offers all the essentials and then some, including Wi-Fi 6E, Ethernet, and plenty of USB ports in tow.

The G5 KF does make compromises to get there, however, offering only 75W of TGP headroom to its RTX 4060 GPU even as it already offers a small 54WHr battery. Despite this, it still does relatively well in most benchmarks and offers 8GB of VRAM versus most of its RTX 4050-based competition that caps out at 6GB, something that should help with more demanding titles, making it a viable budget-friendly laptop pick for The First Descendant.

The ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14's 2024 iteration gets a newer AMD Ryzen 9 CPU with dedicated AI-centric hardware, a new OLED display that can do up to 120Hz on a razor-sharp 3K resolution, and a lower weight than its predecessor even as it continues to house an RTX 4060 GPU at the entry-level.

The G14 is considerably costly versus most of its 14-inch competition that clocks in much cheaper for similar GPU offerings. It does offer plenty of value as a result of this, as stated above, but can get dragged into unfavorable comparisons with laptops that often have better performance to boot. It still offers one of the best displays in the business, excellent performance out of the box, along with arguably some of the best looks in the business, making it a solid lightweight gaming laptop contender for titles including The Last Descendant.

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The Razer Blade 18 is one of the fastest gaming laptops money can buy, leveraging a 24-core Intel Core i9 14900HX CPU and a best-in-class RTX 4090 GPU with 16GB of VRAM. What sets the Razer Blade apart from its competition, which nearly always comes in the same CPU/GPU configuration is the premium feel it offers that few, if any of its competitors can offer thanks to its CNC-Milled aircraft-grade aluminum design.

To top it off, the Blade throws in an impressive 300Hz QHD+ MiniLED display that is a cut above the competition, along with 2TB of fast SSD and 32GB of DDR5 RAM under the hood. These do cut well north of the recommended hardware specifications for The First Ascendant, allowing users to max out their PvE experience like never before.

The ASUS ROG SCAR 17 X3D Gaming laptop is one of the most powerful CPUs available on a laptop currently with its stacked 3D cache allowing it to be considerably faster than the competition when it comes to gaming. It also houses an Nvidia RTX 4090 GPU with a 175W TGP (including boost) and 16GB of VRAM in addition to a bright QHD display that can do 240Hz.

The SCAR 17 offers plenty of SSD space and a generous amount of VRAM to go with a laptop that also leverages liquid metal under the hood to keep temperatures in check. Priced as a mid-range RTX 4090-based laptop in a market with options that cost nearly $5000 at times, it offers plenty of power and some of the best performance possible on CPU-bound games, making it a great option to get for The First Descendant.

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FAQ

Q: What Is The GPU VRAM Requirement For The FIrst Descendant?

The minimum VRAM requirement for The First Descendant is 4GB. Nexon recommends 6GB if possible to allow for higher graphics presets.

Q: When Is The First Descendant Launching?

The First Descendant is due to release on July 2 2024 for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Steam (PC), PlayStation 5, and PlayStation 4.