NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Founders Edition Review: Still King Of PC Gaming
Homeworld 3 Benchmarks
Homeworld 3
Homeworld 3 GeForce RTX 5090 FE Details @ 4K
Homeworld 3 was effectively CPU limited on the GeForces when running at 1440p, but both managed to out perform the Radeon RX 7900 XTX by a wide margin anyway. With the resolution increased to 4K, the GeForce RTX 5090 is able to pull ahead of the 4090 by a few percentage point and roughly double the performance of the Radeon.
With FSR 2 or DLSS enabled (sans frame generation, Balanced preset), the GeForce RTX 5090 and 4090 are evenly matched, but that CPU limit prevents any meaningful separation. The 4K results with resolution scaling enabled essentially mirror the 1440p results.
Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered Benchmarks
Next up, we’ve got some benchmarks from Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered. The original Horizon Zero Dawn was initially released as an exclusive on the PlayStation 4, but was ported to the PC a couple of years back. A few months ago, however, a remastered version of the game was released, with upgraded visuals and support for more advanced graphics technologies. For those unfamiliar with the game, it follows a character named Aloy, who is on a quest to unravel mysteries of a future Earth ruled by machines. She is outcast from her tribe and fights to uncover her past and stop an impending threat to the future.
Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered
Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered GeForce RTX 5090 FE Details @ 4K
Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered GeForce RTX 5090 FE Details @ 4K
This game supports DLSS and FSR 3, and frame generation is an option too. With resolution scaling enabled alone, the GeForce RTX 5090 continues its winning ways. Flip on frame generation and the same is true, but the RTX 5090 is able to extend its lead and ultimately put up over 370 FPS.
The Talos Principle II Testing
Croteam’s The Talos Principle II is a sequel to the original first-person, puzzle-based adventure game that features philosophical themes and expansive environments with increasingly more difficult challenges as the game progresses. It was originally released for multiple platforms but has been continually updated on the PC.
We saw more of the same in The Talos Principle II. Here, the GeForce RTX 5090 was between 30% - 33% faster than the previous-gen RTX 4090 and nearly twice as fast as the Radeon.
Turn on DLSS (in balanced mode) and the GeForce RTX 5090's performance skyrockets to over 137 FPS with resolution scaling alone and over 200 FPS with frame generation, which is more than enough to propel the card into the lead.
Assassin's Creed Mirage Benchmarks
Ubisoft’s Assassin's Creed Mirage is an action-adventure game set in 9th century Baghdad, Iraq. It is the thirteenth major installment in the storied Assassin's Creed franchise and the successor to 2020's Assassin's Creed Valhalla.
Assassin's Creed Mirage GeForce RTX 5090 FE Details @ 4K
The deltas separating the cards in Assassin's Creed Mirage were relatively small, with the GeForce RTX 5090 leading its older sibling by roughly 12% - 15%, depending on the resolution. Still, it's another clear victory for NVIDIA's latest flagship.
Enabling DLSS or FSR in Assassin's Creed Mirage significantly boosts framerates and all of the cards we tested are able to break the 150 FPS mark. The overall rankings don't change though, and the GeForce RTX 5090 remains in the lead.
Black Myth: Wukong Benchmarks
Black Myth: Wukong is a title with a storied history. It began development way back in 2018, and was first showed to the public with an incredible trailer in 2020, but the pandemic and other internal struggles delayed the game's development and it wasn't released until last year. Black Myth: Wukong supports a variety of upscalers, including NVIDIA's DLSS, AMD's FSR3, Intel's XeSS, and Epic's own TSR. Using DLSS, FSR3, or TSR gives you the option of enabling frame generation too, which you'll need if you want to crank up the visuals in this stunning title.
Black Myth: Wukong
Black Myth: Wukong GeForce RTX 5090 FE Details @ 4K
Black Myth: Wukong is absolutely punishing at the Cinematic image quality preset with full ray tracing enabled. The GeForce RTX 5090 outperforms the 4090 by about 40% here with those settings, but none of the cards put up playable framerates at 4K with native rendering.
If you want to play Black Myth: Wukong with the highest image quality settings, resolution scaling technologies are a must. With DLSS enabled in this game, the GeForce RTX 5090 nearly hits 90 FPS, which is perfectly smooth. Enable frame generation and its framerate skyrockets to 138 FPS, which is again nearly 40% higher than the RTX 4090.
Black Myth: Wukong
Black Myth: Wukong GeForce RTX 5090 FE Details @ 4K
If you want to play Black Myth: Wukong with the highest image quality settings, resolution scaling technologies are a must. With DLSS enabled in this game, the GeForce RTX 5090 nearly hits 90 FPS, which is perfectly smooth. Enable frame generation and its framerate skyrockets to 138 FPS, which is again nearly 40% higher than the RTX 4090.
F1 24 Benchmarks
F1 24 is Codemaster’s latest Formula One racing simulation, and like previous version of the game, it sports impressive visuals. This latest addition to the franchise supports DirectX 12 with ray tracing, and it incorporates support for a number of AMD's FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) features and NVIDIA technologies, like DLSS with frame generation. We tested the games with its Ultra High graphics preset, with ray tracing and TAA enabled at a couple of resolutions to see what these graphics cards could do.
F1 24
With DLSS or FSR 2 (Balanced) enabled in F1 24, once again we see all of the cards in hitting buttery smooth framerates at 4K, but the rankings don't really change. The GeForce RTX 5090 remains the fastest by far and achieves a whopping 290 FPS with frame generation enabled.
Cyberpunk 2077 Benchmarks
Cyberpunk 2077 is based on the Cyberpunk tabletop role-playing game franchise. The tabletop game was published for the first time all the way back in 1988, and the intervening 30-odd years has not changed the game world all that much. As a result, Cyberpunk 2077 looks somewhat retro-futuristic, as this is how people in the '80s imagined what the future would look like.The PC game make use of virtually every advanced DirectX graphics technology and features support for DLSS, FSR and XeSS, and after a somewhat rocky release, it has been significantly updated and optimized for a multitude of hardware configurations. Although it is no longer considered a new title, Cyberpunk 2077 remains a showcase for many advanced graphics technologies.
We tested a pre-release version of Cyberpunk 2077 that's been updated with support for DLSS 4's transformer model and multi-frame generation. This is an important note because this game foreshadows how future games, that are optimized for Blackwell and the RTX 50 series, may perform relative to previous-gen GPUs.
Cyberpunk 2077
What happens when you enabled DLSS 4 and leverage some of that new technology in Blackwell, though? Let's find out...
With the pre-release beta we tested, Cyberpunk 2077 supports DLSS 4 using the new transformer model, and multi-frame generation. As you can see, injecting those frames boosts performance dramatically and the RTX 5090 tops out at over 240 FPS -- a nearly 4.5X increase over native rendering. To go from technically playable, but under 60 FPS, to saturating a 4K 240Hz display is wild and portends the future of game rendering technologies.
Because this game also supports NVIDIA Reflex technology, latency is also low enough that you still fill engaged while playing, even with frame generation enabled. Image quality is also excellent; you can see some of the ways the new transformer model helps DLSS here.
