Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater shocked fans after Digital Foundry revealed it actually ran worse on PS5 Pro than the base PS5.
Unreal Engine 5 has powered some stunning games, but it has also earned a reputation for performance headaches. Stutters, inconsistent frame pacing, and heavy effects often push consoles to their limits.
Fans expected Metal Gear Solid Delta to rise above those struggles. Konami rebuilt the 2004 classic from the ground up, promising cutting-edge visuals and smooth stealth gameplay. On PS5 Pro, players assumed the “best of both worlds” experience awaited them, especially after Sony marketed the console’s AI-powered PSSR upscaling as a performance booster.
Instead, Digital Foundry’s analysis showed the opposite: the Pro version faltered where the base PS5 held steady.
MGS Delta’s unstable FPS makes PS5 Pro version worse
Digital Foundry confirmed that “PS5 Pro can run at a lower frame rate than base PS5.” The channel noted that Snake’s opening jungle landing area already dipped below 60 FPS on Pro, while base PS5 avoided those drops.
Digital Foundry / KonamiIn a direct test route, they measured the base model enjoying up to “a plus 7 FPS advantage” compared to the upgraded hardware. Their conclusion was blunt: “It’s hard to see an upside here.” Pro players also lost the option to toggle graphics modes, leaving no fallback setting.
Worse still, Sony’s new PSSR upscaler backfired. Digital Foundry found that “PS5 Pro has less pixel data to work with,” sometimes hitting just 756p before reconstruction. While motion stability improved slightly, still images looked blurrier than the base console.
The team reported added shimmer, thicker ambient occlusion, and more flicker on shadows. In the lab interior, Pro clawed back some frames, but jungle areas ran consistently worse.
Players voiced their frustration on Reddit. One quipped, “Another delayed game releases in a bad state.”
Another wrote, “Kojima somewhere rubbing his hands together rn.” A third piled on: “Meanwhile, Death Stranding 2 looks and runs like a dream on my base PS5… Unreal Engine 5 vs Decima.”
Metal Gear Solid Delta launches August 28 on PS5, PS5 Pro, and Xbox. Konami has time for a day-one patch, and fans are hoping it delivers.