Tom's Hardware tested 25 desktop CPUs from Intel and AMD against Gears of War: E-Day, an Unreal Engine 5 title the outlet labels "uncharacteristically CPU-heavy" relative to other recent UE5 releases. The benchmark, written by CPU lead reporter Jake Roach, also examines the game's "low core mode" behavior.

What does a CPU-heavy UE5 title change?

Most shipped Unreal Engine 5 games have been constrained first by GPU horsepower, with the processor acting as a secondary bottleneck above 60 frames per second. Roach's piece frames E-Day as inverting that relationship on PC: minimum framerates, frame-time consistency, and 1% lows move in step with CPU choice rather than graphics card selection. The result spreads the field for the 25 Intel and AMD parts the article covers.

What does the 25-CPU spread show?

Roach's test pool spans current-generation desktop silicon from both vendors, from entry-level chips to flagship SKUs. Because the workload is CPU-bound, the benchmark exposes differences in single-thread throughput, cache hierarchy, and inter-core latency that GPU-bound reviews tend to compress. AMD's 3D V-Cache-equipped parts carry a cache advantage in titles that thrash the working set, while Intel's hybrid performance-and-efficiency-core design behaves differently depending on how the engine's job scheduler distributes work.

Why does low core mode matter now?

The piece also investigates the game's "low core mode," a thread-restriction option carried over from older console releases. The option is a legacy of console-bound builds, where capping the game to a small thread count improved frame pacing on constrained hardware. Roach's testing asks whether the modern UE5 build still benefits from that restriction, or whether it now functions as a workaround for desktop CPUs that struggle with the engine's threading model.

What does it mean for chip buyers?

Gears of War has anchored a long-running PC install base, and the franchise has been a reference title for CPU scaling on mid-range hardware. A benchmark that pushes minimum framerates up the CPU stack has direct purchase implications. Buyers weighing a six-core part against an eight-core part, or comparing the latest Ryzen X3D SKUs against Intel's K-series offerings, will see measurable deltas here even with a modest graphics card paired in.

For chip vendors, the workload profile cuts both ways. AMD's pitch for its stacked-cache SKUs rests on cache-sensitive, lightly threaded titles. Intel's single-core boost behavior and thread director scheduling also gain or lose depending on how an engine parks work on efficiency cores.

Roach joined Tom's Hardware from Digital Trends, XDA, PC Invasion, Business Insider, and WIRED, and his coverage at the outlet centers on consumer and workstation CPUs.

The full benchmark, including per-CPU results, the low core mode comparison, and frame-time charts, is available on Tom's Hardware.

As Unreal Engine 5 ships across more major franchises, the pool of CPU-sensitive PC titles continues to widen. The Gears of War: E-Day results give Intel, AMD, and prospective buyers a concrete data point on how the current desktop stack handles the engine's threading demands.