Following the game’s launch last year, Square Enix and Team Ninja released Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin on PC via Steam last month. While I already played the game on both PS5 and Xbox Series X last year, I wanted to check out the PC version and try it on Steam Deck for a review. If you’ve not kept up with the game since launch, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin is an action RPG made in collaboration with Team Ninja. It brings in Team Ninja’s signature action RPG elements, Final Fantasy, and more together for an unforgettable adventure. It has brilliant music, excellent characters, hilarious dialogue, and a lot of heart. If it was better optimized, I’d be constantly recommending it without caveats, but it sadly isn’t a perfect experience technically on any platform right now.
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC requirements
The Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin minimum requirements on PC are aiming for 720p and 30fps while the recommended requirements aim for 1080p and 60fps. They are below:
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC minimum requirements
- Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- OS: Windows® 10 64-bit
- Processor: AMD Ryzen™ 5 1400 / Intel® Core™ i7-6700
- Memory: 8 GB RAM
- Graphics: AMD Radeon™ RX 470 / NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060 6GB VRAM
- DirectX: Version 11
- Storage: 90 GB available space
- Additional Notes: 30FPS (1280×720)
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC recommended requirements
- Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- OS: Windows® 10 64-bit
- Processor: AMD Ryzen™ 5 1600 / Intel® Core™ i7-8700
- Memory: 16 GB RAM
- Graphics: AMD Radeon™ RX 5700 XT / NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1660 SUPER
- DirectX: Version 11
- Storage: 90 GB available space
- Additional Notes: 60FPS (1920×1080)
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC graphics options
On PC, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin lets you play well above the PS5 and Xbox Series X versions thanks to full 4K resolution and up to 120fps frame rate support. The PC port lets you adjust window mode, resolution (from 720p to 4K), toggle v-sync, use graphics presets, adjust frame rate cap (30, 60, or 120), enable an FPS priority mode that adjusts resolution dynamically to run at the target frame rate, adjust rendering resolution for 3D elements, texture detail, shadow quality, shadow distance, toggle anti-aliasing, screen space reflections, ambient occlusion, chromatic aberration, motion blur, enable FSR 1.0, DLSS (on supported hardware), and select monitor. If you opt for 120fps, the game slows down when it can’t keep up in my testing.
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC control options
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin has support for controllers and keyboard/mouse gameplay. On the controller side, you can play with Xbox or PlayStation button prompts. On the keyboard and mouse side, you can rebind controls, but the prompt seemingly remains the same. There are presets for menu and actions here. You can also opt to use only a keyboard rather than keyboard and mouse controls. There are mouse sensitivity and acceleration options as well.
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin supports remapping controls on a controller as well. There are two presets, but you can swap to the custom option and use whatever you want. I ended up playing with my DualSense controller and it showed me the correct prompts. Note that the excellent DualSense features in the PS5 version are not available on PC. I tested this with Steam Input enabled and disabled with the controller wired to be sure.
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC performance – frame rate and resolution
On a laptop with an AMD Ryzen 5-3550H processor (2.1GHz Base speed up to 3.7GHz), 16GB DDR4 RAM, and an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 4GB GPU, I tested the three frame rate options and various settings in Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin. 120fps is just not doable since it slows down the gameplay when it can’t handle the frame rate. 1080p and 60fps is just about doable after turning many settings down. Otherwise, I ended up with 40 to 60fps depending on the situation. I know this isn’t a very powerful laptop, but the visuals really don’t warrant the performance I’ve been getting. This didn’t surprise me considering how it looks and runs on PS5 and Xbox Series X. I didn’t try the Epic Games Store version so I can’t compare, but I didn’t have as many issues as I’ve had in some recent PC releases like Wild Hearts and Jedi Survivor at least.
One thing to note about Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin on Steam Deck and PC, is that it syncs the graphics and display settings over Steam Cloud. Playing on Steam Deck at 720p and moving back to my laptop required manually adjusting the settings. I had to keep doing this while moving back and forth.
Is Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin worth playing on Steam Deck?
In its current state, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin is officially “Unsupported” on Steam Deck by Valve. Despite that, you can get it running by using Proton GE and a launch command. Without those, it would not boot up. I ended up sticking with Proton GE 7-54 and the launch command because nothing else worked for me. Once you do get into the game, everything works fine, but it isn’t a good experience. As much as I love playing games on Steam Deck, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin is not worth getting to play only on Steam Deck right now. I was hoping it would deliver a great portable version since there is no Switch port, but don’t bother with it if you just want to play on Steam Deck right now.
After turning everything off or to the lowest setting and using both FSR and dynamic resolution, you can get decent performance, but the visuals are bad. Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin isn’t a beautiful game in general, and it does not scale down well right now. If this changes with updates or through Valve fixing something on its end through Proton, I will update this. Right now, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin on Steam Deck is disappointing. It is also worth noting that I had better performance on the Steam Deck screen itself compared to playing over DisplayPort or HDMI on the official Steam Deck Docking Station.
I also tested the multiplayer on Steam Deck and had no trouble inviting my friend to join my game seamlessly. It worked perfectly throughout the missions tested for this review. I knew the multiplayer would be good on PC after how it was on console, but I’m glad to see it work well even on Steam Deck.
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin PC Steam review
Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin was not well-optimized at launch on any platform. A year later, the Steam version still isn’t the best way to play the game thanks to a few issues, but the new price point makes it an easier pill to swallow. I enjoyed Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin quite a bit last year. I included it in our best Xbox Series X games of 2022 list as well. While a lot of people might only be familiar with the game thanks to the memes, it has a lot of heart, and I wish it had more polish. Despite the optimization issues, those who waited a year for Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin to hit Steam following its debut on PC through the Epic Games Store are getting a much better experience.
Right now, the base game is cheaper, it has all the updates included, and there’s an option to upgrade and get all DLC right now. While the DLC itself has been hit or miss with its difficulty, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin right now is an easier game to recommend, but I wouldn’t recommend it on PC unless you have a very powerful system. If you have access to a PS5 or Xbox Series X, I’ve had a much better time there compared to how it is on my laptop even at the lowest settings.
Hopefully this Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin Steam Deck and PC review helped you decide if Team Ninja’s take on Final Fantasy is worth your time one year later.
