Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth’s PC performance and modernised settings make it a mostly smooth trip

Victimless crime

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Sega

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth isn’t exactly spawned from the most hardware-bothering of game series. Most previous LADs, be they Kiryu’s Adventures in Punching or the more turn-based reboot have all been technically gentle affairs, and Infinite Wealth is ultimately another one. At the same time, it shares with Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name a newfound interest in PC-specific tricks. That means a full selection of DLSS , FSR and XeSS upscalers, plus DLSS 3 frame generation . Real yakuza might use a gamepad, but it seems real fuzz-haired RPG fantasists use graphics cards .

Let’s take a closer look, then, at how RGG’s latest crime caper performs on PC. We’ll also work out its best settings, to keep it running smoother than a legally distinct Segway.

Owners of a certain Valve-made handheld device may want to read our Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth Steam Deck analysis as well. It all works fine, as you’d expect from a game with Steam’s Verified status, though some manual setting refinements can be just as beneficial on a Steam as they are on a desktop. More so, really.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Sega

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth system requirements and PC performance

2023 got me used to filling in system requirement lists with supercomputer parts. Thankfully, the first big release of 2024 has much simpler demands to meet; assuming your PC could be even charitably be described as “modern,” the only spec you may need to make preparations for is that slightly bulbous 82GB storage space requirement. Despite the note, you likely won’t need to fret about AVX and SSE4.2 compatibility either. Both AMD and Intel have supported those with their mainstream (and enthusiast-grade) CPUs for over a decade, so chances are you’re good to go.

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth minimum specs

• OS: Windows 10 1903 (OS Build 18362), 64-bit
• CPU: Intel Core i5-3470 / AMD Ryzen 3 1200
• RAM: 8GB
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 960 / AMD Radeon RX 460 / Intel Arc A380
• DirectX version: DX12
• Storage: 82GB available space
• Additional notes: 1080p Low @ 30fps w/ Balanced FSR 1.0, requires a CPU which supports the AVX and SSE4.2 instruction set

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth recommended specs

• OS: Windows 10 1903 (OS Build 18362), 64-bit
• CPU: Intel Core i7-4790 / AMD Ryzen 5 1600
• RAM: 16GB
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 / AMD Radeon RX 5700 / Intel Arc A750
• DirectX version: DX12
• Storage: 82GB available space
• Additional notes: 1080p High @ 60fps, requires a CPU which supports the AVX and SSE4.2 instruction set

With these kinds of requirements, it’s no surprise that Infinite Wealth is a smooth runner on most GPUs. Still there are varying degrees of smoothness, and I’ll warn you now: the Hawaii setting that’s so central to both the game itself and its marketing hype? This new hub area performs significantly worse than the returning Yokohama map. It doesn’t suddenly turn the game into a destroyer of rigs, but Honolulu’s wider streets and much grander overall scale do take a heavier toll than any Japanese alley warren. That’s why I used it, rather than Yokohama, for my benchmark tests – if your setup runs great here, it’ll run great anywhere.

I also used an Intel Core i5-11600K and 16GB of RAM for my test PC, so results may vary if you’ve built around a more minimum-spec CPU. But even so, results from the long-obsolete GTX 1050 Ti were encouraging, the Low preset producing 57fps at 1080p. Upgrading from said preset’s Balanced FSR 1.0 upscaling to FSR 2, also on Balanced, produced 50fps – a bit slower, but noticeably sharper.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Sega

Tackle this LAD with something more modern, and you’ll likely be needing a high refresh rate gaming monitor to reap the whole fruit. The Intel Arc A750 , a budget graphics card launched in 2022, could ride the Highest preset all the way to 76fps at 1080p. That’s native, non-upscaled 1080p as well, though the addition of FSR 2 on Quality mode helped the same card (with the same Highest preset) score 74fps at 1440p.

Breaching 100fps is easy enough, including on last-gen hardware. The RTX 3070 , running the Highest preset with Quality DLSS, averaged 107fps on the busy streets of the Aloha State. Dropping DLSS down to Balanced mode also afforded it a smooth 66fps at 4K, so you don’t actually need a cutting-edge PC to cut it at extreme resolutions.

DLSS 3, of course, demands an RTX 40 series GPU to work. Though given how well the RTX 4060 – the baby card of that family – handles Infinite Wealth, any extra AI-generated frames may well be unnecessary. Once again on Highest, it cruised to 83fps at native 1080p, and a playable 47fps at 1440p, the latter propelled to 96 with Quality DLSS.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Sega

A more positive spin on Hawaii’s added performance-hungriness is that for the many, many hours you’re not in it, Infinite Wealth runs even better than the high framerates you’re reading here. A PC that pulls around 90fps in Honolulu, say, can very often hang around 140fps-plus back in Japan. And at least the FPS drop is consistent, and can be planned for – there’s no serious problem with stuttering or crashing, as far as I’ve seen.

Still, the sheer size of the that drop shows that RGG Studio could probably use a little more practice in crafting open worlds of this scale. The much longer, wider, airier layout also makes it harder to hide some of the game’s performance saving tricks, like the comically short draw distance for cars and pedestrians (even on max settings).

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Sega

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth best settings guide

Moseying into the graphics menu reveals that Infinite Wealth doesn’t actually have all that many individual settings to play with, a fair chunk simply being dedicated to all those upscalers. The good news? Almost all of them have a real impact on framerates, which in my book, is preferable to games that proudly list more toggles than an Airbus A380 cockpit when only a couple can actually aid performance.

Using an RTX 4060 running at 1440p as a reference, the Highest preset’s 47fps average crept up to 56fps on High, 81fps on Medium, 108fps on Low, and 114fps on Lowest. Medium applies FSR 2 upscaling on Quality mode, while Low and Lowest both add FSR 1.0, hence why they’re much quicker – though I reckon most PCs can still get a speed boost out of shinier-looking settings.

Here’s how each one affects performance, specifically by dropping from that Highest preset and its 47fps result…

Texture Filtering: Dropping this from 16x to 4x saw Infinite Wealth average 49fps, so it’s one of the less impactful settings. Low-end GPUs (and Steam Deck -style handhelds) will still benefit, but if you’ve got a respectable desktop card, it’s safe to leave this up.

Shadow Quality: Another 49fps result, this time from dropping to Medium. Again, leave this on High unless you’re really struggling.

Geometry Quality: Going from High to Medium only improved performance to the tune of 48fps, a single frame-per-second faster. Stick to High.

Realtime Reflections: This, on the other hand, is worth ditching. Disabling realtime reflections shot average performance up to 56fps, nearly a 20% increase. The quality reduction is tolerable, too. Despite being by the ocean, Honolulu is pretty short on reflections to admire.

Motion Blur: Turn this off as well. My RTX 4060 got up to 50fps by disabling motion blur alone, and I’d say Infinite Wealth looks better without it. Especially the fights, which no longer have to muddy their lovely particle effects with digital blurring.

SSAO: Scrapping ambient occlusion is a tougher choice. I do think it makes the game look noticeably better, but when switching it off netted 51fps for the RTX 4060, there’s clearly a performance cost. I’m going to leave it on in the recommended settings below, but there’s no shame in opting for the extra speed instead, especially on older or weaker hardware.

Render Scale: Leave this on 100%, no matter what. It’s pointless to use when any of the available upscalers perform the same task – lowering the rendering requirements – with the huge additional benefit of making the final image look like native rez.

Anti-Aliasing: You’ve a few options here. The mysteriously-named “Default” AA looks good but is the slowest of the bunch, whereas FXAA and MLAA both increased performance to 54fps at the cost of more visibly jagged edges. Nvidia DLAA is the best overall, maintaining strong sharpness and scoring 51fps, and TAA – at 56fps – is the fastest, if not quite as clean as DLAA. You’ll need a GeForce RTX graphics card to use DLAA, so go with TAA if you’re equipped with something else.

Depth of Field: Surprisingly, disabling this gave a nice little boost up to 51fps. As with SSAO, though, I think DoF adds a fair bit to Infinite Wealth’s look, so only drop it if you really need the extra frames.

Reflection Quality: Once again, I suggest you cut reflections. Medium is the lowest setting, weirdly, but it doesn’t eliminate them entirely – maintaining visual detail – and provided my RTX 4060 with a significant boost up to 56fps.

Nvidia DLSS: Onto the myriad of upscalers and, as usual, DLSS is the prime choice for RTX GPUs that can support it. Even its sharpest-looking setting, Quality, more than doubled the RTX 4060 performance, scoring a 96fps average that’s faster than any of FSR 2, FSR 1.0 or XeSS on their equivalent settings. The only way this is not a must-have setting is if you’re playing at 1080p or below, where there’s a more marked drop in upscaling quality.

DLSS Sharpness: You can leave this on 0.5. It doesn’t affect performance either way, and raising the slider too high will add an ugly effect to edges.

Nvidia DLSS Frame Generation: Despite the enormous FPS-charging power of DLSS upscaling, frame generation only had a muted effect for me. Applied on top of Quality-level upscaling – and you’ll need DLSS running to activate frame gen – the RTX 4060 produced 106fps, which is fast but not really tangibly superior to the original 96fps. At the same time, there’s no real downside to it, save for the usual caveat of DLSS 3 needing an RTX 40 series GPU to work. And a miniscule dash of input latency, if you’re fussed about that.

AMD FSR 1.0: In short, ignore this. Ultra Quality FSR 1.0 both looks blurrier and runs slower (83fps, in the RTX 4060’s case) than Quality FSR 2, and they’re both compatible on all the same hardware.

AMD FSR 1.0 Sharpness: Moot point, since FSR 1.0 should be avoided, but since this is just a sharpening filter it won’t help or hurt performance regardless of the value.

AMD FSR 2: Infinite Wealth’s best upscaler for those without RTX cards. On Quality mode it got the RTX 4060 up to a respectable 90fps, while looking much more like native rez than with FSR 1.0. If you do use this, though, try not to go lower than Quality mode unless you’re seriously short on frames. There’s more of a marked drop in fidelity between Quality and Balanced FSR 2 than there is with Quality and Balanced DLSS.

AMD FSR 2 Sharpness: As with DLSS, the default setting of 0.5 is fine to stick with.

Intel XeSS: This looks decent on Ultra Quality mode, about on par with FSR 2 Quality, but it’s also much slower, only pushing the RTX 4060 to 74fps. Since FSR 2 works on any GPU that XeSS does as well, it’s no contest.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Sega

Since the game (yes, even Hawaii) runs broadly well on all recent GPUs, I think we can stand to be slightly pickier than usual, focusing our settings-lowering efforts on those that provide the really juicy gains and leaving others cranked up. Here, then, is what I’d call the best settings for Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth:

• Texture Filtering: 16x
• Shadow Quality: High
• Geometry Quality: High
• Realtime Reflections: Off
• Motion Blur: Off
• SSAO: On
• Render Scale: 100%
• Anti-Aliasing: DLAA or TAA (is replaced by DLSS or FSR with upscaling enabled)
• Depth of Field: On
• Reflection Quality: Medium
• DLSS or FSR 2: Quality

With DLSS, these settings hoisted the RTX 4060 up to 104fps – a 121% uptick. FSR 2 also proved its value, scoring 100fps. If you’d rather go without upscaling, or you’re playing at 1080p (where it’s harder to match native-level sharpness), know that I still got up to 67fps with TAA at native 1440p. That’s a substantial 43% improvement, mainly just in exchange for some seldom-seen reflections.

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth

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All 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints and where to get them

These areas have the highest chance of giving you Blueprints

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Looking for more Arc Raiders Blueprints? It’s a special day when you find a Blueprint, as they’re among the most valuable items in Arc Raiders. If you find a Blueprint that you haven’t already found, then you must make sure you hold onto it at all costs, because Blueprints are the key to one of the most important and powerful systems of meta-progression in the game.

This guide aims to be the very best guide on Blueprints you can find, starting with a primer on what exactly they are and how they work in Arc Raiders, before delving into exactly where to get Blueprints and the very best farming spots for you to take in your search.

We’ll also go over how to get Blueprints from other unlikely activities, such as destroying Surveyors and completing specific quests. And you’ll also find the full list of all 75 Blueprints in Arc Raiders on this page (including the newest Blueprints added with the Cold Snap update , such as the Deadline Blueprint and Firework Box Blueprint), giving you all the information you need to expand your own crafting repertoire.

In this guide:

• What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?
• Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes
• Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders Blueprints obtained from quests Blueprints obtained from Trials Best Blueprint farming locations

What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?

Blueprints in Arc Raiders are special items which, if you manage to extract with them, you can expend to permanently unlock a new crafting recipe in your Workshop. If you manage to extract from a raid with an Anvil Blueprint, for example, you can unlock the ability to craft your very own Anvil Pistol, as many times as you like (as long as you have the crafting materials).

To use a Blueprint, simply open your Inventory while in the lobby, then right-click on the Blueprint and click “Learn And Consume” . This will permanently unlock the recipe for that item in your Workshop. As of the Stella Montis update, there are allegedly 75 different Blueprints to unlock - although only 68 are confirmed to be in the game so far. You can see all the Blueprints you’ve found and unlocked by going to the Workshop menu, and hitting “R” to bring up the Blueprint screen.

It’s possible to find duplicates of past Blueprints you’ve already unlocked. If you find these, then you can either sell them, or - if you like to play with friends - you can take it into a match and gift it to your friend so they can unlock that recipe for themselves. Another option is to keep hold of them until the time comes to donate them to the Expedition.

Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes

Below is the full list of all the Blueprints that are currently available to find in Arc Raiders, and the crafting recipe required for each item:

Note: The missing Blueprints in this list likely have not actually been added to the game at the time of writing, because none of the playerbase has managed to find any of them. As they are added to the game, I will update this page with the most relevant information so you know exactly how to get all 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints.

Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders

Below is a list of all containers, modifiers, and events which maximise your chances of finding Blueprints:

• Certain quests reward you with specific Blueprints .
• Completing Trials has a high chance of offering Blueprints as rewards.
• Surveyors have a decent chance of dropping Blueprints on death.
• High loot value areas tend to have a greater chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Night Raids and Storms may increase rare Blueprint spawn chances in containers.
• Containers with higher numbers of items may have a higher tendency to spawn Blueprints. As a result, Blue Gate (which has many “large” containers containing multiple items) may give you a higher chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Raider containers (Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, Medical Bags, Grenade Tubes) have increased Blueprint drop rates. As a result, the Uncovered Caches event gives you a high chance of finding Blueprints.
• Security Lockers have a higher than average chance of containing Blueprints.
• Certain Blueprints only seem to spawn under specific circumstances: Tempest Blueprint only spawns during Night Raid events. Vulcano Blueprint only spawns during Hidden Bunker events. Jupiter and Equaliser Blueprints only spawn during Harvester events.

Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, and other raider-oriented container types have a good chance of offering Blueprints. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints have a very low chance of spawning in any container in Arc Raiders, around 1-2% on average. However, there is a higher chance of finding Blueprints in particular container types. Specifically, you can find more Blueprints in Raider containers and security lockers.

Beyond this, if you’re looking for Blueprints you should focus on regions of the map which are marked as having particularly high-value loot. Areas such as the Control Tower in Dam Battlegrounds, the Arrival and Departure Buildings in Spaceport, and Pilgrim’s Peak in Blue Gate all have a better-than-average chance of spawning Blueprints somewhere amongst all their containers. Night Raids and Electromagnetic Storm events also increase the drop chances of certain Blueprints .

In addition to these containers, you can often loot Blueprints from destroyed Surveyors - the largest of the rolling ball ARC. Surveyors are more commonly found on the later maps - Spaceport and Blue Gate - and if one spawns in your match, you’ll likely see it by the blue laser beam that it casts into the sky while “surveying”.

Surveyors are quite well-armoured and will very speedily run away from you once it notices you, but if you can take one down then make sure you loot all its parts for a chance of obtaining certain unusual Blueprints.

Blueprints obtained from quests

One way in which you can get Blueprints is by completing certain quests for the vendors in Speranza. Some quests will reward you with a specific item Blueprint upon completion, so as long as you work through all the quests in Arc Raiders, you are guaranteed those Blueprints.

Here is the full list of all Blueprints you can get from quest rewards:

• Trigger Nade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Sparks Fly”.
• Lure Grenade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Greasing Her Palms”.
• Burletta Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Industrial Espionage”.
• Hullcracker Blueprint (and Launcher Ammo Blueprint): Rewarded after completing “The Major’s Footlocker”.

Alas, that’s only 4 Blueprints out of a total of 75 to unlock, so for the vast majority you will need to find them yourself during a raid. If you’re intent on farming Blueprints, then it’s best to equip yourself with cheap gear in case you lose it, but don’t use a free loadout because then you won’t get a safe pocket to stash any new Blueprint you find. No pain in Arc Raiders is sharper than failing to extract with a new Blueprint you’ve been after for a dozen hours already.

One of the best ways to get Blueprints is by hitting three stars on all five Trials every week. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints obtained from Trials

One of the very best ways to get Blueprints is as rewards for completing Trials in Arc Raiders. Trials are unlocked from Level 15 onwards, and allow you to earn rewards by focusing on certain tasks over the course of several raids. For example, one Trial might task you with dealing damage to Hornets, while another might challenge you to loot Supply Drops.

Trials refresh on a weekly basis, with a new week bringing five new Trials. Each Trial can offer up to three rewards after passing certain score milestones, and it’s possible to receive very high level loot from these reward crates - including Blueprints. So if you want to unlock as many Blueprints as possible, you should make a point of completing as many Trials as possible each week.

Best Blueprint farming locations

The very best way to get Blueprints is to frequent specific areas of the maps which combine high-tier loot pools with the right types of containers to search. Here are my recommendations for where to find Blueprints on every map, so you can always keep the search going for new crafting recipes to unlock.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Dam Battlegrounds

The best places to farm Blueprints on Dam Battlegrounds are the Control Tower, Power Generation Complex, Ruby Residence, and Pale Apartments . The first two regions, despite only being marked on the map as mid-tier loot, contain a phenomenal number of containers to loot. The Control Tower can also contain a couple of high-tier Security Lockers - though of course, you’ll need to have unlocked the Security Breach skill at the end of the Survival tree.

There’s also a lot of reporting amongst the playerbase that the Residential areas in the top-left of the map - Pale Apartments and Ruby Residence - give you a comparatively strong chance of finding Blueprints. Considering their size, there’s a high density of containers to loot in both locations, and they also have the benefit of being fairly out of the way. So you’re more likely to have all the containers to yourself.

Buried City

The best Blueprint farming locations on Buried City are the Santa Maria Houses, Grandioso Apartments, Town Hall, and the various buildings of the New District . Grandioso Apartments has a lower number of containers than the rest, but a high chance of spawning weapon cases - which have good Blueprint drop rates. The others are high-tier loot areas, with plenty of lootable containers - including Security Lockers.

Spaceport

The best places to find Blueprints on Spaceport are the Arrival and Departure Buildings, as well as Control Tower A6 and the Launch Towers . All these areas are labelled as high-value loot regions, and many of them are also very handily connected to one another by the Spaceport wall, which you can use to quickly run from one area to the next. At the tops of most of these buildings you’ll find at least one Security Locker, so this is an excellent farming route for players looking to find Blueprints.

The downside to looting Blueprints on Spaceport is that all these areas are hotly contested, particularly in Duos and Squads. You’ll need to be very focused and fast in order to complete the full farming route.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blue Gate

Blue Gate tends to have a good chance of dropping Blueprints, potentially because it generally has a high number of containers which can hold lots of items; so there’s a higher chance of a Blueprint spawning in each container. In my experience, the best Blueprint farming spots on Blue Gate are Pilgrim’s Peak, Raider’s Refuge, the Ancient Fort, and the Underground Complex beneath the Warehouse .

All of these areas contain a wealth of containers to loot. Raider’s Refuge has less to loot, but the majority of the containers in and around the Refuge are raider containers, which have a high chance of containing Blueprints - particularly during major events.

Stella Montis

On the whole, Stella Montis seems to have a very low drop rate for Blueprints (though a high chance of dropping other high-tier loot). If you do want to try farming Blueprints on this map, the best places to find Blueprints in Stella Montis are Medical Research, Assembly Workshop, and the Business Center . These areas have the highest density of containers to loot on the map.

In addition to this, the Western Tunnel has a few different Security Lockers to loot, so while there’s very little to loot elsewhere in this area of the map, it’s worth hitting those Security Lockers if you spawn there at the start of a match.

That wraps up this primer on how to get all the Blueprints in Arc Raiders as quickly as possible. With the Expedition system constantly resetting a large number of players’ Blueprints, it’s more important than ever to have the most up-to-date information on where to find all these Blueprints.

While you’re here, be sure to check out our Arc Raiders best guns tier list , as well as our primers on the best skills to unlock and all the different Field Depot locations on every map.

ARC Raiders

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

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The Electronic Wireless Show S3 Episode 4: Steam Next Fest recommendations and general indie game enthusiasm

We didn’t think there was much news happening this week and then loads did

Image credit:The Bworg

Here at the Electronic Wireless Show podcast we like indie games (inasmuch as “indie” can ever really be a helpful term; as the “good” doctor Peterson would no doubt say, what do words even mean? It’s bloody complicated!) and thus are using the news that Day Of The Devs is a non-profit (what does non-profit even mean? What does profit mean? It’s bloody complicated!) as a flimsy excuse to talk about indie games. Plus: Steam Next Fest kicks off next week, and there were indie game demos a-plenty, so we talk about some favourites of those, too. Plus: we’ve been playing JRPGs! And I was wrong, it’s episode 4. Please ignore every time I say it’s episode 5. I told you my notes aren’t to be trusted.

You can listen above, or on on Spotify , iTunes , Stitcher , or Pocket Casts . You can find the RSS feed here , and you can discuss the episode on our Discord channel , which has a dedicated room for podcast chat.

Music is by Jack de Quidt.

Links We record on a - wait we recorded this morning this time, things should broadly be as you remember them.

This week we’ve been playing Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth , Granblue Fantasy: Relink , and The Lord Of The Rings: Battle For Middle-earth 2 , for some reason.

Recommendations this week are for the YouTube channel RambleLime , Tank Tested and Tank Tested Two , and the book From Malin Head To Mizen Head .

Granblue Fantasy: Relink

PS4 , PS5 , PC

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth

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The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II: The Rise of the Witch-king

PC

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