It’s not often the gaming industry gets a proper James Bond game, so many fans are notably excited for 007 First Light. However, the Bond origin story game might have raised doubts once more after its publisher, IO Interactive, listed the system requirements online. Some eagle-eyed PC gamers noticed that the game is demanding hardware that either doesn’t exist or is simply incorrect.
The 007 First Light system requirements list demands, at a minimum, an Intel Core i5-9500K, NVIDIA GTX 1660, and 8 GB VRAM; it also recommends an RTX 3060 Ti and 12 GB of VRAM for the supposedly optimal 60 FPS framerate experience at 1080p. You can probably see what’s wrong with the listing already if you own a gaming PC.
X/Twitter users and gamers alike quickly swarmed the comment section and fact-checked IO’s system requirements for 007 First Light. As expected, the i5-9500K doesn’t even exist, and despite recommending 12 GB of VRAM (video RAM), the publishers also recommended an RTX 3060 Ti, which strictly came with only 8 GB of VRAM. Not to mention the game also required 8 GB of VRAM at a minimum, but then also required a GTX 1660, which only has 6 GB of VRAM.
Suffice to say, this kind of hardware was never made and doesn’t exist. The mismatch of specs, particularly in the GPU or graphics card and VRAM segment, also sparked confusion. Does that mean the GTX 1660 simply does not meet the requirements despite being required? The supposed listing mistake has since been the subject of some harsh criticism online, with a commenter stating, “Remember when games were optimized? This is horse [expletive] for modern audiences.”
Some of the requirements also seem unreasonable, despite being correct
The more budget-conscious gamers still found fault even with the correct parts of the 007 First Light system requirements. The system RAM section, for example, recommends a whopping 32 GB for a mere 1080p running at a framerate of 60 FPS, while 16 GB is now the base requirement. Presumably, the game will be a stutter-fest if you do not meet this requirement.
For those who haven’t been following gaming hardware news recently, RAM prices have more than doubled, with some brands even costing 5-10 times as much due to the shortage caused by AI data centers buying up all the RAM production from manufacturers. So requiring high system RAM for 1080p gameplay seems tone deaf. “That 32GB is not a good look with the current memory prices, hopefully there’s not memory leaking issues,” worries another commenter.
Apart from the RAM, more questions have been raised as the system requirements are lackluster as well, with no details about graphical quality, upscaling usage, or even higher resolutions like 1440p or 4K. So far, IO hasn’t addressed the mistake or the criticisms, though I wouldn’t be surprised if they release an updated system requirements listing later down the line. 007 First Light still has a few months to go anyway, before its May 27, 2026 release date.
