Phantom Blade Zero PC Requirements and the 300 GB Preload Space

Phantom Blade Zero PC requirements

These are the requirements published on Steam. Both tiers state that upscaling is enabled and that an SSD installation is required.

Why 300 GB for a 145 GB game?

S-GAME's own preload notice says the game is approximately 145 GB but asks preload users to reserve at least 300 GB of free disk space. The gap is the preload process: the downloaded package and the unpacked game files occupy the drive at the same time until the unlock completes.

Once the game finishes unpacking, the footprint settles back to roughly 145 GB. If the drive cannot hold both copies, you have two options: move other files until 300 GB is free, or skip the preload and download the game after unlock, which avoids the second copy entirely.

The PS5 download is reported at 134.857 GB, so console players need less room than PC players using preload.

SSD, drive choice and graphics drivers

The driver version comes from Chinese coverage of the official preload notice; check your vendor's release notes rather than installing an older driver to match a screenshot.

• Install on an SSD. Both published tiers require it, and the game streams large environments.
• Prefer a drive other than the system drive where possible. Chinese coverage of S-GAME's notice recommends avoiding the C drive so Windows activity does not compete with the game.
• Update your GPU driver before launch. The same notice singles out NVIDIA driver 621.01 as the build with game-specific optimisation and asks AMD users to use the latest Adrenalin release.

What the two targets actually promise

The minimum tier is a 1080p, 30 FPS experience with upscaling on; the recommended tier targets 1440p at 60 FPS with the same condition. Neither tier promises native-resolution rendering, and the recommended CPU is unusual: the i5-10600K sits below the i7-8700K in core count but has newer per-core performance.

Chinese coverage of the notice adds that both tiers assume ray tracing and path tracing are off. The Steam page itself only states that upscaling is enabled, so treat the ray-tracing detail as a report of the notice rather than a fixed rule.

A machine that matches the recommended tier is a 1440p target, not a guarantee of 60 FPS in every fight. If you are near the minimum, expect to lower resolution or settings.

If the preload or first launch fails

PlayBloo has not run the preload or the retail build, so this list follows the official notice and standard store behaviour rather than hands-on testing.

• Confirm the drive has at least 300 GB free before starting the preload, not 145 GB.
• If the download stops with a disk error, free the space and resume rather than deleting the whole preload.
• If unpacking fails at unlock, verify the game files in Steam or the Epic client before redownloading.
• Update the GPU driver before reporting stutter; an outdated driver is the most common pre-launch cause cited in the official notice.
• If you skipped preload and downloaded after unlock, no unpack step is needed, so the drive only needs the final size.