Overview
- Arrowhead, with support from Sony’s Nixxes Software, de-duplicated game data to reduce the PC footprint from roughly 154GB to about 23GB.
- Players can switch to the smaller build now by selecting the “prod_slim” public beta on Steam, with an easy opt-out if issues arise.
- The studio reports no functional differences between legacy and slim versions, so saves, purchases, war progress, and matchmaking remain fully compatible.
- Developer measurements show only around 11% of users are on mechanical HDDs and that level generation, not asset I/O, dominates load times, limiting HDD impact to a few seconds.
- If beta feedback confirms stability, the slim build will become the default and the legacy version will be phased out next year, with modders advised to hold off installing mods during the transition; the PC install is now smaller than current console sizes.