The Witcher 3 runs on exotic Irtysh CPU
I know what you are asking: what on earth is an Irtysh CPU? Honestly, I had no clue this thing even existed. But the team at PRO Hi-Tech sent us a tip about their new video, which explains the chip in detail and includes an interesting demo. It shows a new CPU running modern games at playable frame rates, although some will have a different definition of “playable.” Interestingly, it’s not X86, not even an ARM CPU.
Source: PRO Hi-Tech
According to the video, a Russian-Chinese Irtysh processor has been shown running The Witcher 3 at ExpoElectronica 2026 in Moscow. This CPU is based on LoongArch architecture. The demo system used an AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT graphics card, but the gaming result is more about the CPU and software stack than the GPU.
The tested chip is reportedly the Irtysh C632, a 32-core and 64-thread processor. The Irtysh lineup also includes the C616 and C664, with the flagship C664 offering 64 cores and 128 threads. These processors are based on Chinese LoongArch technology and use LA664 cores. From the articles I saw, it seems that they were announced in December last year.
According to PRO Hi-Tech, the system was running Linux with Steam, Proton and binary translation. The game reached 22 to 32 FPS on Ultra settings in the tested location. On Low settings, the range increased only to 25 to 38 FPS. I do not think it’s mentioned in the video, but I’m assuming that’s 1080p resolution.
Source: PRO Hi-Tech
CPU/translation bottleneck
So it’s not self-developed architecture, but something entirely different based on LoongArch. I have not been up to date with recent Proton updates for LoongArch, so I’m assuming this is based on Box64 support, which gained this arch support in 2024. So the full stack is likely Steam/Proton, Wine, Box64 and LoongArch Linux.
That small gap between Low and Ultra settings suggests the system was not mainly limited by the RX 9060 XT. The GPU should deliver much higher performance in a standard x86 gaming PC. In this case, the x86 game had to run on a LoongArch-based processor through translation, which adds CPU overhead.
Is this CPU going to land in prebuilt gaming PCs? That seems unlikely, given that this is a 32-core processor aimed at commercial and business use. The architecture is not optimized for gaming, but the demo is still interesting because it shows what is already possible for games running through translation on LoongArch.
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