In this video I take a proper trip back to 2015 and test what the “average” mid-range PC gaming experience actually felt like. To do it, I built up a very typical spec for the time: an i5-6500, 8GB of RAM in dual channel, a basic H110 board, a 1TB SATA SSD, and the star of the show, an AMD Radeon R9 380X 4GB (my Sapphire Nitro model). The case and PSU aren’t period-correct (I’m not risking old power supplies), but the performance-critical parts are what matter. I stick to 1080p because that was the sweet spot then (and honestly, it still is for most people), and I jump straight into GTA V—one of the biggest PC releases of that year. Even with lots of settings on high/very high, I’m seeing a really solid experience: roughly 70–90 FPS depending on what’s happening, with 1% lows still staying in playable territory. The CPU and GPU pairing is nicely balanced too, which is exactly what you’d want from a mid-range build. I also run a set of 2015-era benchmarks to show that a ~£600–£650 mid-range PC back then could hit that “proper” 60 FPS 1080p target in most games. Then, to set up my year-by-year comparison series, I throw Cyberpunk 2077 into the mix as a modern baseline—where this 2015 rig lands around 24 FPS on 1080p High, proving just how far game demands have moved on.