Perhaps.  I just would have expected more out of the series x.  Honestly I hope the switch 2 puts 1st party games at 60 fps.  30 fps is awful for anyone who has experience at 60+.

I can't imagine this game being that heavily CPU bound, will be interesting to see what digital foundary say but I suspect they're intentionally not including a 60fps mode on Series X because they don't want invest time in that experience and they want everyone to play it at the highest settings the hardware can allow. 

Only last thing I'd add is that for sure people who have gotten used to super high frames (90+) may not be able to go back to 30fps, but console gamers have constantly been jumping between 30 and 60 on different games consistently throughout every generation. They'd go from playing Call of Duty/GT/Fortnight, to playing something like Uncharted 4 or God of War on the PS4. Or playing 3D Mario/Smash Bros/Mario Kart etc to Playing Zelda. Even across generations we've seen franchises jump like Ratchet and Clank used to be 60fps on PS2, then became 30 on PS3/PS4.

I actually think one thing that makes it very difficult for people to tolerate 30fps on console and the discourse we see a lot online nowadays (aside from the popularity of Digital foundary etc) is the existence of a toggle/option within a game in real time, the brain takes time to adjust if you go down from 60 at the flick of a toggle.. Which I think deep down is part of the reason why Ninja Theory also do not want to allow the option in-game, to not create that experience. Having only a 30fps mode means people acclimate to it, the absence of an option doesn't create this back of forth of users weighing up the benefits and not being fully satisfied with either. I'm thinking to the FFVII Rebirth situation where lots are complaining about how blurry the 60fps mode is, but the option of a 60fps is making them equally unsatisfied with the smoothness of the 30.

I agree with this sentiment. Developers should be free to build their games as they please without undue criticism. There has been a major focus on 60fps this generation and I believe it has come at a cost of WOW factor visuals. Its great that we have games that target 60 but I think there is a market for games that focus on visuals, atmosphere and storytelling as a priority - and I'm okay with a 30fps target to achieve that.

There's no reason to think it's CPU bottleneck-related, by the way, other UE5 engine games like Robocop and Remnant II can run at 100 fps+ on Ryzen 3600s.

To be fair though - I don't think it matters what the spec of the CPU is if the goal is to get the best visuals 30FPS would always end up being the target since its acceptable for most console players.

60 fps needs to be minimum, giving the option is bare minimum

There's also focusing on things that are CPU demanding resulting in that sort of target. As a PC Gamer used to over 100FPS I can't tolerate 30 any more in many types of games but am still all for developers pushing consoles hard since I want impressive visuals and improved mechanics and systems thanks to more CPU power.

It's worth remembering that UE5's core features are highly demanding and the Series X is not new and powerful hardware any more.

If we look at other UE5 games on Xbox Series/PS5, resolutions tend to take a big hit, and framerates are generally unstable. For a game like this that's all about immersing the player in Senua's world and mind, they may not have wanted to compromise that with blurry visuals.

There are hard limits to what you can accomplish at 60fps on 3+ year old console hardware, and the game Ninja Theory wanted to make may well have simply been beyond those limits.

I have a feeling there will be a 60 fps patch later on. maybe ninja theory needs more time since they are a small team.

I don't think there's CPU bottleneck. Digital Foundry tested the raw footage and the game runs between 2304x964 and 2560x1070, so 60 fps performance mode would demand a resolution around 700p ultrawide.