Table of Contents
November 20, after many years of anticipation and several postponements, saw the light shooter Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl. The game turned out to be very demanding and demanding, and many players complain about low performance and technical difficulties.
In this guide we will tell you how to achieve decent FPS on powerful systems without losing graphics performance, as well as how to run STALKER 2 on weak PCs.
Graphic settings in STALKER 2 and what they mean
First, let’s open the display and graphics settings menu and figure out what these or those items mean and what values it is better to set in them. Let’s go!
Display options:
Source: Gamerant / Best Display Options
- Presentation – there is nothing complicated in this point, just select the monitor on which you are going to play STALKER 2;
- Screen mode – for maximum performance, you should set “Special full-screen mode”;
- Display resolution – choose the native resolution for your monitor;
- Aspect ratio – leave it on “Automatic” or set it manually if you know what you are doing;
- Field of view – it all depends on personal preference, but keep in mind that too large values can reduce performance;
- Vertical synchronization – disable to achieve an increase in FPS;
- Frame rate – it is also better to turn it off;
- Nvidia reflex free – for some reason this technology is disabled on all boots. It is better to turn it off in the settings and enable the NVIDIA Reflex Low Latency mode in the NVIDIA Control Panel.
Graphics options
Source: Gamerant / Best graphics settings
- Texture quality – for video cards with 8 GB of memory and below, “High” settings are suitable. If you have more video memory, you can set it to “Ultra”;
- Hair – there are not so many bloody characters in the game, so you can set the settings to “High” or even “Epic”;
- Subject details – for systems with a powerful processor, you can stop at “High” or “Epic”, for the rest it is better to change it to “Medium”;
- Quality of influence – set it to “Medium” for better performance;
- Materials – this setting affects the resolution of all play surface materials. It is better to set it to “High”;
- Post-processing – it is also worth setting the value to “High”;
- Bleeding – you can set it to “Medium”, because this setting will still be replaced by the boost you chose;
- Strong image blur – useless option that only spoils the image. Turn off completely;
- Depth of field – select “Advanced” settings. If it becomes slower in cutscenes, change it to “Medium”;
- Light columns – worth turning to;
- Sharpness – the setting depends on personal preferences, but it is not recommended to set it to more than 30%;
- Scaling method – select DLSS for NVIDIA video card and FSR for other cards;
- Zoom quality – the golden mean is the “Fair” option;
- Resolution scale – this setting will not be available if you have chosen one of the scaling methods;
- FSR 3 frame generation – enable it, because this option will give a good increase in FPS. But keep in mind that this setting may cause graphical bugs;
- Shade quality – it is better to set it to “Medium”;
- Global enlightenment – one of the most power-hungry settings, so here too, the best option is “Medium” settings;
- Shadows – one of the most gluttonous options. If you want to achieve a significant increase in FPS, then set to “Low”;
- Shade quality – the best value is “Average”. Another power-hungry situation;
- Clouds – here it is also worth setting “Average”;
- Fog – if you don’t want to lose the atmosphere, set it to “High”;
- sky – but this setting should be set to “Low”;
- The quality of the vegetation – you can set the “Medium” settings, because this is one of the most demanding settings in the game;
- Environment Draw distance – it is better to leave this option “High” if you do not want objects to be drawn under the nose.
The above settings allow you to get a comfortable 60-75 frames on a system with an Intel Core i7-11800H processor, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 GPU and 32 GB of RAM. Or on a similar system from AMD.
Optimization of STALKER 2 for very weak PCs
But what if your PC can’t handle STALKER 2 at all? In this case, you have to mercilessly cut all the graphics settings and edit the game files manually.
To improve performance, we need the Engine.ini file.
1. Press the key combination WIN + R;
2. In the window that appears, enter %appdata% and press Enter;
3. In the folder that opens, find the path: AppDataLocalStalker2SavedConfigWinGDK;
4. In the WinGDK folder, open the Engine.ini file using a text editor.
At the end of the Engine.ini file, add the following options block:
[SystemSettings]
r.DynamicGlobalIlluminationMethod=2
Grass.capacity=0
r.ContactShadows=0
r.Lumen.Reflections.Let=0
r.MaterialQualityLevel=0
r.Nanite.MaxPixelsPerEdge=4
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=0
r.ShadowQuality=0
r.VolumetricCloud=0
r.volumetricfog=0
These settings disable or reduce the quality of some graphical effects, such as shadows, grass, clouds, and volumetric fog. Additionally, you can play around with other parameters in the Engine.ini file:
- r.ViewDistanceScale=0.5 – reducing the range of drawing materials. A value of 0.5 is suitable for weak PCs, but you can try even 0.3;
- r.TextureStreaming=1 – enabling texture flow, reducing memory consumption;
- r.MaxAnisotropy=2 – setting the anisotropic filtering level to 2 instead of the standard 16, which reduces the load on the GPU;
- r.Lumen.GlobalIllumination=0 – disable global illumination via Lumen. This can greatly improve FPS;
- r.Lumen.ScreenProbeGather.RaysPerPixel=4 – reducing the number of rays for calculating shadows through Lumen, reducing the load on the processor;
- r. Smoke=0 – completely cancel fog, which could improve performance in open areas;
- r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0 – disable reflection from distance fields;
- r.LightFunctionQuality=0 – reduces the quality of the light effect;
- r.ParticleDistanceScale=0.5 – reducing the number of particles and their details at a distance;
- r.EarlyZPass=2 – optimizing the rendering of objects, which improves FPS in scenes with a large number of them;
- r.HZBOcclusion=0 – disable complex occlusion mode;
- r.Streaming.FullyLoadUsedTextures=0 – streaming textures as needed, reducing the load on RAM;
- r.Streaming.PoolSize=512 – sets the texture pool size in megabytes. Suitable for weak video cards;
- t.MaxFPS=60 – limits the maximum FPS. This will reduce the system load if your monitor only supports 60Hz.
That’s it. We hope our tips helped you install STALKER 2: Heart of Chornobyl and get the highest FPS from your PC. If you know other ways to increase the number of frames, be sure to write them in the comments.
Considering the potential for modding in the STALKER series, how might user-created content impact optimization, and what steps can players take to ensure smooth performance when using mods?
## Open-Ended Questions for an Interview about STALKER 2 Optimization
This article provides a comprehensive guide to optimizing STALKER 2 performance on PCs ranging from powerful rigs to older, less capable machines. Here are some open-ended questions based on the article which can spark a lively discussion:
**Section 1: General Optimization Strategies**
* **The article highlights various visual settings that can significantly impact performance. What do you think are the most important settings to adjust for players looking for a balance between visual fidelity and frame rate? Why?**
* **Many players might feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of graphical settings. What would be your advice for someone who wants to improve performance but doesn’t fully understand all the technical terms involved?**
**Section 2: Optimization for Powerful PCs**
* **The article provides recommended settings for a system with a powerful CPU and GPU. What challenges might arise for players with slightly weaker hardware, and how might they need to adjust these recommendations?**
* **DLSS and FSR are mentioned as scaling technologies that can improve performance. What are the pros and cons of each technology, and how might players choose the best option for their specific PC configuration?**
**Section 3: Optimization for Weak PCs**
* **The article emphasizes drastic measures like manually editing the Engine.ini file for very weak PCs. How comfortable are you with making such changes to game files? What are the potential risks and benefits?**
* **Beyond the recommended tweaks mentioned in the article, what other strategies might players with very low-end PCs consider to make STALKER 2 playable?**
**Section 4: Performance and Gameplay Experience**
* **How much of a visual difference do you think players would notice when compromising on certain graphical settings? Is the loss in visual fidelity worth the gained performance for some players?**
* **While optimizing for performance is important, what other factors should players consider when tweaking their settings? For example, how might certain settings impact immersion or the overall gameplay experience?**
**Section 5: Overall Thoughts and Future Improvements**
* **Based on your experience with STALKER 2’s optimization options, what are your initial impressions of the game’s performance on PC?**
* **What features or improvements would you like to see added to the game in future updates to further enhance performance and accessibility for a wider range of PCs?**
By exploring these questions, the interview can delve into the technical aspects of game optimization while also acknowledging the subjective nature of individual preferences and gameplay experience.
