Performance tips for PC players?

Hey duders,

Picked this game up on Steam the other day and so far I'm really enjoying it! ...but it runs like total ass? I've got a 6gb 1060 video card and i7-2600K 3.4 ghz cpu. With the game's default settings, while I'm exploring my starting planet's surface I can't break 30 fps. It's better in space, getting into upper 40s, but still seems kinda ridiculous for a two-year old game. I toggled some of the textures 'n shadows 'n such, but strangely enough it only seemed to get worse on lower settings. Anyone got any tips on how to get this thing approaching 60 frames? Am I just unlucky and started on some perf-destroying starting planet (it's a hot, barren one with little vegetation and no water)? Thanks!

I haven't played this game in a while, but the last time I did I was running a GTX 980 and it ran like butter.

I have a 1080TI now, I should load it up again.

That's definitely weird that you are having trouble breaking 30 fps. I know you've probably done it, but there is an option somewhere to change the framerate limit from 30 to 60.

I tried multiple times across many months and updates to try to get this game to play at a decent frame rate with my 4690K and Strix 1060. I fiddled with both the in-games settings and configuring the game though the Nvidia control panel. Trying to get the game to run at 60, looking at certain spots of the environment instantly cause the frame rate to tank to 30 and below. Locking the game to 30 frames, it looks like shit. So my ultimate solution was this: To say "Fuck this!", go to Steam's support page, remove the game from my account, take the L on the $20 I spent for a key, and continue to look for a successor to Freelancer that isn't as convoluted as Elite Dangerous.

There's a Reddit page with a performance guide. Goodspeed if you can get it to run well enough, but I am fuckin' done with the game.

You gotta eat some low settings with a budget card like that man, crank it all down and you might be okay.

@gtb08: thats the problem though. Unless I'm mistaken thats not possible. Youve got resolution, AA, and v-sync. Thats all I saw to choose form in the gfx settings.

That's definitely not right. There's options for texture quality, shadow detail, reflection quality, anisotropic filtering, HBAO, motion blur quality...

Everyone says disabling Vsync and using your GPU drivers to enforce vsync with triple buffering. I did it and it made a big difference.

@crazybagman: huh...not sure why i thought that. Just checked again but even with all settings no low/turned off i am not having much luck either. At 1440p the game seems stable at 40fps but for some reason at 1080p its constantly fluctuating from anywhere between 160-55fps

I was playing a bit with an FPS counter onscreen and noticed something strange. At times when I would do a big motion with the (third person) camera, it felt like the game grinded (ground?) to a halt, but the FPS didn't drop at all. Either the GOG Galaxy built-in FPS counter is broken or the game's camera sometimes moves in ways that LOOK like slowdown but aren't. I'm using a PS4 controller on the PC, and I've noticed that when I move the camera, it starts out real slow and then quickly accelerates. It seems like it might be some kind of dynamic camera sensitivity thing, but it ends up feeling like the game is chugging more than it actually is.

Or maybe I'm just imagining this all. I'm not great at picking up on these sorts of details.

@alistercat Whoa I think that totally did it. Thanks! I seem to be hovering around 55 fps now so far, which is much improved over what it was before.

Also I don't think the game much appreciates borderless windowed. Even with this change, going to my other monitor a couple times cut the frames in half when I returned, like it doesn't recognize that it's the active window again.

Apparently my issue with the camera acceleration isn't just my imagination. https://steamcommunity.com/app/275850/discussions/1/1471967615880362691/

(not my video, this was from someone in the thread I posted a link to)

I've been having some framerate issues, but it feels like the game is performing a LOT worse than it actually is when the camera suddenly slows down all the time like this.

I've turned motion blur off and set the max FPS to 30. I prefer a sold 30 than a fluctuating 45-60.

My PC is very dated, but with the highest settings on and FPS capped at 30, it's absolutely fine.

If you're still struggling, turn the Anti-Aliasing down a setting. If you're struggling after that, turn shadows down a setting.

To anyone having framerate issues have a try at this:

*enable triple buffering in control panel (game is open gl, triple buffering setting is for openg gl works like a charm, no noticeable input lag at all, +15 fps)

*must set borderless.

*if using vsync, use nvidia vsync setting, not in game

*must set game to 90fpps cap (in game menu, 60 is not enough as it actually caps around 57)

I went from having 30 frames on planets to 60, it might depend on your setup so see if you can tweak some settings in-game if it doesn't right away.