MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries PERFORMANCE GUIDE

MECHWARRIOR 5

Exclamatory Notices:

A) Recent driver updates such as AMD 22.10. 3 and Nvidia 526.86 have been reported by some to cause performance drops - If you are experiencing problems with recent drivers, try rolling back to a previous video card driver. In addition, the Windows 11 update 22H2 has been causing issues for some people - Affected games and apps are inadvertently enabling GPU performance debugging features not meant to be used by consumers - according to Microsoft, which is working on a fix.

Windows update 22H2:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/release-health/status-windows-11-22h2

B) Windows 7 users (As of 23rd Sep, 2021 update/dlc) will not be able to launch game from steam. Go to your game folder and drill down to here:

\MW5Mercs\Engine\Plugins\Wwise\ThirdParty\x64_vc160\Release\bin

Either rename or delete the file: AkMotion.dll

Apparently all that this affects is the rumble control on your controller.

The game should now start right up.

The scope of this guide is to help you get your Mechwarrior 5 running as smooth as possible. It assumes that you have the Minimum Required Computer System, Knowledge on your Video Card, Installing Mods, and editing the .ini files of the game. Each one of these Tips is optional. Without further ado, I present you the following tips in no specific order.

1) NVIDIA Cards - Turn RTX OFF. Mechwarrior 5 supports it but the last I read on it - it was beta support. RTX is known to cause performance issues in mechwarrior 5. It is also suggested that you Turn DLSS OFF as well. DLSS has been known to cause memory problems. If you have geforce experience enabled - turn off (Custom settings sliders) RTX and DLSS as these may override your in game settings. Make sure RTX and DLSS is turned off in geforce experience and in game.

2) Razer Chroma lighting application (Program) has been confirmed as causing some performance issues with Mechwarrior 5. Suggest you turn it off or disable the ability to interact with Mechwarrior.

3) Black Screen Fix: See above windows 7 fix or give this a try: https://steamcommunity.com/app/784080/discussions/0/3162083441811899299/

4) Anisotropy - (In Game Setting) It is recommended that do not start the game with a high value. A max of Anisotropy x4 is suggested as a initial value. Higher Values have caused performance issues for some people.

5) Install Xenopax - Optimize mod - this mod is on steam workshop (And Nexus) and will give you better performance without taking away all your nice graphics. Should be the first in your load order of mods.

6) MODS - Mods are optional. Never assume that a mod will not affect your performance. This is especially true for Graphic Mods or mods that add a lot of new content. This would include the official PGI mod - Enable Infantry. Always make sure your base game works as good as it can .... before adding mods. Using mods that are old and not updated to recent patch/dlc content is not

recommended. Out of date ( or Incorrect load order ) mods can give you bugs, crashes and/or error code 1308.

7) Try turning your in game resolution down.

8) Here are some effects you can disable/reduce in the game (each .ini tweak is optional).

NOTE: Disabling Reflection Environment, Refraction Quality, Grass, Bushes, setting Shadow Max Resolution to 128, or View Distance Scale below .95 may effect your graphics viewing pleasure.

Open the -

C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\MW5Mercs\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor folder. Add the following text to the Engine.ini and save changes (Make a backup optional):

[SystemSettings]

;Disable Depth of Field blur

r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0

;Disable lens flares

r.LensFlareQuality=0

;Disable chromatic aberration

r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0

;Turn off light bloom

r.BloomQuality=0

;Disable space reflections

r.SSR.Quality=0

;Disable Motion Blur

r.MotionBlurQuality=0

;Disable Lightshafts

r.LightShaftQuality=0

r.LightShafts=0

;Object culling - reduce objects, 1.0 is default

r.ViewDistanceScale=.95

;Disable grass

Grass.DensityScale=0

;Disable bushes

Foliage.DensityScale=0

;Disables Film grain effect

r.Tonemapper.Quality=0

;Lower Shadow Resolution 128 or 256 for performance

r.Shadow.MaxResolution=256

;The following work but are not recommended do to major possible Eww Graphics factor (Users tastes vary):

;Disables human eye simulating light vs. dark transitions - NOT Recommened

r.EyeAdaptationQuality=0

;Disable Light Reflections - NOT Recommended

r.ReflectionEnvironment=0

;Disable Refraction - NOT Recommended

r.RefractionQuality=0

9) Capping the frame rate may help in some situations: The human eye notices changes in FPS when the drops are big, but small drops are not always noticed. Capping your frame rate at below your normal default and above 30 (Below 30 the human eye can notice slow FPS easily). Can help with the stutters. Remember there was a time in gaming history that 30 FPS was the standard. So how do you properly cap your frame rate. Get a program (Don't use fraps - mechwarriror 5 can crash if you use fraps) to measure your lowest FPS. For example: My lowest FPS while playing the game is 47. I capped my frame rate at 50.

Path -

C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\MW5Mercs\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor

Open GameUserSettings.ini

Change FrameRateLimit=00.000000 to what you need (for example: 60.000000)

10) And here is the general stuff. Don't run your anti-virus while playing the game - Make sure your hard drive is not full - Make sure your are not running to many background programs - Make sure your drivers are up to date. Verify your steam files.

Lastly, PGI has an official forum for Mechwarrior Online, where a General Discussion page for Mechwarrior 5 can be found:

https://mwomercs.com/forums/forum/565-mechwarrior-5-mercenaries/

Additional contact information (Including a email):

https://help.steampowered.com/en/wizard/HelpWithGameTechnicalIssue?appid=784080

I Hope this Guide has given you some help. If you are a person of knowledge with information on how to make Mechwarrior 5 performance better - Please feel free to stop by the steam forums and give the community your information. You never know... Some day it may help someone else :)

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2582569808

PERFORMANCE GUIDE

MECHWARRIOR 5

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