Performance tweaks for Potato Pcs

[Johnny Hazard]

Hello everyone.
I loved playing Everspace 1, and I am now having a blast with Everspace 2. But my old laptop Pc, despite playing ES1 fine, it struggles a lot with ES2, due to new effects added.
There's post-processing, there's volumetric fog, Dynamic lights and shadows, and HUGE textures to deal with.
So here's my attempt on tweaking the game and making it playable.
-----
By the way, my PC specs:

Intel I5-5200U Quad 2.29Ghz
8 GB RAM
GEFORCE 930M
HD Toshiba 1TB
-----
First, you have to locate where the ini files for the game are. In my pc, they're at
C:\Users\XXUser idXX\AppData\Local\ES2\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor

Open these in a notepad app
GameUserSettings.ini
Scalability.ini
Engine.ini
-----
Now first, inside the game, set all graphic definitions to minimum.
Exit the Game.
-----
go to "GameUserSettings.ini" and make sure that these lines look like this

[ScalabilityGroups]
sg.ResolutionQuality=74.981697
sg.ViewDistanceQuality=0
sg.AntiAliasingQuality=0
sg.ShadowQuality=0
sg.PostProcessQuality=0
sg.TextureQuality=0
sg.EffectsQuality=0
sg.FoliageQuality=3
sg.ShadingQuality=0
-----
go to "Scalability.ini" and change these

[PostProcessQuality@0]
r.BlurGBuffer=0
r.PostProcessAAQuality=0
r.AmbientOcclusionRadiusScale=0
r.BloomQuality=2

[ShadowQuality@0]
r.ShadowQuality=0
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=128
r.Shadow.SpotLightTransitionScale=60
r.Shadow.DistanceScale=0.5

[FoliageQuality@3]
foliage.DensityScale=0
grass.DensityScale=0
foliage.LODDistanceScale=1

[TextureQuality@0]
r.Streaming.MipBias=6
r.Streaming.PoolSize=128

[EffectsQuality@0]
r.SSR=0
r.MaterialQualityLevel=0
-----

now go to "Engine.ini" and add these lines

[SystemSettings]
r.ViewDistanceScale=1
r.TemporalAACurrentFrameWeight=0
r.AmbientOcclusionLevels=0
r.Upscale.Quality=1
r.MaxAnisotropy=0
r.Atmosphere=0
r.SkeletalMeshLODBias=1
r.SkeletalMeshLODRadiusScale=0.5
r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=128
r.VirtualTexture=1
r.VirtualTextureReducedMemory=1
r.MipMapLODBias=1
r.Streaming.Boost=14.0
r.Streaming.UseAllMips=0
r.Streaming.LimitPoolSizeToVRAM=1024
r.Streaming.PoolSize=128
r.Streaming.MaxTempMemoryAllowed=128
r.Streaming.MaxEffectiveScreenSize=0
r.Streaming.MaxHiddenPrimitiveViewBoost=1
r.Streaming.MipBias=6
r.Streaming.UseFixedPoolSize=1
r.UseShaderCaching=1
r.UseShaderPredraw=1
r.Shaders.FastMath=1
r.RefractionQuality=0
r.SceneColorFormat=3
r.DetailMode=0
r.TranslucencyVolumeBlur=0
r.ContactShadows=0
r.EarlyZPassMovable=1
r.EarlyZPass=2
r.DBuffer=1
r.DistanceFieldAO=0
r.HZBOcclusion=0
r.LensFlareQuality=0
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0
r.SSR=0
r.TranslucencyLightingVolumeDim=24
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.AllowLandscapeShadows=0
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0
r.PathTracing.MaxBounces=1
r.AlsoUseSphereForFrustumCull=2
r.LandscapeLODBias=1
r.ScreenPercentage=10
bUseBackgroundLevelStreaming=True
bCombineSimilarMappings=True
r.VolumetricFog=1
r.VolumetricFog.GridPixelSize=4
r.VolumetricFog.GridSizeZ=1
r.VolumetricFog.HistoryMissSupersampleCount=1
r.VolumetricFog.Jitter=0
r.VolumetricFog.LightFunctionSupersampleScale=1
r.VolumetricFog.VoxelizationSlicesPerGSPass=1
FX.AllowCulling=1
FX.MaxCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
FX.MaxGPUParticlesSpawnedPerFrame=5
fx.MaxNiagaraCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
fx.MaxNiagaraGPUParticlesSpawnPerFrame=5
gc.LowMemory.MemoryThresholdMB=4000
r.SkinCache.SceneMemoryLimitInMB=4000

[TextureStreaming]
PoolSizeVRAMPercentage=35

[ConsoleVariables]
r.ViewDistanceScale=1
r.TemporalAACurrentFrameWeight=0
r.AmbientOcclusionLevels=0
r.Upscale.Quality=1
r.MaxAnisotropy=0
r.Atmosphere=0
r.SkeletalMeshLODBias=1
r.SkeletalMeshLODRadiusScale=0.5
r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=128
r.VirtualTexture=1
r.VirtualTextureReducedMemory=1
r.MipMapLODBias=1
r.Streaming.Boost=14.0
r.Streaming.UseAllMips=0
r.Streaming.LimitPoolSizeToVRAM=1024
r.Streaming.PoolSize=128
r.Streaming.MaxTempMemoryAllowed=128
r.Streaming.MaxEffectiveScreenSize=0
r.Streaming.MaxHiddenPrimitiveViewBoost=1
r.Streaming.MipBias=6
r.Streaming.UseFixedPoolSize=1
r.UseShaderCaching=1
r.UseShaderPredraw=1
r.Shaders.FastMath=1
r.RefractionQuality=0
r.SceneColorFormat=3
r.DetailMode=0
r.TranslucencyVolumeBlur=0
r.ContactShadows=0
r.EarlyZPassMovable=1
r.EarlyZPass=2
r.DBuffer=1
r.DistanceFieldAO=0
r.HZBOcclusion=0
r.LensFlareQuality=0
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0
r.SSR=0
r.TranslucencyLightingVolumeDim=24
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.AllowLandscapeShadows=0
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0
r.PathTracing.MaxBounces=1
r.AlsoUseSphereForFrustumCull=2
r.LandscapeLODBias=1
r.ScreenPercentage=10
bUseBackgroundLevelStreaming=True
bCombineSimilarMappings=True
r.VolumetricFog=1
r.VolumetricFog.GridPixelSize=4
r.VolumetricFog.GridSizeZ=1
r.VolumetricFog.HistoryMissSupersampleCount=1
r.VolumetricFog.Jitter=0
r.VolumetricFog.LightFunctionSupersampleScale=1
r.VolumetricFog.VoxelizationSlicesPerGSPass=1
FX.AllowCulling=1
FX.MaxCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
FX.MaxGPUParticlesSpawnedPerFrame=5
fx.MaxNiagaraCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
fx.MaxNiagaraGPUParticlesSpawnPerFrame=5
gc.LowMemory.MemoryThresholdMB=4000
r.SkinCache.SceneMemoryLimitInMB=4000
-----

Don't forget to save the files.
Now you can start the game with really low specs.
WARNING: I am not sure of all the changes made. If you have experience on tweaking UE4, feel free to post better changes.
Have fun

[Johnny Hazard]

Notes about serious issues:
There are two areas in Union that can cause freeze and even crash on a low end PC-
Prescott Base, and Damaris starport.
There's something very heavy that the game tries to load when entering these areas.
Advice: set the game affinity to only 1 core, and wait. The PC will hang for a while (more than 5 minutes, sometimes), and luckily, not crash.
I noticed this happens because while loading these areas, physical memory is pushed beyond 8gb limit.
Cheers.

[pUNK -in- drUBLIC]

... just get a new PC.
JUST KIDDING !! Thanks for your hard work ;)

anyway, concerning some other "bad" maps, visit this page :
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1128920/discussions/0/4263206669449893701/?tscn=1629310296

good luck !

[Johnny Hazard]

Originally posted by ❤️♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥:

... just get a new PC.
JUST KIDDING !! Thanks for your hard work ;)

anyway, concerning some other "bad" maps, visit this page :
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1128920/discussions/0/4263206669449893701/?tscn=1629310296

good luck !

A proper one costs around 1400 Euros here in Portugal.
Yeah, I already started "hinting" to the whole family, so they can raise a crowdfunding campaign to buy me a new PC for Christmas. XP

[punisher]

Just a minor correction, you probably meant

[FoliageQuality@0]

instead of

[FoliageQuality@3]

With the number being 3 you would change the epic setting instead of the low (0) settings.

[Johnny Hazard]

Originally posted by punisher:

Just a minor correction, you probably meant

[FoliageQuality@0]

instead of

[FoliageQuality@3]

With the number being 3 you would change the epic setting instead of the low (0) settings.

It may look like it, but in the game menu, there's no option for foliage quality.
If you look at "GameUserSettings.ini", you will notice these lines:

[ScalabilityGroups]
sg.ResolutionQuality=74.981697
sg.ViewDistanceQuality=0
sg.AntiAliasingQuality=0
sg.ShadowQuality=0
sg.PostProcessQuality=0
sg.TextureQuality=0
sg.EffectsQuality=0
sg.FoliageQuality=3
sg.ShadingQuality=0

Notice, "sg.FoliageQuality=3". You can't change it in-game, so I guess that, by default, foliage is settled at quality 3. (To my knowledge, that is. Never tried Higher settings)

So in the scalability file, I changed the "[FoliageQuality@3]".

[punisher]

There is no foliage or grass in the game so I guess the foliage sg settings will not have any effect. Just wanted to point out that the number after scalability group is the quality level in-game. So they will only take effect when setting the corresponding level in the game. But you are right, there is no quality level setting for sg.FoliageQuality anyway.

[pUNK -in- drUBLIC]

Originally posted by Johnny Hazard:

Originally posted by ❤️♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥:

... just get a new PC.
JUST KIDDING !! Thanks for your hard work ;)

anyway, concerning some other "bad" maps, visit this page :
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1128920/discussions/0/4263206669449893701/?tscn=1629310296

good luck !

A proper one costs around 1400 Euros here in Portugal.
Yeah, I already started "hinting" to the whole family, so they can raise a crowdfunding campaign to buy me a new PC for Christmas. XP

oh hahaha ^^
well, then, good luck in your quest ;)
Let us know if you need people to sign your petition !

[Johnny Hazard]

Update.
Currently using these setting on the Engine.ini file:

[SystemSettings]
r.ViewDistanceScale=0.8
r.DistanceFieldAO=0
r.DistanceFields=1
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0
r.TemporalAACurrentFrameWeight=0
r.AmbientOcclusionLevels=0
r.Upscale.Quality=0
r.MaxAnisotropy=0
r.Atmosphere=0
r.SkeletalMeshLODBias=1
r.SkeletalMeshLODRadiusScale=0.5
r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.AllowSimpleLights=1
r.VirtualTexture=1
r.VirtualTextureReducedMemory=1
r.MipMapLODBias=1
r.Streaming.Boost=14.0
r.Streaming.UseAllMips=0
r.Streaming.LimitPoolSizeToVRAM=1
r.Streaming.PoolSize=128
r.Streaming.MaxTempMemoryAllowed=128
r.Streaming.MaxEffectiveScreenSize=0
r.Streaming.MaxHiddenPrimitiveViewBoost=1
r.Streaming.MipBias=1
r.Streaming.UseFixedPoolSize=1
r.UseShaderCaching=1
r.UseShaderPredraw=1
r.Shaders.FastMath=1
r.RefractionQuality=0
r.RayTracing=0
r.SceneColorFormat=3
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
r.SSR.HalfResSceneColor=1
r.DetailMode=0
r.TranslucencyVolumeBlur=0
r.ContactShadows=0
r.EarlyZPassMovable=1
r.EarlyZPass=1
r.DBuffer=1
r.HZBOcclusion=0
r.LensFlareQuality=0
r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0
r.SSR=0
r.TranslucencyLightingVolumeDim=24
r.AllowLandscapeShadows=0
r.PathTracing.MaxBounces=1
r.AlsoUseSphereForFrustumCull=0
r.LandscapeLODBias=1
r.ScreenPercentage=75
bUseBackgroundLevelStreaming=True
bCombineSimilarMappings=True
r.VolumetricFog=1
r.VolumetricFog.GridPixelSize=4
r.VolumetricFog.GridSizeZ=1
r.VolumetricFog.HistoryMissSupersampleCount=1
r.VolumetricFog.Jitter=0
r.VolumetricFog.LightFunctionSupersampleScale=1
r.VolumetricFog.VoxelizationSlicesPerGSPass=1
r.FogStartDistance=10000
FX.AllowCulling=1
FX.AllowGPUParticles=1
FX.MaxCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
FX.MaxGPUParticlesSpawnedPerFrame=100
fx.MaxNiagaraCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
fx.MaxNiagaraGPUParticlesSpawnPerFrame=100
fx.QualityLevelSpawnRateScaleReferenceLevel=0
r.ParticleLightQuality=0
r.ParticleLODBias=1
gc.LowMemory.MemoryThresholdMB=4000
r.SkinCache.SceneMemoryLimitInMB=4000
r.ShadowQuality=2
r.Shadow.PerObject=0
r.Shadow.PreShadows=0
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=256
r.Shadow.MaxCSMResolution=256
r.Shadow.RadiusThreshold=0.02
r.Shadow.DistanceScale=0.6
r.Shadow.TransitionScale=0.6
r.Shadow.SpotLightTransitionScale=60
r.DFShadowQuality=0
r.DiscardUnusedQuality=1
r.CreateShadersOnLoad=1
r.bForceCPUAccessToGPUSkinVerts=1
r.MaterialQualityLevel=0

[TextureStreaming]
PoolSizeVRAMPercentage=35

[ConsoleVariables]
r.ViewDistanceScale=0.8
r.DistanceFieldAO=0
r.DistanceFields=1
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0
r.TemporalAACurrentFrameWeight=0
r.AmbientOcclusionLevels=0
r.Upscale.Quality=0
r.MaxAnisotropy=0
r.Atmosphere=0
r.SkeletalMeshLODBias=1
r.SkeletalMeshLODRadiusScale=0.5
r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.AllowSimpleLights=1
r.VirtualTexture=1
r.VirtualTextureReducedMemory=1
r.MipMapLODBias=1
r.Streaming.Boost=14.0
r.Streaming.UseAllMips=0
r.Streaming.LimitPoolSizeToVRAM=1
r.Streaming.PoolSize=128
r.Streaming.MaxTempMemoryAllowed=128
r.Streaming.MaxEffectiveScreenSize=0
r.Streaming.MaxHiddenPrimitiveViewBoost=1
r.Streaming.MipBias=1
r.Streaming.UseFixedPoolSize=1
r.UseShaderCaching=1
r.UseShaderPredraw=1
r.Shaders.FastMath=1
r.RefractionQuality=0
r.RayTracing=0
r.SceneColorFormat=3
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
r.SSR.HalfResSceneColor=1
r.DetailMode=0
r.TranslucencyVolumeBlur=0
r.ContactShadows=0
r.EarlyZPassMovable=1
r.EarlyZPass=1
r.DBuffer=1
r.HZBOcclusion=0
r.LensFlareQuality=0
r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0
r.SSR=0
r.TranslucencyLightingVolumeDim=24
r.AllowLandscapeShadows=0
r.PathTracing.MaxBounces=1
r.AlsoUseSphereForFrustumCull=0
r.LandscapeLODBias=1
r.ScreenPercentage=75
bUseBackgroundLevelStreaming=True
bCombineSimilarMappings=True
r.VolumetricFog=1
r.VolumetricFog.GridPixelSize=4
r.VolumetricFog.GridSizeZ=1
r.VolumetricFog.HistoryMissSupersampleCount=1
r.VolumetricFog.Jitter=0
r.VolumetricFog.LightFunctionSupersampleScale=1
r.VolumetricFog.VoxelizationSlicesPerGSPass=1
r.FogStartDistance=10000
FX.AllowCulling=1
FX.AllowGPUParticles=1
FX.MaxCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
FX.MaxGPUParticlesSpawnedPerFrame=100
fx.MaxNiagaraCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
fx.MaxNiagaraGPUParticlesSpawnPerFrame=100
fx.QualityLevelSpawnRateScaleReferenceLevel=0
r.ParticleLightQuality=0
r.ParticleLODBias=1
gc.LowMemory.MemoryThresholdMB=4000
r.SkinCache.SceneMemoryLimitInMB=4000
r.ShadowQuality=2
r.Shadow.PerObject=0
r.Shadow.PreShadows=0
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=256
r.Shadow.MaxCSMResolution=256
r.Shadow.RadiusThreshold=0.02
r.Shadow.DistanceScale=0.6
r.Shadow.TransitionScale=0.6
r.Shadow.SpotLightTransitionScale=60
r.DFShadowQuality=0
r.DiscardUnusedQuality=1
r.CreateShadersOnLoad=1
r.bForceCPUAccessToGPUSkinVerts=1
r.MaterialQualityLevel=0

-------------------------------------------------
Issues I still find:
1- some areas like Prescott freeze the game upon loading (too much stuff loaded it seems)
I managed to bypass that by temporarily reducing process affinity to only 1 core (core 3, because 1 is mostly used by windows - this in a quad core intel5)
2- slight fps drop in areas with land.
3- slight fps drop in areas with a lot of stuff. (seems like the game hasn't a special routine to hide objects that aren't on sight or above a specified distance to reduce the load sent to the GPU)

[Red-Eyed_Gelynome]

So this game uses Unreal Engine, For people who wants to understand certain settings, I created an old guild for State of Decay 2 that uses UE4 which is similar to this

https://www.reddit.com/r/StateOfDecay/comments/iwvpt1/sod2_unreal_engine_4_and_you_a_performance/

It shows you, like the things you could customized on UE4 scalability and Engines, This tweak also can be used on any Single player UE4 games like SAO:FB / Mist Survuval / And of course, this.

For example, r.particleLODBias, you can set this to positive value to blur the particles ingame. (Blurring it too much can lead to it being invisible textures)

[Толкне]

Thank

[Johnny Hazard]

Originally posted by Red-Eyed_Fairace:

So this game uses Unreal Engine, For people who wants to understand certain settings, I created an old guild for State of Decay 2 that uses UE4 which is similar to this

https://www.reddit.com/r/StateOfDecay/comments/iwvpt1/sod2_unreal_engine_4_and_you_a_performance/

It shows you, like the things you could customized on UE4 scalability and Engines, This tweak also can be used on any Single player UE4 games like SAO:FB / Mist Survuval / And of course, this.

For example, r.particleLODBias, you can set this to positive value to blur the particles ingame. (Blurring it too much can lead to it being invisible textures)

Indeed. We need to spread this info enough, so people know how to fine tune games for their specs. It really helps.
For example, if you are struggling with the volumetric fog in certain areas of the game (it gets really intense and visibility becomes nul), you can change this on engine.ini

[SystemSettings]
r.Atmosphere=0

[ConsoleVariables]
r.Atmosphere=0

It turns off volumetric fog and standard fog. The game will feel weird, so I advise you to use it ONLY, on the area you have trouble with.
Turn the game off
change the Engine.ini values to 0
save the Engine.ini file
restart the game
load the save with the troublesome area
do your thing
save again.
game off, change atmosphere settings to 1
and go into the game again.

or, you can use the Unreal engine console wrapper to inject the value in-game, as a console command.
https://framedsc.com/GeneralGuides/universal_ue4_consoleunlocker.htm

[pedal2metal]

Thank you!

My potato PC is a 2021 MS Surface Pro 7+ w/Intel i5-1135G7 @2.40 GHz, Intel Iris Xe graphics & 8GB RAM. Already did the DX11 switch day 1 to fix loading. After that been tweaking resolution & other game graphics settings. Was able to gerry-rig my way through Union (Prescot Base was always trouble, had to run 640x480 screen with windowed 532x400 game to make it through) & now in Zharkov (which is noticably worse), I've finally stuck at Vesna Mining Colony after doing the Harvester quest (which also had trouble). After trying to return to Vesna post-Harvester quest, it just won't load & I got tired of constantly rebooting & reloading. So I started looking & found this thread. I've at least got some new things to try now.

This thread should be pinned so other "potato players" can easily find this info & begin their journey. Thanks again, cheers!

[pedal2metal]

Originally posted by pedal2metal:

Thank you!

My potato PC is a 2021 MS Surface Pro 7+ w/Intel i5-1135G7 @2.40 GHz, Intel Iris Xe graphics & 8GB RAM. Already did the DX11 switch day 1 to fix loading. After that been tweaking resolution & other game graphics settings. Was able to gerry-rig my way through Union (Prescot Base was always trouble, had to run 640x480 screen with windowed 532x400 game to make it through) & now in Zharkov (which is noticably worse), I've finally stuck at Vesna Mining Colony after doing the Harvester quest (which also had trouble). After trying to return to Vesna post-Harvester quest, it just won't load & I got tired of constantly rebooting & reloading. So I started looking & found this thread. I've at least got some new things to try now.

This thread should be pinned so other "potato players" can easily find this info & begin their journey. Thanks again, cheers!

So I tried some of these settings & while they helped with the current issue: always getting the "Out of video memory trying to allocate a texture!", they caused more instability within UE itself with now the UE bug report screen popping up instead.

So I went a different route, trying to see if I could minimize the changes needed to get it working again.

I poked around & saw that in other games, many had recommended boosting your Virtual Page File Size in Windows. So I did this, boosting my Page File Size from 8GB (to match my RAM) to a range of 8GB to 32 GB.

I also edited the GameUserSettings.ini for a few key settings. The version in the Windows directory, rather than WindowsNoEditor directory (path is same except for this final directory).

Here's the summary of what I did:
1. Set screen resolution to 640x480.
2. Use DirectX11 (D12 has all kinds of issues) for Everspace 2.
3. Start game, go to Settings: set to Low for all graphics, use Window mode (size should be automatically set to 532x400), turn on VSync, Set max FPS to 30, set max FPS when focus lost to 15. Apply the settings, exit settings, exit game.
4. Set a custom Page File Size in Windows to be 1x - 3x your RAM size. So in my case with 8GB RAM, that is 8GB - 24 GB. You'll need to reboot your PC now to apply the settings.
5. Edit/Modify C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\ES2\Saved\Config\Windows\GameUserSettings.ini as needed (save the current version first under new name if you are paranoid). Note all these parameters should already be in the .ini, you should only need to change values.
Edit: Change file to Read-Only after editing so game doesn't modify:
[/script/engine.gameusersettings]
bUseDesiredScreenHeight=True

[/script/es2.esgameusersettings]
DynResMinScreenPercentage=25.000000
MenuFpsLimit=30
CappedFPS=30
ResolutionSizeX=400
ResolutionSizeY=280
LastUserConfirmedResolutionSizeX=400
LastUserConfirmedResolutionSizeY=280
DesiredScreenWidth=640
DesiredScreenHeight=480
LastUserConfirmedDesiredScreenWidth=640
LastUserConfirmedDesiredScreenHeight=480

In general, I found the page file size & ResolutionSize, together, were most impactful.

Note: I've also run with ResolutionSizeX=320, ResolutionSizeY=240. Just maximize the window to make things readable. But 400 & 280 were the values that first got me working reliably, along with the Page File Size boost. When quitting out of ES2 after fixing, I went & checked my Page File Size & it was 11.2 GB so indeed, the game needed more swap space.

Edit: "working" does not mean "performant". While doing the 3 drone terminal hacks, while I couldn't read my graphics performance monitor popup due to the 400x280 resolution, I'd estimate the FPS was in the 10-15 range, at best, probably below 10 FPS much of the time. You had to be really ginger & slow with the drones due to the excessive frame lag.

@Developers: It seems really strange that 11.2 GB of swap space is needed when running at 400x280 frame size. Frame lag @400x280 frame size?!? While I realize some things don't scale with frame size (textures?), something just feels off, my spidey-sense is tingling.

I noticed that instability increased gradually as I progressed through the game, suggesting some cumulative effect(s). Ceto: no crashes, Union: Prescot Base was finicky, Zharkov: Vesna Mining Colony was a nightmare, Harvester quest was finicky. Essentially, Zharkov is what pushed me over the edge to now dig into this & see if I could improve the base stability vs. doing the <lower resolution, reboot, reload> loop which I'd been doing up to then since before Zharkov, only Prescot was really an issue.

Fwiw, I realize my system is on the potato edge but sometimes that edge helps find code issues not exercised by the bleeding edge to produce a more robust product. I realize there's only so many resources, time, etc... & issues have to be triaged but imagine if you find a subtle memory leak only present at the potato edge that leads to stability improvements across the entire spectrum of players? just a thought... :)

ES2 is excellent & i appreciate the effort & attention that has gone into this game. I think it's a masterpiece of game design. It's why I went ahead & purchased after playing the demo, despite the risk given my extreme potato PC for such a recent game. :)

Thanks!

[Johnny Hazard]

Originally posted by pedal2metal:

Originally posted by pedal2metal:

Thank you!

My potato PC is a 2021 MS Surface Pro 7+ w/Intel i5-1135G7 @2.40 GHz, Intel Iris Xe graphics & 8GB RAM. Already did the DX11 switch day 1 to fix loading. After that been tweaking resolution & other game graphics settings. Was able to gerry-rig my way through Union (Prescot Base was always trouble, had to run 640x480 screen with windowed 532x400 game to make it through) & now in Zharkov (which is noticably worse), I've finally stuck at Vesna Mining Colony after doing the Harvester quest (which also had trouble). After trying to return to Vesna post-Harvester quest, it just won't load & I got tired of constantly rebooting & reloading. So I started looking & found this thread. I've at least got some new things to try now.

This thread should be pinned so other "potato players" can easily find this info & begin their journey. Thanks again, cheers!

So I tried some of these settings & while they helped with the current issue: always getting the "Out of video memory trying to allocate a texture!", they caused more instability within UE itself with now the UE bug report screen popping up instead.

So I went a different route, trying to see if I could minimize the changes needed to get it working again.

I poked around & saw that in other games, many had recommended boosting your Virtual Page File Size in Windows. So I did this, boosting my Page File Size from 8GB (to match my RAM) to a range of 8GB to 32 GB.

I also edited the GameUserSettings.ini for a few key settings. The version in the Windows directory, rather than WindowsNoEditor directory (path is same except for this final directory).

Here's the summary of what I did:
1. Set screen resolution to 640x480.
2. Use DirectX11 (D12 has all kinds of issues) for Everspace 2.
3. Start game, go to Settings: set to Low for all graphics, use Window mode (size should be automatically set to 532x400), turn on VSync, Set max FPS to 30, set max FPS when focus lost to 15. Apply the settings, exit settings, exit game.
4. Set a custom Page File Size in Windows to be 1x - 3x your RAM size. So in my case with 8GB RAM, that is 8GB - 24 GB. You'll need to reboot your PC now to apply the settings.
5. Edit/Modify C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\ES2\Saved\Config\Windows\GameUserSettings.ini as needed (save the current version first under new name if you are paranoid). Note all these parameters should already be in the .ini, you should only need to change values:[/script/engine.gameusersettings]
bUseDesiredScreenHeight=True[/script/es2.esgameusersettings]
DynResMinScreenPercentage=25.000000
MenuFpsLimit=30
CappedFPS=30
ResolutionSizeX=400
ResolutionSizeY=280
LastUserConfirmedResolutionSizeX=400
LastUserConfirmedResolutionSizeY=280
DesiredScreenWidth=640
DesiredScreenHeight=480
LastUserConfirmedDesiredScreenWidth=640
LastUserConfirmedDesiredScreenHeight=480

In general, I found the page file size & ResolutionSize, together, were most impactful.

Note: I've also run with ResolutionSizeX=320, ResolutionSizeY=240. Just maximize the window to make things readable. But 400 & 280 were the values that first got me working reliably, along with the Page File Size boost. When quitting out of ES2 after fixing, I went & checked my Page File Size & it was 11.2 GB so indeed, the game needed more swap space.

Edit: "working" does not mean "performant". While doing the 3 drone terminal hacks, while I couldn't read my graphics performance monitor popup due to the 400x280 resolution, I'd estimate the FPS was in the 10-15 range, at best, probably below 10 FPS much of the time. You had to be really ginger & slow with the drones due to the excessive frame lag.

@Developers: It seems really strange that 11.2 GB of swap space is needed when running at 400x280 frame size. Frame lag @400x280 frame size?!? While I realize some things don't scale with frame size (textures?), something just feels off, my spidey-sense is tingling.

I noticed that instability increased gradually as I progressed through the game, suggesting some cumulative effect(s). Ceto: no crashes, Union: Prescot Base was finicky, Zharkov: Vesna Mining Colony was a nightmare, Harvester quest was finicky. Essentially, Zharkov is what pushed me over the edge to now dig into this & see if I could improve the base stability vs. doing the <lower resolution, reboot, reload> loop which I'd been doing up to then since before Zharkov, only Prescot was really an issue.

Fwiw, I realize my system is on the potato edge but sometimes that edge helps find code issues not exercised by the bleeding edge to produce a more robust product. I realize there's only so many resources, time, etc... & issues have to be triaged but imagine if you find a subtle memory leak only present at the potato edge that leads to stability improvements across the entire spectrum of players? just a thought... :)

ES2 is excellent & i appreciate the effort & attention that has gone into this game. I think it's a masterpiece of game design. It's why I went ahead & purchased after playing the demo, despite the risk given my extreme potato PC for such a recent game. :)

Thanks!

Intel Iris XE is not a potato. It's simply not made for modern 3d games.
You SHOULD deactivate dynamic lights/shadows and volumetrics.
Yes, this will make the game look bland, but it's the only way. Vesna Mining is a case of HEAVY volumetric clouds.

Here are some lines you SHOULD use

[SystemSettings]

r.DistanceFieldAO=0
r.DistanceFields=1
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0
r.TemporalAACurrentFrameWeight=0
r.AmbientOcclusionLevels=0

r.Atmosphere=0

r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.AllowSimpleLights=1

r.Shaders.FastMath=1
r.RefractionQuality=0
r.RayTracing=0

r.DetailMode=0
r.TranslucencyVolumeBlur=0
r.ContactShadows=0

r.HZBOcclusion=0
r.LensFlareQuality=0
r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0
r.SSR=0
r.TranslucencyLightingVolumeDim=24
r.AllowLandscapeShadows=0
r.PathTracing.MaxBounces=1
r.AlsoUseSphereForFrustumCull=0
r.LandscapeLODBias=1

r.VolumetricFog=0
r.VolumetricFog.GridPixelSize=4
r.VolumetricFog.GridSizeZ=1
r.VolumetricFog.HistoryMissSupersampleCount=1
r.VolumetricFog.Jitter=0
r.VolumetricFog.LightFunctionSupersampleScale=1
r.VolumetricFog.VoxelizationSlicesPerGSPass=1
r.FogStartDistance=10000
FX.AllowCulling=1
FX.AllowGPUParticles=1
FX.MaxCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
FX.MaxGPUParticlesSpawnedPerFrame=100
fx.MaxNiagaraCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
fx.MaxNiagaraGPUParticlesSpawnPerFrame=100
fx.QualityLevelSpawnRateScaleReferenceLevel=0
r.ParticleLightQuality=0
r.ParticleLODBias=1

r.ShadowQuality=2
r.Shadow.PerObject=0
r.Shadow.PreShadows=0
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=256
r.Shadow.MaxCSMResolution=256
r.Shadow.RadiusThreshold=0.02
r.Shadow.DistanceScale=0.6
r.Shadow.TransitionScale=0.6
r.Shadow.SpotLightTransitionScale=60
r.DFShadowQuality=0

r.MaterialQualityLevel=0

Try using these lines partly. You can start by disabling AO, volumetric fog.
r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.AllowSimpleLights=1
These lines force only 1 dynamic light effect per object.

[pedal2metal]

Originally posted by Johnny Hazard:

Originally posted by pedal2metal:

So I tried some of these settings & while they helped with the current issue: always getting the "Out of video memory trying to allocate a texture!", they caused more instability within UE itself with now the UE bug report screen popping up instead.

So I went a different route, trying to see if I could minimize the changes needed to get it working again.

I poked around & saw that in other games, many had recommended boosting your Virtual Page File Size in Windows. So I did this, boosting my Page File Size from 8GB (to match my RAM) to a range of 8GB to 32 GB.

I also edited the GameUserSettings.ini for a few key settings. The version in the Windows directory, rather than WindowsNoEditor directory (path is same except for this final directory).

Here's the summary of what I did:
1. Set screen resolution to 640x480.
2. Use DirectX11 (D12 has all kinds of issues) for Everspace 2.
3. Start game, go to Settings: set to Low for all graphics, use Window mode (size should be automatically set to 532x400), turn on VSync, Set max FPS to 30, set max FPS when focus lost to 15. Apply the settings, exit settings, exit game.
4. Set a custom Page File Size in Windows to be 1x - 3x your RAM size. So in my case with 8GB RAM, that is 8GB - 24 GB. You'll need to reboot your PC now to apply the settings.
5. Edit/Modify C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\ES2\Saved\Config\Windows\GameUserSettings.ini as needed (save the current version first under new name if you are paranoid). Note all these parameters should already be in the .ini, you should only need to change values:[/script/engine.gameusersettings]
bUseDesiredScreenHeight=True[/script/es2.esgameusersettings]
DynResMinScreenPercentage=25.000000
MenuFpsLimit=30
CappedFPS=30
ResolutionSizeX=400
ResolutionSizeY=280
LastUserConfirmedResolutionSizeX=400
LastUserConfirmedResolutionSizeY=280
DesiredScreenWidth=640
DesiredScreenHeight=480
LastUserConfirmedDesiredScreenWidth=640
LastUserConfirmedDesiredScreenHeight=480

In general, I found the page file size & ResolutionSize, together, were most impactful.

Note: I've also run with ResolutionSizeX=320, ResolutionSizeY=240. Just maximize the window to make things readable. But 400 & 280 were the values that first got me working reliably, along with the Page File Size boost. When quitting out of ES2 after fixing, I went & checked my Page File Size & it was 11.2 GB so indeed, the game needed more swap space.

Edit: "working" does not mean "performant". While doing the 3 drone terminal hacks, while I couldn't read my graphics performance monitor popup due to the 400x280 resolution, I'd estimate the FPS was in the 10-15 range, at best, probably below 10 FPS much of the time. You had to be really ginger & slow with the drones due to the excessive frame lag.

@Developers: It seems really strange that 11.2 GB of swap space is needed when running at 400x280 frame size. Frame lag @400x280 frame size?!? While I realize some things don't scale with frame size (textures?), something just feels off, my spidey-sense is tingling.

I noticed that instability increased gradually as I progressed through the game, suggesting some cumulative effect(s). Ceto: no crashes, Union: Prescot Base was finicky, Zharkov: Vesna Mining Colony was a nightmare, Harvester quest was finicky. Essentially, Zharkov is what pushed me over the edge to now dig into this & see if I could improve the base stability vs. doing the <lower resolution, reboot, reload> loop which I'd been doing up to then since before Zharkov, only Prescot was really an issue.

Fwiw, I realize my system is on the potato edge but sometimes that edge helps find code issues not exercised by the bleeding edge to produce a more robust product. I realize there's only so many resources, time, etc... & issues have to be triaged but imagine if you find a subtle memory leak only present at the potato edge that leads to stability improvements across the entire spectrum of players? just a thought... :)

ES2 is excellent & i appreciate the effort & attention that has gone into this game. I think it's a masterpiece of game design. It's why I went ahead & purchased after playing the demo, despite the risk given my extreme potato PC for such a recent game. :)

Thanks!

Intel Iris XE is not a potato. It's simply not made for modern 3d games.
You SHOULD deactivate dynamic lights/shadows and volumetrics.
Yes, this will make the game look bland, but it's the only way. Vesna Mining is a case of HEAVY volumetric clouds.

Here are some lines you SHOULD use

[SystemSettings]

r.DistanceFieldAO=0
r.DistanceFields=1
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0
r.TemporalAACurrentFrameWeight=0
r.AmbientOcclusionLevels=0

r.Atmosphere=0

r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.AllowSimpleLights=1

r.Shaders.FastMath=1
r.RefractionQuality=0
r.RayTracing=0

r.DetailMode=0
r.TranslucencyVolumeBlur=0
r.ContactShadows=0

r.HZBOcclusion=0
r.LensFlareQuality=0
r.DepthOfFieldQuality=0
r.SSR=0
r.TranslucencyLightingVolumeDim=24
r.AllowLandscapeShadows=0
r.PathTracing.MaxBounces=1
r.AlsoUseSphereForFrustumCull=0
r.LandscapeLODBias=1

r.VolumetricFog=0
r.VolumetricFog.GridPixelSize=4
r.VolumetricFog.GridSizeZ=1
r.VolumetricFog.HistoryMissSupersampleCount=1
r.VolumetricFog.Jitter=0
r.VolumetricFog.LightFunctionSupersampleScale=1
r.VolumetricFog.VoxelizationSlicesPerGSPass=1
r.FogStartDistance=10000
FX.AllowCulling=1
FX.AllowGPUParticles=1
FX.MaxCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
FX.MaxGPUParticlesSpawnedPerFrame=100
fx.MaxNiagaraCPUParticlesPerEmitter=10
fx.MaxNiagaraGPUParticlesSpawnPerFrame=100
fx.QualityLevelSpawnRateScaleReferenceLevel=0
r.ParticleLightQuality=0
r.ParticleLODBias=1

r.ShadowQuality=2
r.Shadow.PerObject=0
r.Shadow.PreShadows=0
r.Shadow.CSM.MaxCascades=1
r.Shadow.MaxResolution=256
r.Shadow.MaxCSMResolution=256
r.Shadow.RadiusThreshold=0.02
r.Shadow.DistanceScale=0.6
r.Shadow.TransitionScale=0.6
r.Shadow.SpotLightTransitionScale=60
r.DFShadowQuality=0

r.MaterialQualityLevel=0

Try using these lines partly. You can start by disabling AO, volumetric fog.
r.SimpleDynamicLighting=1
r.AllowSimpleLights=1
These lines force only 1 dynamic light effect per object.

Thanks, i'll play around with these.

Things are running better now, though I just did an intentional crash test on Prescot using 1024x768 screen size, 512x384 base window resolution but with window maximized. It got all the way into Prescot but when I tried landing at the Freelancer pad, it gave a UE error dialog. The page file size was 12.6 GB
post-crash. Not sure why the game needs 20GB+ of real+virtual RAM for 1024x768 with
performance capped at 30 fps. Something isn't adding up...