My guide was stolen (with proof) - Optimized settings, fps unlock, FOV, ultrawide fix, color fringing, etc.

[DaemonX_HUN]

October 10 edit:

The creator who stole my guide (from this post) DMCA takedowned my guide in the Silent Hill 2 / Guides section and removed it, even though I'm the original guide author. I wrote about this to Steam.

TL;DR: Here's video proof that I'm the creator of this guide:

Video link

---

My Silent Hill 2 settings guide only existed on Steam Forums and on Reddit a few days ago. I also wanted to make it available as a proper guide under the Guides tab, but I got hospitalized for a day due to a small surgery, and I wasn't able to work on it.

During this time, my guide was stolen and copied by Steam user Sumi, who published my work under the Guides section without asking for permission or without crediting me. Moreover, he begged for money (through Ko-Fi) and he acted like he is the original creator of the guide. Also, when another user and I called him out in the comments, he deleted those comments.

On October 8th, I came home from the hospital, and I released my guide (which was previously only available here on the forums and on Reddit) under the Guides section too. Furthermore, I added a lot of new information into it (clarifications, new fixes), and also new images.

On October 9th, I saw that Steam user Sumi copy-pasted those new information and pictures too from my updated guide. I find this extremely unethical. He doesn't credit the original author, he deletes my and others' comments, and he begs money for work/research that's not even his.

On October 9th/10th (not sure) he tried to DMCA-takedown my guide.

So to sum it up:

• He acts like created the guide he stole from me
  
• He begs for Steam Awards for a guide he stole
  
• He begged for money through Ko-Fi for a guide he stole (until presumably Steam removed his Ko-Fi link)
  
• He tried to take down my guide/writings, even though I'm the original creator
  
• He deleted all the comments of those who called him out, and disabled the ability to comment on his video

The post has been made into a guide.

Optimized settings

1. Under Display & Graphics, set Renderer Quality Preset to Custom to enable Advanced Quality Settings.
   
2. Disable SSR. Screen space reflections are ugly in this game (as proven by this image[i.imgur.com]), and even without SSR, the game uses a combination of Lumen and cube maps for puddles, etc.
   
3. Set Shadows to Low. It could result in a staggering 35%+ fps gain compared to High. While the difference is stark before entering the city (first 10 minutes), after that, it will be mostly imperceptible in outside areas (due to atmospheric fog), or inside of buildings.
   
4. Set Shaders to Medium for a 7% increase in fps. Keep in mind though that this may introduce white artifacts (e.g. around James' eyes) on certain setups.
   
5. Leave all other options at the highest setting (and texture at what your GPU can handle), as those have a seemingly negligible impact on performance.
   
6. By disabling ray tracing, you can get an additional 27%+ boost to your framerate. RT is not noticeable at all in most scenarios, and it doesn't disable and replace the bad SSR implementation either. However, it completely changes the rendering of certain sections (due to bounce lights), making some interiors go from completely black to naturally filled with light (although it can be argued it makes those parts less moody and atmospheric). Here's a comparison[i.imgur.com] for both scenarios.
   
7. Use DLSS Quality at 1080p, DLSS Balanced at 1440p, and DLSS Performance at 1600p UW / 2160p for a significant boost in performance.

Unreal Engine 5 Unlocker (FoV, Free Camera, etc.)

Unreal Engine 5 Unlocker is a paid software, but you can use it to tweak a wide variety of settings. You can increase/decrease the field of view, change the camera position like in other games' photo modes, or even add different post-processing effects. To use UE5U, follow the steps below.

1. Download Unreal Engine 5 Unlocker[opm.fransbouma.com].
   
2. Open the unlocker, run the game, add the executable to the app, and inject DLL.
   
3. If you want to use the in-game console to use commands (e.g. FOV change), hit the Tilde key to open it(or set it to a different button under the Configuration menu if you are using a European keyboard).

Color fringing and ghosting fix

Similarly to other modern third-person games with lots of post-processing effects (e.g. A Plague Tale: Requiem, Jedi: Survivor, Black Myth: Wukong), when you rotate the camera, there is a very noticeable and distracting, white halo/ghosting/fringing effect around the playable character. This can be mitigated by using the code below, but you can't get fully rid of it, as there will still be some ghosting around James body while rotating the camera in/near foggy areas.

1. Navigate to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Local\SilentHill2\Saved\Config\Windows and open Engine.ini
   
2. Copy the code below to the end of the ini file and save it.

Code:

[SystemSettings]
r.SceneColorFringe.Max=0
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
r.motionblurquality=0
r.Distortion=0
r.DisableDistortion=1

Here's a video after applying the fix (no more ghosting). This also disables Chromatics Abberation.

Frame Gen

The game doesn't have built-in frame generation support, but Unreal Engine 5 does, at least for FSR. You can enable FSR frame generation by following these steps.

1. Navigate to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Local\SilentHill2\Saved\Config\Windows and open Engine.ini
   
2. Copy the code below to the end of the ini file and save it.
   
3. Select FSR 3.0 Supersampling option under Display & Graphics.

Code:

[SystemSettings]
r.FidelityFX.FI.Enabled=1.

Keep in mind that:

1. It is suspected that the frame generation here is the older, inferior version of AMD FSR (3.0 instead of 3.1).
   
2. You can't enable Nvidia Reflex (or its AMD Alternative) in the game, so you need a really high base fps to make the extra input lag added by frame generation less noticeable. Alternatively, you can add Reflex via RivaTuner Statistics Server.
   
3. Frame generation is only possible by using AMD's upscaling method, which generally provides worse image quality than DLSS and XeSS.
   
4. Frame generation doesn't work well with the in-game vignette, especially on wider screens than 16:9. It can lag in motion[i.imgur.com] compared to the rest of the image if you turn the camera fast. You need to disable it.

Nvidia Reflex

You can force the game to use Nvidia Reflex which will decrease input latency and make the game more responsive. This is useful for normal play and especially useful for those who want to use frame generation.

1. Download and install MSI Afterburner + RivaTuner Statistics Server[www.guru3d.com].
   
2. Launch MSI Afterburner (which will also launch RTSS), then inside RTSS, click on Setup, then for the Enable Framerate Limiter option, choose Nvidia Reflex, then hit OK. This will force Nvidia Reflex on globally, but you can also enable it on a game-by-game basis.

Vignette removal

You can disable the vignette to get a clearer, more consistent image, and to get rid of potential artifacts that are caused by using FSR Frame Generation and vignette together.

1. Navigate to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Local\SilentHill2\Saved\Config\Windows and open Engine.ini
   
2. Copy the code below to the end of the ini file and save it.

[SystemSettings]
r.Tonemapper.Quality=1

Ray tracing ray reconstruction

If you decide to use ray tracing, you can also use ray reconstruction to improve certain reflections. Here's a comparison with the feature turned off and on by Reddit user robbiekhan. However, based on my experience, this also significantly strengthens the ghosting/color fringing around James when rotating the camera.

1. Navigate to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Local\SilentHill2\Saved\Config\Windows and open Engine.ini
   
2. Copy the code below to the end of the ini file and save it.

[SystemSettings]
r.NGX.DLSS.denoisermode=1
r.Lumen.Reflections.BilateralFilter=0
r.Lumen.Reflections.ScreenSpaceReconstruction=0
r.lumen.Reflections.Temporal=0
r.Shadow.Denoiser=0
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0

Cutscene framerate unlocker

You can use the Silent Hill 2 fps unlocker[github.com]. made by RoseTheFlower. There are two versions. While using version 1.0, the cutscenes will technically run at unlocked framerates, some animations will still be capped at 30 fps. With 1.1, all animations will run at unlocked framerates, but it may introduce some desync with dialogue and mouth movement (further testing needed). However, both versions will fix the inverse ghosting and flicker issue that low framerates introduce on OLED screens and certain TCL TVs while using VRR.

Ultrawide cutscene fix

You can use the Silent Hill 2 widescreen mod[github.com]. made by RoseTheFlower.

Stutter mitigation

It's not possible to fix stutters, but it may be possible to reduce their frequency and intensity.

Option #1 - Switch to Vulkan rendering

Using the DXVK translation layer, you can switch to Vulkan rendering by forcing the game to launch in DirectX 11 mode. Keep in mind that this disables AI-based upscaling (so only TSR and FSR 1.0 will work), frame generation, and ray tracing. Furthermore, you may experience visual bugs.

• Download DXVK from the official GitHub page[github.com].
  
• Copy the contents of the ZIP file (d3d11.dll and dxgi.dll to "SHProto\Binaries\Win64").
  
• In Steam, right-click the game and select Properties, then enter '-dx11' (without quotes) under Launch Options.

Option #2 - Forcing shader precompilation

Another option is to force the game to compile shaders. You need to copy the following commands to Engine.ini, and launch the game in DirectX 11 mode. Keep in mind that this disables AI-based upscaling (so only TSR and FSR 1.0 will work), frame generation, and ray tracing. Furthermore, you may experience visual bugs.

r.ShaderPipeLineCache.Enabled=1
r.ShaderPipeLineCache.Precompile=1

To run the game in DirectX 11 mode, in Steam, right-click the game and select Properties, then enter '-dx11' (without quotes) under Launch Options.

Additional tweaks

Some users have reported less frequent stuttering with the following Windows settings.

1. Disable hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling. In Windows 11, this can be changed by going into Settings, then choosing Graphics, and then changing the default graphics settings. For the setting to take effect, a restart is required. This will also disable frame generation.
   
2. Changing CPU priority to High, IO priority to High, and Page priority to Normal. It can be done manually, but there's also a mod[www.nexusmods.com] for it by Gantz79 on NexusMods.

Update DLSS and fix DLSS ghosting

The game uses an older version of DLSS (3.5.10). You can upgrade it to the latest version (3.7.20) to potentially gain some image quality improvements.

• Visit TechPowerUp[www.techpowerup.com] and download the latest DLL.
  
• Replace the old DLL (which is located in D:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\SILENT HILL 2\SHProto\Plugins\DLSS by default) with the new one.

To fix DLSS ghosting (e.g. on leaves and small particles), use DLSSTweaks.

• Visit NexusMods[www.nexusmods.com] and download the latest DLL.
  
• Copy the contents of the ZIP file to the folder where the game's executable is located (D:\SteamLibrary\steamapps\common\SILENT HILL 2\SHProto\Binaries\Win64 by default).
  
• Run DLSSTweaks from the game's folder, hit OK, then under DLSSPresets, force preset E for all the DLSS modes you use, then click Save.

[DaemonX_HUN]

Added information on how to enable Frame Generation in the game.

[BoBr]

Any advice on microstutter fix? The only "fix" so far I've found is to set shadows to low so my overall average fps is higher so the "drop" when stutters happens much less noticeable

[DaemonX_HUN]

Added information about how to unlock framerate in cutscenes and how to remove black bars while using wider aspect ratios.

[DaemonX_HUN]

Originally posted by GIGACHAD GAMER ELITE:

Any advice on microstutter fix? The only "fix" so far I've found is to set shadows to low so my overall average fps is higher so the "drop" when stutters happens much less noticeable

You can't. It's a typical problem of practically all UE4/5 games. The only newer UE games that don't stutter are Hi-Fi Rush and maybe Days Gone.

[Marsson]

A Plague Tale: Requiem doesn't use UE :) Asobo uses their own engine.

[kody]

im on ryzen 9 7950x3D with bios setting cppc set to driver
tuff X670E mobo
48gb 6400mhz ddr5 ram
msi suprim AIO 4090
rog swift oled 240hz 0.03ms 3440x1440p ultra wide
max ultra settings DLSS quality and im getting no less than 170 fps no stuttering except BS 30 fps locked cut scenes, my cpu temp never gets above 33c and gpu cant get over 40c

[DaemonX_HUN]

Originally posted by Marsson:

A Plague Tale: Requiem doesn't use UE :) Asobo uses their own engine.

Fixed it, thanks! Point is this is a common problem in many modern games, sadly.

[kickassez]

thank you for this, i hope there will be another way to change FOV soon.

[BreathTaking]

I think the the color fringing and ghosting is meant to be there for the custscene, so it looks more like you're in a dream. They should only enable it when in cutscene,, in gameplay it's kind of distracting a bit when it shows up.

[DaemonX_HUN]

Originally posted by ZAHRAMAR:

Are you the Redditor? Because yes this work and thank you.
Edit: I just deleted topic I created to not steal your credit (if you are indeed the Redditor, and if so, I would reward you)!

Yeah, it's me, and I'm glad I could help. :D

[BearlyAti]

Thank you for this post. Coming from another Hungarian gamer.

[Ben]

thanks for the legendary sex man

[Rancid]

Thanks. The 30 fps cap on the cinematics is a godsend. It makes no sense they forced this (Even if it was something artistic, hell, make it optional), specially when someone could fix it on its own day one.

EDIT: It doesn't work, sadly.

[Rancid]

Originally posted by ZAHRAMAR:

Are you the Redditor? Because yes this work and thank you.
Edit: I just deleted topic I created to not steal your credit (if you are indeed the Redditor, and if so, I would reward you)!

Weren't you refunding the game because it doesn't have Denuvo? Yet here you are. Lol

[Arhat]

Originally posted by DaemonX_HUN:

Optimized settings

1. Under Display & Graphics, set Renderer Quality Preset to Custom to enable Advanced Quality Settings.
   
2. Disable SSR. Screen space reflections are ugly in this game (as proven by this image[i.imgur.com]), and even without SSR, the game uses a combination of Lumen and cube maps for puddles, etc.
   
3. Set Shadows to Low. It could result in a staggering 35%+ fps gain compared to High for seemingly minimal visual difference.
   
4. Set Shaders to Medium for a 7% increase in fps.
   
5. Leave all other options at the highest setting (and texture at what your GPU can handle), as those have a seemingly negligible impact on performance.
   
6. Disable / do not use ray-tracing, as most of the time its improvements are not noticeable and/or really subjective, and it doesn't provide a replacement for the bad SSR anyway. Turning it off, you can get an additional 27%+ boost to your framerate.
   
7. Use DLSS Quality at 1080p, DLSS Balanced at 1440p, and DLSS Performance at 1600p UW / 2160p for a significant boost in performance.

FOV

1. Download Unreal Engine 5 Unlocker[kemono.su].
   
2. Open the unlocker, run the game, add the executable to the app, and inject DLL.
   
3. Use the Tilde key to open the console (or set it to a different button under the Configuration menu if you are using a European keyboard).
   
4. In the console, type "fov 100" (without quotations) or any number of your choice, then hit Enter.

Color fringing and ghosting fix

Similarly to other modern third-person games with lots of post-processing effects (e.g. A Plague Tale: Requiem, Jedi: Survivor, Black Myth: Wukong), when you rotate the camera, there is a very noticeable and distracting, white halo/ghosting/fringing effect around the playable character. Here's how to fix it.

1. Navigate to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Local\SilentHill2\Saved\Config\Windows and open Engine.ini
   
2. Copy the code below to the end of the ini file and save it.

Code:

[SystemSettings]
r.SceneColorFringe.Max=0
r.SceneColorFringeQuality=0
r.motionblurquality=0
r.Distortion=0
r.DisableDistortion=1

Here's a video after applying the fix (no more ghosting). This also disables Chromatics Abberation.

Frame Gen

The game doesn't have built-in frame generation support, but Unreal Engine 5 does, at least for FSR. You can enable FSR frame generation by following these steps.

1. Navigate to C:\Users\YourUsername\AppData\Local\SilentHill2\Saved\Config\Windows and open Engine.ini
   
2. Copy the code below to the end of the ini file and save it.
   
3. Select FSR 3.0 Supersampling option under Display & Graphics.

Code:

[SystemSettings]
r.FidelityFX.FI.Enabled=1.

Keep in mind that:

1. It is more than likely FSR Frame Gen 3.0, not 3.1 (inferior version).
   
2. You can't enable NVidia Reflex Boost (or its AMD Alternative) in the game, so you need a really high base fps to make the extra input lag added by frame generation less noticable.
   
3. Frame generation is only possible by using AMD's upscaling method, which generally provides worse image quality than DLSS and XeSS.

Cutscene framerate unlocker

You can use the Silent Hill 2 fps unlocker[github.com]. made by RoseTheFlower.

Ultrawide cutscene fix

You can use the Silent Hill 2 widescreen mod[github.com]. made by RoseTheFlower.

Do you know how to disable film grain?