Boost Your Performance in ARK: Survival Evolved

This guide provides helpful tips and tricks to optimize the performance of ARK: Survival Evolved, a demanding open-world survival game. The guide focuses on reducing graphics settings, adjusting launch options, updating graphics drivers, disabling background programs, using SSD for game files, and using performance mods. Each tip is thoroughly explained with recommended settings, commands, and additional information to help players improve FPS and reduce lag. The guide also includes a section on recommended graphics settings to achieve the best graphics to performance ratio. By following these tips, players can enhance their gameplay experience in ARK: Survival Evolved.

Introduction

ARK: Survival Evolved is an open-world survival game that offers a challenging and immersive experience for players. However, the game can be demanding on your computer's resources and may cause performance issues, such as lag and low FPS. In this guide, we'll provide you with tips and tricks to help you optimize your game's performance and improve your overall gameplay experience.

1. Reduce Graphics Settings

Reducing the graphics settings is one of the simplest ways to increase performance in ARK: Survival Evolved. Lowering the graphics settings, such as shadows, textures, and reflections, can help improve FPS and reduce lag.

Here are some recommended settings to change for a performance boost:

Shadows: Low
Textures: Medium
Reflections: Off
Anti-Aliasing: Off
Ground Clutter: Off
Sky Quality: Low
High-Quality Materials: Off



Shadows: Shadows can have a significant impact on performance, especially in areas with a lot of shadows, such as forests. By setting shadows to low, you can improve FPS and reduce lag.

Textures: Textures affect the quality of objects and surfaces in the game. Lowering textures to medium can help improve FPS without sacrificing too much visual quality.

Reflections: Reflections can add realism to the game, but they also require a lot of resources. Turning off reflections can help improve performance.

Anti-Aliasing: Anti-Aliasing helps smooth out jagged edges, but it can also reduce FPS. Turning off Anti-Aliasing can help improve FPS.

Ground Clutter: Ground Clutter affects the amount of vegetation rendered in the game. Turning off Ground Clutter can help improve performance in areas with a lot of vegetation.

Sky Quality: Sky Quality affects the rendering of the sky in the game. Lowering Sky Quality can help improve FPS.

High-Quality Materials: High-Quality Materials affect the rendering of materials, such as metal and water. Turning off High-Quality Materials can help improve performance.

2. Adjust Launch Options

ARK: Survival Evolved allows players to modify the launch options, which can help increase performance. Go to your Steam Library, right-click on ARK: Survival Evolved, select Properties, and click on Set Launch Options. Add the following commands:

-USEALLAVAILABLECORES: This command will help improve performance by utilizing all available CPU cores.
-sm4: This command will force the game to use Shader Model 4, which can improve performance.
-nomansky: This command will disable sky rendering, which can improve performance.
-d3d10: This command will force the game to use DirectX 10, which can improve performance.
-lowmemory: This command will reduce memory usage, which can improve performance.

3. Update Graphics Drivers

Make sure to update your graphics drivers regularly to ensure that your hardware is running optimally. If you are unsure how to update your drivers, check the manufacturer's website for the latest drivers for your graphics card.

4. Disable Background Programs

Other programs running in the background can consume system resources and affect performance in ARK: Survival Evolved. Disable any unnecessary programs if possible, such as web browsers and chat clients, before launching the game.

5. Use an SDD For Game Files

Using an SSD for the game files will dramatically reduce load times and improve overall performance. If you have an SSD with enough space, consider moving the game files to it for better performance.

6. Use Resolution Scaling

Resolution scaling is a feature that allows you to reduce the rendering resolution of the game without changing the monitor's resolution. This helps improve FPS without sacrificing too much visual quality. A lot of the time, if set correctly, isn't noticeable at all during general gameplay. To enable resolution scaling, go to the graphics settings and adjust the resolution scale slider. This can also be done with softwares such as GeForce Experience.

7. Disable V-Sync

V-Sync is a setting that synchronizes the game's frame rate with your monitor's refresh rate. While this can help eliminate screen tearing, it can also reduce FPS. To disable V-Sync, go to the graphics settings and uncheck the V-Sync option.

8. Overclock your hardware

Overclocking your CPU or GPU can help improve performance, but it can also cause instability and potential damage. ONLY attempt overclocking if you are experienced and know what you are doing.

9. Use a performance optimization tool

There are several performance optimization tools available that can help optimize your computer for gaming, such as Razer Cortex or Game Fire. These tools can help free up system resources and improve performance in ARK: Survival Evolved.

Conclusion

In conclusion, optimizing the performance of ARK: Survival Evolved can greatly enhance the gameplay experience for players. By reducing graphics settings, adjusting launch options, updating graphics drivers, disabling background programs, using SSD for game files, and using performance mods, players can improve FPS and reduce lag. Additionally, lowering the resolution, closing other applications, overclocking hardware, adjusting in-game settings, using launch commands, and using performance optimization tools can further improve performance.

While It's difficult to give a specific number for how much FPS players can expect to gain by following these tips in ARK: Survival Evolved, as it can vary depending on the player's hardware, settings, and other factors, following these tips should result in a noticeable improvement in FPS and a smoother gameplay experience overall. Players may also see a reduction in stuttering and other performance issues. Ultimately, the degree of improvement will depend on the individual system and the settings used. It's recommended to test out different settings and tweaks to find what works best for your specific hardware and preferences.