Store Page
ACE COMBAT 8: WINGS OF THEVE
All Discussions Screenshots Artwork Broadcasts Videos News Guides Reviews

ACE COMBAT 8: WINGS OF THEVE

Store Page
View Stats:
Global Achievements
Optimization?
So I'll start off with my specs, since they are absolutely NOT top of the line whatsoever given that I'm having to run this game on the lowest possible settings.

GPU: AMD RX Radeon 6500 XT
CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5500
RAM: 16 GB

I'm wondering just what the hell I can do to improve my game performance, because I'm running into a couple of issues;

- I've noticed that my game audio sounds... strange. Some characters will sound like they're speaking on the other side of the room (my in-game audio output setting is set to "headphones" iirc), while other characters (i.e Cope) I can hear just find. Additionally, I've noticed that sometimes character's dialogue will just cut mid-sentence *and* for multiple sentences at a time, which basically means I have to rely on the subtitle text just to hear what's actually going on. On top of that, in some cutscenes I can't hear the characters when the camera's outside the cockpit, but then I can hear them just fine when the camera jumps into the respective character's cockpit. I have no idea what's causing this but I'm assuming it's a GPU/driver issue, though I'm pretty sure I have the latest drivers...

- Gameplay wise the performance is ok. I have the FPS capped to 30, and while I can play multiplayer just fine, I've noticed that I have some serious issues playing the campaign. TO BE SPECIFIC: if I'm playing a mission that's over OPEN OCEAN or an island, then the game runs just fine. But if I'm playing a mission that's over IN-LAND TERRAIN (so no ocean), then it turns into a total chuggathon lagfest. But the thing is, if I'm playing multiplayer, I don't get this issue regardless of the terrain type, so I don't know if my hypothesis that the game just *really* does not like it when it has to render terrain/trees/whatever is remotely correct or not.

Am I just cooked? Or is there anything I can potentially do to *at least* make my game not run like a slideshow in campaign aside from just hopefully waiting for some patches or buying a better GPU?

EDIT: I've also found another solution that'll work in case the solution in the pinned comment isn't enough;

Basically, create an Engine.ini file in this file directory (AppData -> Local -> BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment -> Ace Combat 8 -> Config -> Windows), and copy-paste the following text into it:

[SystemSettings]
r.DynamicGlobalIlluminationMethod=0
r.ReflectionMethod=0
r.Lumen.DiffuseIndirect.Allow=0
r.Lumen.Reflections.Allow=0
r.DiffuseIndirect.Denoiser=1
r.RayTracing=0
r.RayTracing.GlobalIllumination=0
r.RayTracing.Reflections=0
r.RayTracing.Shadows=0
r.RayTracing.AmbientOcclusion=0
r.RayTracing.Denoiser=0
r.RayTracing.Translucency=0
r.RayTracing.Lumen.DiffuseIndirect=0
r.RayTracing.Lumen.Reflections=0
r.RayTracing.SSR.Enable=0
r.PathTracing=0
r.GenerateMeshDistanceFields=0
r.DistanceFieldShadowing=0

Then save it, and then set it to "Read Only" via Properties to keep the game from overwriting or deleting it. It'll make some cutscenes look weird, but I got a MASSIVE performance boost by doing this in combination with assigning more virtual memory to the pagefile system.

I found out about it through the posts/comments on this particular nexus mod (https://www.nexusmods.com/acecombat8wingsoftheve/mods/15?tab=posts). I DID NOT INSTALL THE MOD ON THE PAGE ITSELF, I just copy-pasted this from what somebody suggested in the posts section. Hope this helps for some people!! :steamhappy:
Last edited by SharkLordSatan; Oct 5 @ 2:06am
The author of this topic has marked a post as the answer to their question.
Click here to jump to that post.
Originally posted by SnW:
Originally posted by SharkLordSatan:
Originally posted by SnW:
add a bit more of virtual memory from your fastest drive to the pagefile system, i'm running the game on an old system and runs fine at 1080 with everything on ultra.

i was skeptical because of the requirement so i was very careful with testing the game within the 2hs. I used to have several long loading times even but i solved it doing that and ended up keeping the game.

The game uses like 27 gb of RAM it seems for some reason, so that virtual memory helped, now the game runs smooth and loading times are normal, i didn't touchi any ini files at all.

Do you know where/how I can do that?

yes ofc.

Press Win + R, type sysdm.cpl, and press Enter. In the System Properties window that pops up, select the Advanced tab at the top. Under the Performance section, click Settings,

go to the Advanced tab and click the Change... button under the Virtual memory section. At the top of the Virtual Memory window, uncheck the box that says "Automatically manage paging file size for all drives". Select your fastest drive from the list. Select the Custom size radio button below. Enter 20480 in both the Initial size (MB) and Maximum size (MB) fields (20 GB = 20,480 MB). Click the Set button right next to the numbers.

Click OK on all open windows to apply the changes, then restart your PC when prompted.
< >
Showing 1-15 of 68 comments
Ragnell Avalon VTuber
Sep 30 @ 7:19am 
Are you running it on an SSD? Apparently the buggy audio issue is a known problem with trying to run the game on HDDs.
#1
SharkLordSatan
Sep 30 @ 10:56am 
Originally posted by Ragnell Avalon VTuber:
Are you running it on an SSD? Apparently the buggy audio issue is a known problem with trying to run the game on HDDs.

Yeah I'm running it on an SSD. It's an ADATA LEGEND 800 GOLD.
#2
demv
Sep 30 @ 10:59am 
The Game have a memory leak issue right now
#3
SharkLordSatan
Sep 30 @ 11:02am 
Originally posted by demv:
The Game have a memory leak issue right now

I mean I believe it, but wouldn't that mean every aspect of the game should be a slideshow for me and not just specific levels in campaign? Either way I'm hoping they either put out a patch to fix it or give us a way to turn off the mandatory ray-tracing.
#4
DW9x
Sep 30 @ 11:09am 
Originally posted by SharkLordSatan:
Optimization?
I don't think anything in the PC port was optimized in the slightest, don't think anyone who meets their current "minimum" can actually get a decent experience. No idea if they actually bug tested their PC port, the way this launch has turned out.
#5
KineticZen
Sep 30 @ 11:28am 
A better GPU won't help, since I get some ridiculous frame drops on a RX 7900 XTX if there are explosions/particles filling the screen on a close ground kill.

Although I'm enjoying the game, the optimization is abysmal -- having both Easy Anti-Cheat & Denuvo running at the same time (on top of the usual UE5 jank) probably doesn't help. I've tried running on FSR Native AA (1440p, 120 frame cap) & lower settings. It shouldn't be anywhere near as uneven as it gets sometimes.

If you increase your FPS cap to 60 or higher, can you maintain around that level? What's your monitor's refresh rate -- is it a multiple of 30/60? 144hz can introduce frame pacing issues when you aren't using a divisible cap value, i.e. 72 FPS (which most games don't offer). None of this will correct the issue, of course, but I don't think you should have to cap to 30 with that card.

AMD released an optional driver version (Adrenalin 26.9.2) yesterday that might help, so I'll try that, but I honestly don't think it's a driver issue. I didn't get much stuttering in Townfall, another recent high-fidelity UE5 release, either, even without shader cacheing.

Your audio issue sounds very odd -- I haven't experienced anything like that.
#6
jHawk
Sep 30 @ 11:29am 
I came across this benchmarking article that suggested the minimum RAM for the current verison should actually be 32GB not 16 for "comfortable performance"

https://en.gamegpu.com/news/igry/ace-combat-8-wings-of-theve-trebuet-minimum-32-gb-ozu-dlya-komfortnoj-igry
Last edited by jHawk; Sep 30 @ 11:30am
#7
II SG93 II
5
4
Sep 30 @ 11:48am 
There is literally no reason this game had to be made on Unreal Engine 5. It doesn't look that much better than AC7 but runs considerably worse and has worse image quality and temporal stability at the same res.

UE5 is killing my interest in new releases.
#8
Cephei
4
Sep 30 @ 11:50am 
Originally posted by II SG93 II:
There is literally no reason this game had to be made on Unreal Engine 5. It doesn't look that much better than AC7 but runs considerably worse and has worse image quality and temporal stability at the same res.

UE5 is killing my interest in new releases.

Glad they made it in UE5. It looks great and runs great if you have decent hardware. maybe it's time to upgrade that PC. I can't wait for The Witcher 4.
#9
Azeth
Sep 30 @ 12:25pm 
Originally posted by II SG93 II:
There is literally no reason this game had to be made on Unreal Engine 5. It doesn't look that much better than AC7 but runs considerably worse and has worse image quality and temporal stability at the same res.

UE5 is killing my interest in new releases.

That's how it goes nowadays, minor graphic improvement in exchange for tanking performance
#10
SharkLordSatan
Sep 30 @ 12:37pm 
Originally posted by KineticZen:
A better GPU won't help, since I get some ridiculous frame drops on a RX 7900 XTX if there are explosions/particles filling the screen on a close ground kill.

Although I'm enjoying the game, the optimization is abysmal -- having both Easy Anti-Cheat & Denuvo running at the same time (on top of the usual UE5 jank) probably doesn't help. I've tried running on FSR Native AA (1440p, 120 frame cap) & lower settings. It shouldn't be anywhere near as uneven as it gets sometimes.

If you increase your FPS cap to 60 or higher, can you maintain around that level? What's your monitor's refresh rate -- is it a multiple of 30/60? 144hz can introduce frame pacing issues when you aren't using a divisible cap value, i.e. 72 FPS (which most games don't offer). None of this will correct the issue, of course, but I don't think you should have to cap to 30 with that card.

AMD released an optional driver version (Adrenalin 26.9.2) yesterday that might help, so I'll try that, but I honestly don't think it's a driver issue. I didn't get much stuttering in Townfall, another recent high-fidelity UE5 release, either, even without shader cacheing.

Your audio issue sounds very odd -- I haven't experienced anything like that.

I did update my AMD driver to the latest version but it didn't do anything to resolve either the framerate or the audio issues.

I don't really care too much about playing at 30 FPS cap or on the lowest settings, I just want my game to not turn into a slideshow whenever I'm playing a mission that isn't over open ocean 😭
#11
watcherofanime935
Sep 30 @ 2:28pm 
Yeah. This game eats about 18gb of ram for me. It's def a resource chug. I'd be genuinely surprised if it wasn't a memory leak.
#12
Ragnell Avalon VTuber
Sep 30 @ 10:24pm 
After playing for 18 hours straight yesterday on launch day I'm of the impression that there's not a memory leak, simply because while I definitely had some issues in the very target-rich late-game maps (not helped by me streaming, which obviously added to processor overhead), they all went away on the last two missions which feature very few enemy targets. If there was a memory leak I would expect performance to degrade noticeably over time, but that didn't happen.

I do have 64gb of RAM but given the complete lack of optimization I honestly wouldn't expect that to be proof against a memory leak.
#13
thebiggestbaz
Sep 30 @ 11:04pm 
I think there is a memory leak issue, on my first few launches it would crash on loading the first mission saying my card was out of video memory, idk if this applies to you but this is how I fixed the issue. Since I implimented the below I have had no issue, game runs smooth at all ultra setting except for textures thats on high. I have a geforce rtx 3080 and only 8 gig of ram:

• Press the Win + R keys on your keyboard to open the Run dialog box.
• Type sysdm.cpl and press Enter to open System Properties.
• Go to the Advanced tab and click Settings under the Performance section.
• Go to the Advanced tab again and click Change under Virtual Memory.
• Uncheck "Automatically manage paging file size for all drives" if it is checked.
• Select the drive where the game is installed.
• Choose Custom size.
• Set the Initial size to whatever your RAM is, so for 8 gig it was 12288 Maximum was 24576.
• Click Set, then click OK, and restart your computer before launching the game.

After this, go to properties and lunch options on steam and manual put the resolution to be a tad lower, so I set it to: -w 2560 -h 1440

The issue I think was when I launched the game it was boardless, everything was at ultra and the resoltion was waaaay too much and it overload the card. Once you get into the game make sure to make it fullscreen and change the resoltuion.

If you do that it should work, it worked for me
#14
Val
Sep 30 @ 11:33pm 
There is very little that you can do. It drops to the mid 30's even on a RTX 5090, with heavy upscaling enabled.

It's just piss-poorly optimized, sadly.
Last edited by Val; Sep 30 @ 11:33pm
#15
< >
Showing 1-15 of 68 comments
Per page: 1530 50

ACE COMBAT 8: WINGS OF THEVE > General Discussions > Topic Details
Date Posted: Sep 30 @ 6:51am
Posts: 68
Discussions Rules and Guidelines