Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 pushes the visual fidelity of horde shooters with high-quality rasterized lighting and an impressive AI swarm system, rendering hundreds of enemies on the screen at once. Astartes will have to fight knee-deep in Tyranid forces to claim victory, but doing so will require a fairly powerful PC or modern console.

Related

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2: 8 Beginner Tips

The Codex Astartes supports these actions.

Posts

The good news is that most settings are highly customizable in Space Marine 2, both for PC users and consoles. In this guide, we cover some of our recommended settings for Space Marine 2, covering everything from graphics settings to camera settings that make Space Marine 2 much more comfortable to play.

Video Settings

General

Motion Blur Intensity

Off

Resolution Upscaling

DLSS (Nvidia)

FSR (Other GPUs)

Render Resolution

Balanced

Quality (Console)

Preset

Quality

Quality (PC)

Texture Filtering

High

Texture Resolution

Medium or High

Pick the highest value your GPU can support

Shadows

Medium

SSAO

Default

Screen Space Reflections

Default

Volumetrics

Medium

Effects

High

Details

Medium

Cloth Simulation

Medium

Console players should look at playing Space Marine 2 on the Quality preset. This sets the game to 4K resolution with a 30 FPS target. Performance lowers the internal resolution to 1080p, aiming for 60 FPS. Unfortunately, this target is seldom met in the thick of combat. Dips to 45 or 50 FPS are common, which can result in choppy frame pacing and variable responsiveness. Quality mode will feel more consistent in moment-to-moment gameplay despite the lower frame rate.

Xbox Series S Owners

Quality mode on the Xbox Series S sets the game to 1440p with a 30 FPS target. Performance mode is unavailable.

PC Settings

PC players have a handful of options to configure with this port, although strangely there's a lack of an FOV slider and ultrawide support—the latter of which will be added in a patch shortly post-launch. Frame generation is currently not available, but DLSS 3.0 and FSR3 will be added in a post-launch update.

As for settings, we suggest you run all texture settings on high and everything else on medium. The difference between medium and high is only noticeable at higher resolutions (1440p and 4K), and that's if you don't use any form of upscaling. If you're struggling to hit your desired frame rate, DLSS and FSR can be used in this title. Owners of Nvidia GPUs should always use DLSS, but FSR is available for all PC configurations.

Upscaling Cheat Sheet

The following upscaling settings modify your internal resolution by the values showcased below. Divide your in-game resolution by these values to get your true internal resolution.

Native

No change, effectively TAA

Dynamic

Adjusts your resolution to hit the target frame rate.

Quality

1.5x lower

Balanced

1.7x lower

Performance

2x lower

Ultra Performance

3x lower

Finally, there have been reports of blurry, unloaded textures. If you suffer from this problem, you need to install Space Marine 2 on an SSD. This game will suffer from texture streaming issues and microstutters if installed on an HDD.

Controls

Control binds are entirely down to preference, but we do suggest that you bind your aim key to something comfortable. Console users should have it bound to their left trigger by default, a common keybind for most third-person shooters. PC users have this bound to middle mouse button by default, which is a little clunky. Consider binding it to a side mouse button instead and leaving the aim setting to "Toggle."

We don't recommend binding aim to the right mouse button because melee is a crucial part of Space Marine 2. You'll want this on a button you feel comfortable spamming.

For some quick setting tips:

  • Adaptive Triggers are supported in Space Marine 2, located under the "Controller" submenu.
  • You can disable controller vibration under the "Controller" submenu.
  • Aim assist can be adjusted from the "Camera" tab of the settings menu.
    • We suggest putting this on "High" for easy headshots against PvE enemies.
Related

Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 - Astartes Heraldry, Explained

Unlock new customization options for your Space Marine through the Astartes Heraldry system.

Posts

Camera Settings

Controller

Aim Assist

High

Shake

Camera Shake

Off

For some strange reason, controller aim assist is found under the "Camera" tab instead of the "Controls" and "Accessibility" tabs. We suggest you set aim assist to "high." This will make your camera instantly snap to an enemy's torso when you aim. With a small nudge of the right stick, you'll be able to land easy headshots with just about every weapon.

All players will also want to turn off camera shake. Strong melee attacks, explosives, and incoming sniper fire will violently shake your screen. Turning this setting off makes it much easier to track enemies in the thick of combat.

Interface Settings

Close

HUD

Reminder Tips

Off

Directive Panel

Off

Sight

Off

The dynamic HUD of Space Marine 2 is fairly good right out the box, but there are a few things you can safely remove to clean up the screen. Reminder Tips reference equipment functionality and how to do basic things like parrying. You can generally turn this off. Directive Panel simply lists the current objective at the top-right of your screen. You can always press Tab or the menu button to pull up this information; it's not needed.

Sight places a white dot at the center of your screen at all times, giving you a point of reference while running. This can help players who suffer from motion sickness or otherwise struggle to aim. If you don't suffer from either issue, you can safely turn this off.

Every other setting can be freely adjusted to suit your preferences. We recommend leaving everything else on "Dynamic" so it naturally appears when needed.

Accessibility Settings

HUD

Subtitles

If desired

Video

Color Blind Mode

If desired

We don't recommend that every player toggles these settings, but it's important to mention that Space Marine 2 has subtitles and color blind filters under the "Accessibility" tab of the options menu. Subtitles are a good idea if you're playing the campaign, as most character voices get drowned out in gunfire and gory executions. Be sure to enable "Subtitle Backgrounds" so you can read the text mid-combat.

Color-blind settings are actually useful for all players in this title, as it'll adjust the colors of enemy parry and unblockable telegraphs. The default colors (blue and red) blend into SM2's environment most of the time, so enabling a color-blind filter can make discerning these telegraphs a little easier. Play around with the settings to see what feels right for you.

Displate Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 Collection

Close

Check out the Collection here!