Quick Links
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2pushes 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.
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.
DLSS (Nvidia)
Quality (PC)
Medium or High
Pick the highest value your GPU can support
Cloth Simulation
Medium
Consoleplayers 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
PCplayers 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 yourun 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 FSRcan 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.
No change, effectively TAA
1.5x lower
1.7x lower
2x lower
Ultra Performance
3x lower
Finally, there have been reports ofblurry, unloaded textures.If you suffer from this problem, you need toinstall 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 youbind 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 becausemelee is acrucialpart of Space Marine 2.You’ll want this on a button you feel comfortable spamming.
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 toturn 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.
Sight
The dynamic HUD of Space Marine 2 is fairly good right out the box, but there are a few things you’re able to safely remove to clean up the screen.Reminder Tipsreference equipment functionality and how to do basic things like parrying. You can generally turn this off.Directive Panelsimply 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.
Sightplaces 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 recommendleaving everything else on “Dynamic"so it naturally appears when needed.
If desired
Color Blind Mode
We don’t recommend that every player toggles these settings, but it’s important to mention thatSpace Marine 2 has subtitles and color blind filters under the “Accessibility” tabof 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’re able to read the text mid-combat.
Color-blind settingsare 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.
