Alan Wake 2 may be setting a new standard for video game visuals with its graphics settings. With detailed lighting and hair strands that put the Resident Evil remakes to shame, fixing your fps is crucial to watching the horror play out.
The graphics in Alan Wake 2 demand the best of the best performance from your chosen platform. But what are the best settings to choose for frame rate, performance, and visuals to bring this long-awaited horror game to life? Let’s get to our recommendations.
Best graphic settings for Alan Wake 2
Be sure to play Alan Wake 2 in a dark room for a truly horrifying experience. This is the recommendation from Alan Wake’s developer, Remedy Entertainment. The suggestion is to “play in a dark room as we do in Finland.” For other audiences, treat the game as a night-time exclusive.
You shouldn’t cheat the system and play in the middle of the day, as horror games like Alan Wake are best experienced at night. So start a new game when the sun sets, grab a cushion to hide behind if things get too scary, and fix your settings according to our recommendations below.
PC graphics settings
To get the best experience out of Alan Wake’s demanding settings, you should set most visual settings to high. You may experience frame drops with these settings, so make sure your PC meets the minimum requirements to play Alan Wake 2. As stated by Epic Games, these are:
- Video Card – GeForce RTX 2060, Radeon RDX, 6 GB VRAM
- Processor – Intel i5-7600K or AMD Ryzen 7 3700X
- Memory – 16 GB RAM
- OS – Windows 10/11 64-bit
- Hard Drive Space – 90GB SSD
While Alan Wake was subject to controversy due to its demanding system requirements, the game will be just as enjoyable using the Medium Preset. This preset still offers Ray Tracing functionality even with Ray Tracing disabled in the settings.
Display and Effects
- Display Mode – Fullscreen
- Display Resolution – 1920×1080 (16:9)
- Render Resolution – (1280×720 (Quality)
- Resolution Upscaling – DLSS
- Vsync – OFF
- Brightness Calibration – to your preference
- Motion Blur – ON
- Film Grain – ON
Quality
- Quality Preset – High
- Post-Processing Quality – Low
- Texture Resolution – Ultra
- Texture Filtering – High
- Volumetric Lighting – Medium
- Volumetric Spotlight Quality – Medium
- Global Illumination Quality – High
- Shadow Resolution – Medium
- Shadow Filtering – High
- Shadow Detail – Medium
- Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (ISSAO) – ON
- Global Reflections – High
- Screen Space Reflections – High
Ray Tracing
- Ray Tracing Preset – OFF
- DLSS Ray Reconstruction – OFF
- Direct Lighting – OFF
- Path Traced Indirect Lighting – OFF
- Transparency – OFF
PS5 graphics settings
The choices on console are far more limited than PC for Alan Wake 2. Although console players have less room for graphics adjustments, the newest console generation meets the high visual standards and performance demanded from Remedy. There are minimal differences between the platforms visually, and those starting the game will be in awe regardless.
- Game Mode – Quality
- Brightness Calibration – to your preference
- Motion Blur – ON
- Film Grain – ON
Xbox Series X|S graphics settings
The settings on Xbox Series X|S are exactly the same as PlayStation 5. These consoles are capable of running Alan Wake 2 with few issues. The game offers visual upgrades that have never previously been seen on older consoles. Xbox and PlayStation can easily run Alan Wake’s demanding settings with 1440p FSR including near perfect shadows, lighting, hair, and much more to make it feel like a real-life third-person experience.
- Game Mode – Quality
- Brightness Calibration – to your preference
- Motion Blur – ON
- Film Grain – ON
