MWLL Performance Guide

Since MWLL is built off of the original Crysis engine, massive intense battles may occasionally slow your FPS on an older low to mid range computer or laptop as Crysis doesn't take advantage of using multiple CPU cores. However, by using the preset performance optimized user.cfg available below and then optionally toggling shadow rendering to low with the F4 key, you can enjoy a relatively smooth MWLL experience.

A modern AMD Ryzen 5000+ or Intel 12000+ series non-mobile CPU will be able to deliver 60+ FPS at 1080p resolution most of the time with the default MWLL settings. AMD's X3D series of CPUs will give the highest FPS. MWLL comes preconfigured with most of the tweaks in the "Balanced" user.cfg.

TL;DR: For best stability and performance while keeping high visual fidelity, run at 1080p (1920x1080) or lower resolution and select one of the four (HQ/Balanced/Performance/Ultra Performance) user.cfg files mentioned below.
If you're crashing to desktop (CTD) after a while, use the memory optimized versions here.

User.cfg

User.cfg is the file that provides fine-grained control over the graphical quality of MWLL. The downloadable user.cfg files below contain settings that improve the visual quality of the game while also increasing performance over Crysis's stock graphics settings.
The optimized balanced user.cfg increases FPS close to Crysis Medium settings but with quality of Crysis High settings while increasing shadow rendering distances.
Performance optimized user.cfg slightly reduces object quality and shadow rendering distance while HQ user.cfg increases them.

It is placed in the C:\Users\[username]\Documents\My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client directory. (Replace username and/or drive name with your current Windows username / Windows installation drive.)

To easily browse to the correct location, start the MWLL Launcher and towards the bottom left corner of the MWLL Launcher, click Open User Data Folder. In the Explorer window, double click MWLL and then double click Client.

Alternatively, you can browse to the correct folder by copy/pasting this into your Explorer window: %USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client

The user.cfg files below all feature mapped function keys that toggle a few key settings:

• F4 toggles shadow rendering distance between high quality and FPS improved low
• F9 toggles Shader post processing (Very slightly increases FPS but some maps look dull / desaturated with it disabled, removes depth of field blur effect while zooming, removes god-rays and shimmering underwater effects)
• F10 toggles Crysis's FPS and memory counter - use it to monitor your game's memory usage. If you're routinely over 3200 MB, consider restarting MWLL and use the memory optimized versions here
• F11 toggles net_channelstats - use to diagnose red-x / lossy connection to servers. Details how to use it are found here: Net_channelstats
• PAUSE toggles HUD - for screenshots

The user.cfg config files have been changed significantly. If you're running the previous versions, please update to these for increased FPS overall.

They all include these tweaks:

• Allow all lighting effects (dynamic, particle and static) on all maps.
• HDR rendering is enabled for proper lighting/brightness on all maps - avoids over-bright rendering.
• Edge anti-aliasing enabled for less jaggies.
• Increased FPS by reducing the water effect quality a bit.
• Increased FPS by shortening the decal effects lifetime - laser burn effects disappear more quickly.
• Increased FPS by disabling distant static object dissolve render effect.
• Full screen antialiasing (FSAA) disabled for these reasons:
  • Causes minor texture corruption.
  • Consumes more memory which may cause crashes on larger maps.
  • Can prevent proper switching between full-screen and windowed modes and switching to desktop.
  • It can decrease FPS a lot.
  • If you really want better anti-aliasing, consider using Reshade's SMAA.

Download Links

Highest quality visuals and good performance Preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

• Set for highest quality visuals. Better FPS than stock Crysis High settings yet comparable high quality effects.
  • Longer shadow draw distances with more real-time shadows cast from terrain and objects.
  • Screen Space Ambient Occlusion enabled for more realistic lighting effects.
  • Optimized particle and texture settings - balanced for visuals and FPS.

Balanced quality vs performance preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

• Set for balanced quality visuals. FPS almost as fast as stock Crysis Medium settings but with considerably improved visuals.
  • Medium shadow draw distances and keeps shadows cast from terrains on.
  • Screen Space Ambient Occlusion enabled for more realistic lighting effects.
  • Optimized particle and texture settings - leans towards better performance.
  • Increased FPS by reducing distant level of detail rendering for static objects.

Best performance optimized preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

• Set for performance oriented visuals. FPS around stock Crysis Medium graphics settings while looking a lot better (avoids opaque water bug).
  • Low shadow draw distances.
  • Screen Space Ambient Occlusion enabled - faster, less accurate version.
  • Performance optimized light, particle, decal and texture settings.
  • HUD anti-aliasing disabled.

Ultra performance optimized preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

• Ultra performance oriented visuals for low end systems/laptops. FPS faster than stock Crysis Medium graphics settings while still looking better (avoids opaque water bug).
  • Very low shadow draw distances.
  • Screen Space Ambient Occlusion disabled.
  • HUD anti-aliasing disabled.
  • Best performance optimized light, particle, decal, vegetation, shadow and texture settings.
  • Increased FPS by further reducing distant level of detail rendering for static objects.

User.cfg - Memory Optimized

Updated Mar 2025 - Low memory usage versions of the above for players that have CTD (crash to desktop) problems!

Two versions are available:

• Low memory version that enables the Crysis low resolution texture pack.

• Extra low memory version that saves even more memory by:
  • enables the Crysis low resolution texture pack.
  • enables Crysis's texture streaming mode.
  • Sets all cloud and bumpmap textures to half size resolution.
    

Detailed info about the settings:

• They only change non playable asset textures. Mechs, tanks, MWLL specific objects, etc will still have their original high resolution diffuse (colormap) textures.
• The low resolution texture pack loads smaller textures which saves more memory.
• Half sized bumpmap resolution textures slightly reduce the up-close depth quality of objects.
• The texture streaming mode skips caching textures into memory and loads them as they are needed.
  

What they do:

They significantly lower the initial memory used and gives players more game time before Crysis becomes unstable.
Will reduce crash-to-desktop (CTDs) for some players that go over 3200 MB memory in-game (check with F10 toggle!).

• On Windows 10 and 11 and higher end GPUs with 16GB VRAM or more, Crysis requests more memory from Windows as textures, objects/assets are loaded in-game. A memory allocation bug in the original Crysis code can occur upon load requests causing the CTD. The chance of this happens increases exponentially over 3200 MB. While in-game, check your Mem=xxxxMB counter via the F10 key. If over 3500 MB, the CTD may be only minutes away from happening. Restart your game to solve this.
• We are working on a memory allocation patch for Crysis that'll solve this issue as well as the occasional Duncan Fisher CTD audio bug in Solaris Arena mode. Stay tuned!

Low memory version (Crysis low resoution texture pack):

• Texture quality on some static objects such as rock formations will be noticeably lower.

Extra low memory version (Crysis low resoution texture pack and texture streaming):

• Texture quality on some static objects such as rock formations will be noticeably lower.
• Some objects will have a slightly flatter look at close ranges.
• Some static textures will initially be in lower resolution for a few moments until they load their highest level of detail.
• Very minor stuttering during the first minutes of a map might occur as textures are loaded.
• Occasionally, some explosion or fire effects might look more blocky - restarting your game fixes this.

Download Links - Memory Optimized

Memory Optimized Crysis low resolution texture pack enabled:

Low memory & Highest quality visuals and good performance preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Low memory & Balanced quality vs performance preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Low memory & Best performance optimized preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Low memory & Ultra performance optimized preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Download Links - Memory Optimized Texture Streaming Mode

Memory Optimized Crysis low resolution texture pack and texture streaming enabled (even more memory saving):

• Uses texture streaming mode skips caching textures into memory and loads them as they are needed. Occasionally, some explosion or fire effects might look more blocky.
• Asset textures (mechs, tanks, MWLL specific objects, etc) will still have their original high resolution textures.
• In the Crysis console, you'll occasionally see errors with "ImagePreprocessing: Scaling of..." due to the bumpmap resolution being halved. This can be safely ignored.

Lowest memory & Highest quality visuals and good performance preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Lowest memory & Balanced quality vs performance preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Lowest memory & Best performance optimized preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

Lowest memory & Ultra performance optimized preset - Updated Mar 2025 (right-click > Save link/file and place into My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client)

To easily browse to the correct location to place the user.cfg, start the MWLL Launcher and towards the bottom left corner of the MWLL Launcher, click Open User Data Folder. In the Explorer window, double click MWLL and then double click Client.

Alternatively, you can browse to the correct folder by copy/pasting this into your Explorer window: %USERPROFILE%\Documents\My Games\Crysis Wars\MWLL\Client

User.cfg - Detailed Change Log

Version 2.3 - Mar 2025 changes:

Added

Ultra Performance normal memory and low memory user.cfgs.

Changed

e_shadows_cast_view_dist_ratio = 0.65       ;[~] Controls small detail shadow distance rendering.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 0.8/0.65/0.25/0.15
* Used to be 0.45 for balanced config. Shadow rendering ratio increased to 0.65 to avoid daylight seeping through some voxels.

sys_flash_edgeaa = 0                        ;[~] HUD antialiasing - Set to 0 for a small ~%2 boost in fps.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 1/1/0/0
* Used to be 1 for Performance config. Saves more FPS in draw call heavy situations (city maps).

sys_flash_curve_tess_error = 2              ;[~] HUD curve roundness - If sys_flash_edgeaa is set to 0, this needs to be set to 2.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 4/4/2/2

r_ImposterRatio = 1                         ;[~] Cloud texture map resolution - 1 is half the original res, 0 is full res. Saves 0 to ~30 MB.  Only set to 1 in low mem user.cfgs.
* Used to be 1 only in extra low mem config. Now set to 1 for all low and extra low mem configs.

Version 2.2 - Feb 2025 changes:

Added

sys_flash_edgeaa = 1                        ;[~] HUD antialiasing - Set to 0 for a small ~%2 boost in fps.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 1/1/1/0
* When enabled, HUD anti-aliasing increases the draw calls (press F10 to see the "DP" value) and decreases FPS. Disabling it helps FPS but the jaggies are noticeable.

sys_flash_curve_tess_error = 4              ;[~] HUD curve roundness - If sys_flash_edgeaa is set to 0, this needs to be set to 2.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 4/4/4/2
* When sys_flash_edgeaa is disabled, this needs to be set to 2 or else thin HUD lines will not be visible.

e_vegetation_sprites_distance_ratio = 1     ;[~] Vegetation switch to sprites ratio - Lower ratio reduces distance certain vegetation will switch to FPS friendly sprites.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 1/1/1/0.75

r_ImposterRatio = 0                         ;[~] Cloud texture map resolution - 1 is half the original res, 0 is full res. Saves 0 to ~30 MB.  Only set to 1 in extra low mem user.cfgs.

r_TexBumpResolution = 0                     ;[~] ALL bumpmaps texture resolution - 1 is half the original res, 0 is full res. Minor quality loss at close ranges. Saves 25-100 MB.  Only enabled in extra low mem user.cfgs.
* When set to 1, the lower resolution is only seen within 25m-75m of an object.

r_TexResolution = 0	                    ;[~] ALL diffuse texture maps resolution - 1 is half the original res. Significant quality loss at close ranges.  Set to 1 manually to save 200-400 MB.
* When set to 1, the lower resolution is only seen within 50m-100m of an object.

e_particles_lights = 1                      ;[~] Allows particle effects such as missiles to create their own dynamic lighting effects.  HQ/Balanced/Perf/UltraPerf: 1/1/1/0
* Was previously disabled. Performance impact is negligible.

Changed

r_DynTexMaxSize = 320                       ;[~] Reduces texture thrashing on some maps to increase FPS.
* Used to be 256 - maps that are texture heavy such as TC_Clearcut will increase their FPS by 10-15% in certain locations using the 320 value.

Screenshots user.cfg - TC_LostHope

• 

  Crysis High setting

• 

  Crysis High setting

• 

  High Quality user.cfg

• 

  Balanced Quality user.cfg

• 

  Performance user.cfg

• 

  Crysis Medium setting

View all of the Screenshots Comparison showing the differences between the user.cfg configurations and how they compare to the stock Crysis settings.

The Settings Menu

Graphics

We recommend to use 1080p (1920x1080) as the highest resolution for maximum game stability. Higher resolutions such as 1440p (2560x1440) or 4k (3840x2160) may increase the chance of the game crashing to desktop (CTD) and will require a faster, more modern CPU and GPU to achieve smooth FPS.

It is strongly suggested that you do NOT change the settings in OPTIONS / SYSTEM SETTINGS / GRAPHICS / ADVANCED from their defaults. MWLL ships with pre-configured optimal medium settings that have combined performance and visual tweaks to give you more FPS in intense graphics heavy battles. Do NOT use the "Autodetect - Optimal Settings" as they will remove the optimizations until the next restart.

The Crysis engine that MWLL is built on requires a CPU that has high single thread performance to deliver high FPS. Recent AMD Ryzen 3000/5000 and Intel CPUs Haswell and later series with 3 GHz base clock or faster are recommended while the best performance will be achieved on a Ryzen 5800 X3D, Ryzen 7000/9000 series or Intel 13600+ series.

Crysis doesn't require a high-end GPU for smooth 1080p (1920x1080) gaming. Any AMD RX460 or GTX 1030 or newer GPU will be fine for the pre-configured optimal settings.

The quickest way to reclaim FPS on older hardware or if your machine lacks a discrete graphics card are:

• Reducing your in-game resolution and disabling any multi-GPU setups (Nvidia SLI, AMD CrossFire, or Nvidia Optimus). After finding your monitor's native resolution, try to reduce your resolution to some lower setting of the same ratio. For example change 1920 x 1080 to be 1600 x 900. The FPS gains made by lowering your resolution will only be more pronounced if your machine lacks a discrete graphics card or has an older CPU. You can use an upscaler application such as Magpie to upscale from a lower resolution to your monitor's native resolution here

• Setting in-game Anti-Aliasing Quality to OFF found in OPTIONS / SYSTEM SETTINGS / GRAPHICS. The MWLL pre-configured optimal settings already have Crysis's FPS friendly edge anti-aliasing enabled by default. Crysis's Full screen antialiasing (FSAA) consumes more memory which may cause crashes on larger maps.

• Disabling FULLSCREEN mode found in OPTIONS / SYSTEM SETTINGS / GRAPHICS. This will switch Crysis to Windowed-mode and will need a helper application to hide the window border such as these apps:

1. Use the upscaler application Magpie that also enables borderless Windowed mode explained here.
2. Other Borderless Windowed mode helper applications to remove the border around MWLL are available here.

Advanced Settings

We strongly recommend that you don't alter these settings as they will possibly disable the MWLL pre-configured optimizations. If absolutely needed, reducing the following settings might increase your FPS.

• POSTPROCESSING QUALITY
• VOLUMETRIC EFFECTS QUALITY
• PARTICLES QUALITY
• SHADERS QUALITY
• WATER QUALITY

For higher FPS while keeping the MWLL optimizations, we highly recommend to utilize the user.cfg - specifically, the "Best performance optimized preset - Updated Feb 2025" preset mentioned above.

Sound

It is advised that on your first launch, that you reduce the in-game sound somewhat and bring it up to a comfortable level afterwards as the defaults may be too high. Performance wise, there is functionally no gains to be made by playing with settings in the Sound menu.

Help

Consider joining the MWLL Discord community here to meet up with other MWLL players and ask for help with user.cfg config files.
For more information on how to install, customize, or write your own User.cfg file, see the page on Console Variables.

Outdated CFGs

WARNING! The following user.cfg files are out of date and have a bunch of bugs that causes some settings to be set to the highest possible setting (ie sys_spec_Shadows = 0 sets *all* shadows to the max and killing performance).
Only use them if you are willing to edit the file yourself to fix the bugs and change/experiment with the necessary config settings at your discretion to meet your preferences.

There are multiple bugs in the following user.cfgs! DO NOT USE THEM WITHOUT CAREFULLY ANALYZING THEM! At the minimum, change the following:

• sys_spec_Shadows = 0 should be sys_spec_Shadows = 1 .
• Deleting the line e_particles_quality = 9 or ingame projectiles will become invisible.
• Deleting the line d3d9_forcesoftware = 1, or the ingame Console and Cbill Transfer Menu will be unusable due to invisible text
• Deleting the line e_particles_max_emitter_draw_screen = 0, or too many particles will be shown on certain maps and perf will tank.

(Outdated/Buggy) Low Visuals/High Performance Preset

(Outdated/Buggy) Alternate Low Visuals/High Performance Preset

(OLD) High Visuals Preset

Shader Cache cleanup

If you normally have adequate performance, but lose it seemingly out of the blue: use the Clear Shaders option from the MWLL Launcher. MWLL Shaders have a gamut of interesting bugs tied to them, from hidden performance sinks to rainbow clouds and pink hovercraft dust- but it's easily fixed in the click of a button.

Other Options

If you are still having trouble getting the performance you're looking for, consider joining the MWLL Discord and inquiring in the #tech_support channel for more assistance.

Besides that, the following are a few more options that can increase stability and performance, but have to be approached with a trial-and-error mindset, considering each player's mix and match of these settings may not work for another player's system.

• Running the game in DX9 instead of DX10 mode from the launcher
• Running the game in Windows Compatibility mode for Windows 8, Windows 7.1 (Can be found by right-clicking the launcher, and opening 'Properties')

These, and a few more steps can be found in the Troubleshooting Guide