Having the ability to play an extended RPG like Persona 3 Reload on a handheld gadget is, for many people, a completely fantastic factor. However in the event you’re attempting to play Persona 3 Reload on Steam Deck with the default settings, you have seemingly encountered some extreme efficiency points that may sluggish the sport to a crawl in sure scenes. Fortunately, there’s a straightforward solution to dramatically enhance the sport’s body charge.
In case you pay shut consideration to the areas by which the body charge tanks, you might need discovered what the issue is: reflective surfaces. Though Reload’s PC graphics settings menu is disappointingly primary, it does supply the power to show off Reflections. To do that, head into the System menu, choose Config, then Graphics Settings, and set Reflections to Off (be sure that to save lots of your adjustments, too). I might advocate setting your body charge restrict to 60 when you’re at it.
One of the best demonstration of this distinction comes within the Iwatodai Strip Mall. A very good portion of the display screen is stuffed by the glass surrounding the doorway to Wilduck Burger, and the distinction with this setting is dramatic. With Reflections turned off, the sport is basically capable of keep 60fps, with some occasional, minor dips and body pacing issues–nothing too noticeable. However with Reflections turned on, the world turns into borderline unplayable, with the body charge dipping into the kids and infrequently going as little as 10fps on my Steam Deck OLED.
That is likely to be as a result of obvious use of ray tracing, as Digital Foundry describes, which does not play properly with the Deck’s {hardware}. Happily, regardless of the cruel “On/Off” language, turning off reflections doesn’t suggest all reflections within the recreation disappear. Whereas Wilduck Burger’s storefront turns into a reasonably boring-looking grey mass, the ray-traced reflections are changed with some various in different areas; the ground of the entryway to Tartarus is not half-bad to my eye.
Tweaking this setting ought to enhance efficiency even in one thing like your dorm room, which has a mirror whose ray-traced reflections show to be an excessive amount of. Even the sport’s menu experiences downside with reflections turned on, constantly dropping the body into the 50s and lending it an unsteady really feel.
Though the Reflections setting results in a dramatic enchancment, it would not lock the body charge to 60. In my expertise, the breakable objects you encounter all through Tartarus nonetheless result in some efficiency issues when they’re current, as do sure rooms within the space. The restricted graphics settings do not current you with some ways to tweak efficiency to your liking; it is primarily simply shadow high quality and rendering scale. I have never discovered the issues extreme sufficient to take an extra hit to picture high quality, although your mileage could differ.
Hopefully, efficiency can be improved via future updates. I do not anticipate ray-traced reflections to ever run nicely on the present Deck {hardware}, however different points appear minor sufficient that I think they may very well be resolved. Regardless of the case, the present problems–with Reflections turned off–are minor sufficient that I might nonetheless heartily advocate the Deck model of Persona 3 Reload primarily based on the opening seven hours, given simply how handy the portability makes the sport (and grinding via Tartarus) to play. For extra on what to anticipate from this remake, test our Persona 3 Reload assessment, or decide up the sport at GameSpot sister web site (*3*) for 13% off.