Bethesda Softworks and id Software’s first-person shooter, DOOM: The Dark Ages, is now available for PC, and we’ve put together the best settings for getting optimized performance on mid-end system specs.
Before we delve into the best settings for the PC version of DOOM: The Dark Ages, make sure you’ve updated your GPU drivers and Windows to their latest respective versions. Additionally, disable or close any unnecessary background applications in order to reduce the CPU overhead as much as possible. The settings detailed ahead should provide a more optimized balance between graphics and frame rate compared to the presets available in-game.
DOOM: The Dark Ages Best Settings
The settings below are there to serve as a broad starting point for further optimization based on your specific hardware specs. As a result, you may need to further tweak some settings until you find a sweet spot based on your display’s refresh rate and the overall performance you seek.
DISPLAY
- Window Mode: Fullscreen
- Resolution: as per the max resolution of your display or preference
- Refresh Rate: Maximum possible on a VRR/G-sync display, otherwise as per your preference
- Vertical Sync: Off on a VRR/G-sync display, On otherwise
- Present From Compute: On
- Resolution Scaling Mode: Off
VIDEO
- Upscaler: NVIDIA DLSS on supported Nvidia GPUs, Intel XeSS on Intel GPUs, else AMD FSR
- Upscaler Super Resolution: Quality
MOTION BLUR
- Motion Blur: On
- Motion Blur Amount: High
- Motion Blur Quality: Medium
ADVANCED
- Overall Quality Slider: Custom
- Texture Pool Size: 4096
- Shadow Quality: Medium
- Reflections Quality: High
- Lights Quality: High
- Particles Quality: Ultra
- Decal Quality: Ultra
- Water Quality: High
- Volumetrics Quality: High
- Texture Filtering Quality: Ultra Nightmare
- Geometric Quality: High
- Shading Quality: High
- Directional Occlusion: Medium
How Does DOOM: The Dark Ages Run On Steam Deck?
DISPLAY
- Window Mode: Windowed
- Resolution: 960 x 600
- Refresh Rate: 90
- Vertical Sync: Off
- Present From Compute: On
- Resolution Scaling Mode: Off
VIDEO
- Upscaler: AMD FSR
- Upscaler Super Resolution: Performance
MOTION BLUR
- Motion Blur: On
- Motion Blur Amount: High
- Motion Blur Quality: Medium
ADVANCED
- Overall Quality Slider: Custom
- Texture Pool Size: 1556
- Shadow Quality: Low
- Reflections Quality: Off
- Lights Quality: Low
- Particles Quality: Low
- Decal Quality: Low
- Water Quality: Low
- Volumetrics Quality: Low
- Texture Filtering Quality: Low
- Geometric Quality: Low
- Shading Quality: Low
- Directional Occlusion: Low
As seen in the video above, DOOM: The Dark Ages runs at a frame rate in the 25 to 45 fps range on the Steam Deck on mostly Low settings. Given that the frame rate often stays above 30 fps, the game is largely playable on Valve’s handheld device.
