STALKER Anomaly Graphics Guide

Keep in mind that each of these settings may have a wildly different effect on FPS on your machine, I'm basing this on my own install (gtx1080, i7-4960x, 32gb ram)
- Windows 10 users (works for every game):
Right-click the game's .exe, go to compatibility tab and check "disable fullscreen optimizations" (up to +40 fps)
Go to settings-gaming and disable gamebar and gamedvr (extra 5-10fps)
Open services.exe and disable the four xbox live services (extra 3-5 fps)
[Basic graphics settings]
== Render type ==
+ dx8 - static lighting only, no dynamic shadows, few advanced options, best performance
+ dx9 basic - dynamic lighting only on certain objects
+ dx9 full - dynamic lighting on all objects, static and dynamic
+ dx9 enhanced - same as full but with some extra dx10 features
+ dx10 - a bunch of extra graphics options, recommended
+ dx11 - only one extra graphics option over 10 but with many others not working as intended and missing shaders, not recommended
== Quality settings ==
These are just recommended presets of advanced graphics options
== FOV ==
 The game uses vertical FOV and not horizontal (78 in-game FOV roughly translates to 110 horizontal FOV which most other games use)
[Advanced settings (not all of these are available in all dx modes)]
== Vision distance ==
Controls the distance at which stuff renders in the world, affects FPS quite a bit since it also increases the range at which most other graphics options are rendered
== Object detail ==
Controls amount of polygons used to represent objects; lower settings make trees look fugly; doesn't affect fps too much but does use up extra VRAM
== Texture detail ==
Controls resolution of all textures in the game; higher settings have almost no effect on FPS but take up the most VRAM out of any setting and decreases loading times
== Anisotropic filtering ==
Affects sharpness of textures when you're looking at them at an angle; minimal FPS performance even on low-end machines and makes the game look much better
== Anti-aliasing ==
Smooths out edges of objects to get rid of jittering, may have a big FPS hit as it usually does in most games but for whatever reason in Stalker I barely noticed an FPS difference; huge quality difference though
== Grass density ==
Increases amount of grass on the ground; coupled with the next two settings may have a big performance impact
== Grass distance ==
Increases range at which grass is rendered, big performance decrease
== Grass size ==
Biggest performance hit out of any setting for some reason and higher settings make grass unreasonably huge anyway; keep it low for many extra frames
== Sun shadow ==
Turns sun into a dynamic light source, big fps hit
== Grass shadows ==
Makes grass drop shadows; not too much difference with this on and off at the cost of a couple frames
== Actor shadow ==
Makes your character drop shadows in first person; recommended off because the shadow when prone just looks like you're crouching so 0/10 for immersion
== Lighting distance ==
Increases the distance at which light sources are rendered; small fps hit
== Shadow distance ==
Same as above but for shadows, and performance hit is a bit bigger
== NPC flashlights ==
Gives NPCs flashlights at night; small performance hit
== Detail bump ==
Activates bumps on textures, giving them depth; very small performance hit, but does make the game load an additional texture for everything, increasing VRAM usage and loading times
== Steep parallax ==
Improves bump textures by giving them even more depth; I don't think it has any effect without detail bumps on; minimal fps impact
== Sun quality ==
Supposedly improves the quality and color of the sun, but I haven't noticed too much difference; big performance hit though
== Sun rays ==
Turns on visible lightrays/godrays in the air; big fps drop
== Sun shaft main/base intensity ==
Increases the stregnth and color of sunrays, looks unreasonably bright at higher settings; minimal performance impact if you already have sun rays on
== Specular factor ==
Increases the amount of light reflected from surfaces; higher settings make textures look too bright and reflective IMO; almost no performance hit
== SSAO mode ==
Controls the mode at which the game approximates shadows made by small objects in tight spaces such as corners and under furniture; SSAO has the smallest fps hit while HDAO has the biggest out of the three but looks the best; all options can have a very big FPS impact for not that noticeable visual difference
== SSAO quality ==
Controls the quality and depth of shadows made with SSAO
== Soft water ==
Makes water textures blend in with surrounding ground textures smoothly rather than cutting off; I haven't noticed any performance difference but it could affect fps somewhat in Zaton and the swamp
== Soft particles ==
Same as soft water but for fog and smoke, fades them out smoothly near solid objects; no performance difference for me
== Depth of field ==
Makes the world blurry during reloads and is the worst setting to ever exist, no performance difference
== Volumetric light ==
Same as sun rays but for other objects such as flashlights; small performance hit
== Wet surfaces ==
Makes objects look wet during rain and drowns Rostok's bunker; tiny performance hit
== Volumetric smoke ==
Has no effect
== Tessellation ==
Increases mesh quality beyond what the game's models can do; somewhat broken and doesn't work most of the time, and no real visual difference unless you look really closely at things; no performance hit for me
== 60hz ==
Caps the game's engine at 60fps
== Vsync ==
Caps the game's engine at your monitor's refresh rate to remove screen tearing at the cost of input delay; on my pc it makes the game crash upon hitting "apply", but shouldn't have too much performance impact