TL;DR
- Control Resonant is a demanding PC game — Ultra settings will hurt your FPS more than you expect.
- The sweet spot for most players is High textures + Medium volumetrics + DLSS Quality + Ray Tracing Off.
- Path Tracing is only worth enabling on RTX 4080 or higher — ideally with DLSS and Frame Generation.
- Turn off SDF Reflections, Motion Blur, and Film Grain first — big visual cost, small visual benefit.
- Enable Frame Generation only after you have a stable base frame rate.
- DLSS 4.5 is not automatically faster than older DLSS modes on older GPUs — test and compare.
Why Control Resonant Is So Demanding on PC
Control Resonant runs on Remedy’s Northlight engine and supports both Ray Tracing and full Path Tracing. That combination can absolutely destroy frame rates if you go in with everything set to Ultra.
The game supports NVIDIA DLSS 4.5, AMD FSR 4, Ray Reconstruction, Frame Generation, and Multi Frame Generation on RTX 50-series hardware. NVIDIA specifically highlights these as major features of the PC version.
But the catch is real: Path Tracing is brutally expensive. Testing on an RTX 4060 laptop found performance jumping from 33 FPS to 63 FPS simply by switching from maximum settings to an optimized configuration — with Ray Tracing and Path Tracing disabled. That is nearly double the frame rate by changing graphics settings, not hardware.
The lesson is simple: Ultra does not always mean better. It often just means your GPU is overworked for gains you can barely see during gameplay.
Control Resonant Best Settings – Quick Recommendation for Most PCs
If you want to get into the game without spending 30 minutes in the graphics menu, start with this:
- Display Mode: Fullscreen
- Resolution: Native monitor resolution
- Upscaler: DLSS or FSR
- Upscaler Quality: Quality at 1080p / Balanced at 1440p
- Frame Generation: Off initially
- VSync: Off if using G-Sync or FreeSync
- Texture Resolution: High
- Texture Filtering: High / Ultra
- Level of Detail: High
- Global Illumination: High
- Volumetric Lighting: Medium
- Volumetric Spotlight: High
- Fog: Medium
- Shadow Map Resolution: High
- Shadow Map Filtering: High
- Shadow Map Detail: High
- SSAO: On
- Screen Space Reflections: Medium
- SDF Reflections: Off
- Ray Tracing: Off
- Path Tracing: Off
- Motion Blur: Off
- Film Grain: Off
- Lens Distortion: Off
Keep textures and LOD high. Reduce volumetrics, reflections, and lighting first. That is where the performance gains come from without destroying how the game looks.
Control Resonant Best 1080p PC Settings
At 1080p, the goal is a stable 60 FPS or higher without compromising the game’s visual identity.
- Resolution: 1920×1080
- Display Mode: Fullscreen
- Upscaler: DLSS / FSR Quality
- Frame Generation: Off initially
- VSync: Off with FreeSync or G-Sync
- Texture Resolution: High
- Texture Filtering: High
- Level of Detail: High
- Global Illumination: High
- Volumetric Lighting: Medium
- Volumetric Spotlight: High
- Fog: Medium
- Shadow Map Resolution: High
- Shadow Map Filtering: High
- Shadow Map Detail: High
- SSAO: On
- Screen Space Reflections: Medium
- SDF Reflections: Off
- Ray Tracing: Off
- Path Tracing: Off
- Motion Blur: Off
- Film Grain: Off
Reducing expensive settings rather than dropping everything to Low produces the best balance. Keep textures and LOD high — those are what make environments look sharp during gameplay.
Control Resonant Best 1440p PC Settings
1440p is the sweet spot for most gaming PCs right now. The official recommended hardware target for 1440p/60 is around an RTX 3060 Ti, RX 6700 XT, or Intel Arc B580 with 16 GB RAM — and that target assumes Ray Tracing is off and Balanced upscaling is used.
- Resolution: 2560×1440
- Upscaler: DLSS Quality
- Frame Generation: Off initially
- Ray Tracing: Off
- Texture Resolution: High
- Texture Filtering: Ultra
- Level of Detail: High
- Global Illumination: High
- Volumetric Lighting: High
- Volumetric Spotlight: High
- Fog: Medium
- Shadows: High
- SSAO: On
- Screen Space Reflections: Medium
- SDF Reflections: Off
- Motion Blur: Off
- Film Grain: Off
This High/Medium mix gives you significantly better image quality than the Medium preset while keeping expensive lighting and reflection settings under control.
Control Resonant Best 4K PC Settings
Native 4K is extremely demanding. Even very powerful GPUs can struggle at native 4K Ultra without Ray Tracing. DLSS is essentially mandatory here.
- Resolution: 3840×2160
- Upscaler: DLSS Quality
- Texture Resolution: Ultra
- Texture Filtering: Ultra
- Level of Detail: High
- Global Illumination: High
- Volumetric Lighting: Medium / High
- Shadows: High
- Screen Space Reflections: Medium / High
- SDF Reflections: Off / Medium
- Ray Tracing: Off initially — enable once you have headroom
- Motion Blur: Off
- Film Grain: Off
Start with Ray Tracing off. Get a stable base frame rate first. Then enable RT features gradually and check your FPS after each change.
Should You Use DLSS in Control Resonant?
If you have an NVIDIA RTX GPU, yes — absolutely. DLSS is one of the easiest performance gains you can get without touching individual settings.
- 1080p: DLSS Quality
- 1440p: Start with DLSS Quality, drop to Balanced if you need more FPS
- 4K: DLSS Quality first, Balanced if needed
Do not jump straight to Performance mode. At 1440p and especially 1080p, aggressive upscaling makes fine details noticeably softer and the image quality loss becomes obvious.
DLSS 4.5 Is Not Automatically the Best Option on Older GPUs
This is an important detail that catches people out at launch.
You might assume that DLSS 4.5 being newer means it is automatically faster. That is not always true. Testing has shown that on older RTX hardware — including the RTX 3060 Ti — some DLSS 4.5 configurations are not necessarily faster than older DLSS modes.
The correct approach: test DLSS 4.5 against older DLSS modes, compare FPS and image quality, and keep whichever performs better on your specific card. Do not blindly pick the newest option.
Should You Enable Frame Generation?
Not until you have a stable base frame rate. Frame Generation works best when your GPU is already producing a reasonably solid frame rate.
Going from a base of 60 FPS to a displayed FPS much higher with Frame Generation is a smooth experience. Going from 25 FPS to 80 FPS with Frame Generation is not — because the responsiveness still reflects 25-FPS rendering. The input latency and feel do not improve just because the frame counter goes up.
The correct order is: optimize your actual rendering performance first, then experiment with Frame Generation as a bonus on top.
Is Ray Tracing Worth Enabling in Control Resonant?
It depends on your GPU.
For mid-range cards, turn it off. The official recommended spec assumes RT disabled, and the performance cost is significant. Ray-traced lighting can improve the atmosphere noticeably — especially in reflective and well-lit environments — but not at the cost of dropping below 60 FPS.
For high-end cards like the RTX 4080 and 4090, RT High is worth experimenting with. Testing found that High RT offers a strong balance between visual quality and performance rather than simply maxing every RT option.
Is Path Tracing Worth It in Control Resonant?
Path Tracing is the highest quality lighting mode in the game — and the most expensive by a significant margin. Here is a realistic breakdown by GPU:
- RTX 3060 Ti / 3070 / 3080: Not recommended
- RTX 4070 / 4070 Super: Experiment with caution
- RTX 4080 / 4090: Yes, with DLSS and Frame Generation
- RTX 5070 Ti: Yes, with DLSS and Frame Generation
- RTX 5080 / 5090: Absolutely — this is what those cards are for
Even on the RTX 5090, DLSS and Frame Generation are a major part of achieving very high frame rates with Path Tracing active. Do not expect Path Tracing to run well without upscaling.
Control Resonant Best Settings for RTX 50-Series GPUs
If you are running an RTX 5070 Ti, RTX 5080, or RTX 5090, you have significant headroom to push the settings much harder. NVIDIA’s own testing reports up to 380 FPS on an RTX 5090 at 1440p Ultra with Path Tracing under its DLSS 4.5 and Multi Frame Generation configuration — though those are DLSS plus Frame Generation figures, not native rendering.
A sensible high-end configuration for RTX 50 series at 1440p:
- Ultra Textures, Ultra Filtering, Ultra LOD
- High/Ultra Lighting and Volumetrics
- High Shadows and SSR
- Ray Tracing High
- DLSS Quality + Ray Reconstruction
- Frame Generation On
- Path Tracing — enable if you want the full visual upgrade
Which Settings Have the Biggest FPS Impact?
Do not lower everything equally. Some settings cost much more performance than others. Reduce these first:
- Path Tracing — massive performance hit, disable unless you have a top-end GPU
- Ray-Traced Indirect Lighting — huge cost even on powerful cards
- Volumetric Lighting — expensive in atmospheric areas, drop to Medium first
- Global Illumination — particularly costly at high RT settings
- SDF Reflections — turn this off immediately, it is one of the easiest wins
- Shadow settings — can be reduced with relatively little visible loss during gameplay
Which Settings Should You Keep High?
These are worth protecting before you reduce anything else:
Texture Resolution: Keep at High or Ultra if your VRAM allows it. Textures deliver good visual quality relative to their performance cost and are what make environments look sharp up close.
Texture Filtering: Keep at High or Ultra. It maintains detail at different viewing angles without being the first thing to sacrifice.
Level of Detail: Keep at High. Dropping this makes environments noticeably less detailed, especially when traversing Manhattan at speed.
Post Processing Settings – What to Turn Off
Motion Blur: Turn it off. Control Resonant is a fast melee action game with aggressive traversal. Motion blur makes rapid camera movement feel smeared, especially on high-refresh displays.
Film Grain: Turn it off. Disabling it gives you a cleaner, sharper image during gameplay.
Lens Distortion: Turn it off for the clearest gameplay image.
Depth of Field: Personal preference. Leave it on for cinematic presentation, turn it off if you want maximum clarity during combat.
VSync and Frame Rate Cap Settings
If you have G-Sync or FreeSync, turn VSync off in the game and manage it through your VRR setup. If you do not have VRR and experience screen tearing, enable VSync.
For frame rate caps, match your monitor’s refresh rate:
- 60 Hz monitor: Cap at 60 FPS
- 120 Hz monitor: Cap at 120 FPS
- 144 Hz monitor: Cap at 141–144 FPS
- 165 Hz monitor: Cap at 162–165 FPS
A frame cap prevents your GPU from rendering frames your monitor cannot display and helps maintain consistent frame pacing.
Control Resonant Best Settings by GPU
- GTX 1070: 1080p / Low-Medium / Quality upscale / RT Off
- RTX 3060: 1080p–1440p / Medium-High / DLSS / RT Off
- RTX 3060 Ti: 1440p / Medium-High / DLSS Balanced-Quality / RT Off
- RTX 3070: 1440p / High / DLSS / RT Off
- RTX 4070: 1440p / High-Ultra / DLSS / RT experiment
- RTX 4070 Ti Super: 1440p / Ultra / DLSS / RT High
- RTX 4080: 1440p–4K / Ultra / DLSS / RT High
- RTX 4090: 4K / Ultra / DLSS / RT High or PT
- RTX 5070 Ti: 1440p–4K / Ultra / DLSS + FG / RT + PT
- RTX 5080: 4K / Ultra / DLSS + FG / PT
- RTX 5090: 4K / Ultra / PT / DLSS + FG — go all out
These are starting points, not guaranteed FPS figures. Your CPU, RAM, VRAM, driver version, and upscaling mode all affect actual performance. The game is predominantly GPU-bound at higher settings.
Control Resonant Low-End PC Settings
The official minimum spec targets roughly an i5-8500 or Ryzen 5 3500, 16 GB RAM, and a GTX 1070, RX 5600 XT, or Intel Arc A580 at 1080p/30 on Low settings with Quality upscaling and RT off.
If you are close to minimum spec, prioritize a stable frame rate above all else:
- Resolution: 1080p
- Upscaling: Quality or Balanced
- Textures: Medium
- Filtering: Medium
- LOD: Low / Medium
- Global Illumination: Low
- Volumetrics: Medium
- Shadows: Medium
- SSR: Off
- SDF Reflections: Off
- Ray Tracing: Off
- Path Tracing: Off
- Motion Blur: Off
- Film Grain: Off
If you are still under your target FPS, drop to a more aggressive upscaling mode before turning everything to Low. Upscaling costs almost nothing visually compared to dropping textures to Low.
Control Resonant Steam Deck and Handheld PC Settings
Do not attempt desktop Ultra settings on a handheld. The game includes a dedicated Handheld preset — start there and then experiment:
- Textures: Medium
- LOD: Low / Medium
- Shadows: Low / Medium
- Volumetrics: Medium
- Ray Tracing: Off
- Path Tracing: Off
- Upscaling: Enabled
- Frame Generation: Test carefully
The goal on a handheld is a stable, consistent frame rate. Screenshot quality is not the priority here.
My Overall Recommended PC Settings for Control Resonant
If you are setting up on a typical mid-to-high-end gaming PC targeting 1440p/60, start with this exact configuration:
Display
- Fullscreen
- 2560×1440
- DLSS Quality
- Frame Generation: Off
- VSync: Off / VRR On
Graphics
- Textures: High
- Filtering: Ultra
- LOD: High
- Global Illumination: High
- Volumetric Lighting: Medium
- Volumetric Spotlight: High
- Fog: Medium
- Shadows: High
- SSAO: On
- SSR: Medium
- SDF Reflections: Off
- Ray Tracing: Off
- Path Tracing: Off
Post Processing
- Motion Blur: Off
- Film Grain: Off
- Lens Distortion: Off
- Depth of Field: On
- Vignette: Optional
Then play for 15 to 20 minutes in a demanding area. If you are comfortably above your target FPS, increase settings in this order: Volumetrics → Shadows → SSR → Global Illumination → Ray Tracing.
That approach is far more effective than turning everything to Ultra and watching your frame rate collapse.
Before jumping into the graphics settings, if you still need to claim your Digital Deluxe or preorder content, our Control Resonant preorder and Deluxe Edition bonuses guide walks through exactly how to get every item.
Frequently Asked Questions – Control Resonant PC Settings
What are the best PC settings for Control Resonant?
For most players the best starting point is High textures, High LOD, Medium volumetrics, Medium SSR, SDF Reflections off, Ray Tracing off, and DLSS Quality. This delivers strong image quality without triggering the game’s biggest performance costs.
Should I enable Ray Tracing in Control Resonant?
Only if you have a high-end GPU. On mid-range cards like the RTX 3060 Ti or RTX 4070, the performance cost is not worth it. On an RTX 4080, 4090, or RTX 50-series card, RT High is worth experimenting with. Always establish your base FPS with RT off first.
Is Path Tracing worth enabling in Control Resonant?
Path Tracing is only realistically usable on RTX 4080, RTX 4090, and RTX 50-series cards — and even then, DLSS Quality and Frame Generation are essentially mandatory alongside it. On mid-range hardware, leave it off.
Should I use DLSS or FSR in Control Resonant?
If you have an NVIDIA RTX GPU, use DLSS. It provides better image quality than FSR on compatible hardware. AMD GPU owners should use FSR 4. Both are significantly better than running native resolution at lower graphics settings.
Should I turn on Frame Generation in Control Resonant?
Not until you have a stable base frame rate. Frame Generation displays more frames but does not improve responsiveness when your base rendering FPS is too low. Optimize your actual FPS first, then enable Frame Generation as a boost on top.
Is DLSS 4.5 better than older DLSS in Control Resonant?
Not always on older RTX hardware. Testing has shown that RTX 3060 Ti owners in particular should compare DLSS 4.5 against older DLSS modes rather than assuming newer is faster. Test both and keep whichever performs better on your specific card.
What settings have the biggest performance impact in Control Resonant?
Path Tracing, Ray-Traced Indirect Lighting, Volumetric Lighting, Global Illumination, and SDF Reflections have the biggest performance costs. Reduce or disable these first before touching textures or LOD.
Can Control Resonant run on a low-end PC?
Yes, but with significant compromises. The minimum spec targets 1080p/30 on Low settings with Quality upscaling and RT off. Use Medium textures, disable SSR and SDF Reflections, keep Volumetrics at Medium, and rely on upscaling rather than native resolution.
