Borderlands 2 - Gain Performance And Improvements With .ini File Tweaks

Disable Startup Movies

This will allow you to turn off the various logos when the game starts up. They’re already skippable with a quick click, but this allows you to deactivate all of them.

In WillowEngine.ini, find these lines:

[FullScreenMovie]
StartupMovies=2K_logo
StartupMovies=Gearbox_logo
StartupMovies=NVidia
StartupMovies=Loading
SkippableMovies=2K_logo
SkippableMovies=Gearbox_logo
SkippableMovies=Attract
SkippableMovies=NVidia

Then, add a ; in front of each “StartupMovie” line. The result will be this:

[FullScreenMovie]
;StartupMovies=2K_logo
;StartupMovies=Gearbox_logo
;StartupMovies=NVidia
;StartupMovies=Loading
SkippableMovies=2K_logo
SkippableMovies=Gearbox_logo
SkippableMovies=Attract
SkippableMovies=NVidia

And you’re done — none of the usual logos will load when you start up Borderlands 2, and you’ll get into the game quicker.

Disable Framerate Smoothing

This might help you get better performance if you’re having some graphical issues.

In WillowEngine.ini, find this line:

bSmoothFrameRate=TRUE

If it’s set to TRUE, you can disable it by setting it to FALSE, like this:

bSmoothFrameRate=FALSE

Disable Black Outline Shader

You know that big black outline that surrounds most objects and gives them a more cartoonish look? It’s cool, but removing it is another way you can tone down the graphical requirements of Borderlands 2 to get it to run better.

In WillowEngine.ini, find this line:

DefaultPostProcessName=WillowEngineMaterials.WillowScenePostProcess

To turn off the shader, you need to make adjustments to the line — namely, remove both instances of the word “Willow,” so it looks like this:

DefaultPostProcessName=EngineMaterials.ScenePostProcess

Disable Cel Shading (or whatever it is)

In WillowEngine.ini, find the same line as above:

DefaultPostProcessName=WillowEngineMaterials.WillowScenePostProcess

and change it to:

DefaultPostProcessName=WillowEngineMaterials.RyanScenePostProcess

That will remove the black outline shader as above, and also disable the cel shading effect to make the graphics slightly more realistic and add more contrast on surfaces. You’ll also get a pretty marked performance boost, because these shaders take a fair amount of processing power.

Disable Shadows and Lighting to Boost Performance

In WillowEngine.ini, find these lines (all of which are under [SystemSettings] but not all of which are together:

DynamicLights
DynamicShadows
bAllowLightShafts

Set them all to “False.” The lines should look like this:

DynamicLights=False
DynamicShadows=False
bAllowLightShafts=False

If you’ve already knocked your graphical settings down to the minimums and are still having troubles with framerate, turning off those settings may help.

Reduce Texture Pop-in Time on Ammo

If you’ve noticed texture pop-up when you open loot containers and it’s irritating you, you can greatly reduce it or eliminate it with this alteration.

In WillowEngine.ini, find these lines:

MipFadeInSpeed0=0.3
MipFadeOutSpeed0=0.1
MipFadeInSpeed1=2.0
MipFadeOutSpeed1=1.0

Reducing the texture pop-in requires you to turn down the values by changing them all to zero. They should look like this:

MipFadeInSpeed0=0
MipFadeOutSpeed0=0
MipFadeInSpeed1=0
MipFadeOutSpeed1=0

Reduce All Texture Pop-in

You can also alter the time it takes for textures to render throughout the game. I’m unsure just how noticeable an effect this tweak actually creates, but it may make the game run a little smoother.

In WillowEngine.ini, find [SystemSettings].

Scroll down until you see a number of lines that start with the phrase TEXTUREGROUP.

On each of those lines, copy and add this text string: ,NumStreamedMips=0

Enable/Disable Reflections

You can turn reflections in water and other surfaces on and off independently of your other graphics settings if you choose.

In WillowEngine.ini, find these lines:

AllowImageReflections
AllowImageReflectionShadowing

Just switch the True/False value to turn them on or off. They’ll look like this:

AllowImageReflections=True
or
AllowImageReflectionShadowing=False

Boost Texture Resolutions

If you want to kick up the graphical fidelity of Borderlands 2, you can increase the resolution of some textures so they’ll look more like those of cutscenes. Expect this tweak to negatively impact your performance, however.

In WillowEngine.ini, find these lines:

MaxProcBuildingLODColorTextureSize
MaxProcBuildingLODLightingTextureSize

and change them to this:

MaxProcBuildingLODColorTextureSize=2048
MaxProcBuildingLODLightingTextureSize=2048