Hello, I’d like to share my configuration for Hitman 3 (World of Assassination) for the best experience on the new Steam Deck OLED models. Out of the box, it runs decent, but not great. I looked up optimal settings, but the guides currently available don’t take into consideration the new OLED model features. Such as the slightly better performance, the screen now being capable of 90Hz, and XeSS and FSR 2 being added to the game.
So after a lot of tinkering, these are the settings I found offer the best experience across all maps, I figured I’d share with the community. *Please share any recommendations or changes that you’ve found to be better*.
First, in Steam’s battery settings (… button while in game) enable per-game profile, and limit the FPS to 45FPS. I targeted 45FPS because it feels very smooth, keeps graphics looking great, doesn’t kill the battery quickly like 60FPS is going to, and scales perfectly with 90Hz refresh rate. Now onto Hitman’s Graphics settings:
Adaptive Supersampling Technology: AMD FSR 2
Adaptive Supersamping Quality: Quality
Level of Detail: Medium
Texture Quality: High
Mirror Reflection Quality: Medium
Reflection Quality: Medium
Motion Blur: Off
Simulation Quality (Graphics): Best
Any settings not listed, I didn’t change from default.
After you’re satisfied with the changes you’ve made, you can add “-skip_launcher” to the launch options. (Click the settings “gear” icon before launching game, general tab).
Also, another major QoL improvement when it comes to the back buttons: I’d recommend mapping them to toggle run and toggle instinct, so you don’t have to hold the bumper buttons down. I also have one of the buttons mapped to “M” to quickly toggle the map.
Any feedback welcome! Hope this helps someone :)
Thanks for the settings! Is HDR working for you? Even if it says ON in the launcher options I don’t get the HDR badge above the brightness slider in the Deck’s Quick Settings menu. And the option to toggle HDR doesn’t appear in the in game graphics settings menu. :/
HDR never worked for me in Hitman 1 or 3 on Steam Deck LCD (docked to HDR display), and it doesn’t work on OLED either. I’m not really surprised; Hitman 3 is known for having had broken HDR for a long time.
It works well for me on desktop if I a) turn on HDR in Win 10 manually and b) turn it on in the launcher as well. It looks amazing on my LG CX. I really hope it’s fixable on the Deck (like many other games) through proton or by the devs at some point.
Hey thanks for this! I just installed the World of Assassination on my new OLED yesterday so this will be very helpful!
Awesome! Let me know how it does for you! All the guides already out there were made before FSR2 was added, so they recommended turning down graphics settings more than needed, and shooting for 40FPS. This may have been great at the time before FSR2 was added, and when LCD only supported 60Hz.
45FPS/90Hz is way better than 40/80, and you don’t have to knock down the graphics as much with FSR2, and perhaps the faster memory and such.
Thanks for this - my OLED is supposed to show up this week, so I’ll give your settings a whirl thereafter.
I personally prefer sticking to 30fps at native than having to use fsr2, which is not great to begin with and even worse when you go to low resolutions as baseline. After all, hitman is by no means a fast paced game that benefits from higher fps. Subjective of course, but if stable 30fps (or higher obviously) are within reach without resolution sacrifice - I keep it as starting point.
Great details dude, thank you!
What’s the length of time you can play HITMAN on the deck before it needs charging?
I have tried so many times to get into hitman, my favorite contemporary stealth series probably being dishonored. It’s just too overwhelming(?) for me
I’d say follow the guided story missions until you get comfortable. They’re very much “go here, do this” and are generally pretty fun. But then there’s a huge amount more to uncover on every map once you do the story stuff, which will now be way less intimidating since you’ve learned the map doing the story stuff. It’s a big sandbox and you’re rewarded for being creative. Take your time on each map, each one is almost its own game.