For the best balance of image quality and performance in Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection on PC, use High textures and models, Medium shadows and reflections, High anisotropic filtering, Ambient Occlusion on, Motion Blur off, and DLSS or FSR 2 on Quality at 1440p. At 1080p, native resolution or Quality upscaling is usually enough; at 4K, start with DLSS Quality or FSR 2 Quality and lower shadows before sacrificing textures.
That profile targets a stable 60 fps on a sensible modern gaming PC without turning Naughty Dog's spectacular environments into muddy cardboard scenery. The collection includes Uncharted 4: A Thief's End and Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, and both games can behave very differently depending on whether you're in a tight interior, a foliage-heavy jungle, or one of Madagascar's wide driving sections.
Before changing anything, check the official Steam listing for current requirements and updates. The collection also benefits from shader compilation and texture-streaming work during the first launch, so don't judge performance from the opening minutes alone.
Best Uncharted Legacy of Thieves PC settings
The best starting point is a tuned High preset, not Ultra. Ultra increases the cost of shadows, reflections, volumetric effects, and long-distance detail, but the visual difference is often invisible during a fast climb or firefight. High preserves the texture detail that makes Drake's ruined architecture and Chloe Frazer's environments pop while avoiding several expensive background effects.
| Graphics Setting | Recommended Value | FPS Impact | Visual Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Texture Quality | High | Low FPS impact, high VRAM use | Sharper rock, clothing, walls, and weapon surfaces |
| Model Quality | High | Medium | Improves geometry on characters, ruins, and vehicles |
| Anisotropic Filtering | 16x | Very low | Keeps roads, floors, and ground textures clear at angles |
| Shadow Quality | Medium | High | Reduces shadow resolution and distant shadow detail |
| Reflections | Medium | Medium to high | Controls water, glass, and shiny surface reflections |
| Ambient Occlusion | On or High | Low to medium | Adds contact depth around rocks, walls, and characters |
| Volumetric Effects | Medium | Medium | Changes fog, haze, smoke, and light shafts |
| Screen Space Shadows | On | Low to medium | Improves small dynamic shadows near the camera |
| Motion Blur | Off | None | Cleaner camera movement and aiming |
| Depth of Field | Gameplay preference | Low | Softens backgrounds during cinematic focus effects |
| Chromatic Aberration | Off | None | Removes colored edge fringing |
Textures are the setting you should protect first, provided your GPU has enough VRAM. At 1080p, 6GB is generally comfortable for a High profile; 8GB or more gives you a safer margin at 1440p. If you see sudden texture pop-in, stutter when entering new areas, or unusually long traversal hitches, drop textures one step before cutting every other setting. Those symptoms point more toward VRAM pressure than raw shader performance.
Anisotropic filtering is the easy win. Set it to 16x if the game exposes the option. It makes the dirt tracks in Madagascar, stone walkways, and interior floors look dramatically better at oblique angles while costing almost nothing on a modern graphics card. Lowering it to 4x or 8x to gain a frame or two is rarely worthwhile.
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Upscaling is the most powerful performance control in the PC release. It renders the game below your display resolution, then reconstructs a sharper final image. Used correctly, it can turn an unstable 45 fps experience into a consistent 60 without the ugly blur associated with older spatial upscalers.
| Target Resolution | Recommended Upscaler | Starting Mode | When to Change It |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1080p | Native or DLSS/FSR 2 | Quality | Use Balanced only when the GPU cannot hold 60 fps |
| 1440p | DLSS on Nvidia, FSR 2 on AMD | Quality | Move to Balanced for demanding jungle and driving scenes |
| 4K | DLSS or FSR 2 | Quality | Use Balanced for 60 fps; avoid Performance unless necessary |
| Steam Deck | FSR 2 | Balanced or Performance | Pair with a 30 fps cap and reduced shadows |
Nvidia owners should begin with DLSS Quality. It generally produces the cleanest reconstruction of foliage, thin branches, and distant geometry, all of which can shimmer during the jungle chapters. AMD and Intel users should try FSR 2 Quality first. FSR 2 can look excellent in motion, though fine vegetation may show more crawling or sharpening than DLSS.
At 1440p, DLSS or FSR 2 Quality renders at a lower internal resolution while retaining enough detail for Drake's climbing routes and combat arenas. Balanced mode is the rescue option when GPU usage remains pinned at 99 percent and your frame rate falls below the display's refresh target. Performance mode is best reserved for 4K displays on weaker cards or handheld hardware. At 1080p, Performance mode throws away too much fine detail and can make faces, foliage, and weapon silhouettes look soft.
Don't enable an upscaler and assume every stutter is fixed. Upscaling reduces GPU rendering cost, but it won't solve a CPU limit, shader-compilation hitch, insufficient VRAM, or background application interference. Watch the frame-time graph if your monitoring tool supports it. A flat 16.7 ms line is a smooth 60 fps target; a counter that says 60 while frame times jump between 10 and 30 ms will still feel uneven.
For more general troubleshooting, Steamoz's guide to PC crashes and FPS fixes covers several useful Windows-side checks. The same fundamentals apply here: update the GPU driver, disable unnecessary overlays, and make sure the game is installed on an SSD.
Where Uncharted's biggest FPS drops happen
The collection is largely well behaved once its shaders and assets settle, but a single average benchmark doesn't tell the whole story. The demanding moments are easy to identify. In A Thief's End, Madagascar's wide landscapes combine foliage, distant ruins, dynamic shadows, water, and vehicles. The jeep sequences can expose both GPU limits and traversal-related frame-time spikes. In The Lost Legacy, the Western Ghats open areas push draw distance and vegetation harder than the game's more linear interiors.
| Scenario | Likely Limitation | First Setting to Lower | Practical Target |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small interior firefight | CPU or engine frame pacing | None; inspect background apps | Stable 60 fps or your chosen cap |
| Madagascar jeep chase | GPU, shadows, streaming | Shadows, reflections, volumetrics | Stable 45-60 fps without large drops |
| Jungle traversal | GPU and VRAM | Textures only if VRAM is full | Consistent frame times over peak FPS |
| Large Lost Legacy vistas | GPU and geometry draw distance | Model quality, then upscaling mode | 60 fps on High or a locked 30 fps |
| Dense combat with explosions | GPU effects and CPU simulation | Volumetric effects and reflections | No dips that disrupt aiming |
Use the Madagascar hub and driving sections as your stress test rather than the opening chapter. Walk, drive, and rotate the camera across the widest view you can find. Then repeat the test during a firefight. If the frame rate is low in both situations, you're GPU-limited and should adjust resolution scaling, shadows, or reflections. If performance drops only during traversal or crowded combat, the issue may be CPU scheduling, asset streaming, or shader compilation.
There's a good reason not to chase an ultra-high average. Uncharted is a cinematic third-person adventure built around camera movement, climbing animations, and sudden combat transitions. A locked 60 fps feels substantially better than a fluctuating 80-to-48 fps range. If your hardware cannot maintain 60, cap the game at 30 or 40 fps rather than accepting constant swings. A stable 40 fps on a 120Hz display can be a particularly pleasant compromise, assuming your monitor supports a matching refresh mode.
Variable refresh rate through G-Sync or FreeSync is worth enabling. Set the cap a few frames below your display's maximum refresh rate—for example, 141 fps on a 144Hz panel—but only if the hardware can actually approach that figure. For a 60Hz screen, a 60 fps cap is fine when it holds; otherwise, a stable 30 fps cap is less distracting than constant judder.
Performance profiles for different gaming PCs
There isn't one magic preset because the collection scales across a wide range of GPUs. The important distinction is whether your system is limited by graphics horsepower, VRAM, or the processor. Use these profiles as starting points, then test them in the demanding locations listed above.
| PC Class | Resolution and Target | Core Settings | Upscaling Profile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry-level 1080p | 1080p, 30-60 fps | Medium textures, Medium models, Low shadows, Medium effects | FSR 2 Balanced |
| Mainstream 1080p | 1080p, 60 fps | High textures and models, Medium shadows, High filtering | Native or Quality |
| Mainstream 1440p | 1440p, 60 fps | High textures, High models, Medium shadows and reflections | DLSS/FSR 2 Quality |
| High-end 1440p | 1440p, high refresh | Very High textures and models, High shadows, High effects | Quality or native resolution |
| 4K enthusiast | 4K, 60 fps | High textures, High models, Medium shadows, Medium reflections | DLSS/FSR 2 Quality or Balanced |
| Steam Deck or similar handheld | 1280x800, 30 fps | Low shadows, Medium textures, Low reflections, effects reduced | FSR 2 Balanced or Performance |
For a mainstream 1440p machine, the sweet spot is surprisingly simple: High textures, High models, Medium shadows, Medium reflections, Medium volumetrics, Ambient Occlusion enabled, and Quality upscaling. This keeps the faces, clothing, ruins, and vehicles looking expensive while targeting the settings that create the largest frame-time savings.
On a lower-end GPU, lower shadow quality before texture quality. Shadows are recalculated across large areas and can become expensive in foliage-heavy scenes. Reflections are another strong cut, particularly near water and glossy indoor surfaces. Volumetric effects affect fog and god rays, so Medium usually preserves the atmosphere without the cost of High.
On a CPU-limited system, lowering resolution may do almost nothing. Watch GPU utilization: if it sits well below 90 percent while the frame rate is poor, reduce background processes, close browsers, disable overlays, and use a sensible frame cap. Lowering model quality can help a little in crowded scenes, but don't expect an enormous gain because the game still has to process animation, streaming, and world logic on the processor.
Steamoz's low-FPS troubleshooting guide has additional advice on overlays and system conflicts. You can also compare storage and hardware expectations with our PC requirements breakdown; the games differ technically, but the checklist for diagnosing a struggling system is useful.
Stutter fixes, frame caps, and final tuning
First-launch stutter is the most common reason players think the game runs worse than it should. Let the collection finish its initial shader work, avoid repeatedly changing drivers during testing, and give each setting profile several minutes in the same area. Traversing into a new section can still produce a short hitch as assets stream, but repeated stutter usually points to a deeper system issue.
- Install the game on an SSD. Both games stream detailed environments, animation data, and high-resolution textures. A hard drive can turn normal traversal into prolonged stalls.
- Update your graphics driver. Use a current Game Ready or Adrenalin driver, then reboot before benchmarking. If the problem began immediately after a driver update, a clean installation can be worth trying.
- Disable overlays temporarily. Test Steam Overlay, Discord, GeForce Experience, Radeon recording tools, RGB utilities, and performance monitors one at a time. Don't permanently disable everything without testing; isolate the culprit.
- Use exclusive fullscreen or borderless consistently. Switching modes while troubleshooting can reset scaling, HDR, and refresh behavior. Confirm that Windows and the game are using the same display resolution.
- Cap for consistency. Choose 60, 40, or 30 fps based on the worst demanding scene, not the opening corridor. A frame cap prevents the GPU from bouncing between power states and makes camera movement feel steadier.
- Check VRAM and temperatures. If VRAM is full, texture streaming can become erratic. If the GPU or CPU is thermal throttling, a lower preset won't fix the root cause.
Motion Blur deserves a clear recommendation: turn it off for gameplay. The effect is part of the cinematic presentation, but it smears the image during rapid camera turns and makes a minor frame-time dip feel worse. Depth of Field is more subjective because it mainly affects cinematic focus and some aiming scenes. Keep it on if you like the filmic look; disable it if you want the cleanest possible image.
Chromatic Aberration should stay off for most players. The colored fringing around the edges of the image is an intentional lens effect, not extra detail. HDR is worth enabling only if your monitor has real HDR performance and you've calibrated Windows correctly. A mediocre HDR display can make dark caves and interiors look flatter than a properly tuned SDR presentation.
If you play through Steam Link or another streaming setup, prioritize a locked frame rate and lower effects over maximum resolution. Network latency is already competing with input response, so uneven local frame pacing becomes especially noticeable. For more performance-focused configuration ideas, see Steamoz's settings guide for higher FPS and our max-FPS graphics breakdown.
The short version for a smooth playthrough
Start with High textures and models, Medium shadows, Medium reflections, Medium volumetrics, 16x anisotropic filtering, Ambient Occlusion on, Motion Blur off, and Quality upscaling. Test the Madagascar driving sections and the wide landscapes in The Lost Legacy. If the GPU is maxed out, switch to Balanced upscaling or lower shadows. If VRAM is full, reduce textures. If the GPU is underused, investigate CPU load, overlays, thermals, and frame pacing instead.
That approach keeps Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection looking like the lavish adventure it is while removing the settings that quietly waste performance. You don't need Ultra across the board to enjoy the best version of Drake and Chloe's journey; you need stable frame times, a clean reconstruction mode, and enough headroom for the game's biggest vistas.
For patch information and technical support, consult Naughty Dog's official site, the Nixxes support portal, and the game's official Steam discussions. Those sources are the best place to verify changes after future PC updates.