Offering pre-orders, often with exclusive bonuses or early access, has become common in the gaming industry. While it can provide financial support for game development, it can also create a situation where studios receive revenue before delivering a polished product. This is precisely what has been happening with recent hyped releases. Mortal Kombat 1, whose global release is scheduled for September 19, 2023, is currently out in early access for those who pre-ordered the game’s premium edition. Well, as usual, the game is unfinished, and players have been reporting about the stuttering issue during the cutscenes. So, is there a fix for this issue? More details are shared here.
Cutscenes and other animations in many modern games are often pre-rendered, meaning they are not generated in real-time by the game engine. Since these cutscenes are not rendered in real-time, they should generally not be affected by the player’s hardware performance, which is why it’s unusual for stuttering to occur during their playback. While players have speculated that these cutscenes are capped at 30 FPS, making them appear janky, the reason has yet to be officially verified. Anyway, if you are encountering similar stuttering issues during cutscenes, continue reading.
Mortal Kombat 1 (MK1) Stuttering during Cutscenes issue: Is there any fix yet
Now, obviously, there is no official fix for this issue yet. But like always, gamers have been discussing the issue and sharing some workarounds that worked for them. So, we have compiled a list of potential fixes that may solve the stuttering cutscenes issue. Keep in mind that they are not guaranteed fixes and may not work for everyone.
Skipped Shader Preparation?
Do not skip the shader preparation process when starting the game. Let it be completed as intended to ensure optimal performance and stability. If you accidentally canceled it, reinstall the game and allow the shader preparation process to complete during the initial launch.
Playing on an Nvidia Card?
If you are using an Nvidia graphics card, then you are in luck. Players have tweaked some settings in the Nvidia Control Panel and found a way to get rid of the stuttering issue. So, follow the steps below and give this workaround a try!
Open the Nvidia Control Panel and navigate to “Manage 3D Settings”. On the right, you’ll see “Global Settings” and “Program Settings”. Choose “Program Settings” and select Mortal Kombat 1 from the drop-down list. If it’s not listed, click “Add”, locate the game’s .exe file from its installation folder, and add it. Now, adjust the following settings:
- Max Frame Rate: 60 FPS
- Low Latency Mode: On
- Power Management Mode: Prefer Maximum Performance
- Anti-aliasing: FXAA: On
- Anti-aliasing – Transparency: 8x
- Triple Buffering: On
- Texture Filtering – Anisotropic Sample Optimization: On
After this, save the changes, and then launch the game. By now, the issue should be fixed.
GPU related workarounds
GPU-related issues are the main cause of stuttering. So, the first and foremost thing you need to check is your system’s GPU drivers. So, head to the official website of your GPU manufacturer, Nvidia or AMD, and check whether an update is available for the card you own. If an update is available, make sure to download and install it. After that, you will have to ensure that the game is running exclusively on your dedicated GPU. So, open Windows Graphics Settings. You can find it under Settings>Display>Graphics. After that, add Mortal Kombat 1 by clicking “Browse”. Click on the game and choose “Options”. Under sub-options, select “High Performance” and click “Save”.
System-related workarounds
Now, you will also need to make sure that you have given administrator privileges to the game. If you haven’t, right-click on the game’s executable file and select “Run as administrator”. After that, open your antivirus software or Windows Firewall settings, access the Exclusions or Exceptions tab, and add Mortal Kombat 1 to the list of excluded programs. The next thing is to make sure that no resource-hogging applications are running in the background. So, open your Task Manager (Ctrl+Shift+Esc), go to the Processes tab, and clear out all the unwanted applications that are resource-heavy.
In Game Settings
When you are in the main menu of the game, head to Settings>Graphics>Display. Here, if the Video mode is set to Borderless, switch to the windowed mode. Other than that, make sure that the in-game resolution is set to the native resolution of your monitor. After this, set the Graphics Quality preset to Low and make sure features like Bloom, Shadow Quality, etc. are turned off or low. Also, try tinkering with the Vsync option as well. If it is on, try setting it to off and vice versa.
Set the Monitor Refresh Rate to 60 Hz
If you are using a monitor that has a refresh rate of more than 60, then consider lowering it to 60 when launching the game. You can do so by going to Windows Settings> Display> Advanced Display Settings> Choose a refresh rate> 60. After this, save the changes and launch the game.
Well, those are some workarounds that may solve the stuttering during cutscenes issue in Mortal Kombat 1. In any case, when players encounter stuttering or performance issues during cutscenes in a game, it’s a legitimate concern, and we hope that the developers will investigate and address it with the game’s full release. Well, if you found this guide informative, follow DigiStatement for more such reads. Read more: Mortal Kombat 1 (MK1) Infinite Loading Screen Issue: Is there any fix yet
