Frame generation is baked into ACE COMBAT 8: WINGS OF THEVE, but the game ships with no menu toggle to turn it on — and the usual console variables get overridden the moment you launch. After some digging I found a way to force it through a simple INI edit, and that’s exactly what I want to walk you through here. If you’re chasing smoother frame rates in the skies and don’t want to leave free performance on the table, this is the fix.
I put this together because the workaround isn’t obvious and the enabling variables don’t behave the way you’d expect. One honest caveat up front: this is an INI mod, and I have no idea how the anti-cheat will treat it — so treat the online portion at your own risk before you commit.
Forcing DLSS Frame Generation Through Engine.ini
The trick is to add a pair of Streamline console variables to an Engine.ini file inside the game’s config directory. Because the game overrides the normal enable variables, editing this file is the reliable way to force frame generation on.
- Press WinKey+R, then copy in %localappdata%\Bandai Namco Entertainment\ACE COMBAT 8\Saved\Config\Windows and press OK.
- Create a new file named Engine.ini inside that folder. Make sure the extension is actually INI — if Windows is hiding extensions, you can easily end up with Engine.ini.txt by mistake.
- Add the following into the file:
[ConsoleVariables]
r.Streamline.InitializePlugin = 1
r.Streamline.DLSSG.Enable = 1
After you save the file, right-click Engine.ini, open Properties, tick the read-only checkbox, and press OK. Locking it down keeps the game from rewriting your settings on the next launch.
Before you go online with this, understand that I genuinely don’t know how the anti-cheat will react to an INI mod like this — so use it online at your own risk.
Running Without Easy Anti-Cheat
If you’d rather test this with the anti-cheat out of the picture, you can launch the game directly. Create a steam_appid.txt file inside the ACE COMBAT 8\Game\Binaries\Win64 folder, put 2288340 inside it, and save. With that in place you can launch AceCombat8.exe directly without Easy Anti-Cheat loading.
Enabling Reflex On + Boost
Reflex should switch on automatically once you’re set up, but if you want the more aggressive behavior you can push it further. Add this line alongside the others in Engine.ini to enable Reflex in On + Boost mode:
t.Streamline.Reflex.Mode = 2
I also posted a mod to Nexus Mods with the Engine.ini already set up, so if you’d rather not hand-edit the file you can grab that instead — it should be live once the game is approved there.