Pause Menu Lag Fix

Description

This mod fixes the menu lag that can cause FPS to crater after closing game menu's.

Installation instructions

1. Install with your favorite mod manager

2. Enjoy Menu Lag Fix

The issue

Starfield decides texture and mesh detail with a state machine called ScreenSizeBasedLOD. Each cycle it measures how much screen space every material covers and checks the result against available VRAM, then promotes or demotes mip levels to fit with the available memory.

This state machine does not stop when you open certain game menu's and your VRAM suddenly frees up. CheckBudget classifies VRAM pressure into four levels. At the lowest-pressure level it sets an internal "refresh everything" flag, which forces mip 0, the highest resolution, on every material. This queued full-resolution texture upload can overpower available memory when you close the menu and your VRAM suddenly becomes pressured again, causing the driver to start thrashing.

This mod forces the controller to not execute any state that increases detail levels when menu's are open by redirecting those functions to the engine's own internal reset, making sure the engine does not assign any LOD for promotion when the menu is open.

Shout outs

Deity Vengy - for help with testing and putting out the bounty

0xBobby & Star Wars Genesis - testing