The Callisto Protocol is a singleplayer third-person survival game.
The game was released on December 2, 2022. At launch the game was suffering from major performance and shader compilation stutter problems.
A patch released on January 19, 2023, which added New Game Plus (originally promised to arrive alongside a Hardcore game mode on February 7, 2023[2]), general performance improvements and other changes[3].
The December 2 and 7, 2022 patches fixed shader compilation related stutters, that were present at launch, by performing shader precompilation while at the main menu.[4] The February 7, 2023 added the previously promised Hardcore mode, while improving performance of ray-traced effects and improving the experience on Steam Deck.[5][6][7] As of the latest patch, the game unfortunately still has many asset-loading related stutters hindering the overall experience.
General information
- Official Discord server
- Steam Community Discussions
Availability
- Denuvo Anti-Tamper DRM was removed on March 26, 2024.[8]
Version differences
- Digital Deluxe Edition includes the base game, Season Pass and Retro Prisoner character and weapons skin
- Day One Edition was for people who pre-purchased the game, including the base game and Retro Prisoner character and weapons skin.
Monetization
Type |
Notes |
DLC
| Season Pass with content regarding story, skins, new death animations and new mode. |
One-time game purchase
| The game requires an upfront purchase to access. |
DLC and expansion packs
Name |
Notes |
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Pre-purchase incentive |
Retro Prisoner character and weapons skin. |
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Season Pass |
Includes Outer Way Skin Collection, Contagion Bundle (March 2023, Contains new Contagion mode: reduced ammo and health drops, a customized difficulty and permadeath), Riot Bundle (Spring 2023, Black Iron Prison area, twelve new enemy death animations and Engineer Skin Collection) and story content (Summer 2023.)[2] |
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The Outer Way Skin Collection |
This collection includes Outer Way themed player and weapons skins. |
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Contagion Bundle |
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Riot Bundle |
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Final Transmission |
Story DLC. |
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Essential improvements
Skip intro videos
Rename/move/delete logo files[citation needed]
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- Go to
<path-to-game>\TheCallistoProtocol\Content\Movies\ .
- Rename/move/delete the following files:
AMD_Logo_4K.bk2
Bink_Krafton_SDS_Logos.bk2
Bink_Krafton_SDS_Logos.uasset
Intro_logo_Krafton_SDS.bk2
Krafton_SDS_logos_4k.bk2
Unreal_InstaLOD_logos.bk2
Unreal_Logo_4K.bk2
Wwise_InstaLOD_Logos_4K.bk2
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Game data
Configuration file(s) location
Save game data location
- At least 99 manual save slots available. Manual saves permanently save the most recent checkpoint.
Video
- Only Display graphical settings can be changed while in-game, other graphical settings can only be changed while at the main menu.[9]
- Supports benchmarking option in the Graphics menu. This benchmarking option is hidden on Steam Deck only since the February 7, 2023 update.[7]
Graphics feature |
State |
Notes |
Widescreen resolution |
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Multi-monitor |
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Ultra-widescreen |
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The FOV is Hor+. The game rendering and UI scale correctly to high aspect ratios, like 32:9 |
4K Ultra HD |
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Field of view (FOV) |
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75°. Use The Callisto Protocol FOV fix. |
Windowed |
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Borderless fullscreen windowed |
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Anisotropic filtering (AF) |
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Texture filter quality option available: Low, Medium or High. |
Anti-aliasing (AA) |
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Disabled, FXAA and TAA Using any different anti-aliasing option than TAA will disable upcaling (FSR), screen space reflections, physical refractions and ray tracing.[11] |
High-fidelity upscaling |
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FSR 2.1, TAAU [12] DLSS Super Resolution can be forced with this mod (resolution multipliers cannot be changed and DLAA is not supported). |
Vertical sync (Vsync) |
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60 FPS and 120+ FPS |
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High dynamic range display (HDR) |
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DX12-only and requires HDR to be enabled through Windows first, otherwise option will be greyed out.[11] A limited set of peak brightnesses are allowed. |
Ray tracing (RT) |
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Ray-traced "transmission" (on/off toggle, enhances lighting of fleshy surfaces[9]), shadows (on/off toggle) and reflections (disabled, medium or high).[13][12] DX12-only. |
Color blind mode |
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High contrast mode available to separately color player, enemies and pickups. |
- The game engine may allow for manual configuration of the game via its variables. See the Unreal Engine 4 page for more details.
Disable vignette and chromatic aberration
TCP-Fixes and Improvements: Optional Files
Input
Audio
Audio feature |
State |
Notes |
Separate volume controls |
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SFX, Music and Dialogue toggles and volume sliders available. |
Surround sound |
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Dolby Atmos supported.[15] |
Subtitles |
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Font size, Font color, Speaker name (and color), Background (opacity and color) and Dyslexic font options available. |
Closed captions |
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Mute on focus lost |
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Royalty free audio |
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Localizations
Language |
UI |
Audio |
Sub |
Notes |
English |
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Simplified Chinese |
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French |
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German |
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Italian |
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Japanese |
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Korean |
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Polish |
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Brazilian Portuguese |
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Russian |
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Fan voice-over by «Mechanics VoiceOver», download |
Spanish |
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Latin American Spanish |
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Ukrainian |
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Fan translation, download. |
Turkish |
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Fan translation, download or download 2. |
Issues unresolved
Performance is very limited
- Due to the game's CPU utilization being very single-thread limited, the CPU is underutilized (only 2 cores are really utilized) and subsequently performance is severely impaired.[16] The game is even more CPU-limited when running under DirectX 11, resulting in even worse general performance than when using the default DirectX 12.[9] The developers of the game have acknowledged this problem and are working on alleviating these performance issues through several upcoming patches.[17][18]
Stutters while traversing in the game
- The game can stutter when moving around in the environment of the game. This is independent from settings or hardware, and is not shader compilation-related as shaders are pre-compiled for this game since the December 7, 2022 patch. It is likely related to loading.[4]
Game will not launch due to VR hook
- If VR hardware is used, you may be unable to launch the game without its requisite software running.
Workaround: delete VR hook files[19]
|
- Delete
<path-to-game>\Engine\Binaries\ThirdParty\OpenXR\win64\openxr_loader.dll .
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Other information
API
Technical specs |
Supported |
Notes |
Direct3D |
11, 12 |
Can switch DirectX version in General Graphics menu, requires restart.[12][20] |
Executable |
32-bit |
64-bit |
Notes |
Windows |
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Middleware
System requirements
Windows |
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Minimum |
Recommended |
Operating system (OS) |
10, 11 | |
Processor (CPU) |
Intel Core i5-8400 AMD Ryzen 5 2600 |
Intel Core i7-8700 AMD Ryzen 5 3600 |
System memory (RAM) |
8 GB |
16 GB |
Hard disk drive (HDD) |
75 GB |
75 GB (SSD) |
Video card (GPU) |
Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 AMD Radeon RX 580 DirectX 11 compatible
| Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 AMD Radeon RX 5700 DirectX 12 compatible |
- A 64-bit operating system is required.
Notes
References