PC requirements & FPS
CPU, Vulkan 1.3 GPU, memory and storage specs for MKW Recomp, plus the maintainer’s measured frame-time breakdown.
- CPU: x86-64 AVX2
- GPU: Vulkan 1.3
- RAM: 16 GB rec.
- Disk: ~30 GB free
Minimum & recommended PC specs
Every requirement below comes directly from the adriadam10/mkw-recomp README and build scripts (tools/build/README.md).
- Operating system
- Windows 10 / 11 64-bit, or Linux x86_64 with
glibc 2.31+(Debian 11, Ubuntu 20.04, SteamOS and newer). - CPU instruction set
- x86-64 processor with AVX2 (
-march=x86-64-v3): Intel Haswell (4th Gen) or newer; AMD Excavator / any Zen or Ryzen CPU. - Graphics API
- Vulkan 1.3 capable GPU and up-to-date driver (NVIDIA, AMD RADV / Adrenalin, Intel ANV / Arc).
- Mesh shaders
VK_EXT_mesh_shaderrecommended; GPUs or drivers without it automatically run task and mesh shaders as compute passes.- System memory
- 16 GB RAM recommended (Prepare runs parallel C and SPIR-V workers; if memory runs low, v0.1.4+ halves worker count automatically).
- Storage space
- About 30 GB free for generated C, object cache and SPIR-V shaders, in addition to your own game dump.
Measured hardware frame times
Upstream benchmark figures from docs/performance.md measure raw native game frames (without optical-flow frame generation):
| Date | GPU & Driver | CPU & RAM | OS | Internal Res | Median Race Frame |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-11-09 | Radeon 660M APU (Mesa 26.2 RADV) | Ryzen 5 7535HS (13 GB) | Linux 7.2 (CachyOS) | 720p | 31–33 ms (~30 fps) |
| 2026-11-09 | GeForce GTX 1050 Ti 4 GB (582.66) | Core i5-8400 (16 GB) | Windows 11 | 1080p | 42–45 ms (~23 fps) |
Important 30 fps rule: Mario Kart World asks for 60 fps (16.7 ms). When a machine runs slower than 60 fps, leaving Settings > Screen > Frame rate on Automatic can still flip between 30 and 60 or slow game speed if frame time exceeds 33.3 ms. Set Frame rate > 30 first, then optionally turn on Frame generation (2x) in v0.1.8 for 60 Hz smoothness.
Why CPU recording currently caps FPS (the 33.6 ms serial chain)
In docs/roadmap.md, the maintainer profiled a 720p race frame on the Radeon 660M test system using MKW_TRACE_TL:
| Pipeline Stage | Measured Time (Radeon 660M, 720p) |
|---|---|
| Game logic thread (fence release to final submit) | ~3.4 ms |
| Vulkan backend command-buffer recording (replay thread) | ~19.0 ms |
| GPU execution of submitted command buffers | ~9.7 ms |
| Frame completion & synchronization handoff | ~1.5 ms |
Because the game’s main draw submission arrives at the end of its frame and the GPU waits for Vulkan command recording (~19 ms), CPU replay efficiency—not raw TeraFLOPS alone—is the primary path toward native 60 fps. Active roadmap items include dirty-only dynamic state, cross-frame descriptor caching (MKW_DRAW_CACHE), parallel submit recording, and PGO on the generated C.
VRAM & sparse texture pool scaling
Since v0.1.6, MKW Recomp sizes its large tiled course texture pool dynamically to one quarter of dedicated VRAM, clamped between 768 MiB and 3 GiB (an 8 GB card receives 1,792 MiB; integrated GPUs default to 768 MiB and respect firmware carve-outs in v0.1.8). In v0.1.8, when VRAM fills up (#63), sparse tiles fall back cleanly to system memory instead of drawing black terrain. Advanced users can still override SPARSE_MIB or GPU_MEM_LIMIT inside mkw.ini.
Controllers for MKW Recomp
MKW Recomp uses SDL3 for native gamepad input, gyro steering (motion_fusion.c), per-player rumble and up to 4-player local split-screen. These controllers pair cleanly on Windows 10/11 and Linux:
| Controller | Best For in MKW Recomp | Hardware Advantage | Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| GameSir Cyclone 2 | Drift timing & gyro steering | TMR sticks, Hall linear/microswitch triggers, gyro + 1000 Hz dongle | View on Amazon |
| 8BitDo Ultimate 2 Wireless | Desktop Windows & SteamOS dock | TMR sticks, 2.4 GHz wireless dock, Switch/XInput mode switch | View on Amazon |
| Sony DualSense | Built-in gyro & low-latency USB | 6-axis IMU supported by SDL3 motion fusion + crisp D-pad | View on Amazon |
| Xbox Wireless Controller | Plug-and-play local multiplayer | Native Windows XInput & Linux xpadneo multi-controller pairing | View on Amazon |
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Common questions
Does MKW Recomp run on macOS or ARM64 Windows?
No. Current releases compile strictly for x86-64 Windows and Linux with AVX2 and Vulkan 1.3. There is no Metal/MoltenVK macOS build or Android build.
Does my GPU need hardware ray tracing or DLSS?
No. Switch 2 optional hardware extras (DLSS, HDR, ray tracing and touch) are stubbed off by default so the game runs its standard rasterized path on any Vulkan 1.3 GPU.
Will a 4 GB VRAM card run races?
Yes—the maintainer’s Windows test machine uses a 4 GB GTX 1050 Ti (768 MiB sparse pool), and v0.1.8 adds system-RAM fallback for sparse tiles when video memory fills up.