Bioshock: artistic vision - or not as the case may be

packerfan · Post by **packerfan** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:29

Ill post these again...

Anyone who thinks paddy, myself, ibrin and other people working hard on this patch are wrong about vert-. could you kindly explain to me how the screenshots aren't loosing view when you go from fullscreen to widescreen... you can clearly see in the red highlighted areas that something is missing, so how can we not be loosing something... it is fully obvious that the top of the banner is missing in the widescreen resolution...

And yes you were right that you can't compare widescreen images if they are the same height as the full screen

For vert- which this game is you put the widescreen as the same width as the full screen and put it inside

For hor+ you put the fullscreen and wide shots as the same height and put the full in the wide

Two more overlays... one from Elios on IRC and the other is dopefishes edited...

Credit to Elios for pictures (he was on irc)

Credit to dopefish for pictures

So explain why games should be like the above screenshots which are obviously loosing vertical space when we have more screen width than our fullscreen counterparts

This is an example of what should be happening

Badmagic · Post by **Badmagic** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:33

Just created a new account to say I have tried setting up three separate accounts at the 2k forum with three separate e-mails none of which gets the activation emails so just posting here to say I am another looking for a solution to this issue, its just such as shame as everything looked like it was going to work out before the demo.

On a side note I am also in the UK and am slightly perplexed that users outside the US are still being forced to wait until the 24th to activate and play, not sure how this is going to work as to combating piracy, I suppose it just depends on if the cracks start to appear any time soon, I know at least three guys who have decided to do this although they wouldnâ€™t usually even consider it.

Its annoying as I would prefer it if they would just support the company and wait a couple of days but on the other side of the coin I can understand their frustration.

Anyway, that was a bit of a diversion so on with what I was originally going to say.

I was in a discussion about this yesterday on another forum, after thinking about it tonight I deciding to finally register here to confirm my personal options, the following is mostly cut â€˜nâ€™ pastes from my own posts on another forum or three.

The game looks great don't misunderstand, but that does not make it correct.

In the past people used the excuse that it was due to competitive multi-player, that is not an acceptable excuse for a MP game let alone an SP game in my personal opinion.

I am a PC user but I do want to see this issue fully addressed on both the 360 and PC versions.

Itâ€™s not the end of the world if itâ€™s not fixed but by god, with a game with this fairly unique although familiar visual flair and style it just seems such a shame to not get it right.

The optical illusion of a zoomed in view is where it really hurts I luckily donâ€™t projectile vomit from this unlike so many of my less fortunate fellow WS users but it does make every environment feel cramped and simple detracts from the general enjoyment of the game.

I would guess for those that do have projectile vomiting induced by the FOV oversights seen here and in other titles it would detract even more from their enjoyment.

As for those trying to suggest that itâ€™s as it was intended for WS users where 4:3 are actually gaining additional height by some error then this makes for far worse a problem, it means there was a major design flaw in the title that was deliberately implemented, to me this is much worse than a simple error in coding but a massive error in judgment.

I have also seen a post by someone stating that this is considered a perfectly normal way of implementing WS resolutions within titles, again this is an even worse error in judgment on behalf of the Devâ€™s as it simply is not sufficient, again in my personal opinion.

So last but not least what it boils down to is simply to say to the devâ€™s if any of them happen to peruse this thread, please review the situation as it stands, if you decide there has been an oversight then I am sure myself and many others will be glad to hear of a possibly real solution from a patch, if however you decide that this was intentionally designed to display in this manner please do post to let us know what your decision is but let me stress, are you sure you want to tell people that your support of widescreen comes in a form that the vast majority of WS users and enthusiast have a polar opposite view of.

Last but not least, regarding distribution and release dates, well I am in the UK and along with countries like Australia our activation times seem to beâ€¦ in fact no you have enough on your plates, thatâ€™s a whole other topic.

EvilCornbread · Post by **EvilCornbread** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:35

There is no need to theorize on what is "almost certainly isn't the case". Just look at the facts that are available or test it for yourself and give people some evidence, not what you personally feel they couldn't possibly have done (based on NOTHING). Seriously, stop with the crap. It just makes lurkers like me register to say how fed up we are with reading made up junk in the middle of real tangible evidence.

But there's no "evidence" to be had. Depending on how you look at it, either they developed for 4:3 and cropped the widescreen version, or they developed for widescreen and opened up the 4:3 version. Regardless, they made the decision to keep the horizontal FOV constant. It was an intentional decision, for any of a number of reasons (to establish a claustrophobic feel, to help with performance, etc).

If I had to guess, I'd assume that they developed for 16:9, because that's what the 360 is, and that's where they're likely to get the majority of their sales. Plus some portion of PCs are 16:9 (or widescreen in general). Why would they design the game for 4:3 when that's going to be the substantial minority of their customers?

So, the only thing that makes sense is that they developed for widescreen and opened up the 4:3 version. Which, as I've said, is a totally reasonable way to handle 4:3.

jayx360 · Post by **jayx360** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:37

cornbread....Why is it vomit inducing then?

Badmagic · Post by **Badmagic** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:41

There is no need to theorize on what is "almost certainly isn't the case". Just look at the facts that are available or test it for yourself and give people some evidence, not what you personally feel they couldn't possibly have done (based on NOTHING). Seriously, stop with the crap. It just makes lurkers like me register to say how fed up we are with reading made up junk in the middle of real tangible evidence.

But there's no "evidence" to be had. Depending on how you look at it, either they developed for 4:3 and cropped the widescreen version, or they developed for widescreen and opened up the 4:3 version. Regardless, they made the decision to keep the horizontal FOV constant. It was an intentional decision, for any of a number of reasons (to establish a claustrophobic feel, to help with performance, etc).

If I had to guess, I'd assume that they developed for 16:9, because that's what the 360 is, and that's where they're likely to get the majority of their sales. Plus some portion of PCs are 16:9 (or widescreen in general). Why would they design the game for 4:3 when that's going to be the substantial minority of their customers?

So, the only thing that makes sense is that they developed for widescreen and opened up the 4:3 version. Which, as I've said, is a totally reasonable way to handle 4:3.

Although itâ€™s been pointed out earlier that elements such as the tattoos on the wrists make that argument a moot point as even if it was intentional that is worse news because it means there was a massive oversight in the basic design.

kohlstream · Post by **kohlstream** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:42

The idea that a moving 2D image is capable of resulting in motion sickness because the scrunched up viewfield implies to our brain different movement than we are used to in a game is not something those who are set against the idea will readily accept. It requires a bit more acceptance that the brain infers more 3D from 2D images and the processes behind motion sickness than most people tend to consider or even think about.

I registered just to show a small part of the PC ZONE review of bioshock. At the time i thought it was strange but now i think it relates directly to this issue.

And also, there are people who get motion sickness from playing regular FPS games without this problem; similarly they feel sick when watching a home movie where the camera moves around too fast. But this guy is a game journalist who probably plays FPS every day and he says heâ€™s never felt ill playing a game before, so I think this problem might be quite serious.

Tolyngee · Post by **Tolyngee** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:43

"]Heres a little image I made. Might help you guys educate some people out there (though that seems impossible at times)

I actually do understand all of that, that is why I am here.

But the devs seem to either not understand FOV, or understand H+, or, dare I say it... both?

I'm trying to find some way to argue that they thought they were right...? Just in case they argue that the FOV is correct for WS, it is just wrong for 4:3...

They either don't understand FOV, or went with BF's example?

Dunno, I don't game much, hadn't played a game in six months, but as I said, it's very obvious their implementation is wrong when you consider what zoom level would occur with a TH2G user...

Be nice to understand the logic when a dev actually ships a product in this state though, no? (this is the first game I've played with the issue, to my knowledge... HL2/Doom 3/FC are H+? BF, which I have never played, keeps the FOV identical as it is viewed as a "cheat")

Or is it just accepted in WSGF to just accept it's wrong, and just needs to be fixed? In the event it's a misunderstanding on the dev's part?

I truly do get the feeling they are (like i showed) taking a look back at their math, and seeing it as they first saw it... they didn't take into account that a crop is a zoom, and the more WS you get, the worse the zoom becomes... And ignoring that the FOV never changes for any resolution applied...

So, the only correct thing to do right now is play at 4:3 'til it's fixed?

Lastly, right as I am thinking about finally taking the TH2G plunge (for racing sims...), this has to happen, to make it clear that support just isn't to be expected...

sirmonster · Post by **sirmonster** » 22 Aug 2007, 01:53

[quote]The idea that a moving 2D image is capable of resulting in motion sickness because the scrunched up viewfield implies to our brain different movement than we are used to in a game is not something those who are set against the idea will readily accept. It requires a bit more acceptance that the brain infers more 3D from 2D images and the processes behind motion sickness than most people tend to consider or even think about.

I registered just to show a small part of the PC ZONE review of bioshock. At the time i thought it was strange but now i think it relates directly to this issue.

And also, there are people who get motion sickness from playing regular FPS games without this problem; similarly they feel sick when watching a home movie where the camera moves around too fast. But this guy is a game journalist who probably plays FPS every day and he says heâ€™s never felt ill playing a game before, so I think this problem might be quite serious.
GREAT FIND! i wonder if the reviewer was aware of the crop/stretch/zoom job done on it, most likely a reviewer would be on a widescreen. ive been playing fps games since doom. i still have the floppy discs around somewhere, ive never felt sick till this game. and ive yet to progress past where the demo ends as i dont want to experience the game like this.

Manny Calavera · Post by **Manny Calavera** » 22 Aug 2007, 02:00

"]I tired to register but I didnt get the email, Can someone else post them?

They have disabled new members from trying to join,great way to support the game,instead of adding more mods and answering questiosn,oh and adding more bandwith so people dont keep timing out on the forums.Someone did post it up though,thanks all for the work and suggestions thus far in trying to fix this.

2K and Liz and the Devs are still in hiding,and have left no owrd.

'Soon' in 2K marketing speak must mean "when we feel like it" :roll:

khula · Post by **khula** » 22 Aug 2007, 02:00

I posted about this issue on PCZone's technical site under the bioshock thread...

http://forums.dearwandy.com/viewtopic.php?id=23527

Page 3 near the bottom. Their reviewer replied with a very interesting point, namely

"This wasn't mentioned in the PC Zone review because we didn't know about it. We didn't know about it because we played through the entire game in widescreen without noticing anything wrong, or feeling that the screen was cramped in any way. It's just not an issue. Although if I owned Widescreen Gaming Forum, I'd probably take it upon myself to be outraged."

"Would you have picked up on this had you not read about it on Kotaku? I doubt it."

My reply....
Er wrong... I was at the WSGF that broke this tidbit before it even hit that site.. In fact that site nicked our pic from our thread on that forum the same as several other sites are doing including shacknews

http://www.shacknews.com/

about fourth article down now... And anyway since when do hardware concerns not get reflected in a review? Just because it's a monitor issue shouldn't relegate it to the 'not interested' bucket should it?

And so it continues on that site

EvilCornbread · Post by **EvilCornbread** » 22 Aug 2007, 02:07

cornbread....Why is it vomit inducing then?

Because the FOV might be tighter than you'd like. As I've said, if you don't like the FOV they've chosen, that's fine, and I very well may end up agreeing with you. Didn't really bother me in the demo, but it might for longer playsessions. We'll see.

But it's not a "widescreen is done wrong" issue, or a widescreen-vs-4:3 issue.

For example -- what if instead of their current implementation they made the 4:3 version letterboxed. Would people still be upset about the widescreen version? I suspect instead the 4:3 group would be up in arms and the widescreen folks would be talking about how that's how the game is supposed to look. And yet the widescreen version would be exactly the same as it is now. It's all a matter of perspective.

sirmonster · Post by **sirmonster** » 22 Aug 2007, 02:09

I posted about this issue on PCZone's technical site under the bioshock thread...

http://forums.dearwandy.com/viewtopic.php?id=23527

Page 3 near the bottom. Their reviewer replied with a very interesting point, namely

"This wasn't mentioned in the PC Zone review because we didn't know about it. We didn't know about it because we played through the entire game in widescreen without noticing anything wrong, or feeling that the screen was cramped in any way. It's just not an issue. Although if I owned Widescreen Gaming Forum, I'd probably take it upon myself to be outraged."

"Would you have picked up on this had you not read about it on Kotaku? I doubt it."

My reply....
Er wrong... I was at the WSGF that broke this tidbit before it even hit that site.. In fact that site nicked our pic from our thread on that forum the same as several other sites are doing including shacknews

http://www.shacknews.com/

about fourth article down now... And anyway since when do hardware concerns not get reflected in a review? Just because it's a monitor issue shouldn't relegate it to the 'not interested' bucket should it?

And so it continues on that site

so they just didnt notice the difference in screens vs what they see in game with widescreen? to deem it not an issue is pretty stupid as it clearly is. i cant play it. it makes me sick. as it has others, and other reviewers.

Osuperman · Post by **Osuperman** » 22 Aug 2007, 02:27

I had to sign up just to give my two cents on this topic:

Because the game's textures have been designed with 4:3 resolutions in mind, when you zoom in on that image, (much like STALKER did, pre patch) you end up lowering the resolution of those textures, therefore us widescreen users are unfairly getting a lower texture IQ than those on 4:3 displays, check it out for yourselves, the difference may be slight, but it's noticeable.

On my first play though I thought the backgrounds looked very blocky, and that my mouse was jumping around like mad, its all due to this zooming-in of the 4:3 native resolution of the game... Play through the demo in 4:3 and everything looks so much better (even without AA, but thats a whole different story... sigh).

XxDeadlyxX · Post by **XxDeadlyxX** » 22 Aug 2007, 02:54

With no DX10 AA and this FOV issue I may pass on this game for the moment.

Sweetz · Post by **Sweetz** » 22 Aug 2007, 03:06

Regardless, they made the decision to keep the horizontal FOV constant. It was an intentional decision, for any of a number of reasons (to establish a claustrophobic feel, to help with performance, etc).

That's a assumption, you don't know for a fact it was intentional, they might have just overlooked it.

A person might have said the STALKER developers made an intentional decision to keep the FOV the same for widescreen, but that wasn't the case. The developers said it was a mistake and that they basically just overlooked it; they later corrected it with a patch because they acknowledged it was incorrect.

How much of the environment the Bioshock devs wanted us to see is admittedly arguable. However, the one thing that says to me that the current widescreen implementation isn't "intended" is the amount of detail getting cut off on the players hands. I mean we're missing the tattoo, the shirt detail, the bottom of the wrench and other weapons. I can't believe they'd put that much work into detailing something that they "intended" to get cut off.

Gabbo · Post by **Gabbo** » 22 Aug 2007, 03:25

I posted about this issue on PCZone's technical site under the bioshock thread...

http://forums.dearwandy.com/viewtopic.php?id=23527

Page 3 near the bottom. Their reviewer replied with a very interesting point, namely

"This wasn't mentioned in the PC Zone review because we didn't know about it. We didn't know about it because we played through the entire game in widescreen without noticing anything wrong, or feeling that the screen was cramped in any way. It's just not an issue. Although if I owned Widescreen Gaming Forum, I'd probably take it upon myself to be outraged."

"Would you have picked up on this had you not read about it on Kotaku? I doubt it."

My reply....
Er wrong... I was at the WSGF that broke this tidbit before it even hit that site.. In fact that site nicked our pic from our thread on that forum the same as several other sites are doing including shacknews

http://www.shacknews.com/

about fourth article down now... And anyway since when do hardware concerns not get reflected in a review? Just because it's a monitor issue shouldn't relegate it to the 'not interested' bucket should it?

And so it continues on that site

Wow that guy is a dick.

Yeah we wait for Kotaku to tell us about widescreen implementation. Oh yeah... we are outraged so Ibrin can make money...

God... what a condescending prick.

Wow. Reading forums like that make me thankful for the WSGF. They are all pretty much clueless when it comes to widescreen gaming. It just sounds like a bunch of l33t speak teenagers.

packerfan · Post by **packerfan** » 22 Aug 2007, 04:13

Edit: I just typed something up for 5 minutes and then just deleted it.... why do I even bother with this stuff...

Tucson · Post by **Tucson** » 22 Aug 2007, 04:13

Because the game's textures have been designed with 4:3 resolutions in mind, when you zoom in on that image...you end up lowering the resolution of those textures..."

:shock:

I don't know if you're just misunderstanding the issue or what, but textures are no more "made" for widescreen or quadro-vision or whatever than standard displays. If that were true there'd really not be any support for it, not to mention the huge amount of work and storage of all the textures would consume.

But I do think I know what you're trying to say, and agree its a problem. I believe the phenomenon you're trying to describe is that when the game zooms in widescreen or surround it is greater than normal, making textures look "blurry" even though they're in fact the same resolution and texture even.

vlÃƒÂ¤d · Post by **vlÃƒÂ¤d** » 22 Aug 2007, 04:23

Hi all! I've been lurking here for a while, but thought I'd raise my head and offer a bit of support.

First thanks for posting on this, I think you guys have spelled things out quite well here. Secondly, I'm passing the info around to the vid card driver sites like nvNews and TweakForce, (formally TweaksrUs), with links to this thread and the thread over at 2k forums.

Hopefully, this issue can be resolved relatively easily by the devs, and I certainly hope that other Unreal 3 games don't have the same issues.

Post by **Ryom** » 22 Aug 2007, 04:25

With the way Bioshock currently supports widescreen, we see almost 50% less of the game in a current screen capture than we would versus a horizontal+ screen capture. :lol:

Widescreen Gaming Forum