Widescreen Gaming Forum

[quote]Do you believe that they are obligated to invest in providing an enhanced gaming experience to an unusual, nonstandard configuration that probably constitutes less than 1% of their customer base and that the game is not advertised as supporting?

No I don't think they are OBLIGATED. But I do think they should have an interest that their game look as good as possible on as many "setups" out there as possible... but there's just ONE thing in the way:

The horizontal width is LOCKED. Therefore the wider the display, the more you have to crop. Now to me, that isn't an ideal way of creating a game "window". Remember that YOUR preferred FOV can still be implemented WITHOUT locking the 4:3 aspect ratio. That's just simple programming!

The fact that BioShock's width IS locked at 4:3 (and it just so happens that nearly all the other recent U3 engine games ALSO lock the 4:3 aspect) stinks of lazyness on the part of the developers.

Okay now, we're going around in circles with regards to the FOV choice by the develops, you like it, I don't, let us say no more about it.

So I'd like to ask you: What are you favourite 3D FPS games, and which of those do you think think 'nailed it' with regards to your desired FOV? (discounting BioShock)

Hey trrll, I'm still waiting for an answer to the above... ;)

trrll ... enough ... that last post shows you clearly aren't getting what I/we are saying or you are just twisting things because you want to play silly buggers ...

Goodbye.

The fact that BioShock's width IS locked at 4:3 (and it just so happens that nearly all the other recent U3 engine games ALSO lock the 4:3 aspect) stinks of lazyness on the part of the developers.

What is locked is not the aspect ratio, but the FOV, so it is not correct to refer to it either as 16:9 aspect or as 4:3 aspect. The solution that they chose provided the FOV that they felt the game needed on all of the monitor configurations that are officially supported by the game. So your complaint is essentially that they did not invest time and money into figuring out how to provide special-cased enhanced support for nonstandard configurations that constitute a negligible proportion of the market. You might call this laziness. An investor would probably call it cost-effective allocation of limited development resources.

So I'd like to ask you: What are you favourite 3D FPS games, and which of those do you think think 'nailed it' with regards to your desired FOV? (discounting BioShock)

Frankly, I don't think any before Bioshock nailed it. I enjoyed playing Black, Doom3, Halo 1 & 2, and F.E.A.R. (and further back, Marathon) although for some of them I found the FOV annoying.

What is locked is not the aspect ratio, but the FOV, so it is not correct to refer to it either as 16:9 aspect or as 4:3 aspect. The solution that they chose provided the FOV that they felt the game needed on all of the monitor configurations that are officially supported by the game. So your complaint is essentially that they did not invest time and money into figuring out how to provide special-cased enhanced support for nonstandard configurations that constitute a negligible proportion of the market. You might call this laziness. An investor would probably call it cost-effective allocation of limited development resources.

Okay agreed it's not locked at 4:3 (the tallscreen examples from GABBO prove that) but the width is locked... and I doubt an investor would call it a "cost-effective allocation of limited development resources" when nearly every other FPS out there can do it just fine!

Frankly, I don't think any before Bioshock nailed it...for some of them I found the FOV annoying.

Well then that explains it, you are in the minority sir, not I. ;)

fyi MoH:A FOV is 75 as well

:?:

[quote][quote]This whole thread has gone to the birds. Its has degreded into discussions about minor disputes of facts and figures and is being dragged into pettyness.

The argument still remains that BioShock the great game that it is, had widescreen implemented poorly. It was NOT a choice to implement it that way, that is evident. It was an EPIC UnrealEngine3 (UE3) choice, a UE3 implementation as seen with all of thier other UE3 titles. So stop saying it was a design decision and try backing it up with suggestions that calculations could have been used by 2K on thier game.

If there were FOV calcs and other such design decisions made by 2K like you say, then why are they ALL the same with the other UE3 titles?Wouldn't EPIC have left those design descision up to each developer instead of making it default? Clearly it was default, and thus clearly it has something to do with performance of the engine not some artistic design decision. What a crock.

The Unreal engine provides settings to modify FOV. If it didn't, it wouldn't be so easy to hack it to change the FOV. Control of FOV is a basic feature of a 3D engine; without it, a game would not be capable of carrying out the most basic "cinematic" effects such as zoom in or zoom out. So it simply doesn't make any sense to suppose that this choice is somehow being imposed by EPIC. I find it particularly revealing that so many people are willing to embrace the ridiculous notion that this choice is somehow imposed by the Unreal engine, presumably because the obvious explanation--that EPIC did leave it up to developers, and that multiple developers are making similar decisions because they have independently considered how best to handle different aspect ratios and have come to similar conclusions--is so unpalatable that you cannot even bring yourself to consider it.



Where did I say anything was imposed. I pointed out that it was clear that the FOV was left as default. You are spinning things around to give yourself more weight to your argument. It is far more palatible to realise that you are attempting verbal gymnastics for the benefit of your cause.

[quote][quote][quote]
No, but it is does point towards your unpalatable argument that it was a design decision. It is far more likely that is was a tried method by UE3 and that the game developers left it that way because they did not want to reinvent the wheel.

I suppose that if Bioshock used the same FOV as every other FPS game, that might be (barely) plausible. But in fact, everybody is complaining tht Bioshock uses a narrower FOV than almost any other FPS. So why would Epic use such a nonstandard default? And why would a skilled developer, experienced with FOV, choose to accept such a nonstandard default if it was not what they wanted?

That is precisely what I want to know.



And the answer is quite simple: they wouldn't, and they didn't. The other game you have pointed to, Gears of War, does not use that FOV. Nobody has measured the FOV for Airborn, but I'll bet that it doesn't either. So the only answer that makes sense is what you refuse to believe--that Irrational/2K is telling the truth when they say that they tested dozens of variations, and picked the one that they felt gave the best game experience.

I need to lead you back to where we started again. I am talking about the fact that all the UE3 engines are Vert+ not HOR+.
EPIC Licesensees mostly, if not all use Vert+, by default. This WAS NOT, IS NOT a design decision by 2K.


Side note observing your behaviour:
You keep and should cease chunking down the converstaion into minute details and trying to proove your knowledge on all the different species of ants when we are clearly discussing an elephant. Or is that what you do, chunk down into the most finite detail until you totally lose the people your trying to discuss with as they do not and can possibly not share your knowledge about the make up of a grain of sand and thus proove yourself right by default. A technique labelled as The master of a thousand cuts, continually hiding from the fight when it gets threatening and then continually emerging to attack when no one is looking until eventually the advesary is to tired to continue. This is by no means meaningful to anyone. By doing this you minimalise the pool of knowledge so only you can fit into it yourself.

I need to lead you back to where we started again. I am talking about the fact that all the UE3 engines are Vert+ not HOR+.
EPIC Licesensees mostly, if not all use Vert+, by default. This WAS NOT, IS NOT a design decision by 2K.


Side note observing your behaviour:
You keep and should cease chunking down the converstaion into minute details and trying to proove your knowledge on all the different species of ants when we are clearly discussing an elephant.

You've slipped into a seductive mode of fallacious thinking--imagining that a bunch of weak arguments add up to a strong argument. One of the things that scientific training teaches is how to break an argument down into its fundamental elements and examine their validity. So let's now put it all back together to examine the validity of your argument. Your claims are as follows:

1) Epic, for some incomprehensible reason, chose default FOVs for the Unreal 3 engine very different from those used by most FPS games in the past.

2) Multiple independent development teams, people with years of experience in FPS game development, and with millions of dollars riding on their design decisions, somehow failed to notice this, simply accepted the default, and never bothered to question it or playtest different FOV options. Statements from a developer that they did in fact test dozens of 16:9 FOV variants before coming to a final decision are lies.

And your total evidence for this unlikely-sounding hypothesis as follows:

1) You don't like the FOV of Bioshock or the way it handles aspect ratios.

2) All Unreal 3 engines use the same FOV and way of handling different aspect ratios.

Except there is one small problem: #2 is false. Gears of War uses a different FOV from Bioshock. Rainbow 6 Vegas is not even "VERT+"

Now here's a test of logical thinking--if similarity of FOV or handling of aspect ratios is evidence for your hypothesis, then aren't differences like GoW's wider FOV or Rainbow 6's handling of aspect ratios evidence against it?

Furthermore, forgetting to change a default is not the only possible explanation for similarities; there is an alternate explanation. In particular, there is a logical reason why developers producing games for widescreen should prefer to maintain the same FOV for the 4:3 version, and why we will almost certainly see this done more and more often in the future:

It is basic economics. As more potential customers come to own wide aspect ratio screens, it becomes less and less cost-effective to invest a lot of money and effort into optimizing the 4:3 display. So what is the most economical way to support 4:3? In contrast to games developed initially for 4:3, games developed for 16:9 are likely to use the full width of the 16:9 display for such things as scripted events. Simply chopping off the sides to fit it into 4:3 runs the risk of cropping off important parts of scripted events. In addition, 4:3 players may be blindsided by enemies that they were supposed to see coming, but don't because of the narrower FOV.

So cropping off the sides means an expensive investment in 4:3 playtesting, perhaps even adjusting scripted events and level design--hardly cost effective when fewer and fewer of your customers even own 4:3 screens. How can you save that money, and devote it to improving aspects of the game that are more likely to increase sales? Simple! Don't crop off the sides at all. Letterbox the 16:9 FOV into the width of the 4:3 display, and open the view up vertically so that it is not so obvious that the 4:3 version is really just a letterboxed version of the 16:9 version.

You realize with Vert-, a TripleHead2Go user sees 33% of the original 4:3 frame instead of 300%? Three monitors more worth of screen real estate... three times as many pixels... three times wider with the same pixel height as the original 4:3 monitor... and they see one third of what a single monitor sees instead of three times as much.

This makes sense to you???

You are playing a game, then all of a sudden you add one monitor to each side of you and expand the game onto them... and your viewable area takes a nosedive and zooms waaay in instead of expanding while keeping the same zoom level. Nothing strange about that?

You'll get a GREAT detailed look at whatever was in the middle of the screen though, with 3x as many pixels dedicated to 1/3 the area...

[quote] I need to lead you back to where we started again. I am talking about the fact that all the UE3 engines are Vert+ not HOR+.
EPIC Licesensees mostly, if not all use Vert+, by default. This WAS NOT, IS NOT a design decision by 2K.


Side note observing your behaviour:
You keep and should cease chunking down the converstaion into minute details and trying to proove your knowledge on all the different species of ants when we are clearly discussing an elephant.

You've slipped into a seductive mode of fallacious thinking--imagining that a bunch of weak arguments add up to a strong argument. One of the things that scientific training teaches is how to break an argument down into its fundamental elements and examine their validity.

Clearly I am not a scientist, and either are you until you proove it, and regardless, that will not make you more qualified to create an opinion. However that does not mean we both cannot develop opinions and arguments, and I appreciate your time and effort you are putting into your posts.

So let's now put it all back together to examine the validity of your argument. Your claims are as follows:

1) Epic, for some incomprehensible reason, chose default FOVs for the Unreal 3 engine very different from those used by most FPS games in the past.

2) Multiple independent development teams, people with years of experience in FPS game development, and with millions of dollars riding on their design decisions, somehow failed to notice this, simply accepted the default, and never bothered to question it or playtest different FOV options. Statements from a developer that they did in fact test dozens of 16:9 FOV variants before coming to a final decision are lies.

That is fairly cose to what I am trying to say. I am more so pointing to the use of VERT+ instead of the usual/expected/tried/traditional HOR+.

And your total evidence for this unlikely-sounding hypothesis

That is where you scientific opinion is about as qualified as mine. Even though you are still not a scientist to me. Regardless, again it wouldn't make you more qualified to construct an opinion. That being said, I believe it is a likely-sounding hypothesis.

And your total evidence for this unlikely-sounding hypothesis
as follows:

1) You don't like the FOV of Bioshock or the way it handles aspect ratios.

2) All Unreal 3 engines use the same FOV and way of handling different aspect ratios.

Except there is one small problem: #2 is false. Gears of War uses a different FOV from Bioshock. Rainbow 6 Vegas is not even "VERT+"

Now here's a test of logical thinking--if similarity of FOV or handling of aspect ratios is evidence for your hypothesis, then aren't differences like GoW's wider FOV or Rainbow 6's handling of aspect ratios evidence against it?

What you are saying is definetly possible, no doubt about that. You also must admit and I am going to ask you too, that what I believe is not impossible either is it?

However, I believe it is far more likey, around the 80-90% more likely mark, that the reason BioShock has VERT+ is because EPIC already developed it like that. The reason Gears has a different look (FOV/aspect ratio or whatever) could be for many reasons, and one is that it is different because it is a 3rd person game with from what I hear and led to believe is a different style of play. Regardless it is still VERT+ much like most if not all of the other UE3 engine titles.

That being said, I still think that BioShock's widescreen was implemented incorrectly, poorly and was not to do with design decision but rather a default or a recommendation by EPIC. Please, also do not insult anyones intellegence and use the media release as some sort of evidence that it was so. Just because 2K said they did it a certain way does make it so. They only thing that is so, is that they will act in the best interest of thier investors, and if they hold more corporate responsibility, they will act in the best interest of all thier stakeholders.

Furthermore, forgetting to change a default is not the only possible explanation for similarities; there is an alternate explanation. In particular, there is a logical reason why developers producing games for widescreen should prefer to maintain the same FOV for the 4:3 version, and why we will almost certainly see this done more and more often in the future:

Now that I nearly totally disagree with. Granted it is possible that they think that, however it would be shortsighted of them and not a sound economic decision for the medium term.

The reason I say this is because the future of visual human interface, ie the screen, is headed in a wider direction, according to Ed Lantz (which is the paper I refered to a few posts ago) The visual human interface is to assimilate immerson and realism. The more immersion and realism the more effective the communication is delivered. The whole point of communication is to get the most effective message across. Media, advertising, movies all follow this principle.

To reach TOTAL VISUAL immerson and realism we have to stimulate all of the visual nerve endings, leave none spared. Obviously this is not an attainable teachnology right now. But in the meantime stimulation of the more important visual nerves is more effective for communication. Those nerves are concentrated on the horizontal plane, as we are surface dwellers and use our horizontal view much more significatanly, of which anyone cannot doubt. So until we are using head mounted displays we are stuck with screens, screens which are getting wider and can also be multi screened to increase peripheral stimulation.

So restricting in game viewing to VERT+ is shortsighted. It means the wider technology tries to go the less someone sees. If they wanted to achieve what you are saying, they could have simply put black bars on either side of the game for widescreen users. But guess what, that would not go down to well at all.

It is basic economics. As more potential customers come to own wide aspect ratio screens, it becomes less and less cost-effective to invest a lot of money and effort into optimizing the 4:3 display. So what is the most economical way to support 4:3? In contrast to games developed initially for 4:3, games developed for 16:9 are likely to use the full width of the 16:9 display for such things as scripted events. Simply chopping off the sides to fit it into 4:3 runs the risk of cropping off important parts of scripted events. In addition, 4:3 players may be blindsided by enemies that they were supposed to see coming, but don't because of the narrower FOV.

So cropping off the sides means an expensive investment in 4:3 playtesting, perhaps even adjusting scripted events and level design--hardly cost effective when fewer and fewer of your customers even own 4:3 screens. How can you save that money, and devote it to improving aspects of the game that are more likely to increase sales? Simple! Don't crop off the sides at all. Letterbox the 16:9 FOV into the width of the 4:3 display, and open the view up vertically so that it is not so obvious that the 4:3 version is really just a letterboxed version of the 16:9 version.

Nup, I don't swallow that, and neither did the other game engine developers who supported HOR+.

So I'd like to ask you: What are you favourite 3D FPS games, and which of those do you think think 'nailed it' with regards to your desired FOV? (discounting BioShock)

Frankly, I don't think any before Bioshock nailed it. I enjoyed playing Black, Doom3, Halo 1 & 2, and F.E.A.R. (and further back, Marathon) although for some of them I found the FOV annoying.

I think after that statement I'm going to have to call it a day on this thread. Bye bye trrll, it's been ... exhausting.

You realize with Vert-, a TripleHead2Go user sees 33% of the original 4:3 frame instead of 300%? Three monitors more worth of screen real estate... three times as many pixels... three times wider with the same pixel height as the original 4:3 monitor... and they see one third of what a single monitor sees instead of three times as much.

This makes sense to you???

You are playing a game, then all of a sudden you add one monitor to each side of you and expand the game onto them... and your viewable area takes a nosedive and zooms waaay in instead of expanding while keeping the same zoom level. Nothing strange about that?

You'll get a GREAT detailed look at whatever was in the middle of the screen though, with 3x as many pixels dedicated to 1/3 the area...

The game is not designed or advertised to provide an enhanced display on triplehead configurations. It is designed and advertised to play in the standard configurations of 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3. The notion that development of a game should be driven by an oddball configuration that constitutes less than 1% of the market for the game makes little economic sense.

What you are saying is definetly possible, no doubt about that. You also must admit and I am going to ask you too, that what I believe is not impossible either is it?

Very little is impossible. But it certainly strains the imagination to think that a team of professional game programmers--people with the skills to produce hit games, and who have spent their professional careers manipulating fields of view, and with millions of dollars, and probably their jobs, riding on the success of this game--would somehow forget to consider whether the default FOV of a game engine is appropriate for their game.

However, I believe it is far more likey, around the 80-90% more likely mark, that the reason BioShock has VERT+ is because EPIC already developed it like that.

A 3D engine is a software tool. It can show any kind of 3D image from any perspective, with any FOV, that a developer desires. Developers don't simply use a default FOV; they are constantly manipulating FOV for dramatic effect. For example, when you aim your weapon and the screen seems to zoom in, that is actually a manipulation of FOV.

The reason Gears has a different look (FOV/aspect ratio or whatever) could be for many reasons, and one is that it is different because it is a 3rd person game with from what I hear and led to believe is a different style of play. Regardless it is still VERT+ much like most if not all of the other UE3 engine titles.

It certainly makes sense that whether a game is first person or third person would make a difference to the choice of FOV. But that is the point that I'm making--FOV is so fundamental that even a halfway competent developer is always thinking about whether the FOV is correct for his type of game, just as any decent film director is always thinking about whether the framing of a scene is correct. And the team at Irrational is a lot more than halfway competent--they have a track record of producing hit games.

That being said, I still think that BioShock's widescreen was implemented incorrectly, poorly and was not to do with design decision but rather a default or a recommendation by EPIC.

EPIC is not a bunch of beginners, either. They are extremely expert at 3D graphics and have been doing it for years. Their engines have been the basis of many hit games. So it once again strains the imagination to suppose that they would recommend an incorrect or poor way to handle 3D graphics.

Please, also do not insult anyones intellegence and use the media release as some sort of evidence that it was so. Just because 2K said they did it a certain way does make it so. They only thing that is so, is that they will act in the best interest of thier investors, and if they hold more corporate responsibility, they will act in the best interest of all thier stakeholders.

Now that I nearly totally disagree with. Granted it is possible that they think that, however it would be shortsighted of them and not a sound economic decision for the medium term.

And play testing a game to verify that everything about the game--the FOV, the graphic design, the difficulty, the plot--all works together to produce a great game experience is a fundamental part of that corporate responsibility. So I didn't need to be told that they tested dozens of variations of FOV to pick the best one; they would have to be incredibly incompetent not to have done so, and Irrational's track record of commercial success (now including Bioshock) is compelling evidence that they are far from incompetent.

The reason I say this is because the future of visual human interface, ie the screen, is headed in a wider direction, according to Ed Lantz (which is the paper I refered to a few posts ago) The visual human interface is to assimilate immerson and realism. The more immersion and realism the more effective the communication is delivered. The whole point of communication is to get the most effective message across. Media, advertising, movies all follow this principle.

So restricting in game viewing to VERT+ is shortsighted. It means the wider technology tries to go the less someone sees.

It is not shortsighted to direct your development efforts toward the display systems that will be the overwhelming majority throughout the life of your product. Indeed, it would fiscally irresponsible to do otherwise.

Successful games, movies, or advertising are not created based on some notion of the media of the future--they are created for the media of today. What Irrational/2K knew going into this project is that the majority of their customers would be playing the game in 16:9 or 16:10, with some still using 4:3, and that players using other configurations were a negligible tiny minority and would continue to be so throughout the projected commercial life of the game.

If they wanted to achieve what you are saying, they could have simply put black bars on either side of the game for widescreen users. But guess what, that would not go down to well at all

They developed for the display technology that they expected to be dominant for the life of their product--16:9/16:10 displays--and optimized the FOV for that type of display. There is no way that putting black bars on the sides would further that goal.

It is basic economics. As more potential customers come to own wide aspect ratio screens, it becomes less and less cost-effective to invest a lot of money and effort into optimizing the 4:3 display. So what is the most economical way to support 4:3? In contrast to games developed initially for 4:3, games developed for 16:9 are likely to use the full width of the 16:9 display for such things as scripted events. Simply chopping off the sides to fit it into 4:3 runs the risk of cropping off important parts of scripted events. In addition, 4:3 players may be blindsided by enemies that they were supposed to see coming, but don't because of the narrower FOV.

So cropping off the sides means an expensive investment in 4:3 playtesting, perhaps even adjusting scripted events and level design--hardly cost effective when fewer and fewer of your customers even own 4:3 screens. How can you save that money, and devote it to improving aspects of the game that are more likely to increase sales? Simple! Don't crop off the sides at all. Letterbox the 16:9 FOV into the width of the 4:3 display, and open the view up vertically so that it is not so obvious that the 4:3 version is really just a letterboxed version of the 16:9 version.

Nup, I don't swallow that, and neither did the other game engine developers who supported HOR+.

Yes, "HOR+" used to be a common strategy for supporting wider aspect reatios. But that was largely a consequence of games being developed primarily for 4:3 and only secondarily being adapted to wider aspect ratios. Even the name "HOR+" implicitly recognizes that 4:3 is primary, describing a game's widescreen FOV by reference to to the 4:3 display.

But times have changed. 16:9/10 are becoming dominant. Bioshock is part of a new wave of games that have been developed with 16:9/10 play in mind from the beginning. So when a developer, late in development, has to decide how to support 4:3 monitors, chances are that they'll chose to keep the same FOV that they've previously tested with widescreen monitors--which implies that the game will end up being expanded vertically to avoid unsightly letterboxing.

The game is not designed or advertised to provide an enhanced display on triplehead configurations. It is designed and advertised to play in the standard configurations of 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3. The notion that development of a game should be driven by an oddball configuration that constitutes less than 1% of the market for the game makes little economic sense.

Horz+ covers all the wider aspects for free. It makes great economic sense. Like using OpenGL and OpenAL to make games simpler to port to other platforms makes sense.

[quote]The game is not designed or advertised to provide an enhanced display on triplehead configurations. It is designed and advertised to play in the standard configurations of 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3. The notion that development of a game should be driven by an oddball configuration that constitutes less than 1% of the market for the game makes little economic sense.

Horz+ covers all the wider aspects for free. It makes great economic sense. Like using OpenGL and OpenAL to make games simpler to port to other platforms makes sense.

Except that it isn't free. The "Horz+" approach means that 4:3 gamers will see less on the sides. How will this affect the game? Will parts of important scripted events be cropped off? Will the game be unreasonably hard by virtue of part of the FOV being cropped off? Answers to these questions do not come for free, they mean expensive play testing--and if problems are found, expensive modifications to the game. A lot of money to spend for a dying aspect ratio, money that could otherwise go into enhancing other features of the game. But if they simply fix the FOV and allow the game to expand vertically to fill the screen, they can be confident that the game will be playable on 4:3 monitors, so they get 4:3 support "for free."

As for customers with rare multiscreen configurations, they can turn off the extra screens and get exactly the same game experience as 16:9 owners, so it is not as if they are not supported at all. And they don't constitute enough of the potential market to justify any investment of time, effort, or money to provide enhanced support.

[quote][quote]The game is not designed or advertised to provide an enhanced display on triplehead configurations. It is designed and advertised to play in the standard configurations of 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3. The notion that development of a game should be driven by an oddball configuration that constitutes less than 1% of the market for the game makes little economic sense.

Horz+ covers all the wider aspects for free. It makes great economic sense. Like using OpenGL and OpenAL to make games simpler to port to other platforms makes sense.

Except that it isn't free. The "Horz+" approach means that 4:3 gamers will see less on the sides. How will this affect the game? Will parts of important scripted events be cropped off? Will the game be unreasonably hard by virtue of part of the FOV being cropped off? Answers to these questions do not come for free, they mean expensive play testing--and if problems are found, expensive modifications to the game. A lot of money to spend for a dying aspect ratio, money that could otherwise go into enhancing other features of the game. But if they simply fix the FOV and allow the game to expand vertically to fill the screen, they can be confident that the game will be playable on 4:3 monitors, so they get 4:3 support "for free."

As for rare multiscreen configurations, they can turn off the extra screens and get exactly the same game experience as 16:9 owners, so it is not as if they are not supported at all. And they don't constitute enough of the potential market to be justify any investment of time, effort, or money to provide enhanced support.

no it wont hurt 4:3 users you just letter box scripted events not hard to do
and then make that anamorphic thats an easy fix right there

if the game is well thought out it should be a problem HL2 for one was targeted at 4:3 at the time and works fine with widescreen and CS is the most played on line game ever and has H+ and no one bitches about it

and at LANs were money is on the line every one uses the same setup any way

if widescreen is done right multiscreen works fine out of the box


lets look at Quake Wars for a bit it has a wide FOV in 4:3 my guess is about 90
in 5:4 its Vert+ since 5:4 is taller then 4:3
then theres 16:10 and 16:9 both use 4:3 vert +
http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/node/8124
if you see here you can do HOR+ AND VERT+ for 5:4 at the same time
IF you code for it and i would bet if gabbo tested it would work in tallscreen too
see every one can win its not hard
if you also note that the menus are vert- so they are framed the same for every one
if a game is done right it is a win for every one that plays regardless of the monitor

this is going to be a VERY competitive game along the lines of Battlefield 2
and no one is bitching about that


and how about RTS games like CnC3 its H+ is it unfar i can see more of the map then a 4:3 user? and again no one bitches about it and its a CPL game

then we come to driving games were H+ is a must imo
ever use the in car view it makes the car feel narrow in 4:3
DiRT in wide screen is a sight to behold


in a related note in 2009 the US will end analog over the air broadcasts
should we not do that becouse its not fair to people that cant get a digital TV?
TVs and PC monitors are going wide screen you cant even get a Dell any more with out one
hor+ is the right way to do it
and the Gods of PC gaming have spoken
Valve, id, and Bethesa use hor+

WIDE screen should have a wider fov then 4:3 or it would be called shortscreen

some of us dont give a damn what the devs want
i want to be looking threw the eyes the the person im playing
no a window
i want to see as i would see if standing there
and if that means a bit of distortion on the edges so be it

This isn't that difficult, he's just trying to chum the waters for some reason. There are a half-dozen or more solid and irrefutable reasons behind our wants, he just chooses to ignore them and fabricate his own fallacies as to why a lousy locked down implementation is better than a good open implementation. That's about all there is to it.

Let's try this one more time:

1.) Horz+ can easily covers all available aspects the wider you go from 4:3 without zooming in or out relative to the 4:3 frame. And it looks natural and makes sense! You triple the width, you see 2 screens more worth on the side... not 2 screens worth LESS on the sides.

2.) Vert+ covers all aspects taller than 4:3 (there is only one that I've ever heard of someone using... 5:4.

3.) They can both exist (horz+ and Vert+) in the game, it's not a one or the other choice... see quakeworld for example.

4.) Narrow FOV's give me headaches (I'm even gaming on a 37" screen from 3 feet away... should be super according to trrll) and make other people sick. But fine, let the dev use a "window" FOV, they just better not lock it down unless...

5.) Both FOV planes need to be locked if competitive fairness is the reason NOT to use Horz+... because using Vert- gives widescreeners an even bigger advantage with a massive vertical FOV. So the only fair competitive implementation is to pick an aspect and box the frame for display on other aspect ratio monitors.

6.) Chicks dig Horz+

7.) If the developer absolutely wants you to see something, that is what cut-scenes are for. Valve doesn't seem to have any trouble with cinematic lead-throughs without using cutscenes and while supporting multiple aspects.

Number 8 onward can be filled in by the rest of the crew, I'm going to bed.

no it wont hurt 4:3 users you just letter box scripted events not hard to do
and then make that anamorphic thats an easy fix right there

Every change costs money and must be playtested. As is the trend with top-quality games, scripted events are no longer videos that play at fixed points; they are implemented in game with the game engine. So you are talking about numerous changes scattered all through the game. That's going to cost a significant amount of money, coming out of a fixed development budget. Why spend that money on a dying aspect ratio, when it could be used to improve other aspects of the game that all players will appreciate?

if the game is well thought out it should be a problem HL2 for one was targeted at 4:3 at the time and works fine with widescreen and CS is the most played on line game ever and has H+ and no one bitches about it

You reinforce my point; it is much easier to take a game that was originally targeted for 4:3 and expand the sides to make it 16:9, because you can be confident that nothing important will be lost. This was a reasonable approach when widescreen displays a small part of the market, and developers were more concerned with optimizing games for 4:3 and didn't want to spend a lot of money on widescreen, but these days, it is the other way around. Games are optimized for widescreen, and the cheapest, safest way to adapt them to 4:3 is to retain the same FOV and let the view expand vertically to fill the screen.

and at LANs were money is on the line every one uses the same setup any way

Not really an issue for a single-player game such as Bioshock

if widescreen is done right multiscreen works fine out of the box

But multiscreen is an insignificantly small part of the market, so which approach supports multiscreen best simply is not an economic consideration.

lets look at Quake Wars for a bit it has a wide FOV in 4:3 my guess is about 90
in 5:4 its Vert+ since 5:4 is taller then 4:3
then theres 16:10 and 16:9 both use 4:3 vert + ....

Different games, different constraints and economic incentives. Quake Wars may well have been developed initially for 4:3, but even if it was not, the Quake series has always emphasized multiplayer action, which imposes concerns related to maintaining balance in competitive play when players may have different displays (not a concern in a single player game such as Bioshock, of course). Also, it appears to involve outdoor action with long sightlines. In such a case, too wide a FOV for your monitor's resolution can be a detriment, since it makes things smaller, and can impair distance vision (not a concern in indoor games such as Bioshock, of course).

then we come to driving games were H+ is a must imo
ever use the in car view it makes the car feel narrow in 4:3
DiRT in wide screen is a sight to behold

Yes, driving games benefit well from a very wide, even multiscreen, display, because in an actual car you can's see very far up or down, but you can see out the side windows. Again, different games, different design issues.

WIDE screen should have a wider fov then 4:3 or it would be called shortscreen

Wide actually refers to aspect ratio--so it's relative. Obviously, a 4:3 display can be physically wider than a "widescreen" display. It's only wide relative to its height, so shortscreen is equally correct, even if "widescreen" sounds better from a marketing prespective. Developers have to consider for each individual game how best to take advantage of a display that is so short relative to its width, or so wide realtive to your height.

some of us dont give a damn what the devs want

Not everybody is going to like every game. Tastes differ, and a developer's vision of a game may not match yours--in which case you may choose to buy something else instead. A developer is primarily interested in selling the product, which means giving a large number of people something pretty close to what they want. Based on sales, Bioshock seems to be doing that.

i want to be looking threw the eyes the the person im playing
no a window
i want to see as i would see if standing there
and if that means a bit of distortion on the edges so be it

Except of course that when you are actually standing there, the perspective is right, angles are correct, objects are the size they would actually appear if they were real, and there is no distortion at the edges of your vision. All of these are cues to your brain that you are not standing there looking at a real scene, but only at a picture of one.

1.) Horz+ can easily covers all available aspects the wider you go from 4:3 without zooming in or out relative to the 4:3 frame. And it looks natural and makes sense! You triple the width, you see 2 screens more worth on the side... not 2 screens worth LESS on the sides.

Zoom refers to a change in FOV. Since the 4:3 and 16:9 displays have the same FOV, neither is zoomed in, and each will show perfect and identical perspective when viewed from a distance 2/3 of the width of the screen. The game is designed to play on screens that are 4:3, 16:9, or 16:10, not on "triple width" displays. Note that a projection 4:3 display may be double or triple the width of a typical 16:9 monitor, yet nobody is insisting that such a display should show 2 or 3 times as much on the sides.

2.) Vert+ covers all aspects taller than 4:3 (there is only one that I've ever heard of someone using... 5:4.

While people can assemble all sorts of odd aspect ratio displays, there is no reason to expect developers to support them, since they are a minuscule fraction of the market. The standard aspect ratios are 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3. Some games may fortuitously work OK on odd aspect ratio configurations, but it is not reasonable to expect developers to make that a major criterion in development.

They can both exist (horz+ and Vert+) in the game, it's not a one or the other choice... see quakeworld for example.

Of course they can. No one approach is right for all situations. The skilled developer will choose an approach that best enhances the gameplay experience for his particular type of game.

Narrow FOV's give me headaches (I'm even gaming on a 37" screen from 3 feet away... should be super according to trrll) and make other people sick. But fine, let the dev use a "window" FOV, they just better not lock it down unless...

And distortion gives some people headaches. Some people have had problems with every FPS game ever created. Many people are unable to play any FPS game for more than a short period of time. Scientific research into the matter shows that a wide FOV is associated with a greater frequency of such problems than a narrow FOV, but there will always be exceptions. No one approach will be perfect for everybody, but based on sales, Bioshock seems to be coming pretty close.

Both FOV planes need to be locked if competitive fairness is the reason NOT to use Horz+... because using Vert- gives widescreeners an even bigger advantage with a massive vertical FOV. So the only fair competitive implementation is to pick an aspect and box the frame for display on other aspect ratio monitors.

This does not apply at all to single player games such as Bioshock. Even for multiplayer games, whether one display or another gives a competitive advantage depends upon the details of the game's design. A greater vertical view is obviously more of an advantage in mountainous terrain. Once again, there is no single best approach; it has to be determined experimentally on a case-by-case basis.

If the developer absolutely wants you to see something, that is what cut-scenes are for. Valve doesn't seem to have any trouble with cinematic lead-throughs without using cutscenes and while supporting multiple aspects.

Old technology. Modern PCs and consoles are powerful enough that cut scenes can be implemented within the gaming engine without having to set them apart

Zoom refers to a change in FOV. Since the 4:3 and 16:9 displays have the same FOV, neither is zoomed in, and each will show perfect and identical perspective when viewed from a distance 2/3 of the width of the screen.

Still not getting it are you? Refer to the many graphics posted as to why cropping and locking causes a zoom. The zoom result is the logical result of that action.

2.) Vert+ covers all aspects taller than 4:3 (there is only one that I've ever heard of someone using... 5:4.

While people can assemble all sorts of odd aspect ratio displays, there is no reason to expect developers to support them, since they are a minuscule fraction of the market. The standard aspect ratios are 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3. Some games may fortuitously work OK on odd aspect ratio configurations, but it is not reasonable to expect developers to make that a major criterion in development.

5:4 is probably a larger segment of displays than even 4:3. And its a perfectly standard ratio, being common on 19" LCDs and 17" & 19" CRTs. There is NO reason for games not to work on any aspect ratio, it's just good programming.

They can both exist (horz+ and Vert+) in the game, it's not a one or the other choice... see quakewars for example.

Of course they can. No one approach is right for all situations. The skilled developer will choose an approach that best enhances the gameplay experience for his particular type of game.

It makes sense to use that method as you don't cut off any aspects from use. Everything is covered perfectly, and the current zoom is maintained at wider or taller aspects. It just makes sense.

Narrow FOV's give me headaches (I'm even gaming on a 37" screen from 3 feet away... should be super according to trrll) and make other people sick. But fine, let the dev use a "window" FOV, they just better not lock it down unless...

And distortion gives some people headaches. Some people have had problems with every FPS game ever created. Many people are unable to play any FPS game for more than a short period of time. Scientific research into the matter shows that a wide FOV is associated with a greater frequency of such problems than a narrow FOV...

So let the user control the FOV! Easy fix.

Both FOV planes need to be locked if competitive fairness is the reason NOT to use Horz+... because using Vert- gives widescreeners an even bigger advantage with a massive vertical FOV. So the only fair competitive implementation is to pick an aspect and box the frame for display on other aspect ratio monitors.

This does not apply at all to single player games such as Bioshock.

So then why was the config that controls the FOV locked? No reason to do so in a single player game. Just bad juju.

If the developer absolutely wants you to see something, that is what cut-scenes are for. Valve doesn't seem to have any trouble with cinematic lead-throughs without using cutscenes and while supporting multiple aspects.

Old technology. Modern PCs and consoles are powerful enough that cut scenes can be implemented within the gaming engine without having to set them apart

Who said anything about pre-rendered video? Again, not me. FOV's and aspect can be changed during an in-game cutscene to show everything needed.



There are dozens of logical reasons not to do what Bioshock did. You are arguing for an illogical viewpoint, a viewpoint that praises developers for taking shortcuts, and harms the end-users. We hold devs to a higher standard.

[quote]
Zoom refers to a change in FOV. Since the 4:3 and 16:9 displays have the same FOV, neither is zoomed in, and each will show perfect and identical perspective when viewed from a distance 2/3 of the width of the screen.

Still not getting it are you? Refer to the many graphics posted as to why cropping and locking causes a zoom. The zoom result is the logical result of that action.

No, the so-called zoom is an illusion due to comparing a 16:9 screen with a 4:3 screen of a different width. One could create the same zoom illusion with two identical 16:9 proportion images of different widths. Since correct perspective is dependent upon the width of the screen (see my previous posts), the only correct comparison is between screens of identical width, whether 4:3 or 16:9.

5:4 is probably a larger segment of displays than even 4:3. And its a perfectly standard ratio, being common on 19" LCDs and 17" & 19" CRTs. There is NO reason for games not to work on any aspect ratio, it's just good programming.

So what? The same Bioshock approach that works for 4:3 and 16:9 will work fine for 5:4. So far, nobody has cited any system on which Bioshock will not work; the only complaint is that it will not provide the enhanced display on some exotic multiscreen systems that some people might wish it to. But there is little economic incentive for developers to program to provide enhanced displays on such nonstandard systems that constitute an insignificant portion of the market. Some games may provide a display that looks better on such systems than others, but this is almost certainly fortuitous.

t makes sense to use that method as you don't cut off any aspects from use. Everything is covered perfectly, and the current zoom is maintained at wider or taller aspects. It just makes sense.

There is no such parameter as "zoom." What people refer to as a "zoom" is a change in the size or FOV of an image. A static image has no zoom, but a zoom effect can be created by enlarging (for a 2D image) it or reducing the FOV (for a 3D image).

So let the user control the FOV! Easy fix.

Yes, as I've said before, I have no objection 2K providing a code or other mechanism to let people alter the FOV. However, some games depend upon FOV for dramatic effect, so it makes sense for games to have a default FOV chosen by the developer.

So then why was the config that controls the FOV locked? No reason to do so in a single player game. Just bad juju.

It automatically provides the FOV that the developer has found to produce the best game experience, no matter what the proportions of the screen are. To achieve this automatic accommodation, either the vertical or horizontal view must be fixed. What you all call HORIZ+ corresponds to fixing the vertical view. What you call VERT- corresponds to fixing the horizontal view.

Who said anything about pre-rendered video? Again, not me. FOV's and aspect can be changed during an in-game cutscene to show everything needed.

But if the FOV is different for 16:9 and 4:3, every cut scene will have to be playtested and adjusted to make sure it works on both aspect ratios. So now you are back to expecting the developer to divert development resources away from making the widescreen experience as good as possible in order to accommodate the rapidly diminishing 4:3 userbase.

There are dozens of logical reasons not to do what Bioshock did. You are arguing for an illogical viewpoint, a viewpoint that praises developers for taking shortcuts, and harms the end-users. We hold devs to a higher standard.

A game has a limited development budget. If a developer finds a "shortcut" that saves time and money, with little if any sacrifice in the game experience for the great majority of the customer base, then that frees up resources to invest in aspects of the game that yield a greater dividend in terms of improving the gameplay experience and (the bottom line) sales. From the sales figures for Bioshock, it seems that Irrational has done an excellent job of managing the difficult, zero-sum job of allocating development resources.

His name is trrll ffs. What's wrong with you people? :lol: