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4:3 gaming needs to die...

BlackClouds said:
WRONG again! I'm not rich, I just got a job, and a big screen and no babies (child support is killer!). From here on out, there is no excuse for not having widescreen support.
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You have more money than me, so you are rich. Widescreen is for movies! Games should use all the tv space they can.
 
What if there's something on the floor that you have to have, and the 16:9 doesn't show it! You could be screwed!

It's all smashed and stuff on my tv.
 
I don't understand why so many people with 16:9 TV's are so stubborn about 4:3 content. What's the big deal? I really don't care whether a game is 4:3 or 16:9, so long as it's a good game. I buy widescreen movies because they were intended to be widescreen, and I don't cry when they don't fill my screen. And I play games in whatever aspect ratio they were made in. Honestly, I'd rather have a developer pick one and use it than bother with the effort of supporting both. And I don't care which one.
 
Well I mean like if it was originally 4:3, and in the 16:9 conversion it cut off or shrunk something really small on the bottom of the screen so you couldn't see it anymore. Could be screwed!
 
Red Scarlet said:
Well I mean like if it was originally 4:3, and in the 16:9 conversion it cut off or shrunk something really small on the bottom of the screen so you couldn't see it anymore. Could be screwed!
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Nothing's cut off unless you want it to be. You can either have pillar boxes, or have it stratched. Zooming's an option, but that's your choice, which could result in what you said, but isn't required.

16:9 > 4:3

It's a fact, there's no two ways around it.

HD > SD

It's a fact, there's to two ifs, ands, or buts about it.

Just because you can't afford it, or refuse to pay for it, doesn't make it any less superior.
 
It's also a fact that I prefer fullscreen for games and widescreen for movies. When I think of a game in widescreen the whole time, it doesn't sound that good. I enjoy fullscreen!

No ifs, ands, or buts about that. fact fact fact fact fact fact fact fact fact fact
 
Red Scarlet said:
It's also a fact that I prefer fullscreen and widescreen for movies. No ifs, ands, or buts about that. fact fact fact fact fact fact fact fact fact fact
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You prefer something inferior. That's wonderful.
 
Stop apologising for your 10 year old 20 inch tv. This is GAF, you're supposed to be on the cutting edge. Buying new game systems at 400$ plus, buying games when they come out at full price, yet balking at getting a decent tv, please. Once going to progressive scan and widescreen, there's no going back for new games. Might as well rename this the retro forum then, where we are happy playing genesis and snes games on old outdated tv's.

And even if you're personally outdated...the game industry isn't, and they should be on the cutting edge also. There is no excuse. We are talking about important facts here. :)
 
And the world still goes on. I'm sure you like many things deemed inferior by others as well. Get off your high horse.

The last (and really ONLY) system I got at launch was the Dreamcast, BC. :)

My TV works fine. I'd rather get my money's worth out of it than have to buy a new one just because. Wasteful!
 
BlackClouds said:
And even if you're personally outdated...the game industry isn't, and they should be on the cutting edge also. There is no excuse. We are talking about important facts here. :)
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Someone needs to tell this to the rest of Square-Enix... Tri-Ace is the only one that seems to understand this.
 
SnakeXs said:
Nothing's cut off unless you want it to be. You can either have pillar boxes, or have it stratched. Zooming's an option, but that's your choice, which could result in what you said, but isn't required.

16:9 > 4:3

It's a fact, there's no two ways around it.

HD > SD

It's a fact, there's to two ifs, ands, or buts about it.

Just because you can't afford it, or refuse to pay for it, doesn't make it any less superior.
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HD is better than SD...duh. But 16:9 > 4:3 ? Where'd you come up with that? You can display whatever you want in either format. To use your own words, nothing's cut off unless you want it to be.
 
Red Scarlet said:
And the world still goes on. I'm sure you like many things deemed inferior by others as well. Get off your high horse.

The last (and really ONLY) system I got at launch was the Dreamcast, BC. :)
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Probably not. I tend to not be bitter when something's better than what I have.

Just because there's something better out there, doesn't mean what you have is worse. Doesn't mean what's out there isn't better, and unneeded, though.
 
16:9 is a much more cinematic view, and is closer to what your eyes see.

4:3 goes against what your eyes want. With a 4:3 screen you're left with tons of dead air around the screen.

16:9 fills that in, caters to human eyesight, and allows for more room for things to occur.
 
I'm not bitter about it. I just don't enjoy the condescending attitude about 4:3 you and others are saying. How *it must be this way for all!*. You aren't everyone, don't speak for me, please! I'll get an HD tv when my current one dies.

I'm not going "omg death to HD/16:9". I like it for movies. I don't care about it for games right now. That's all.

I dunno..you'd be surprised at what my eyes can and can't see..4:3 may be closer. :lol
 
jedimike said:
People can bitch about bad framerates, screen tearing, lighting bloom all day long, but for me the biggest distraction is a 4:3 screen. After playing my 360 for a few weeks, I tried to play Call of Cathulhu (a 4:3 game). I just couldn't get into it because I felt like I was playing with blinders on. It's really bad because the premise of the game is to look around and find clues. The restrictive view was just too great for me to ignore.

The wider peripheral view of 16:9 is just so much more natural. I can't imagine a better reason to upgrade to an HDTV and a 360 or PS3. It's nice to know that every game is being made for HD, which means 16:9. I really hope Nintendo gets on board with it... movie studios have known this for a couple decades now.
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I didn't even read the thread, but damn you are so gay for xbox, acutally you're totally xbox. 360 is the best console ever, i can't play 4:3, blah blah. Might was well tac on an advertisement for LIVE and list the March releases.

16:9 will the the standard when the market decides, looks like 2009.
 
Red Scarlet said:
I'm not bitter about it. I just don't enjoy the condescending attitude about 4:3 you and others are saying. How *it must be this way for all!*. You aren't everyone, don't speak for me, please! I'll get an HD tv when my current one dies.

I'm not going "omg death to HD/16:9". I like it for movies. I don't care about it for games right now. That's all.
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Nor did I say OMG U AL NED HD RITE NOW LAWL

I'm just stating the facts. If you don't like it, then enjoy what you enjoy. The facts remain.

And, no sane person I know has seen HD games and demanded 4:3. Not 1. The preference of 4:3 to 16:9, in it's native form (Thus not you with a 4:3 screen seeing letterboxes, I mean a 16:9 screen displaying 16:9 content) is baffling.
 
Red Scarlet said:
And the world still goes on. I'm sure you like many things deemed inferior by others as well. Get off your high horse.
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Going to ride this high horse until the legs fall off, cause I know I'm right, and I know you're oh so wrong. And talk about condescending attitudes, not supporting cutting edge features because they assume we are all too poor to buy a new tv, and ofcourse we won't miss what we don't have right? That is condesceneding far as I'm concerned. These companies assuming such things and it just ain't right!

And Snake is right, human eyesite is widescreen! We are talking about important facts here. :)
 
Yeah, but I wasn't talking to you with what you quoted me on.

I have no qualms with the eventual switch to HD for games. I have qualms when people decide that something has to be one way, and only that way for everybody involved.

Perspective. Learn about it.

*done with topic*
 
I recently discovered the joy of playing WoW in widescreen...even on my 4:3 monitor I felt like I was rediscovering the game for the first time with all that extra screen space. Simply wonderful!
 
This all seems kind of moot in the long run. For next gen PS3 and X360 gamers (don't know about Revolution), you kind of get what you wish for. They will be designed around HD resolutions graphics as standard, so you get the wider fuller image as well as higher resolutions, but those with SD sets can still play. The image will just get downsampled and cropped for 4:3. Video outputs with either HDMI/DVI to component to S-video even composite to maybe (heaven forbid) RF. These systems are on the cutting edge, it's just a matter of upgrading when it's time for you...but 4:3 forever? Please.
 
Most people who would rather play games in 4:3 modes on a SDTV probably haven't had the chance to play a 16:9 game in 480p or higher. I used to say the exact same things as most in this topic before getting a new HD set.

Anyway games will support 4:3 for some time so it's not a big deal, it would just be nice if more games supported 16:9.
 
I don't understand all the 4:3 for life people. Aside from hesitance to drop a bunch of money on a new TV, I don't know how you could possibly prefer it. As others have said, 16:9 is much closer to how we actually see things. 4:3 isn't a deal breaker by any means but 16:9 is vastly superior...especially for things like racing games and FPSers where peripheral vision is crucial.
 
... Nevermind. Went off the handle a bit, haha. Still, in my mind the upgrade is hardly worth the money spent.
 
While I would agree that the thread title is a bit inflammatory, I still can't see why someone would prefer 4:3 over the other. Then again, they were probably just reacting to the ferocity of the original poster's statement. Anyone who honestly believes that 4:3 is superior is deluding themselves though.

EDIT: I liked your original post better. It gave me a funny feeling in my belly.
 
Dragona Akehi said:
Perfect Dark and GoldenEye wasn't really 16:9 as far as I remember: the "16:9 mode" was stretched horizontally.
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I'm not entirely sure how the Rare widescreen N64 games worked, especially given that I played them on screens incapable of properly displaying a widescreen image, but I do remember that the Goldeneye "widescreen" mode did expand your view of the playfield. I tried it once -- the image was all squished to fit on my screen, but I could tell that a wider view of the playing area was visible.

Unless I'm wrong, of course.
 
All games should have a 16:9 display option. Period. It takes little effort from a developer to adjust the aspect ratio and re-adjust HUD objects and such, and it doesn't effect anyone with a regular 4:3 TV. Every game is better off for it no matter what opinion you hold on the subject.

Remember, you can have widescreen on standard definition, but you cannot have high definition without widescreen. Again, you can have widescreen without high definition.


DavidDayton said:
I'm not entirely sure how the Rare widescreen N64 games worked, especially given that I played them on screens incapable of properly displaying a widescreen image, but I do remember that the Goldeneye "widescreen" mode did expand your view of the playfield. I tried it once -- the image was all squished to fit on my screen, but I could tell that a wider view of the playing area was visible.
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Putting a 16:9 signal on a 4:3 display will result in everything looking squished taller. That's what's supposed to happen, since the game thinks it's stretching out the entire display on a wider 16:9 monitor.
 
BlackClouds said:
Might as well rename this the retro forum then, where we are happy playing genesis and snes games on old outdated tv's.
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Yeah, we certainly can't have that, can we?
 
No Sir, and btw, I was referring to certain game companies for their condescending behavior (for not supporting cutting edge features like widescreen), not Red Scarlet or anybody else in this thread. Just to make that clear.
 
krzy123 said:
i have a 16:9 tv and still play 4:3 games on it in the wide zoomed mode, doesnt bother me :|
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I did that for a while, but I started to notice how stretched out and fat everything looked.

Now it's 4:3 games in a regular old 4:3 window.
 
I would say the aspect ratio would largely depend on the type of game.

I mean, a vertical scrolling shooter, or pacman would benefit little from the extra widescreen space.

FPS' or racing, however, could possibly benefit from seeing more around you, but that also depends on the nature of the material - for example, F-zero, where vertical view is also important, or Metroid where seeing above you is equally important.

Of course, it depends on whether the extended ratio actually increases your horizontal view, or decreases you vertical view for a larger picture - ratio is just that, a ratio, nothing to with actual size or field of vision. that's left up to the developer.
 
WindyMan said:
Putting a 16:9 signal on a 4:3 display will result in everything looking squished taller. That's what's supposed to happen, since the game thinks it's stretching out the entire display on a wider 16:9 monitor.
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Well, yes, I know that.
 
SnakeXs said:
16:9 is a much more cinematic view, and is closer to what your eyes see.

4:3 goes against what your eyes want. With a 4:3 screen you're left with tons of dead air around the screen.

16:9 fills that in, caters to human eyesight, and allows for more room for things to occur.
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Ehh, not necessarily. The 4:3 version could show absolutely everything the 16:9 version shows, with additional content on the top and bottom. Or the 16:9 version could show absolutely everything the 4:3 version shows, with additional content on the sides. Or they both might have some area the other view couldn't see.

As long as it's not video or a real-time animation framed as if it were a video, full-screen makes the most sense for games, whether that full screen is 4:3, 5:4, 16:9, or 23:11.
 
hh, not necessarily. The 4:3 version could show absolutely everything the 16:9 version shows, with additional content on the top and bottom. Or the 16:9 version could show absolutely everything the 4:3 version shows, with additional content on the sides. Or they both might have some area the other view couldn't see.

As long as it's not video or a real-time animation framed as if it were a video, full-screen makes the most sense for games, whether that full screen is 4:3, 5:4, 16:9, or 23:11.
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IAWTP
 
i'm so sick and tired of 4:3 content, too. i can't wail 'till PS3 comes out so i can buy a new TV and enjoy (finally!) 16:9 games and movies!
 
I think it's probably more important for developers to actually make good games worth playing, period. I waited 16 hours in the rain outside of Best Buy for a system I'm not even playing. Fuck 4:3/16:9/whatever, the fucking games suck right now, whether they're in widescreen or not, and that's the truth.
 
Some N64 games stretched the image so you'd have to set your TV to widescreen mode. My TV has a widescreen mode and uses this method nicely.

Some of them squashed the image manually to where you didnt have to turn on Widescreen mode on the TV. I'm sure this was a fake method instead of using true widescreen.
 
I think games should be developed for 16x9. It's just a more natural, pleasing, cinematic ratio. I'm actually opposed to games switching between 4:3 and 16:9 as the screen ratio IS a big deal and developers should optimize for one ratio or the other.

Case in point: RE4. Widescreen on a 4:3 tv because the ratio is so important to the overall game experience.
 
RegularMK said:
Name me the price you found and you may have a convert.
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I purchased a 30" Sanyo HDTV with HDMI, 2 component inputs and an ATSC tuner with QAM enabled for $592 a year ago. It was also available for $300 - 400 for awhile.
 
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