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[Victor Omega]

Fidelity: the degree to which an electronic device (such as a record player, radio, or television) accurately reproduces its effect (such as sound or picture) - Merriam-Webster
Yes. Gamers within the PC space have always been “Fidelity Conscious” towards, Frame rate, resolution, and performance.

But in recent years, Console gamers and even Casual gamers (Mobile space) have all been more sentient towards those things which has led to smarter buying decision.

I would argue Digital Foundry has at least influenced the FCG consumer more than the likes of IGN or people like Linus Tech Tips.

Do you think Digital Foundry created the Fidelity Conscious Gamers?

 

[bigdad2007]

No. People cared about this sort of stuff way back in the day. There is a reason “blast processing” was a Sega marketing gimmick.

 

[violence]

Someone else would have done it.

I’m assuming the only people that watch their content is the more hard-core crowd. They definitely give the masses more knowledge of what’s going on. Where before we probably ignored performance issues, now we’re more annoyed. However, I’m sure there’s people in game development who don’t fully understand this side of things and more people in game development being educated may benefit the game right?

That being said, the first time I saw T2 in 4K I didn’t see any issues, I was just into the movie. Now that I understand DNR, it looks horrendous. Was I better off just being ignorant?

Zelda ocarina of Time runs at 20 frames per second and it’s the best game of all time.

Redfall running at 4K/120 won’t make it a good game.

 

[unclbenn]

i dont think they "created" it but they definitely brought it to the masses. just look at all the other channels that have been born out of digital foundry

 

[cjp]

edit: nvm, ignore.

 

[HL3.exe]

Inevitable. Even before DF became popular, I've always been interested in the tech and design behind games.

And don't forget, the PS360 generation and before were mostly unstable in performance (with exceptions). It's only after the 8th generation and the slowing down of Moore's Law, where fewer gamers were wowing gamers with giant leaps in tech and design and players were willing to accept bad frame rates in favor of interesting simulation fidelity, that ubiquitous standards became prevalent. Things like smooth frame pacing and frame times became the focus, instead of leading with insane simulation fidelity that tanked the frame rate, like Crysis.

 

[CrustyBritches]

They provided the info console gamers wanted to know. They didn’t create them.

 

[violence]

double post

 

[ReBurn]

Lens of Truth is what got me into it.

 

[Gaiff]

On consoles, maybe. People have been obsessed with frame rates and resolutions since times immemorial.

To be fair, I also didn’t care about it on consoles until I got a PC and went back to console to realize something was off. I still don’t care about it all that much on consoles. The trade-off was always freedom for convenience so I’m usually good to go with whatever the dev decide unless it’s really awful.

 

[havoc00]

Im more of a 3d Bio motion man myself

 

[Wildebeest]

No. If you go back to classic gaming, there were more platforms and even more focus on which version was best and which platforms were holding things back. But yes, a lot of older games ran at sub 30 frames for a lot of the time, and people just coped because they wanted more complex or detailed games. I think it was mostly when Quake came around that FPS became a huge thing in PC gaming. The physics simulation was tied to the frame rate, so there were some things you just couldn't do in competitive games with low framerate. Then Quake 2 was used for benchmarking hardware like 3d acceleration cards in magazines. When displays switched from CRT tech issues like latency and screen tearing started to get very noticeable for most people.

 

[adamsapple]

Lens of Truth is what got me into it.

Now that's a blast from the past.

 

[rodrigolfp]

has led to smarter buying decision.

Moving to PC, right?

 

[ReBurn]

On consoles, maybe. People have been obsessed with frame rates and resolutions since times immemorial.

To be fair, I also didn’t care about it on consoles until I got a PC and went back to console to realize something was off. I still don’t care about it all that much on consoles. The trade-off was always freedom for convenience so I’m usually good to go with whatever the dev decide unless it’s really awful.

Immemorial? Frame rates really didn't become a big discussion until the 90's. People argued over slowdown in the 16-bit days but we didn't think of it as frame rate because we didn't really start thinking in frames until we got to 32-bit consoles and progressive scan monitors started to become more common. Before that we were concerned with how many and what size sprites and the number of colors could be used from whatever size palette the graphics chip supported.

 

[ChiefDada]

Do you think Digital Foundry created the Fidelity Conscious Gamers?

Nope. I've been interested in video game tech ever since the PS3 era. That is the point in gaming where the line between photorealism and real-time graphics were blurred enough for me to be curious about what was going on under the hood, with games like KZ2, TLOU, MGS4, etc. Sadly, DF focuses much more on the most boring aspects of game visuals - resolution and frame rate. Not as interesting as discussing the actual tech being utilized but it makes for great platform war fodder that I willingly and happily indulge in.

 

[poppabk]

Nah I remember all those interlacing close ups from before DF even existed.

 

[TrebleShot]

This again?

The answer is no.
Literally had the same
Thread like a couple of weeks ago.

DF is great entertainment and provides great information for people wondering where to buy their games.

 

[majorgamer10]

I think everyone likes an interesting conversation, so it's natural.

 

[Starbuck2907]

Graphics wars started many, many years before digital foundry even existed. They just give tech nerds and fanboys more details to talk about.

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

Some people are genuinely curious about which version of a game they should buy, but it's mostly just ammunition for Teh Console Warz (tm).

 

[Kuranghi]

When I was a boy and playing PC games and changing settings and res I didn't understand what v-sync stutter was but I remember hating it, now I can mitigate it and know why it happens in the first place, so I appreciate everything I've learned from oothersin the past and now them.

Though I do think your average person who has little understanding of why things are happening gets caught up in it, gets so confused and then ends up not enjoying things they probably would have if they were ignorant.

I see that sometimes in my TV sales job, people are so focused on say having 4x HDMI 2.1 ports that only really LG or Samsung has. Sony, Hisense and others only have 2x 2.1 ports and 2x 2.0 ports and the amount of people who won't buy the Sony even after I ask them what they're doing with the TV and 2.1 bandwidth is super irrelevant to them, sure you want your TV to be future-proof but it'll be surprising to me if films and TV suddenly start being broadcast/streamed at framerates above 24/25/30 at 4K to facilitate a need for that higher bandwidth.

Plus those people will have upgraded their TV for other reasons by then anyway, like size, spec increase, increased panel resolution and such.

 

[Gaiff]

Immemorial? Frame rates really didn't become a big discussion until the 90's. People argued over slowdown in the 16-bit days but we didn't think of it as frame rate because we didn't really start thinking in frames until we got to 32-bit consoles and progressive scan monitors started to become more common. Before that we were concerned with how many and what size sprites and the number of colors could be used from whatever size palette the graphics chip supported.

Yeah, since the dawn of 3D accelerators 25-ish years ago which is ancient in technological terms. 25 years in tech might as well be 200 years in human years.

 

[RoboFu]

It really does hurt the industry but at the same time games like Mario and Zelda keep getting awards and selling tens of millions... so it's not all doom
And gloom.

 

[Fess]

Maybe for some. But I woke up on these things by myself long before DF existed. As said in another thread I imported all big PS1 games from the US just to go from 25fps (PAL) to 30fps (NTSC). And when I found out I had played SNES Super Metroid in slow motion my whole life I was quite pissed. Slower speed wasn’t really a thing on the Commodore computers where many devs were located in the UK.

Btw I especially remember Motorhead on PS1 which was the first game I tried with a performance mode. It was possible to halve the number of opponents on the track for a doubled framerate. Obvious choice for me!

 

[Killer8]

Comparisons have been done since back in the Genesis vs SNES days, possibly earlier. You can read old threads on GAF of PS2 vs GC vs Xbox face-offs. IGN used to do comparisons which you can still find archived online. Many of the discussions and language used sounds eerily similar to today, it's surreal how little has changed in 20 years.

What's different today is that the differences between the platforms is now trivial and is almost like splitting hairs compared to back then, where sometimes a platform could have a completely different version of the game due to technical constraints.

 

[kikii]

No. People cared about this sort of stuff way back in the day. There is a reason “blast processing” was a Sega marketing gimmick.

yeah so true, however DF is like ohh zoom 400% that grass, it looks better on ps2 than on NES...normally ppl dont even pay attention to those

 

[semiconscious]

nah. most people who enjoy driving cars don't necessarily also enjoy disassembling/reassembling them. being a gaming specific forum, there's more of the type of people who do enjoy doing so here than in the wider gaming population...

 

[Crayon]

Maybe someone would be ding it better. Their random musings are pretty shallow. Their uploads can be clickbaity. John's retro series is unique.

Otherwise, idk how these guys are like a singular authority now. Maybe that's indictive of the audience being limited. On the other hand, when nxgamer started trying to do something similar, got weird harassment online. Presumably from df fans? So maybe df is more of a magnet for tribal types.

 

[DownLikeBCPowder]

Just a symptom. It has always been this way but modern internet magnifies certain messages both sent and received. But make no mistake, improved visual fidelity and so forth have always been marketable and marketed. I still don't think the number is as large as it seems due to the amplification.

 

[analog_future]

Digital Foundry didn't create anything.

The channel is popular because people have grown to have a thirst for an understanding of the fine details behind the games they play, and DF were the first big channel to provide that.

 

[Hugare]

They didnt create it, of course, but certainly helped to make it more popular to the masses and inspired other content creators to do the same kind of analyses.

I've always been into tech, but DF introduced me to more stuff and produced deep dives that no other channel was doing at the time.

DLSS 3, for example, when it wasnt even released to the public yet, they've already created their own tools for the analyses. A bunch of other channels tried and failed to produce DLSS 3 content spreading misinformation.

They arent flawless, but they are the best in what they do imo, and educated and influenced tons of people. Even developers pay attention to what they say, sometimes patching their games according to what they've pointed out.

 

[Griffon]

How old are you OP? It's been that way since always.

I'd even argue that right now, tech and graphics is much less of a focus and a selling point than back in the 90s.

 

[March Climber]

i dont think they "created" it but they definitely brought it to the masses. just look at all the other channels that have been born out of digital foundry

Bingo. They popularized it, added good presentation, and also found a great way to dumb down the complexities for the casual audience(the most important aspect).

 

[MayauMiao]

But in recent years, Console gamers and even Casual gamers (Mobile space) have all been more sentient towards those things which has led to smarter buying decision.

Console gamers have been doing this for a long time. The only reason you barely hear about it back then is the lack of Youtube like platform and Internet access, plus ability to easily capture screen or videos.

Just imagine if people had it back then, we be hearing insults between Atari 2600 and ColecoVision fanboys.

 

[Victor Omega]

How old are you OP? It's been that way since always.

I'd even argue that right now, tech and graphics is much less of a focus and a selling point than back in the 90s.

34. I'm asking a question (i already know the answer to) for conversation’s sake.

 

[Gaiff]

Console gamers have been doing this for a long time. The only reason you barely hear about it back then is the lack of Youtube like platform and Internet access, plus ability to easily capture screen or videos.

Just imagine if people had it back then, we be hearing insults between Atari 2600 and ColecoVision fanboys.

Console gamers have been fighting about specs and tech since the late 80s.

 

[MayauMiao]

Console gamers have been fighting about specs and tech since the late 80s.

 

[JimboJones]

Do we still want to be arguing "angular graphics" and missing "soul"?

Maybe someone would be ding it better. Their random musings are pretty shallow. Their uploads can be clickbaity. John's retro series is unique.

Otherwise, idk how these guys are like a singular authority now. Maybe that's indictive of the audience being limited. On the other hand, when nxgamer started trying to do something similar, got weird harassment online. Presumably from df fans? So maybe df is more of a magnet for tribal types.

Some of the stuff on his channel was genuinely bad like if you want to talk bias and pulling stuff from his ass he didn't know what he was talking about.
He's got better since he started at ign probably because he either couldn't get away with that stuff or he's educated himself better.

 

[MaestroMike]

n64 being 64 bits and more powerful than ps1 gave me a confidence boost as a kid

 

[StereoVsn]

There were plenty of folks discussing power differences of consoles way before DF and will be doing that until consoles are just some VMs in the cloud.

DF provides entertaining and useful overviews of game performance and I love their DF Retro segments.

 

[Scotty W]

No, I recall reading very intensive reviews of DVDs back in the day.

The mindset probably comes from car magazines

 

[LordOfChaos]

It existed before and certainly would without them, but they definitely popularized it even further too.

 

[Deerock71]

It was inevitable. DF just found a niche and rode the wave.

 

[Lionel Richie]

I appreciate the thread OP and it's a quality discussion to be had. I honestly see both sides of the coin, as you SHOULD be well informed of any hobby you're seriously into. Reputable, objective information is NEVER a bad thing. On the other hand, while Digital Foundry is amazing and I'm very much a fan, it serves a perverse unintended role of fans either over simplifying it into a numbers game or flat out shitposting. Like most things in this great fine world, "bits analysts" are best used in moderation.

 

[CGNoire]

Graphic Settings in PC Games since forever Created the Fidelity Conscious Gamer.

 

[Haint]

No. Digital Foundry just repackaged and built a business model around what was already happening on the Beyond3D forums. "Sub-HD" was common knowledge and a common pejorative in the "Core Gamer" sphere regarding PS360 well before Digital Foundry was a thing.

 

[Reizo Ryuu]

I remember telling my friends to pick pal 60 instead of 50 so the games run smoother; another friend of mine wanted to get vga cables for his dreamcast to improve the picture quality as well. This shit has always existed.

 

[Crayon]

Do we still want to be arguing "angular graphics" and missing "soul"?



Some of the stuff on his channel was genuinely bad like if you want to talk bias and pulling stuff from his ass he didn't know what he was talking about.
He's got better since he started at ign probably because he either couldn't get away with that stuff or he's educated himself better.

Which one, John? I figure they would pick up a lot. John and Alex were regulars here and while Alex was spicy, neither were dumb. Richard was back on beyond3d, I think. Also sharp. They must have picked up a lot over the years, even if only from being corrected. They still don't come off as real experts, though. We have people here who have at least as much insight on graphics. Probably because some ARE profesionals.

 

[YCoCg]

Didn't we already have this thread recently? It feels familiar.