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[koam]

By that, I mean, let's assume we have a game that's 720p. In that resolution, the framerate is set to 60 but it stutters a lot, so you get 45-55 fps sometimes. If someone were to play that same game in 480p, would they get a consistant 60fps? 480p is less demanding, so i'm wondering if the games would run better.

I remember in the N64 days, when you got the expansion ram, if you played a game in 640x480, it would run slower but with higher res graphics.

 

[AtomicShroom]

Technically they could. Running at a higher resolution is always more demanding for the hardware.

But I'm fairly sure that they won't, because games on Xbox 360 are always rendered in 720p. Then they run through the scalar and get downsampled to 480p. So you gain absolutely no framerate boost since the games are rendered at a set resolution, no matter what the final output is. That's for Xbox 360. We'll see if Sony does it differently, allowing developpers to render games at 480p to gain a performance boost.

And that's AFAIK. I could be wrong on this. Please do correct me if I am.

 

[ronito]

Well I most certainly hope they beave differently.

 

[GitarooMan]

I think it's possible, although with the power of these systems, I think most games will run in 720p pretty smoothly. Another good example is MVP Baseball 2004 and 2005 which run significantly slower in my experience in 720p than in 480p on Xbox

 

[cubicle47b]

It depends on whether the game is internally rendered at 480p (in the 360's case I thought every game was rendered at 720p and then the scaler outputs the correct format) and whether the bottleneck has to do with resolution (it could be that the CPU has to calculate more physics / AI than it can handle).

 

[gofreak]

But I'm fairly sure that they won't, because games on Xbox 360 are always rendered in 720p. Then they run through the scalar and get downsampled to 480p. So you gain absolutely no framerate boost since the games are rendered at a set resolution, no matter what the final output is.

I'm not sure about this. I think devs can include multiple rendering modes, as long as one of them is 720p. For example, it's reported that PGR3 has a specific 480p mode for SDTVs, with the benefit of 4xAA (vs 2xAA at 720p) - so there must be a specific mode in order to do that.

 

[eso76]

By that, I mean, let's assume we have a game that's 720p. In that resolution, the framerate is set to 60 but it stutters a lot, so you get 45-55 fps sometimes.

If the frame rate stutters and drops to 55 fps, then you'll see 30fps on your screen. If V-sync is activated that is.
Refresh rate is synched to the tv's, so you can't have 58, 55, 45 fps, anything below 60fps will be refreshed at 30 fps.

Apart from that, games could definately run smoother in 480p, it's a lot less pixels to draw each frame; but it depends on the developer; all X360 games will be rendered internally at 720p and then scaled up or down, but i guess it would be possible to include different internal rendering resolutions as long as they also have a standard 720p mode, which is mandatory for Microsoft.

 

[C- Warrior]

Meh, 720p is the way it is.

The jump between resolutions from the N64 days to PS2 is bigger than it is from Xbox to 360.

 

[Particle Physicist]

this is why i hope that when ign and gamespot do head-to-heads, they compare them in high res, and in low res.. but they probably wont. :/

 

[Kobun Heat]

I just bought an HDTV, and by god if the games don't beave any differently I'm taking it right back to the store.

 

[Shogun]

Beave?

 

[koam]

They need to allow us to edit topics for 3 minutes after you post them

 

[Helznicht]

The jump between resolutions from the N64 days to PS2 is bigger than it is from Xbox to 360.

This is VERY Incorrect.

PS & N64 = 320 x 200 = 64000 pixels

****add 243200 pixels and get=>

PS2 & Xbox = 640 x 480 = 307200 pixels

****add 614400 pixels and get=>

X360 = 1280 x 720 = 921600 pixels


Thats like 3x the resolution increase from the 2 previous generations. Even without widescreens, its still more.

And even though there were a few current gen games with higher resolutions, the N64 could get 640x480 with the memory pack also.

 

[Particle Physicist]

This is VERY Incorrect.

PS & N64 = 320 x 200 = 64000 pixels

****add 243200 pixels and get=>

PS2 & Xbox = 640 x 480 = 307200 pixels

****add 614400 pixels and get=>

X360 = 1280 x 720 = 921600 pixels


Thats like 3x the resolution increase from the 2 previous generations. Even without widescreens, its still more.

And even though there were a few current gen games with higher resolutions, the N64 could get 640x480 with the memory pack also.

i think he meant the visual impact was greater.. which i agree with.

 

[cubicle47b]

i think he meant the visual impact was greater.. which i agree with.

Yeah, last gen was essentially a 4x increase in pixels (PS & N64 did 320x240). This gen is a 3x increase.

 

[Vaandaviii]

This is VERY Incorrect.

PS & N64 = 320 x 200 = 64000 pixels

****add 243200 pixels and get=>

PS2 & Xbox = 640 x 480 = 307200 pixels

****add 614400 pixels and get=>

X360 = 1280 x 720 = 921600 pixels


Thats like 3x the resolution increase from the 2 previous generations. Even without widescreens, its still more.

And even though there were a few current gen games with higher resolutions, the N64 could get 640x480 with the memory pack also.

320x240, not 200.


Talking about 720p the increase is lesser than the last gen increase (3 vs 4 times)

(640x480)/(320x240) > (1280x720)/(640x480) (4 > 3)

But 1080p is a considerably bigger jump (6,75 vs 4 times)

(640x480)/(320x240) < (1280x720)/(640x480) (4 < 6,75)

 

[Helznicht]

i think he meant the visual impact was greater.. which i agree with.

I will agree only if we are limited to 30" TV's. Greater than that and the argument is STRONG that the res difference this gen is noticable. I have an Xbox and a HTPC, and play several games on my 52" HDTV at 720p. The clarity jump from OOT to Fable to a game like COD2 is very similar.

 

[bycha]

If the frame rate stutters and drops to 55 fps, then you'll see 30fps on your screen. If V-sync is activated that is.
Refresh rate is synched to the tv's, so you can't have 58, 55, 45 fps, anything below 60fps will be refreshed at 30 fps.

Uhm... Is this real? U can't have 45? It's only 60, 30 and below 30? How many of this gen games have V-sync activated?

 

[Helznicht]

Talking about 720p the increase is lesser than the last gen increase (3 vs 4 times)

Thats an incorrect way of looking at it IMO.

You will never convince me the speed jump from my moped to my first car was less than my bike to my moped.

Bike = 10 mph
Moped = 40 mph
Car = 120 mph

My first car went 80 MPH faster than my moped. BUT, if I only drove that car on nieghbor hood streets at 25 mph (a small tv), I guess it wouldnt matter.

 

[Particle Physicist]

I will agree only if we are limited to 30" TV's. Greater than that and the argument is STRONG that the res difference this gen is noticable. I have an Xbox and a HTPC, and play several games on my 52" HDTV at 720p. The clarity jump from OOT to Fable to a game like COD2 is very similar.

bah. im quite happy with my 27"


:.(

 

[Helznicht]

bah. im quite happy with my 27"

sure you are

 

[Particle Physicist]

Thats an incorrect way of looking at it IMO.

You will never convince me the speed jump from my moped to my first car was less than my bike to my moped.

Bike = 10 mph
Moped = 40 mph
Car = 120 mph

My first car went 80 MPH faster than my moped. BUT, if I only drove that car on nieghbor hood streets at 25 mph (a small tv), I guess it wouldnt matter.

thats not a fair comparison either. cause no one drives at 120 mph. just sayin.

 

[Deg]

Meh, 720p is the way it is.

The jump between resolutions from the N64 days to PS2 is bigger than it is from Xbox to 360.

No.

 

[The Faceless Master]

thats not a fair comparison either. cause no one drives at 120 mph. just sayin.

i think thats the point... kinda like not having a HDTV!

or something... i could be wrong...

 

[cubicle47b]

The problem with your car/moped/bike analogy is you were used to going greater than 40 mph before you got your car. The moped was compared to what you'd already experienced and could never truly be fast. There are other factors unique to the analogy like the danger involved in driving at high speeds too.

The difference between 320x240 and 640x480 on someone with a SDTV or EDTV is greater than the difference between 480p and 720p on a 720p set even if we're talking about huge sets (although it's a lot closer at a size like 65"). If you're doing your comparison between the three on a large 720p set yeah, the jump to 720p is going to have more visual impact but no one had a 720p set in 1999 when the DC hit.

 

[eso76]

Uhm... Is this real? U can't have 45? It's only 60, 30 and below 30? How many of this gen games have V-sync activated?

yup, it's real. Refresh rate in games is in synch with the tv raster; think of a brush which paints the screen moving from the top to bottom 60 times per second.
A game can refresh at 60fps (one frame for each rasters pass) or 30 (once every other rasters pass) or 20, 15, 12, 10...only exact submultiples (is this a word ?) of 60. Which means the only available refresh rate immediately below 60 is 60 / 2 = 30.
If at some point a 60 fps game drops to 57, 58, then it has to drop to 30.

Think of JSRF on pal xbox's; when you're playing in Pal 60 mode you'll experience many slowdowns during which the game runs at 30 fps when it can't render 60 or more fps.
However, it seems to always manage to render internally at at least 50fps, and that's why in Pal 50hz mode there's absolutely no slowdown.

I'd say 95% of games have V-Sync enabled; you can say it's not when you notice the infamous 'tearing' effect; this happens when the refresh rate of the console drops and goes out of synch with that of the tv; this results in the the screen displaying 2 different frames at the same time; one frame in the upper part and the next frame in the bottom part; this happens because the new frame arrived 'late'; it arrived when the raster was already in the middle of the screen and had already 'painted' its upper part with the informations it had (the old frame).
Gt4, ninja gaiden, mgs2, splinter cell are a few examples of games running with V-sync disabled OR in fact with some kind of dynamic v-sync (enabled when the console can output 60fps or more, disabled when it drops below that).
You'll notice some tearing from time to time, but no real slowdown.

 

[Helznicht]

I have been to 120 MPH and it rocks! Just like 720P widescreen on my TV does. :lol

 

[cubicle47b]

I've driven at 120mph and no one but me in the car noticed we were driving faster than normal (and I didn't notice much of a difference). Of course there were only light curves so we weren't experiencing heavy g's. 720p is only decent on my monitor. 1080p is fucking brilliant, though (it's 1920x1200 native).

 

[jett]

No.

Uh, as was proved before, the resolution jump is smaller next-gen(when considering 720p, that is)...and it will pretty much go unnoticed by most gamers, too.

 

[capitalCORN]

I'm starting to believe some of you enjoy 480p.

 

[ToyMachine228]

This thread was better when it said "Would games beave differently" :lol

 

[Particle Physicist]

I'm starting to believe some of you enjoy 480p.

well, 480p is much better than what i can view games at right now. someday. someday, i will have an decent tv..

:.(

 

[Amir0x]

well, 480p is much better than what i can view games at right now. someday. someday, i will have an decent tv..

:.(

But I thought you were happy with your wildly incapable TV!

 

[GaimeGuy]

I'm starting to believe some of you enjoy 480p.

Why not? 720x480 is perfectly acceptable for a resolution.

Or are you saying that all DVDs look like shit?

 

[BlueTsunami]

I'm starting to believe some of you enjoy 480p.

480p is actually pretty good, also, being downsampled from 720p (as gofreak stated) which gets you (2x the AA?) which 720p at 2x AA you would get 4x AA for 480p gets you nice AA at that Res. Although, watching game vids at 720p...it makes it hard to go back to 480p. Alot of detail is lost.

 

[Amir0x]

Why not? 720x480 is perfectly acceptable for a resolution.

Or are you saying that all DVDs look like shit?

It's still pretty laughable next to higher resolutions, that's correct.

 

[Particle Physicist]

But I thought you were happy with your wildly incapable TV!

um. yes. yes i am. er.. yeah.

 

[goomba]

Id prefer games to stick to a 480p standard, as this would mean photorealistic graphics would be easier to achieve.

 

[BlueTsunami]

Id prefer games to stick to a 480p standard, as this would mean photorealistic graphics would be easier to achieve.

?

 

[goomba]

?

Higher resolutions require more horsepower, horsepower that could be used for other tasks such as texturing, polygons etc.

DVD's are in 480 resolution and they are photorealistic afterall.

 

[Amir0x]

Higher resolutions require more horsepower, horsepower that could be used for other tasks such as texturing, polygons etc.

DVD's are in 480 resolution and they are photorealistic afterall.

...

 

[ShowDog]

I'd say 720p is a good resolution, and I'm usually not crazy about resolutions. With anti-aliasing on I usually don't see much of a difference above 1024x768 on pc games, as opposed to those who swear by 1600x1200. I believe the switch to Hi-Def is definately a good one, it's just too bad I can't take advantage of it (yet). I believe higher definition resolutions will make games look much more impressive, no point having super detailed textures when there's not enough pixels to show off the detail.

 

[vatstep]

Higher resolutions require more horsepower, horsepower that could be used for other tasks such as texturing, polygons etc.

DVD's are in 480 resolution and they are photorealistic afterall.

 

[BlueTsunami]

I'd say 720p is a good resolution, and I'm usually not crazy about resolutions. With anti-aliasing on I usually don't see much of a difference above 1024x768 on pc games, as opposed to those who swear by 1600x1200. I believe the switch to Hi-Def is definately a good one, it's just too bad I can't take advantage of it (yet). I believe higher definition resolutions will make games look much more impressive, no point having super detailed textures when there's not enough pixels to show off the detail.

For now 720p is that sweet spot but I think 1080p has equal returns (like 480p to 720p). At this time 1080p sets are crazy to find, so 720p is where its at.

Higher resolutions require more horsepower, horsepower that could be used for other tasks such as texturing, polygons etc.

DVD's are in 480 resolution and they are photorealistic afterall.

I was going to make a funny comment about this but Film does not equate to games in any way....ummm... I don't even know where to begin. Basically, games need the higher resolutions to show off more detail (textures) which makes the game more appealing (visualy).

Ummm...i'm confused.

 

[DCX]

Higher resolutions require more horsepower, horsepower that could be used for other tasks such as texturing, polygons etc.

DVD's are in 480 resolution and they are photorealistic afterall.

You don't operate heavy machines do you?

DCX

 

[koam]

How on earth did you guys manage to turn this into a huge argument. It was a straight forward questions. Mods you can lock this, my question was answered

 

[GaimeGuy]

Indeed. :lol

 

[Beer Monkey]

If you guys are doing pixel math, it is all fucked up. You need to factor how many pixels each system can push through, and that's not just about resolution, you have to factor in interlacing, which at some resolutions allows you to get away with half of the fill rate.

Early PS1 games:

320x240 * 60 fields per second = 4,608,000 pixels per second

A tiny amount of later PSOne games (640x480 but only 240 lines per field, half the bandwith of progressive scan):

640x240 * 60 fields per second = 9,216,000

Early PS2 games (rendered 640x480 but only 240 lines per field):

640x240 * 60 fields per second = 9,216,000

An increasing amount, though still minority, of later PS2 games:

640x480 * 60 frames per second = 18,432,000

Xbox 360 launch titles:

1280x720 * 60 frames per second = 55,296,000

If you compare launches only, PS2 launched at only double the pixel throughput of PS1 launch games.

Xbox 360 is launching at over 5x the pixel throughput of launch PS2 titles, and still triple the throughput of late PS2 titles.

Of course, there are many other visual factors to consider when comparing graphics. But pretending that the pixel rendering bandwidth hasn't jumped more than the PS2 did is crap. Hell, even throw in the 480p Dreamcast, and this is still a bigger jump than that system over the PS1.

 

[Bebpo]

Well it happened on current gen Xbox games. For example, Amped 2 runs at a much higher framerate in 480p vs. 720p.

So it could happen.

The question then becomes: if you own an HDTV do you play at 720p with a non-60fps framerate or 480p with a 60fps framerate?

 

[Beer Monkey]

The question then becomes: if you own an HDTV do you play at 720p with a non-60fps framerate or 480p with a 60fps framerate?

If the developer provided that option, and many may not (out of laziness or even political reasons), my choice would still depend on the title or genre.

Racing games, I would certainly go for the framerate, every time.