Widescreen Gaming Forum

There's something funky about this game. The FOV doesn't feel right even when playing with a 4:3 res and looking up and down makes me feel like I'm playing Duke Nukem 3D; like the view is distorting.

And, GeneralAdmission, the image you edited is an accurate representation. To clarify the situation, imagine that screnshot is of a cutscene where you talk to two people, one on the left edge of that 16:9 view and one on the right edge. Now imagine if narrower aspect ratios didn't add to the top and bottom of the image, but instead cut off the sides; that would leave 4:3 users not being able to see the charachters talking to them.

I figured that was about right, based on Dopefish's AR list.

I agree with you that cutting off the sides of the screen--resulting in loss of important game elements--is certainly not the right solution. That would be the equivalent of a pan-n-scan solution (PnS needs to die out already!).

With that said, would you agree that the current widescreen implementation of FC2 on the PC is severely lacking? I don't have the game, but the horizontal FOV shown in the screenshots is definitely 'cramped', IMO. Given that widescreen displays are rapidly taking over the PC and TV markets, I think games should cater to widescreen first: expand the horizontal FOV (90-100 degrees is nice), maintain a consistent vertical FOV across all platforms, and letterbox the output on 4:3 or 5:4 displays. This is exactly how wide-AR TV shows and films are displayed on 4:3 screens.

And of course, horizontal FOV should play nice with Triplehead. :wink:

-edit-
Yikes. I didn't know Crysis has a shark level. I guess that's another game I won't be able to finish. :(

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And, GeneralAdmission, the image you edited is an accurate representation. To clarify the situation, imagine that screnshot is of a cutscene where you talk to two people, one on the left edge of that 16:9 view and one on the right edge. Now imagine if narrower aspect ratios didn't add to the top and bottom of the image, but instead cut off the sides; that would leave 4:3 users not being able to see the charachters talking to them.

Then you have a cut-scene that was made for widescreen and needs to be anamorphic in narrower aspect ratios.

Far Cry 2 needs some serious widescreen support, incase none of you knew this is what happens when you set ForceWidescreen="1" from your GameProfile.xml in "X":Documents and Settings"username"My DocumentsMy GamesFar Cry 2

http://personal.inet.fi/koti/dadeathi/Screenshot0005.jpg

You get the black bars.

That option gives you the developers intended 16:9 view, with black bars to fill in the extra vertical resolution on your 16:10 monitor.

[quote]... and it should get taller when you go to a narrower aspect ratio.The screens get wider or narrower ... the height doesn't change so the vertical FOV shouldn't change.

Which is why I posted this to explain ...


The narrower aspect ratios are no taller ... so their vertical FOV does not change.
And as I explained, if you do make a game for 16:9 and then make narrower FOVs narrower instead of taller, then you wind up cutting out the sides of the intended view, potentially leaving 4:3 users and such missing important visual information.


With that said, would you agree that the current widescreen implementation of FC2 on the PC is severely lacking? I don't have the game, but the horizontal FOV shown in the screenshots is definitely 'cramped', IMO.
It certainly is, but as I've mentioned, the same goes for the vast majorty of other console centric games which came before it.


Given that widescreen displays are rapidly taking over the PC and TV markets, I think games should cater to widescreen first: expand the horizontal FOV (90-100 degrees is nice), maintain a consistent vertical FOV across all platforms, and letterbox the output on 4:3 or 5:4 displays. This is exactly how wide-AR TV shows and films are displayed on 4:3 screens.
Letterboxing is an option, and avalable in FC2 as DD's screenshot shows. However, real time rendering allows those black bars to be filled in with imagery, much like some movies are filmed foropen matte. I think that is a better option for games; why use black bars when you can fill the screen with something worth looking at?


And of course, horizontal FOV should play nice with Triplehead.
Yeah, a lot of developers shamefully overlook the few that venture any wider than 16:9.

Amen, kyleb and dopefish, please go try playing the game in 16:9 or 16:10 and then tell us that it feels better than 4:3.

I'm currently using a 4:3 monitor, but I play most games in 16:10 window mode, but I got a headache after playing for 5 minutes.
It feels like your trying to walk down stairs looking through a camera, It just does not work well and you will fall and hurt yourself badly.

Edit: I want to agree with you guys slightly that its designed for 16:9, but really its so bad that I doubt the dozens of people that have worked on the game not a single one of them was like "You know what? This feels wrong."

Sure, it may feel better to you, but that doesn't mean it was designed that way. It was designed for 16:9 for the consoles. Almost all newer games use a low FOV. I don't like it, but that's what they're doing. To "correct" the screen to how it was intended, it would be Vert+ for anything less than 16:9 and Vert- for anything higher.

I think this problem primarily exists for a couple of reasons. Games that are developed for consoles, you are typically sitting further back. The further back you sit, the less terrible the low FOV feels. I tried playing Battlefield: Bad Company on the 360 up close and it just felt too zoomed in, but once you move back and sit further away, it feels okay. So the initial problem comes from the fact that it's a console game first. And Far Cry 2 is a console game before it's a PC game. When you move to the PC, you are suddenly sitting up close. If you tried playing a typical PC game with a regular 90 degree field of view on a console, sitting further away, you'd think it was just as terrible.

So, for it to be "correct," the game would be to be fixed so that it scaled horizontally with a vertical field of view similar to 16:9.

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Is Racer_S trying to figure out a fix for this game? I hope he is. He's our only quick fix hope.

[quote]I don't have the game, but is this a roughly accurate representation of 16:9, 16:10, and 4:3?

I'm not looking at the screen right now, but I was running 1600 x 900 on a 16:10 monitor (with black bars on the top and bottom) and that looks right as far as how much of the gun I could see.

At first I thought this was the reason everything felt so cramped, and it wasn't until I googled "far cry 2 fov" that I found out the problem. I'm probably just going to play in a 4:3 resolution until this gets fixed.

I took a screenshot in both 1600x900 and 1680x1050 and they both have the exact same FOV, the 16x9 image is just a little bit squished, so I was wrong, it's not as you illustrated above.

16:9 is bot stretched AND vert-? FOR SHAME!

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I think this problem primarily exists for a couple of reasons. Games that are developed for consoles, you are typically sitting further back. The further back you sit, the less terrible the low FOV feels. I tried playing Battlefield: Bad Company on the 360 up close and it just felt too zoomed in, but once you move back and sit further away, it feels okay. So the initial problem comes from the fact that it's a console game first. And Far Cry 2 is a console game before it's a PC game. When you move to the PC, you are suddenly sitting up close. If you tried playing a typical PC game with a regular 90 degree field of view on a console, sitting further away, you'd think it was just as terrible.

Hey buddy ... now there is an argument for the "designed in 16:9" that makes some sense and could explain the narrow FOV at 16:9
Games designed in 16:9 should therefore have their FOV adjusted for the PC ... horizontally not vertically.
That said it doesn't prove the game was designed in 16:9 any more than my argument that it wasn't.

I'm gonna agree to disagree with you and kyleb ... I'm still not convinced it was designed in 16:9.

Some adjustments might be needed when porting from the console to the PC, sure. The distance between the screen is a lot different between the two. However, 99% of the games for the 360 are default 16:9 because that's what they develop for. You can just tell that it was intended for 16:9. ;)

I'd just really like people to get this "default 4:3" out of the way. Games are hardly designed for 4:3 anymore, especially games that are targeted for the 360 or PS3.

In the end, it still handles scaling horizontally wrong, and it needs fixed.


I think the developers just need to take into consideration the difference in distances between the screens when switching between a console and the PC. At least provide some options for adjusting it ourselves like older games used to do.

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