*spin* another 60 vs 30 framerate argument

[LuckyGuess]

I can take a corner at 30 fps as well as I can at 60 fps.

The physics is the same. So button timing can still work @ a higher frame than the screen shows?

Yet, the visual cue for timing is dramatically affected.
There is 1/30 second delay between me seeing something and 'clicking' a button.

IMO, a good simulation really needs to offer a sense of freedom, and not lock you in rapid fire locked to how slow you are, but how fast you want to me. Please, let me respond quicker than my slowest button click.

In story drive games 24, 30 frame second is fine. When the game, is action based, "I feel" more comfortable responding at a 60hertz to 72hertz frame refresh. It empowers a realistic emotionally informed experience. @ 30 frames Car games are completely on the screen, guessing for the moment between frames, and never in your head as a direct driving sensation. It has to be faster than my physical limit, so that the mental limit can enjoy it. = My Opinion.

Neil_in_Florida with his 1976 red Corvette, wanting a game that compares.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

I don't want to be arrogant. But are you in shuch a position where you game that well that such tiny delay makes a diference to your ability to play? I can understand that affecting the top of the top pro gamers, but for 99% of people, is such tiny improvement worth half the eye candy?

Its funny you should mention that.

You all game better at 60 fps, you are humans and the human body is one marvelous piece of engineering. if you don't believe being able o react on screen twice as fast is gonna give you a benefit im disappointed in your belief in humans

In any case, competitive gamers play on 120 fps on CRT screens! There is a reason for that, because the higher framerate helps!!

I would go so far as to wager that if we play 1vs1 in a shooter with anyone here having 30 fps and me running at 60 I will whipe the floor with you. Hell if you own a ps3 and blops2 you can play in 3d which runs at 30 fps.

But to answer your question, I'm a fairly decent player (I held the record for the longest free for all win streak ever on ps3 mw2 with 116 straight wins!dunno if anybody beat me after I switched to mw3. This was while I was a student and not exactly sober 99% of the time)

 

[Phil]

I'd also make a point, that at ever increasing tv screen sizes (well, at least in my case - I use a projector with a screen size of 3m diagonal), the apparent lack of framerate is even more apparent. Of course, bigger screeen, also means that you are likely sitting further away from the screen, but I think with the progress in technology (big screens becoming affordable), the general screen size has increased for the majority of people. If you smooth out an object traveling at in 30 frames over a second in 1m or 2m surely makes a different. The bigger the screen, the bigger the jumps inbetween the frames.

It's also why in the movie theaters - the closer you sit to the screen, the more you notice the jumps when the camera pans around a large landscape and you notice how jerky 24fps really is.

This may not be an issue for most people, but it's very noticable playing a FPS in front of a big screen where rotation the camera view has objects traveling my 3m diagonal projected screen in a split of second.

 

[doob]

The distance travel over time at a certain speed is the same regardless of frame rate.

Yes and no.

Yes, the distance traveled over a constant speed is the same.
No, the frame rate will affect the perception of where we see/identify visual cues and their distance in relation to the frame rate, dam it, why do you see motion and distance slowed down with high speed cameras taking 1000 or more fps? (Would be really easy to catch a fly, dodge a bullet or react faster and more precision to a curve if our eyes and brains could perceive at such speeds wouldn't it? We could track movement so easily, predict more easily, compensate more easily, we would had higher precision in several aspects just from that.)

The frame rate at which you see said distance being traveled affects how we perceive the position of said object moving between each frame (and i feel like i'm chasing around in circles now). You keep focusing on just frame time of 16ms vs 33ms and ignoring distance gap in relation with possible very high speed situations of moving objects close by to you where the distance gap travelled between each frame leads to imprecisions from both the perceived position and input, and at 30 or as you mentioned we humans can't perceive individual differences around above 15-20fps so the perceived distance gap would be even higher, and at some point depending on the moving objects speed, it's too low for the brain to offset independently of how many visual cues and ahead tracking you try to guess.

Try playing Trackmania nations at locked 60(or more)fps then 30 and then 20 on very high speed track with a good amount of short visual queues situations such as high speed loops with tight cornered exits or splits and other similar situations and take note on your last 3 runs on each locked frame settings to see how your performance drops as the frame rate lowers, because you loose precision in both distance motion tracking and input as well.
As frame rate lowers that distance jump/gap between objects/cuepoints in each frame will degrade not only the precision in perceiving motion and the object(s) position(s) but also from the whatever input device is being used. Ever wondered why some first person shooters have the annoying "mouse lag" effect and how some tricks such as mouse acceleration&smoothing are used/avaiable to offset said lack of precision and responsiveness. with higher frame rates that's less of a problem.

 

[Davros]

Try playing GT or Forza with no sound, no rumble or no force feedback and tell me how that works for you.

I think everyone played with no forcefeedback as the xbox360 doesnt support it

 

[LuckyGuess]

Does anyone think driving games need to start warping perspective or making that an option?

There are many times when I have to squint to look ahead and there is just too much wasted display area. ~ How about a fish eye lens mode? A button that instead of looking behind you, bends the screen to magnify the center area and compress or warp the border, so the info is there, just no flat z transform.

"Wide Angle /// Fish Eye Zoom" trigger button for Gran Turismo???
It would make scanning the horizon a LOT EASIER!!! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisheye_lens

Developers have at it. Just don't stop it from coming to Polyphony Digital free of royalties.
= It's because of them I thought it up. {Must see over the next hill or around the next corner!!!}

 

[owen]

Does anyone think driving games need to start warping perspective or making that an option?

There are many times when I have to squint to look ahead and there is just too much wasted display area. ~ How about a fish eye lens mode? A button that instead of looking behind you, bends the screen to magnify the center area and compress or warp the border, so the info is there, just no flat z transform.

"Wide Angle /// Fish Eye Zoom" trigger button for Gran Turismo???
It would make scanning the horizon a LOT EASIER!!! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisheye_lens

Developers have at it. Just don't stop it from coming to Polyphony Digital free of royalties.
= It's because of them I thought it up. {Must see over the next hill or around the next corner!!!}

you mean like need for speed? no, if the game is running at a good enough resolution and at 60fps you should be able to see down the road, unless of course you are driving too fast and the framerate is so slow that you have no time to react.

 

[LuckyGuess]

Fish Eye zoom trigger button work on it.

There is nothing better than doing F1 speeds on a straight away. How far is the next corner? How flat out can I reach before I have to start slowing down? ~ I had this idea, before Fast and the Furious movies came up with Speed Vision. Surely this would be a cool feature, just need to figure out how to use it. After burner? rocket boost? there must to be a moment when it could happen without needing the player to reach for a button. Or a bookmark you can set to happen for a segment of track?

Critics are always like, show us something the pc gaming doesn't do? Bend That Lens!!!

 

[Cheezdoodles]

The gap that exist between 16 ms and 33 ms is not huge. In fact its quite small.

Furthermore, unless you spend your time driving with your eyes fixated to the road at the very front of car, your eyes will fixate on reference points that eliminate the sense of speed either through scale or relative speed. Its one thing to look to the side and actually see your car actually moving 10 feet a frame. Its another to look down the track and see a reference point move like a few inches a frame. Or a competitor car whose relative speed to yourself is much slower than 10 feet per frame. When cornering your eyes have to fixate on closer reference points but thats compensated for through the reduction in speed thats required.

To put that in perspective, you ever see a jumbo jet stream across the sky? Does it look like its going 400-600 mph per hour? If you render that in game at 30 fps, would your eyes be able to measure its movement 30 feet per individual frame.

Nevermind that racing is probably one of the worst genre when it comes to visual cues for actions that require immediate reaction for some of the most important aspects of the genre like cornering. Try playing GT or Forza with no sound, no rumble or no force feedback and tell me how that works for you.

1. The difference between 16 ms and 32 ms is actually huge, it's 100%. While you don't see each frame individually, you see new information on screen twice as fast.

2. Higher framerate will always be a big help when you need to react to either your own mistake or some new information.

3. Humans can tell the difference between 60fps and 120 fps. Pro-gamers play at 120 hz for a reason.

4. Why are you so fixated at predicting constant speeds. My point in this discussion has been from the start that 60fps is a huge benefit when it comes to reacting to new information. That may be another car doing something unpredictable or a enemy player running around a corner.

5. Your brain can actually comprehend far higher "framerates". Most people who have been in a serious car accident report that it felt like time slowed down (I experienced this also when I totalled a car 3 years ago - I could see the airbag coming out rather slowly, rather than the 300km/h it explodes in) how? In times of danger your brain expands your short term memory allowing you to "save" more information over a short period of time. Plenty of documentaries about this.

6. I feel a difference between 16 ms input lag and 35 ms input lag and also at 8ms input lag. Plenty others also do the same. (in particular ask serious fps gamers or serious gamers that play fighting games) Just because you think 32ms is a small number doesn't mean there isn't a bug difference

 

[owen]

I think think we need to turn to the discussion towards why we are not getting 60 fps (because we all know its better) instead of making excuses for companies that choose to cap it at 30fps. Why would you no make your game as good as it could be? Its can't be the RAM, it must be the processor speed that is holding it back.

 

[milk]

Its funny you should mention that.

You all game better at 60 fps, you are humans and the human body is one marvelous piece of engineering. if you don't believe being able o react on screen twice as fast is gonna give you a benefit im disappointed in your belief in humans

In any case, competitive gamers play on 120 fps on CRT screens! There is a reason for that, because the higher framerate helps!!

I would go so far as to wager that if we play 1vs1 in a shooter with anyone here having 30 fps and me running at 60 I will whipe the floor with you. Hell if you own a ps3 and blops2 you can play in 3d which runs at 30 fps.

But to answer your question, I'm a fairly decent player (I held the record for the longest free for all win streak ever on ps3 mw2 with 116 straight wins!dunno if anybody beat me after I switched to mw3. This was while I was a student and not exactly sober 99% of the time)

I´m not questioning that higher framerates improve human response times. I´m questioning the the relevance of thatimprovemente. Most games´ code already adds a couple of frames of delay to all your imput, then there is about another frame or two of display lag, so going from 30 to 60 doesn´t really mean a 100% improvemente, but just about 20% or less. Is 25% improved response time worth half the rendering quality? If I´m playing competitively for 5 Grand, sure, if I´m playing at home with friends or by myself (99% of the public) then meh.
Sure more is always better, but when you can´t have infinite processing power, you have to prioritize on the things that are most impactfull. With proper temporal anti-aliasing, the improvement you get from going to 60fps is not worth its costs aside only from racing and fighting games.

 

[tuna]

With proper temporal anti-aliasing, the improvement you get from going to 60fps is not worth its costs aside only from racing and fighting games.

Temporal anti-aliasing does not work, it is just blur unless you compare two frames (in which case you add several frames worth of latency).

 

[owen]

Temporal anti-aliasing does not work, it is just blur unless you compare two frames (in which case you add several frames worth of latency).

Tell him to add Temporal anti-aliasing to Super mario Bros and see how helpful that is. lol. Some games age well, others become unplayable.

 

[LuckyGuess]

I think think we need to turn to the discussion towards why we are not getting 60 fps (because we all know its better) instead of making excuses for companies that choose to cap it at 30fps. Why would you no make your game as good as it could be? Its can't be the RAM, it must be the processor speed that is holding it back.

Own, I think I figured out the answer. Because consumers think 1080p is better than 720p,,, developers are pressured to claim 1080p graphics. But HDTV standards as I currently understand them, still display 1080p at only 30 frames, no higher.

The developer who does 60fps on a console is likely limited to 720p by HDTV standards.

I hope someone here is able to disprove this. I have a HDTV FULL that claims 1080p. But it seems I falsely assumed them stating 1080p meant @ 60fps. Did HDTV marketing Fool me?

 

[Cheezdoodles]

Most games´ code already adds a couple of frames of delay to all your imput, then there is about another frame or two of display lag, so going from 30 to 60 doesn´t really mean a 100% improvemente, but just about 20% or less. Is 25% improved response time worth half the rendering quality?

i dunno which games you are playing but most I play do not have "a couple frames" input lag at 30 fps.

With regards to your question, I would have never played cod if it was 30 fps but looked awesome. I like the sharpest possible control. I never play racing games that are not 60 fps either, even if some other games out there are prettier I don't care, they just aren't as responsive .

Anyways, this is just my opinion (but one that I guess Is shared by alot of people given the 150+ million sales of the cod franchise).

 

[Davros]

I hope someone here is able to disprove this. I have a HDTV FULL that claims 1080p. But it seems I falsely assumed them stating 1080p meant @ 60fps. Did HDTV marketing Fool me?

Im sure it will if you give it a 60fps source, connect it up to your pc

 

[Cheezdoodles]

But HDTV standards as I currently understand them, still display 1080p at only 30 frames, no higher.

Your tv can do 1080p at 60fps, as long as its 1080p native. That's not the issue.

1080p on current consoles is simply to demanding if you want pretty pixels.

The reason why devs choose 30 fps is simple, graphics can sell a game. 30 fps = 2x the time to make each frame pretty. Pretty pixels are easier to convey than 60 fps on an advertisement.

 

[milk]

i dunno which games you are playing but most I play do not have "a couple frames" input lag at 30 fps.

With regards to your question, I would have never played cod if it was 30 fps but looked awesome. I like the sharpest possible control. I never play racing games that are not 60 fps either, even if some other games out there are prettier I don't care, they just aren't as responsive .

Anyways, this is just my opinion (but one that I guess Is shared by alot of people given the 150+ million sales of the cod franchise).

I´d guess you probably like the feeling of improved controls you get when you play 60fps games, when the actual improvement is little. Not negligible sure, but marginal as it is just a water drop on a bucket full of latency.

http://www.eurogamer.net/videos/modern-warfare-3-battlefield-3-input-lag-tests-video

As the video in the link shows, you get about 3 frames worth of imput lag (on the best case scenario that you are playing on a zero lag display) So if the game was caped at 30fps, the added lag would be a 7th of the total lag. On DF´s monitor, where they have another 3 frames of aditional display lag, that would be less.

Regarding players prefering 60fps over 30fps, I already posted a link where a developer did a blind test and his playtesters prefered 30fps with temporal anti-aliasing over 60fps aliased. Those were profetional play-testers by the way, so they are not completely oblivious know-nothing casual people, they do play a lot of games. The game was also a fighting game... So again, I agree 60 is better then 30, and 120 is even better. But the costs are not worth the gains for the majority of consumers.

 

[tuna]

I´d guess you probably like the feeling of improved controls you get when you play 60fps games, when the actual improvement is little. Not negligible sure, but marginal as it is just a water drop on a bucket full of latency.

It is not just latency. It is increased temporal resolution as well.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I think think we need to turn to the discussion towards why we are not getting 60 fps

For eye candy. Half the framerate means twice the graphics effort pre frame, which is considerable. It's akin to having twice the power of your console, or, the other way, half the power. Take any game you like on your preferred console running at 30 fps. Now think that to get 60 fps, it'll look the same as on a console with half the power. That'd be a PS3 with a 1.6 GHz Cell instead of 3.2 GHz, and 250 MHz RSX instead of 500 MHz. Shading, lighting, image quality, all take a hit, unless you halve the resolution. Even if people preferred that in gameplay, it'd suffer in screenshots. It'd also suffer in promotional videos on YouTube which are capped to 30 fps. So in marketing your game will look far worse against the 30 fps competition. Insomniac Games went on record saying they were going to drop 60 fps because gamers don't care for it and it loses sales. (That's their uncorroborated viewpoint).

i dunno which games you are playing but most I play do not have "a couple frames" input lag at 30 fps.

Coverage I've seen on controller lag places it at many frames. Here's a Googled article from Gamasutra. Frame lag ranges up to 10/60th for GTA IV, 8-10/60ths for Halo 3, and that's excluding TV lag of a couple of frames.

Anyways, this is just my opinion (but one that I guess Is shared by alot of people given the 150+ million sales of the cod franchise).

COD's not a fair reference unless we know the major reason for anyone buying it is the framerate. As there are lots of competing factors, including popularity, it's hard to prove that it's for the 60 fps that most people buy it. I certainly know kids who have bought it with no regard for the framerate just because it's the hot game. A look at the dearth of 60 fps games suggests that the market in general isn't in favour, otherwise surely developers would see a connection between framerate and sales and push for higher framerates. Instead, we hear the opposite with the likes of Insomniac going on record that 60 fps harms more than helps. Short of selling two versions of a game, 60 fps simplified visuals and 30 fps extra sauce, I don't know that a comparison can be made. I'd really like to see a developer provide the option in game to switch modes, and see whether Joe Public chooses 30 fps or 60.