Lower rez or diminished effects with higher rez

[Reverend]

Here's a relatively simple question. While this has more to do with programmers that work at a development house that ship retail titles (since they ultimately control this), I am also interested to know the casual gamers opinion on this. The thinking behind this (at least to me!) has farther-reaching impacts than it appears outright.

Note, however, that I would like to discard Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropic Filtering when you consider your vote.

Also, and most importantly, it comes down to what features are considered "expendable" in order to maintain "playable" performance in any one particular title. I honestly cannot decide what features are expendable in this sense... it all depends on what a developer strives to achieve in his game and how much importance/priority he places on a certain effect. The "knowledgeables" here are welcomed to offer what such "expendable" features may be, given the current scenario and what the various IHVs have to offer in terms of their latest available products. Henceforth, given the currently available "features" by the latest hardware, your post (=opinion) on what you think is "expendable" is welcomed.

PS. Sorry if, again, I'm wording this incorrectly in this high-standard crowd but I'm off to have dinner with a family crowd of 20 and I cannot escape this dinner, dammit!

 

[Neutrality]

Should have been a third option.

I like to have high res 1600x1200 with all features intact. If I dont get acceptable framerates I just wont play the game or wait and play the game when there are systems capable of running it at 1600x1200 with all features intact at an acceptable speed.

Im too much of a graphics whore to settle with anything less than the highest rez, textures, effects and other features.

-Neutrality-

 

[DeanoC]

Most of the really cool stuff coming up over the next n years uses bucketloads of fill-rate.

If we want real-time toy-story level graphics get used to 640x480

Let be honest DVD is only 720x500 (ish I can't remember the exact figure) and I'd be happy with a game that looked as good as a movie DVD....

The title I currently work on, with everything on runs o.k. at 800x600 on an ATI 9700 Pro (without MSAA, AF). And thats with clever use of the fast z-reject!

(And before anybody says but Doom3 ran higher than that.... Doom3 doesn't have to enviroments we do, Doom3 gets it easy )

 

[Neutrality]

With anything below 1280x1024 I can see each individual horisontal line on my monitor. Doesnt look good at all. No FSAA+AF and other enhancements will make those go away.



-Neutrality-

 

[John Reynolds]

I'd like to see lower rez qualified a bit more before voting. For me, I won't drop below 10x7 regardless of anything, and I prefer 1280x960 or higher if possible. I also won't game without at least 4x AA enabled (on my 9700).

 

[Luminescent]

As a hardware tech and architecture enthusiast, I like to see developers put the more complex portions of processors to work, such as the fpu's, etc. This means less straight-forward, bandwith intensive multitexturing, simple integer operations, and more complex shader instructions with multiple levels of dependency, procedural effects, and high precision. Anyway, procedural textures are arbitrarily sharp until the point of insufficient precision. Monitors are also incapable of producing high enough resolutions for them to warrant the marginal benefit of higher resolution and toned-down features (in my opinion).

 

[Silent_One]

Note, however, that I would like to discard Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropic Filtering when you consider your vote.

If I had too I'd lower my rez just to use AA.

 

[BenSkywalker]

Lower resolution with all features in tact.

Certain features included in games that would be the ones to be shut off help add atmosphere that helps aid the immersive quality of the title. Take away the lighting and shadowing from SplinterCell as a general example, and the game loses quite a bit of its feel.

Look at the discussions/drooling over DooM3 here and is seems that the overwhelming majority would rather have a title that brings a system to its knees at low res using every feature possible rather then having yet another 16x12x32x6x16 title with the same old visuals(or incremental improvements). I think the poll question is a good one, I would be interested if anyone voted for lower features/higher res and thinks DooM3 is a good approach.

 

[nutball]

I want to be able to run my flat-panel at its native resolution please That means I wan't high-resolution, and support for 16:10 aspect ratio in all games

But honestly, if I have to make a sacrifice, I drop the resolution.

 

[RussSchultz]

I'm with the flat panel group. It must run at 1024x768.

I take whatever features are with that.

(But, on the greater questions, it really depends on the game. A multiplayer FPS, you'd drop the resolution to remain competitive. A single player, maybe you'll accept some choppiness so it looks good. An RTS, frame rate isn't necessarily king)

 

[Sabastian]

Should have been a third option.

I like to have high res 1600x1200 with all features intact. If I dont get acceptable framerates I just wont play the game or wait and play the game when there are systems capable of running it at 1600x1200 with all features intact at an acceptable speed.

Im too much of a graphics whore to settle with anything less than the highest rez, textures, effects and other features.

-Neutrality-

This is exactly the same thing that came to mind when I read the poll. Where is the option for the best of both worlds. I love High res and I want eye candy as well. IMO that is what the industry should be aiming for. Bigger faster better. Who wants to play a game @ 800x600? I personally try to get away with the highest res I can get with as much eye candy as possible with exceptable frame rates. To vote for low res... I just can't do that. To vote for high res without eye candy ... um .... no. I want both. I vote for option 3.

 

[LeStoffer]

I'm happy at 1024x768, so yes, give us the full works of eyes goodies right at that level!

 

[BenSkywalker]

But, on the greater questions, it really depends on the game. A multiplayer FPS, you'd drop the resolution to remain competitive. A single player, maybe you'll accept some choppiness so it looks good. An RTS, frame rate isn't necessarily king

Not to put words in Rev's mouth, but the impression I got from his question was framerate being equal between the two(doing what you must to make the game playable), which would you pick.

 

[darkblu]

i vote for 'effects over resolution', with the remark that there are some effects that are spatially-dependent and they'd just lose their meaning with too low a resolution.

 

[Luminescent]

Good point, darkblu.

 

[BoddoZerg]

As long as I don't have to drop my resolution below 1024*768, effects over resolution anyday. Besides a little less aliasing, I can't really tell the difference between 1024*768 and higher res, but I can definitely tell the difference between no stencil shadows and stencil shadows!

 

[borzwazie]

gimmie 1024x768x32 + AA + Aniso + whathaveyou, and I'm quite pleased. Higher res doesn't seem to offer as much to me as somewhat lower plus effects. note that I'm not talking about 640x480 here, even with AA it looks like crap.

 

[Himself]

Give me the goods, I want all the features being used all the time, if I can't run it with 6X FSAA so be it. I would say that 1024x768 would be my lowest resolution I would ever want to use, people do own large monitors you know. If you do target something low like 1024x768, they don't limit the options screen, people might want to try higher.

Basically, put all you want into it to make it look the best you can, then make it as fast as you can and wait for the hardware to catch up, from there you can put in a dumbed down version on the CD for sales. I want lots of visible detail on the screen, the more the better, I can make it look better with ansio or FSAA at my leisure, hardware willing. If you cut features for the low end then you are evil, make the break today not tomorrow, full steam ahead, go! go! go!

 

[Johnny Rotten]

With anything below 1280x1024 I can see each individual horisontal line on my monitor. Doesnt look good at all. No FSAA+AF and other enhancements will make those go away.

This is why I wont be going to a 21" monitor anytime soon. 19" is, imo, the sweet spot right now given todays video cards.

 

[kyleb]

Lower resolution with all features in tact.

Certain features included in games that would be the ones to be shut off help add atmosphere that helps aid the immersive quality of the title. Take away the lighting and shadowing from SplinterCell as a general example, and the game loses quite a bit of its feel.

i agree with BenSkywalker's logic here i think he pointed out a wonderful example. however, i must insist on at the very least 800x600 on my 21" trinitron. to drive this point hope feel that it important to point out that i have not bought splintercell, simply because i have to drop to 640x480 in the second demo to even attempt to keep the framerate consistently above the all important 30fps mark, even then it drops into the 20's a little. considering the amount of time and money i have put into this system and the fact that it has been shown to be functioning properly; both of which, regardless of the controversy, can easily be seen in my 3dmark03 score. furthermore, going with the other mindset and dropping the features in favor of resolution yields even worse results. granted unreal2 was much worse than splintercell when it comes to this, but such issues i find completely unacceptable and refuse to support developers who fail to see the logic in such an argument.

i should also point out that on a smaller monitor i do find 640x480 acceptable. furthermore, i do us as much aa and af as i can get away with, but at request Reverend i left those out of my vote vote for features over resolution.