Widescreen resolutions question.

[Ug Lee]

Playing Soul Calibur 2 (Xbox) has got me thinking, with regards to 4:3 720p and 16x9 480p.

I would surmise that the reason 720p is running in 4:3 is due to fillrate limitations.

But can anyone provide me with some info about what resolution a game would generally be running at if it was 480 16x9, or 720 4:3? Is it just a case of stretching the image to fit, or are there set resolutions for these types of outputs?

Thanks in advance.

 

[maskrider]

Playing Soul Calibur 2 (Xbox) has got me thinking, with regards to 4:3 720p and 16x9 480p.

I would surmise that the reason 720p is running in 4:3 is due to fillrate limitations.

But can anyone provide me with some info about what resolution a game would generally be running at if it was 480 16x9, or 720 4:3? Is it just a case of stretching the image to fit, or are there set resolutions for these types of outputs?

Thanks in advance.

IMO, if the graphics rendering engine can support anamorphic pixel aspect ratio (not 1:1 pixel aspect ratio), the console do not need to render at the specific wide screen pixel width.

But if it can only support 1:1 pixel aspect ratio, then you have to render at the specific widescreen resolution (e.g. 854x480 for 480p, 1280x720 for 720p).

I think may be the X-BOX does not support anamorphic pixel aspect ratio.

 

[London Geezer]

Playing Soul Calibur 2 (Xbox) has got me thinking, with regards to 4:3 720p and 16x9 480p.

I would surmise that the reason 720p is running in 4:3 is due to fillrate limitations.

But can anyone provide me with some info about what resolution a game would generally be running at if it was 480 16x9, or 720 4:3? Is it just a case of stretching the image to fit, or are there set resolutions for these types of outputs?

Thanks in advance.

IMO, if the graphics rendering engine can support anamorphic pixel aspect ratio (not 1:1 pixel aspect ratio), the console do not need to render at the specific wide screen pixel width.

But if it can only support 1:1 pixel aspect ratio, then you have to render at the specific widescreen resolution (e.g. 854x480 for 480p, 1280x720 for 720p).

I think may be the X-BOX does not support anamorphic pixel aspect ratio.

I THOUGHT that 720p was a widescreen resolution by default... if the 720p output in SC2 is not widescreen then it's not 1280x720 but something else.... but i might be wrong

 

[maskrider]

Playing Soul Calibur 2 (Xbox) has got me thinking, with regards to 4:3 720p and 16x9 480p.

I would surmise that the reason 720p is running in 4:3 is due to fillrate limitations.

But can anyone provide me with some info about what resolution a game would generally be running at if it was 480 16x9, or 720 4:3? Is it just a case of stretching the image to fit, or are there set resolutions for these types of outputs?

Thanks in advance.

IMO, if the graphics rendering engine can support anamorphic pixel aspect ratio (not 1:1 pixel aspect ratio), the console do not need to render at the specific wide screen pixel width.

But if it can only support 1:1 pixel aspect ratio, then you have to render at the specific widescreen resolution (e.g. 854x480 for 480p, 1280x720 for 720p).

I think may be the X-BOX does not support anamorphic pixel aspect ratio.

I THOUGHT that 720p was a widescreen resolution by default... if the 720p output in SC2 is not widescreen then it's not 1280x720 but something else.... but i might be wrong

Yes, 720p is widescreen, and the digital spec for 720p is 1280x720 for all the specified refresh rates and specified square pixel aspect ratio (1:1) and 16:9 aspect ratio.

But in the analog domain, except the timing numbers and the number of lines, there is no quantitative number on the on how many pixels must be used to construct the lines, as long as the line output timing is right, it will be accepted by the display devices.

If the rendering engine supports non-square (anamorphic) pixel aspect ratio, then it can save fill rate by rendering at a lower width while can also output a wide screen image (if the video output controller also supports that) than the current X-BOX scenario which has two vertical black bars on the sides of the 4:3 image at 720p.

 

[fresh]

16:9 doesnt take more fillrate than 4:3. It's just a different aspect ratio. You're still rendering the same # of pixels.

 

[Tagrineth]

16:9 doesnt take more fillrate than 4:3. It's just a different aspect ratio. You're still rendering the same # of pixels.

It depends.

Generally you're going to keep the same vertical resolution but widen the horizontal resolution for converting to 16:9... so 480p standard would be 640x480 but 480p "True" Widescreen would be about 853x480 - which is a decent amount more pixels.

 

[Colourless]

Changing the Pixel aspect you are rendering to is a simple as a matrix multiplication. There is no hardware support required to do it. Resolution doesn't actually matter at all.

 

[maskrider]

Changing the Pixel aspect you are rendering to is a simple as a matrix multiplication. There is no hardware support required to do it. Resolution doesn't actually matter at all.

Well I suppose the video output controller will need to support that as well.

So, in your opinion, what will be the reason that Soul Calibur II on X-BOX have to use the center 4:3 region for gameplay at 720p ?

At 480p/480i all versions support widescreen.

 

[PiNkY]

I guess that originates in other elements such as hud like overlays, videos, 2d GUIs, which would have to be redone for different aspect ratios. Since only a very small percentage of gamers is able to use resolutions like 720p on xbox reworking this artwork for widescreen seems not worth the time to most developers...

 

[maskrider]

I guess that originates in other elements such as hud like overlays, videos, 2d GUIs, which would have to be redone for different aspect ratios. Since only a very small percentage of gamers is able to use resolutions like 720p on xbox reworking this artwork for widescreen seems not worth the time to most developers...

Even at 480p, the 2D GUI is the same under widescreen and 4:3, only that in wide screen it is stretched.

And for the Video, I think it is created in 16:9 as when you run the game in 4:3, it will show as letter box.

There is no rework on the artwork for 16:9 or 4:3 modes as far as I can see from all versions.

 

[Ug Lee]

Thanks for the thoughts, folks.

I was thinking on this a bit more last night -

If the game at 480 was just stretched out to fit 16x9 TVs, why couldn't the 720 output also be stretched to fit 16x9 displays?

That leads me to believe that perhaps the Xbox doesn't support anamorphic pixel ratio, and the 480 mode is running in a resolution designed to fit 16x9 (854x480 for example as maskrider said) and the reason 720 isn't running in 16x9 is purely fillrate/memory/whatever restrictions.

Although that line of thought makes me doubt Namco a bit. Surely there's only so much resources a 3D fighter can chew up in a current-gen console, particularly one like SC2 which isn't technically mind-blowing.

Would be nice if Namco just came out and said what the deal was.