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  • #16
    Originally posted by Jimmy_Jazz View Post
    Yet it's true in many cases (not all - I did just say "alot"), although mainly for first person titles. Have a hunt through the past few years of multiplatform game comparisons on the Digital Foundry. It's also common for games to feature an FoV changer on PC even if the defaults are the same as console.
    I didn't say it wasn't something happening more recently but I am also seeing the balance of some developers setting fixed cameras, frame rates, and do forth and only changing it when complaints happen or people mod the game themselves (things like The Evil Within, the lack of options in RE6 until patched, and most of the Assassins Creed titles come to mind). I just feel with closer to PC console platforms either drives people to be lazy and have it the same everywhere or the opposite and provide more support wherever they can, thus my 50:50 split thought.

    Prior to the last gen, many console & PC FPSs would have 90 degree FoV for 4:3 and higher for 16:9. The earliest example of this I can think of on console is Goldeneye, which had an FoV of over 100 when in 16:9 mode. But at that point we weren't seeing many cross platform FPSs (Red Faction on the PS2?). That changed early on with the PS3/X360 gen
    Goldeneye aside, which did so many console firsts, it's really impossible to say anything but the impact it had after - but most console FPS titles were reversed ports until mostly the last gen, usually downgraded and stuffed into a box they never were designed for. Goldeneye had the benefit of being developed for the system it was on by people pushing boundaries. Usually the other ports came down to just trying to get them to work or lazy and fast cash grabs. No extra thought is going into the things like camera fields.

    The opposite is true, with Widescreen being supported in PS1 and Saturn titles. There was even a 16" widescreen Sony TV early in the PS1's life that was promoted as the perfect companion to the machine. Widescreen monitors didn't really start taking off until LCD monitors became the norm.
    A small handful of titles does not make the opposite true. Nor does the marketing gimmick Sony was trying to use to sell more new windscreen TV's (the same could be said of their intent to push 3D TV late last decade or that TV that allowed two view screen angles depending on what side of the room you were on). They are all trying to make these the industry standard either early or against consumers needs.

    What I remember of widescreen Saturn was mostly the titles that needed the expansion to run it. And as for PS1, and PS2 as well, they were 80-90% Sony internal studios trying to set a trend before it's time.... Things like true widescreen and 1080i support in PS2 titles (things like The Getaway, Omega Boost, and GT4) years before they were industry standards. Again a few releases bucking the trend does not make it an exception because as you say yourself:

    When HD became standard, so did Widescreen. And devs were used to supporting it by that point on both PC and console.
    It's rare for console & PC games to have a fixed framerate. We tend to have a target to aim for that we try to achieve for as much of the game as possible. However, with fluctuating framerates now being an issue it's increasingly common for console titles to offer you an uncapped framerate or a locked 30fps.

    People have been definitely changing FoV widths, V-sync and framerate caps in games since Quake 1, and I wouldn't be surprised if they did it before that - I've never tried playing with Doom's FoV. IF anything, it's only Valve's titles that I can think of that stop you from adjusting the FoV whilst in MP, widescreen or 4:3.
    I wasn't meaning frame rates here, just your FoV comments. Usually the push for this has been FPS as discussed. And often as well the push forward has begun with either mods or requests before developers started doing it themselves as options.

    I also think your overstating the rise in these options here. You make it sound like since Quake it's been a consistent rise in this but it's really been more in the past decade that these options have become more common place. You've said that already elsewhere above. Part of it was the difference between console and PC versions and the leaps on graphics around that time on all platforms had provided better options. There isn't one set answer of course, but I think we basically agree that providing these options wherever possible helps immensely.
    Last edited by Rombie; 03-18-2015, 06:12 AM.

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    • #17
      I do disagree with some of your points above, but we're going to be arguing over semantics and it's a waste of both our effects. Customisation and parity at a solid framerate should be the goal of all multiplatform titles.

      However, there are a couple of points I would like to explore though:

      Originally posted by Rombie View Post
      but most console FPS titles were reversed ports until mostly the last gen, usually downgraded and stuffed into a box they never were designed for.
      I have agree when it came to multi-platform FPSs between 1995 & 2005. Whilst there were ports (Duke 3D, Doom, PoD, Quake 1 & 2), the ports to PS1 & Saturn were usually handled very well (baring a rather lazy Duke 3D port to the PS1). Lobotomy's Quake 1 and Duke 3D ports to the Saturn and Hammerhead's Quake 2 port to the PS1 stand out at the time. Whilst Doom for the N64 had new sprites, lighting & levels. The cancelled PS1 port of Unreal was meant to be outstanding. Outside of that, many cross platform FPSs would be developed with console in mind or as the lead platform (Alien Trilogy, PowerSlave, Red Faction, Time Splitters) or the console and PC versions would be completely different SKUs. It was only really when the original XB showed up that the PS2 stopped being the lead platform for many cross platform titles (usually taking a hit in the texture dept) and it was the PS3/X360 generation where devs started became lazy towards solid framerates on console and lower FoVs compared to PC versions became common.

      Originally posted by Rombie View Post
      I also think your overstating the rise in these options here. You make it sound like since Quake it's been a consistent rise in this but it's really been more in the past decade that these options have become more common place.
      I wouldn't call it a consistent rise because it reached plateau before the end of the last millennium. Any PC game based on the Quake, Source / Gold, Unreal and Battlefield engines (and their children, except possibly UE3) would let you change the FoV via config / ini files and most would let you do so via the console (even if it had to be unlocked first). That probably accounts for the majority of PC first and third person shooters from 1996 until at least 2005.

      However, it's been the past decade that the option has moved from the console / ini files to the Options screen itself.
      "Stories of imagination tend to upset those without one."

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      • #18
        Originally posted by Undead Sega View Post
        Surely you can use the camera exporter and find out the info about each camera right?
        None of the tools from re123/etc properly handle FoV, exporter/importers included.



        @Jimmy_Jazz - I forgot to mention that the FoV can be changed before run time/compile, so the game isn't stuck with the default specs. In fact, there are just a few cameras that use alternate FoV (computers, the RPD main hall fountain, maybe others).
        Last edited by MeganGrass; 03-18-2015, 07:12 AM.
        I'm a blackstar.

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        • #19
          Originally posted by Jimmy_Jazz View Post
          Customisation and parity at a solid framerate should be the goal of all multiplatform titles.
          Totally agreed.

          I have agree when it came to multi-platform FPSs between 1995 & 2005. Whilst there were ports (Duke 3D, Doom, PoD, Quake 1 & 2), the ports to PS1 & Saturn were usually handled very well (baring a rather lazy Duke 3D port to the PS1). Lobotomy's Quake 1 and Duke 3D ports to the Saturn and Hammerhead's Quake 2 port to the PS1 stand out at the time. Whilst Doom for the N64 had new sprites, lighting & levels.
          Ehhh... it depends on what you feel about them. Personally for example I had Quake on Saturn, and it was admirable for a Saturn port of a PC game that Quake was - but it held no candle to the original still. Defiantly not a lazy port, but certainly limitations of the hardware always, and would always have, showed. Development now has that idea of multiple platforms, and just gives those extra boosts like framerate, higher res, better AA support, etc. as bonus where the PC - ones meeting the various standards - can make good use of them. It makes sense to me, I don't have an issue on it that much, just often when you can tell the console version has questionable downgrades do I really care.

          The cancelled PS1 port of Unreal was meant to be outstanding. Outside of that, many cross platform FPSs would be developed with console in mind or as the lead platform (Alien Trilogy, PowerSlave, Red Faction, Time Splitters) or the console and PC versions would be completely different SKUs. It was only really when the original XB showed up that the PS2 stopped being the lead platform for many cross platform titles (usually taking a hit in the texture dept) and it was the PS3/X360 generation where devs started became lazy towards solid framerates on console and lower FoVs compared to PC versions became common.
          Certainly, I never doubted early ones that had actual console development in mind were in the same boat, but even things like Alien Trilogy (which I was massive fan of back in the day) were limited to the console specs of the Saturn and PS1. Things you've mentioned by Goldeneye, Red Faction, or Timesplitters certainly made great use of the limitations by providing things unique to the console environment - but of course they were always in a different realm to the PC based shooters because as soon as they're planed for one platform or whatever thats just the same as something only originally planned for PC (regardless of anything gets a port to other platforms later).

          I wouldn't call it a consistent rise because it reached plateau before the end of the last millennium. Any PC game based on the Quake, Source / Gold, Unreal and Battlefield engines (and their children, except possibly UE3) would let you change the FoV via config / ini files and most would let you do so via the console (even if it had to be unlocked first). That probably accounts for the majority of PC first and third person shooters from 1996 until at least 2005.

          However, it's been the past decade that the option has moved from the console / ini files to the Options screen itself.
          Well then we're agreed. I said that above. It's been less reliant on people modifying the games themselves and providing it as an basic option, often it was the fact people were doing this that led developers to go 'well we might as well make it an option' anyway one would assume.
          Last edited by Rombie; 03-18-2015, 05:43 PM.

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