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[mrklaw]

OP is stupid because he doesn't have a purpose built house dedicated to gaming above all else. How dare he have other entertainment to enjoy? How dare he have other people in the house which might distract from the concentration needed for proper gaming.

You should be ashamed of yourself OP.

 

[sakipon]

OP is stupid because he doesn't have a purpose built house dedicated to gaming above all else. How dare he have other entertainment to enjoy? How dare he have other people in the house which might distract from the concentration needed for proper gaming.

You should be ashamed of yourself OP.

We should sponsor him a mancave so he can better blend in with the rest of GAF.

 

[DonMigs85]

There are enough games in the world, and little enough time in the world, that everyone has the right to be a little picky.

I shouldn't have used the term defective, I was just trying to explain my principle for returning the disc immeditely rather than never ever playing it. Right now it's like a pair of jeans in the wrong size.

Tiny text or not, I think you should get your eyes checked just in case. You really may not know what you're missing.

 

[Vipershark]

I can't and won't move my furniture.

If I move the couch forward it blocks the door and is weird in general... and it would only be for this particular game. I appreciate there's a balance, but in this instance I'm unwilling to be so accommodating.

In present circumstances, moving the couch and replacing the TV are a large disruption to the other people I live with, as well as myself.

There are other entertainment products in the world.

Can you not just grab a chair or something so you can sit closer?
It's not even the game's fault that it's hard to see, this is basic screen resolution to viewing distance ratio.

 

[Link Man]

The main reason I got rid of Monster Hunter 3 without playing it.

 

[Bobby Roberts]

It's not even the game's fault that it's hard to see,

no.

 

[chocolateTHUNDER]

Skyrim has some pretty damn tiny font. Annoying at times if you're sitting further away from the TV.

 

[Vipershark]

no.

The only text there that's hard to read is what's covering her face because of the awful contrast.

 

[Bobby Roberts]

the only text there that's hard to read is all of it.

 

[LuchaShaq]

There are enough games in the world, and little enough time in the world, that everyone has the right to be a little picky.

I shouldn't have used the term defective, I was just trying to explain my principle for returning the disc immeditely rather than never ever playing it. Right now it's like a pair of jeans in the wrong size.

It's like complaining the jeans are too small and then realizing you are morbidly obese and that's why they don't fit.

 

[vocab]

The only font that is unreable is when you are playing on a 52 inch tv and you are sitting like 10-20 feet away from the tv. console gaming fov sucks as well. I pretty much live with severe eye pain and can see and read almost all game text except that blinding psn store.

 

[sakipon]

It's like complaining the jeans are too small and then realizing you are morbidly obese and that's why they don't fit.

Yet his other entertainment products are just fine. So he picked up new jeans in his regular size but they were silly small compared to the other brands.

 

[AlexBasch]

I have my gaming TV next to my PC so I don't sit too far away from the 22" LCD screen.

That said, I liked how Uncharted 3 had huge subtitles.

 

[Mzo]

Hahaha! This thread is ridiculous!

I far prefer tiny text, I think it looks much neater. I would also suggest glasses.

 

[Loomer]

Red Dead Redemption had some ridiculously small subtitles.

 

[Tiktaalik]

Even if you were close to the screen, that font used in Dishonored is horrible for readability.

Most recently I had a lot of trouble with the Sleeping Dogs font. Too small!

 

[HDgaming42]

Didn't King Kong for 360 have unreadable text if played in SD? And crushed blacks that made shadow detail non-existent? If you're really creating a blacklist, King Kong should be on it--as should Dead Rising.

Essentially it seems:

OP is sitting too far from his TV*; perfect eyesight would struggle at that ratio.
That typeface is a terrible choice for legibility.
The methods employed to accentuate subtitle text are laughably poor.

/thread?

*a comfy ottoman might be the solution. Something you can pull into the proper position for some gaming. Not quite comfy couch, but at least you wouldn't have to return your games!

 

[GAMERG0D]

I have to sit right in front of my 42" TV to read and see.

 

[sixghost]

This is nothing. I remember the horror of playing Dead Rising on launch day in 2006 on my old tube TV.

Jesus christ, I couldn't read a single piece of text in that game. What a horrible experience.

 

[Gemüsepizza]

Recommended THX viewing distance for a 32 inch TV: 3.6 feet:

http://myhometheater.homestead.com/viewingdistancecalculator.html

If you don't want to move your couch, you should get a bigger TV. Do you play multiplayer games? If you do, I guess you have died countless times because you didn't see your enemy. Won't happen to me. The size of fonts isn't the problem, your viewing distance / angle is.

 

[Bobby Roberts]

That THX recommendation is for overall picture quality, not for basic readability of subtitles. Pretty sure the THX spec isn't taking into account people putting text on their screen that is really, really small. Again, drawing the comparison to theatrical subtitles - most games are half the standard subtitle size, if not 1/3rd the size. Look at that Sleeping Dogs cap:

That's just fucking stupid. It is. Again - just because a lot of people have gotten USED to it, doesn't mean it's ideal in the slightest, and a lot of people making excuses for the poor decisions regarding readability of in-game text seem to have simply gotten used to it without asking why it looks that way, or whether it should look that way.

 

[DangerousDave]

How is this a 'first world problem' ? I'm simply returning a defective product.

No, you could argue this if you were at the optimal viewing distance of the TV.

You can say that you may prefer bigger fonts, as in movies, but not that is defective.

 

[Flame Lord]

Huh? I never had any problem with text in Dishonored.

 

[Cronox]

Seriously though OP and others, everyone should get their eyes checked at some point. Nothing to be defensive about, just maintenance. And you might be pleasantly surprised .

 

[jett]

As has already been pointed out in this thread, that's not comparable because movies/blurays don't need to accommodate for UI and gameplay elements. What dweebs.

I'm mostly talking about subtitles during cut-scenes, and there really is no excuse there. You always get a text dump with a tiny font, it's moronic.

 

[DonMigs85]

I'm mostly talking about subtitles during cut-scenes, and there really is no excuse there. You always get a text dump with a tiny font, it's moronic.

In OP's case though, it's actual selectable text options.
Still it could stand to be improved.

 

[Gravijah]

not sure why the title was edited, since this is a really annoying issue. if only devs would put in various text sizes instead of just one.

 

[Infernal Monkey]

Haha, holy shit that's bad.

 

[Laughing Banana]

I once played Mass Effect 2 on an SD television.

In comparison the font on Dishonored is like a Godsend.

 

[Bucket-o-roadkill]

fully expected to see the OP being about Dead Rising on a SD TV.

 

[whitehawk]

12 feet away from a 32inch screen? It's partially your own fault OP. I'm usually 4-5 feet away from my 42inch TV.

 

[Coconut]

Two minutes into Dishonoured, I have decided to return my copy for store credit because of the size of the on-screen text.

I haven't bought a full price 'AAA' game in a while, so I'm disappointed to be hit by a game that I simply can't read the text in. I paid £40 for the game, and it's simply uncomfortable to play. My eyesight is totally fine, and I don''t have eyesight difficulties with any other task or part of my life.

My TV is 32", my game is running in 720p through HDMI, and my head is about 12 feet from the screen.

It's disappointing that developers seem to be making games designed for a 24" monitor at 18", or a 6 foot living room, or a 46"+ TV. It's bad enough that HD is now a requirement, but requiring needlessly oversized TVs is really disappointing.

[mods : please change thread title to 'I returned a game because of the font size']

Did you demand some kids to get off your lawn as well after you returned home from returning your game?

 

[Femmeworth]

Stupid title change, this is a legitimate issue even if the OP didn't present it the best way.

 

[Nabs]

Stupid title change, this is a legitimate issue even if the OP didn't present it the best way.

He asked for the title change.

 

[Alex]

General comfort options, from UI and text scaling to control input method/selectable controls, etc,should really gain more of a games production budget

 

[Seance]

Seems fine to me

.

 

[Nekofrog]

How is this a 'first world problem' ? I'm simply returning a defective product.

What is your suggestion? I spend my relaxation time sitting on a desk chair in front of my coffee table, with my back to my house mates?

the product isn't defective, your setup is

 

[PaulLFC]

WTF is wrong with people nowadays. Maybe you should also return it because you don't like the color of some drapes in one of the houses.

And then make a thread about it.

Stupid, stupid post. If you can't see why some people may have a problem with small text, I don't know what to say.

 

[GillianSeed79]

I have to sit right in front of my 42" TV to read and see.

This is what I do. I'd love to have a set up with the couch a few feet from the TV but it would look stupid as hell in my den and I don't have a man cave. I just use one of those leather reclining game chairs that will sit on your floor. It's actually pretty comfy.

 

[Skiesofwonder]

I remember I bought Nut and Bolts and tried to play it on my then SDTV and couldn't read jack shit. At least with Dishonored there is voice acting, but with Nuts and Bolts there is just that babble-babble shit and you have no idea what to do without being able to read the text. I tried moving my chair closer, changing the settings on my TV, and even using my mom's reading glasses. Nothing was comfortable and playing it gave me a headache. The experince soured my so much on Nuts and Bolts that I have never played it since.

 

[antitrop]

Title edits nail it, every time.

 

[Dead]

12 feet away is like an appropriate viewing distance for a 70" TV (if not 80). A 32" though, jeez thats WAY too far. The game isn't at fault here..

 

[DonMigs85]

12 feet away is like an appropriate viewing distance for a 70" TV (if not 80). A 32" though, jeez thats WAY too far. The game isn't at fault here..

Come to think of it, to be readable at that distance it would have to be laughably big anyway. Proportionately bigger than the font size of a typical SNES RPG I think, which already took up a lot of lines:

 

[drkOne]

I play on my 42" at 7 feet and have never had a problem with fonts, Dishonored and Sleeping Dogs included. You should've gotten a TV that best suited your setup, or move the couch closer...

As to "why are subs so tiny?", I prefer them tiny and taking as little UI space as possible.

I challenge you to try and have a good time playing Most Wanted or Burnout Paradise that far away from the TV, it's almost impossible to dodge incoming traffic, can you blame the game?

 

[Katzii]

Some of us are deaf and subtitles need to be easy to read and not quick to disappear.

HURR DURR #FIRSTWORLDPROBLEMS THOUGH, AMIRITE?

This. While I am not entirely deaf, I am hearing impaired and if a game doesn't have clear, legible subtitles, it can seriously impend on my enjoyment of a game. Most recently, for example, I ended up selling on my Jak and Daxter trilogy because the first game had no subtitles and characters with "wacky" voices who never repeated important lines when you spoke to them.

For what it's worth, I find the text in the image in the first post insufferable to read. My 32inch TV is at an optimal distance away from me and my vision is pretty much 20/20 following laser eye surgery, and I still have difficulties with some subtitles, which leaves me lost in some games.

Someone mentioned Nuts and Bolts as an example of a game with unreadable text. Not only was this game patched with more legible text, but they also patched it to have two different text sizes. As far as I'm concerned, this isn't an unfeasible "demand" to make.

 

[MYE]

Think that's bad? Try New Little King's Story.

That font is no more than 4 millimeters on the Vita's screen.

Oh god, what have they done to the king?

 

[DCharlie]

Seriously though OP and others, everyone should get their eyes checked at some point. Nothing to be defensive about, just maintenance. And you might be pleasantly surprised .

there's a flip side plus to having shitty eye sight though.....


free 16x FSAA on EVERYTHING! Unf unf unf.

 

[Mzo]

Seriously though OP and others, everyone should get their eyes checked at some point. Nothing to be defensive about, just maintenance. And you might be pleasantly surprised .

Right?

The first time I got my eyes checked as an adult after years of ignoring it and got a new prescription I was like, hoooooly shit. I kept staring at everything because the world was so clear.

 

[Gokurakumaru]

What? No. As resolutions go higher, font will get smaller in some cases because more pixels will be on screen.

I think you missed the point. Fonts should not be shrinking with each new generation of TV because our living rooms are not changing size every time we buy a new set. That shot in the first post has dialog using, what 20% of the screen width? It's ridiculous. Devs should be identifying a worst case for text, and then scaling that worst case so it fills a sensibly sized bounding box. That box should maximize the use of the screen, not minimize it.

 

[Downhome]

The only time this has been a major problem for me was when I had Dead Rising for 360 before I had an HDTV. Some of the text, I believe it was when I received phone calls, was so tiny that it was literally almost unreadable.