Because the design of the game is deliberately to play like a film. Not just with graphics and lenses and film grain, but also by merging gameplay and cutscenes as much as possible by giving the character limited control in segments that would usually be automated cutscenes.
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Discussion: Aspect ratio of The Order: 1886
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Because the design of the game is deliberately to play like a film. Not just with graphics and lenses and film grain, but also by merging gameplay and cutscenes as much as possible by giving the character limited control in segments that would usually be automated cutscenes.
No idea, only the devs know that. Which is why i think a lot of this argument is pointless. Without any insider information it's just baseless speculations.
That's all well and good. However, my contention is that of the layman. I'm simply not concerned about the equipment used nor the director's/cinematographer's/etc. preference. My statements are made in regards to my own observations and preferences.
I believe that the clinging to 2.40:1 as a standard is made under the assumption that the cinema is the ideal way to view a film. (I contend that 1.78:1 is also better suited for this setting, but I digress) Affordable large-screen, high-quality, well-calibrated displays have changed this and ultra wide displays are not well suited for the vast majority of at-home viewing environments. Coupling my 65" plasma with a blu ray and a decent sound system has made films look and sound far better than they do at the theater, it's cheaper, I can eat whatever I want, and I always have the best seat in the house. I've had mostly good experiences at IMAX, (still not as good as watching at home, however) but IMAX and 3D are infrequently mutually exclusive killing that as an option. The only thing I find enjoyable about the cinema is going to see an "event" movie in which it's expected that you're not practicing traditional theater etiquette and are instead encouraged to vocally and sometimes physically participate. (think The Room, Rocky Horror, etc.) Those circumstances are infrequent novelty.
I guess what I'm getting at is that I wish movie makers would let go of tradition, get away from catering to what's established to be "cinematic," and realize that home media is big(ger?) business. I'm certain that I'm only one of a very large market of people that currently see an announcement trailer and say "cool, when's the blu ray release?" I want to be prioritized and catered to, dammit!
viveks86
Gold Member
Yes! We can agree on that. Except the developer has clearly conveyed intent early in the form of concept art and direct responses to the question. So the debate really is trust vs baseless speculation rather than baseless speculation all around.
But you have to admit it's more probable that is was the vision from the beginning. I think it was their vision but at the same time being able to up the IQ probably helped that decision. Regardless of how the decision came about I'm happy with the outcome.
It's these things I'm looking forward to seeing the most. I think it's a really interesting approach. I understand that some people might not like it but film has nuances and beauty like no other material. To see that in an interactive entertainment, done with a big budget and on a proper scale - well, I think it's fascinating.
A modern TV is 16:9 and so is most network TV, and yet we watch 2.35:1 films on it all the time. If you watch older TV shows like Friends or Seinfeld on it you'll get vertical black bars because of the 4:3 aspect ratio. Anyone playing older games made for 800x600 CRTs is stuck with a 4:3 ratio on their 1920x1080/1200 screens. It's just a matter of the display size not matching the source size.
We've been dealing with this for years, and suddenly it's a problem with this game?
We've been dealing with this for years, and suddenly it's a problem with this game?
Shin-Ra
Junior Member
The developers of Bioshock Infinite are expanding the horizontal FoV appropriately to match the wider aspect ratio.
If you squash that 21:9 image to 16:9 it looks squashed, even ignoring the HUD.
If you keep expanding the horizontal and vertical FoV within the same aspect ratio, you'll get a more and more distorted fisheye picture.
Fisheye is an unrelated and non linear distortion.
I don't understand your point. There is no squashing involved when rendering for different aspect ratios, with or without black bars.
Maybe you are confusing rendering with the type of scaling TV's do when they get the "wrong" aspect ratio. (in a game you won't be rendering for the "wrong" aspect ratio and then stretch it, you will just render for the correct aspect ratio, so no stretching is required.)
Shin-Ra
Junior Member
Where did they reduce the FoV?
BiGBoSSMk23
A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
This sums up how I feel.
I think it's unfair that cynicism and fanboyism are getting in the way of giving proper recognition to the team at RAD for something they've invested clearly a lot of passion and work.
In the 16:9 Bioshock image there is a smaller horizontal FOV. (you see less things horizontally). It makes sense to adjust the scaling when the different images are intended to be viewed on physically different screens.
Lys Skygge
Member
I guess I'm just going to have to disagree. A filmmakers vision should not be stifled because you don't like it. The same applies to game developers.
The aspect ratio of The Order may have been a stylistic choice (I don't believe them), but The Evil Within's PC port easily proves that the aspect ratio of that game was strictly for console performance. There is a pretty significant difference in framerate for TEW between full 16:9 and the default 2.5:1. Or any game, I've done it with plenty, I made a 3840x1620 custom resolution in the Nvidia control panel for screenshotting.
Do people genuinely hate films like Star Wars, or Terminator 2, or any of the millions of films out there filmed in something like 2.4:1 ratio... SERIOUSLY?! You don't use crappy zooming on your TV to "remove the bars" (AND SIDES, or worse SQUEEZE/STRETCH the image??).. do you. DO YOU?!
I don't think it was purely for performance reasons. It's pretty clear that the game was designed with that aspect ratio in mind because stuff starts breaking once you use a less wide 16:9 ratio.
Performance probably played a part, but I don't think there is enough evidence to say that it was strictly for performance.
The clear evidence that it was a performance choice is the resolution itself. 1920x1080 is 16:9 if they wanted to go 21:9 cinematic they would choose 2560x1080 because this is the full HD 1080p 21:9 resolution.
Here they only slap bars on it to get better performance...
To clarify http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BLZAYHC/?tag=neogaf0e-20
Here they only slap bars on it to get better performance...
To clarify http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BLZAYHC/?tag=neogaf0e-20
Shin-Ra
Junior Member
Ok. So what do you do if you want that 21:9 shot FoV on a typical 16:9 display?
You add black bars to form a 21:9 canvas.
WordsintheWater
Member
Why the heck would they draw concept art in that ratio if it wasn't their vision from the beginning?
Does anyone really think the artists decided to have the concept art in that ratio because of "performance reasons"? That to me is far less believable than the alternative.
Does anyone really think the artists decided to have the concept art in that ratio because of "performance reasons"? That to me is far less believable than the alternative.
Neuromancer
Member
I think it's a strange artistic and technical choice, but I'm not going to dismiss the game for that without giving it a shot first.
Yes, you're pictures are wrong. You add the black bars and you didn't get 21:9 aspect ratio like with Bioshock pictures. There is no less pixels and FOV in The Order with 21:9 aspect ratio, only wider FOV ( left and right ). Human eye see a wider FOV left and right, not up and down
They could however just render the part under the black bars and increase the vertical fov... Your point is mood because fov is not a constant. And we have 16:9 tvs
Fair enough. I acknowledge that my stance lacks a certain level of rationality, but I still can't help but wonder if 2.4 is truly a "filmmaker's vision" or if it's more of a Stockholm syndrome relationship with an antiquated standard. In posing this question, I'm also now very interested in knowing what's currently more profitable to the lifetime of a film: its run in theaters or its home DVD/blu ray release coupled with revenue from the multitude of streaming/download services currently available. If anyone has a link with such figures I'd appreciate it.
It is amazing that this still needs to be explained in this day and age. The ignorance that forced us to watch Pan & Scan VHS tapes all those years is still alive and well, I guess.
I don't care what aspect ratio I play or watch something in as long as it's the aspect ratio the director/creator chose for the work. Complaining about black bars is like complaining that your TV is finite. The picture is the picture.
Errr... the PS4 and XB1 can't even hold close to 30fps at 2.5:1, and you think it was a design choice? If it was stylistic, why didn't they go with a more standard 2.35/2.4:1, instead of an unusual 2.5:1?
Because the performance was shit and killing pixels is an easy way to make it up.
The Order is 2.4:1
The concept art and the builds of the game running on early devkits were all in 2.4:1 as well. Even if performance played a roll in the initial decision, they kept with it long after they had the final hardware to work with.
EDIT: Oh, you were talking about Evil Within. Yeah, that was a performance band aid.
Using wide aspect ratios certainly didn't hurt Lord of the Rings' DVD and Blu-Ray sales, or Iron Man's, or The Matrix's, and in fact The Matrix was the top selling DVD of all time for quite a while. So no, using that aspect ratio has no impact on later sales whatsoever. Most people either don't care or at most go "oh, black bars" and then never think of it again.
It's not in any way antiquated. It has a purpose and an artistic use. Movies are made for the big screen, and nobody should alter their ideas or visions for a film due to how it might look on a TV later. If Ready At Dawn feels a wider view is what their game needs, more power to them.
It can be both. We saw footage of Evil Within at ultra-wide aspect ratios quite a long time before release, so I'd say it's a stylistic choice that should have had the side benefit of improving performance, only that got fucked up too.
boredandlazy
Member
I'm fine with it.
If I didn't like it I wouldn't buy it.
If I didn't like it I wouldn't buy it.
Mihael Mello Keehl
Banned
im talking about the black bars lol. I thought it was like cutscene or qte but it look like the whole game in black bars.. even just walking around?
I think you meant 2.40:1, the aspect ratio The Order is in.
And yes, they are there the whole time.
Yes. It's not a very common practice any more, but you can improve performance and/or frame your game in a certain way by just rendering on less of the screen.
For other examples, see various console versions of Doom, Dragon's Dogma, Resident Evil 4, Pitfall on Atari 2600, and last-gen versions of Battlefield 3/4.
This cinematic nonsense is really getting out of hand. First it was 30fps for the cinematic feel, while in reality it just cuts temporal resolution in half.
Now we have cinematic black bars and people arguing that it gives a wider fov as if fov is only expendable in one direction. Completely ignoring the fact that rendering and filming are different...
It is just sad to read.
Now we have cinematic black bars and people arguing that it gives a wider fov as if fov is only expendable in one direction. Completely ignoring the fact that rendering and filming are different...
It is just sad to read.
viveks86
Gold Member
I actually doubt it was just a performance band aid. I think what happened here was that they went for a specific look that reminded people of resident evil 4, but never fully realized it in terms of design or performance. They came up with an aspect ratio but did not execute it well.
That's all you really need, though. Ready At Dawn want The Order to look like a movie, so they're applying a bunch of visual effects that mimic film and extending that thinking to the aspect ratio as well.
You're free to question whether or not those are good decisions, but "we want it to look this way" is a valid enough justification for any choice that affects how a game looks. That's the developers' prerogative even if you dislike the final results and think they should have done it differently.
Oh, Do not get me wrong,I completely accept their vision for their game.
Maybe I worded it poorly. I mean all the excuses and nonsense being posted in this thread about fov.
Oh right. I think that line of reasoning kind of holds water, since you get less overall distortion if you use a wider FoV with a correspondingly wider aspect ratio, but it's still pointless to argue about that without knowing what FoV The Order actually uses.
That's not my question. My question is what produces more revenue over a film's lifetime: ticket sales at the cinema or physical media sales and streaming/download purchases/rentals/etc.
Awesome link. Ihavent seen this presentation before but its similar to a Ready At Dawn SIGGRAPH presentation I saw a while back on the same material. Looks like this has a bit more info and the tech seems to have progressed a bit from what I saw. Regardless their texture and shading work are mindblowing. Really fascinating stuff to learn about.
On the subject of the thread, the bars don't bother me as, if past movie watching experiences are anything to go by, I'll likely completely forget they exist after 10 mins or so. It's clear going by the footage and artwork they have shown that they are using the aspect ratio to frame various "shots" throughout the game. Obviously nobody can say why they proposed the idea of a wider aspect ratio when development first began but its seems crystal clear to me that the game has been designed around that aspect ratio. It really shows in some of the vista shots we have seen so far. I honestly think this game will feel like playing a CG movie in part because of the aspect ratio and I am really excited to experience that.
But that is the point. While the fov is the variable here the aspect ratio of our monitors is not. It is the constant of 16:9. This constant dictates at what vertical and horizontal fov distortion happens. They chose a specific fov which resulted in either distortion or black bars, because they wanted to render a 21:9 image on a 16:9 surface. Obviously they chose the black bars. But again that had nothing to do with with more horizontal fov, or "the image is too wide for a standard 16:9 monitor" nonsense.
Edit:
For everyone really interested in how this stuff works and not just following an agenda read this and calculate it yourself.
http://www.rjdown.co.uk/projects/bfbc2/fovcalculator.php
El-Pistolero
Member
This pseudo-antagonism has to stop. There are many games where both coexist, to the satisfaction of a large segment of the gamers' population.
Lys Skygge
Member
The game is still outputting a 1080p signal. The IQ will look just as good as a 1080p picture. Even the Lawrence of Arabia bluray says it outputs a 1080p image even though only 1920x800 (roughly) of the picture is being used.
Edit: Also most HD TV owners don't have TVs that can output a 2560x1080 signal.
I see no reason not to believe the developer's when the cite that this is the look they were going for. The decision was clearly made very early on, not during an optimization crunch when they were struggling with framerate issues. Do I think it was the right decision? That's impossible to tell without actually playing the resulting game. All I know is I'm glad they were willing to take a risk and do something a little different.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Pretty sure it was for performance. In fact, I think they more or less admitted to it. Them patching in an option to disable it on PC definitely seems to indicate that. Also, the performance is pretty negatively affected on PC when you disable the bars, so there's that.