I’ve got a big HD CRT monitor that has a 4:3 aspect ratio. I want to be able to play the game in 1080i or 720p in full screen mode without pillarboxing.
I think I should be able to set the game to display in full screen, adjust the screen in the games screen settings to fill a whole 16:9 area, and then my monitor should just squash the image back to 4:3 when I display it.
Has anybody had experience doing this? People with component to VGA adapters for their PC monitors will know what I am talking about.
EDIT: It doesn’t look like it.
When I sent 1080i and 720p video to my computer monitor and started up the with widescreen mode turned off it put pillarboxing on both sides of the screen. This resulted in the screen being very tall and skinny. I tried adjust the image from the in-game display resizing option, but it only stretched a few pixels horizontally. I then tried to stretch the image further horizontally but but it still wouldn’t fit the screen. I had to resize vertically to make up for the difference.
So unless your monitor has a very large horizontal resize range, it seems hi-res fullscreen without pillarboxing isn’t going to work.
Note: this was all done using a PS3. No info on the Xbox 360 version, but if it is as Lcdscreen says, then it might be much easier.
Not sure if you’re talking Xbox 360 or PS3, but all XBLA games are made to play properly on 4:3 displays, so if you set the Xbox up correctly then there should be no squashing to be done. It should run in 1080i or 720p, as long as your TV supports it.
Back in the early stages of development Sirlin noted it would work fine for 4:3 displays.
The 16:9 mode is done in a slightly “zoomed in” way where the camera moves up and down a lot more when characters jump (it did this slightly in the original games anyway, it’s just more pronounced now).
There’s no penalty for playing in 4:3. You will get the same amount of play area, and you can even play someone else online if they are in 16:9 mode.
Yes, I know the game will switch to a 4:3 display in high resolutions, the problem is that it will put black bars on the sides of the game in order to do that. If those black bars are part of the actual image then they will show up on my 4:3 monitor and make the screen look very tall and skinny.
I am hoping that I will be able to extend the screen image out with the display settings option in the game and then send it to my monitor.
I’m testing this tonight I think, so I’ll report back my findings.
You can change the screen size in the display settings, so if the black bars are there you should be able to stretch it to full screen. You shouldn’t get black bars on a 4:3 TV though.
EDIT: I think I missed the ball here, lol. Are you trying to force a 1080i/720p image onto a 4:3 CRT?
I highly doubt you are going to be be able to do it. Every 4:3 HD-CRT I know of automatically puts 720p/1080i content in a 16:9 frame. Meaning you’re going to get black bars on the top and bottom. The only way you would be able to do this is if your TV had some kind of zoom function, which is usually only on digital sets.
If you want a true 4:3 picture, you’re going to have to use SD resolutions like 640x480.
My set isn’t exactly a TV. It’s a big presentation monitor. It’s essentially a 37" pc monitor, but it can also do low resolutions for arcade games, and television resolutions. It’s a Mitsubishi Megaview 3717C to be precise. So it doesn’t resize the screen like a HDTV would. It also has screen resizing features like a PC monitor does.
Now, if I could somehow get an adapter that would let me perform a 4:3 zoom on a 1080i image without changing resolutions that would be perfect. I’m going to have to start looking at different component to vga boxes and see what features they have.
Has anyone noticed how they do the so called widescreen is SSF2HDR?. The just zoom in on the sprites. Parts of the background on the top and bottom are lost, swtich between widscreen and 4:3 and its obvious… not good at all.
And how would you suggest they do it? Unless they wanted to alter the playing field width, which would have massively fucked up gameplay, the only other solution was to zoom in on the screen.
I love how people bitch about an added feature that they don’t have to use.
zoning is the primary variable in ST/HDR and for that you need horizontal field of view - not vertical. widescreen gives you exactly the same hFOV as standard ratio - so gameplay is unchanged. however there are bonuses to 16:9. since the characters are drawn at high rez - they look good under magnification. so now, we have crisp characters sprites filling up a greater % of the frame - all while maintaining correct spacing ratios. this definitely helps makes it feel like a “new” game to me.
I’m not bitching about an added feature, I’m just saying its not really widescreen in the sense, like if you are watching a movie, you actually get to see more of the field. It just wasn’t what I was expecting.
To each their own. I’m not a fan of cropped 16:9 image at all, which is why I don’t use it. More power to people that like it, but I think that you’re at a big disadvantage against Vega or Bison players since their air moves are much harder to see.
I don’t like 16:9 HD Remix either. Not only do you get a zoomed in image (the equivalent of a pan and scan movie on a 4:3 sceen), but your character goes behind the health bars when you jump. It makes it hard for me to time things properly when I’m in the air.
the solution is easy for the 360. but sadly i don’t know of any (good) option for the PS3. and fwiw, i have both consoles sitting in front of me right now.