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It is not that hard to accommodate both ratios. Unless you plan on having some special scene where an object fills the viewport exactly, the code to support both is relatively painless.

Hm, I'm not sure what you mean. Can you clarify?

Just to be clear, the question was not about the technical details of supporting multiple aspect ratios (which, as you note, are fairly trivial), but rather about how different aspect ratios can affect gameplay.

I just want to point out a technical element that is often (and can't be) left out:

When you put black bars, you're potentially inducing to cause screen burn-ins because 1/4 - 1/3 of the screen has been completely still in black for countless hours (of gameplay)

Interestingly, I realized about it when I read my LCD's manual which didn't recommend the 4:3 mode (which puts black bars on the sides) because it can potentially cause burn-ins or differences in brightness when you remove those bars.

As for the gameplay side, I'm interested how this thread may evolve.
A cheap way may be to rearrange the HUD elements for different aspect ratios, so that they cover the "advantage" parts.

Gameplay advantages coming from Hardware differences are inevitable.
This doesn't apply just to aspect ratio.
People with fast systems have advantage in Fighting & Racing games than those with slow HW (or other fast paced games).

Those who have a brighter screen have an advantage in games with very dark elements (Left 4 Dead) or where darkness plays an important role (i.e. Thief series) than those who have an old TV which it's white is equal to a recently bought TV's gray.

First Person Shooters with support for 7.1 sound systems, those who have it will have an advantage because they can quickly tell where the enemy fire is coming from.

Gamepads often have less lag than keyboards to get the input (don't ask me why). Players playing with gamepads in fast paced games have again advantage over keyboard-users

I remember Sis 630/730 users had a terrible disadvantage in Warcraft III because of what it seemed to be a bug in the gpu's gamma correction: the game was VERY dark.

Nowadays everyone has a mouse with a scroll-wheel, but years ago those who had it held an advantage because it was very useful (i.e. quick zooming) while other players had to look for the key combination to emulate the same behavior the wheel provided in an instant.

Bottom line, you can minimize the gameplay differences coming from the users int your market having different HW, balancing it, and pretending it stays fair. But there's a lot of variety out there and we have to be clever how to minimize the impact.
Of course, having a specific market (i.e. targeting a console like the PS3) helps a lot because you reduce variety a lot. But still there are things left to do (like in this case aspect ratio and speaker's quality)

Cheers
Dark Sylinc

PS: Whoa, I was just going to post about the technical side, and ended up writing a long post.

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When you put black bars, you're potentially inducing to cause screen burn-ins because 1/4 - 1/3 of the screen has been completely still in black for countless hours (of gameplay) Interestingly, I realized about it when I read my LCD's manual which didn't recommend the 4:3 mode (which puts black bars on the sides) because it can potentially cause burn-ins or differences in brightness when you remove those bars.

Ah, I hadn't thought of this - will definitely take it into consideration.

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Gameplay advantages coming from Hardware differences are inevitable.

Agreed. As you note though, what effect variations in hardware will have depends on the game. I think there are some types of games (the game I'm working on falls in this category) where aspect ratio is more likely to affect gameplay than some of the other variables you mentioned (system speed, input devices, sound, etc.). In these cases, I think trying to address the aspect ratio issue can be important from a gameplay perspective.

Again though, it just depends on the game.

One option to avoid the burn in is to simply not use a solid bar. Animate the boarder with some cute slowly moving clockwork scrolling effect.

I tackled this exact issue for Kōtiro, but I approached it a little differently. I wanted to strike the right balance between visibility and emotional connection:

Resolution and Emotional Connection

Then I followed it up with this, which covers what actual distances mean:

Environment Conventions

If a larger screen space allows the player to see more than they should, you can normalize the problem in the game, instead of on the screen.

You can limit the vision distance with something other than the screen edge like fading objects past a distance threshold, using fog, "fog of war" (ala Warcraft), or something more creative. Instead of cutting the view area down to a single size, make it so the extra view space doesn't show the player anything that would give them an advantage.

In my little top-down sea-creature project, I use something I call "extended-vision" to show the player what is outside the camera space. Its just a bunch of soft circles that indicate the direction, size, and distance of objects outside the camera area, within a maximum distance. The device is called a "compass" in this article on Gamasutra. I align the circles to a radius, and limit them by the screen bounds.



Above is an image showing a 4:3 screen ratio over 16:9. This is the range of ratios I support. The white circles on the outside show what is nearby but not on-screen. The small advantage of a larger screen is practically nullified because you're aware of what you can't see.

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Original post by Pete Michaud I tackled this exact issue for Kōtiro, but I approached it a little differently. I wanted to strike the right balance between visibility and emotional connection: Resolution and Emotional Connection Then I followed it up with this, which covers what actual distances mean: Environment Conventions

Interesting articles - thanks for the links!

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Original post by Slather You can limit the vision distance with something other than the screen edge like fading objects past a distance threshold, using fog, "fog of war" (ala Warcraft), or something more creative. Instead of cutting the view area down to a single size, make it so the extra view space doesn't show the player anything that would give them an advantage.

That's an interesting idea as well. (I wasn't able to run your demo - probably due to my outdated hardware - but the screenshots look very nice!)

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Original post by Matias Goldberg I just want to point out a technical element that is often (and can't be) left out: When you put black bars, you're potentially inducing to cause screen burn-ins because 1/4 - 1/3 of the screen has been completely still in black for countless hours (of gameplay) Interestingly, I realized about it when I read my LCD's manual which didn't recommend the 4:3 mode (which puts black bars on the sides) because it can potentially cause burn-ins or differences in brightness when you remove those bars.

The screen in the picture is a plasma. Modern LCDs are not supposed to suffer from image retention at all, while plasmas do, and are generally not used for gaming for exactly that reason. Devs throwing a bone to plasma owners, like a slowly moving background picture instead of black bars, is obviously not much work and offset some image retention, but that isn't enough to make your software "burn-in proof". For that, you also couldn't have a static score counter, a health bar, or anything of the sort. In short, not worth doing. The only thing that works is not to get a plasma in the first place, or to obey the owner's manual and strongly moderate the relative amount of gaming and off-aspect video viewing you do on it.

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Gameplay advantages coming from Hardware differences are inevitable. This doesn't apply just to aspect ratio. People with fast systems have advantage in Fighting & Racing games than those with slow HW (or other fast paced games).

So what advantage do people with fast systems have in a fighting game, in comparison to people with systems with average HW specs and reasonable graphics settings? I'm thinking none.

Where I can see there being a difference is first-person shooters, especially ones with visual stealth as a key component (Crysis with a custom dense jungle map?), but even then, I see differences of network lag, selective use of low graphics settings and cheating to be much more prominent technical issues than possible hardware advantage.

Driving games would admittedly grant something of an advantage due to your speed perception improving with more detail. Not being big on driving games, I don't know how significant this advantage is, but I imagine it will be at its strongest in high-accuracy simulation and very strong players who have developed beyond braking point / entry speed driving. Arcade racers won't see a difference.

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Gamepads often have less lag than keyboards to get the input (don't ask me why). Players playing with gamepads in fast paced games have again advantage over keyboard-users

Got a link, or any information at all about this supposed systemic keyboard lag? I do not believe it exists. There are valid reasons to use a gamepad or arcade stick over keyboard, of course - accuracy of input, speed of input, and analog input capability. Key jamming and ghosting are legit issues for users of low-quality keyboards but can always be rectified by switching to a high-quality keyboard.

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Original post by Stroppy Katamari The screen in the picture is a plasma. Modern LCDs are not supposed to suffer from image retention at all, while plasmas do, and are generally not used for gaming for exactly that reason. Devs throwing a bone to plasma owners, like a slowly moving background picture instead of black bars, is obviously not much work and offset some image retention, but that isn't enough to make your software "burn-in proof". For that, you also couldn't have a static score counter, a health bar, or anything of the sort. In short, not worth doing. The only thing that works is not to get a plasma in the first place, or to obey the owner's manual and strongly moderate the relative amount of gaming and off-aspect video viewing you do on it.

That is a common missconception. Vendors thought they were resistant to image retention, but practice proved them wrong. This is why recently shipped LCD manuals now come with a burn-in warning.
Yes, the image links to a plasma TV; and no, LCDs are affected by burn ins (although, to a much lesser extent).
Also, one thing is two have a static counter which occupies 1/32 of the screen, and another one is two have 2 black bars which occupy between 1/4-1/3 of the screen.

Interesting, the exact opposite argument you're giving me was being used years ago, since Plasma had lower latency, it was better for gaming. Nowadays no one cares about it since LCDs have come a long way.
Although, I heard Rock Band (or one of those music games) has an option for LCD HDTV lag compensation.
Furthermore Criterion Games also mentions something about it:

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Alex Fry: Very sensible. But as you probably know, most of the latency in gaming today comes from the processing going on in the LCD TV. They often have five, ten frames of latency.

I agree with you though, that a moving animation instead or black bars has to be carefully thought or else it will cause more harm than they cure. This happens with poorly designed screensavers.
And at some point, something will always be susceptible to burn in and yet never hurted (i.e. most of us have the start menu on the bottom of the screen, almost always still).
But 1/3 of a screen being black is something significative that can't be taken lightly.

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So what advantage do people with fast systems have in a fighting game, in comparison to people with systems with average HW specs and reasonable graphics settings? I'm thinking none.

Better response as they can predict enemy movements more fluently and input faster.
Also, you're comparing a High-end system with an "average HW specs and reasonable graphics settings".
You have to compare high-end, average, and below average. Unless you're not targeting the last group. Oh, but the point of this thread is to include as more people as possible having the same (exact?) experience, so we can't exclude them.

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I see differences of network lag, selective use of low graphics settings and cheating to be much more prominent technical issues than possible hardware advantage.

Ahh, yes. But single player also comes into discussion here.
How many times you've heard someone "For god sake I've pressed the damn key! why didn't he move??!" or "WTF? it stalled for 1 second and now I'm dead??"

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Got a link, or any information at all about this supposed systemic keyboard lag? I do not believe it exists. There are valid reasons to use a gamepad or arcade stick over keyboard, of course - accuracy of input, speed of input, and analog input capability.

My keyboard for example.
A cheap USB Genius Keyboard that came with my Mobo. It lags as hell (and I still don't know why) compared to my other PS/2 keyboards.

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Key jamming and ghosting are legit issues for users of low-quality keyboards but can always be rectified by switching to a high-quality keyboard.

Ahh.... so we arrive at the original problem: Fairness of the game when dealing with different Hardware.
The solution you're proposing is analogous to forcing everyone to buy a 4:3 monitor (or whatever the developer decided) or else you can't play the game.
The solution we're looking for is "you have a widescreen monitor? No problem, we've got something special for you so the game feels the same"

Cheers
Dark Sylinc

PS: Thanks Michaud! Excellent articles!
PS2: Slather: Lovely solution!

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Original post by Matias Goldberg Quote: So what advantage do people with fast systems have in a fighting game, in comparison to people with systems with average HW specs and reasonable graphics settings? I'm thinking none. Better response as they can predict enemy movements more fluently and input faster. Also, you're comparing a High-end system with an "average HW specs and reasonable graphics settings". You have to compare high-end, average, and below average. Unless you're not targeting the last group. Oh, but the point of this thread is to include as more people as possible having the same (exact?) experience, so we can't exclude them.

No, the point of this thread is fairness in a competetive setting with different sets of hardware. "The same exact experience" requires either the same exact hardware, or hard-capping the game to the weakest supported hardware.

Regarding fighting games, if the hardware can run the game at minimum detail and resolution (solid 60Hz of course) then the fight is fair. It doesn't matter if the opponent throws ten times as much hardware at the game, has a ton more resolution than you do and everything cranked to eleven, because the extra detail doesn't actually help him win.

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Quote: I see differences of network lag, selective use of low graphics settings and cheating to be much more prominent technical issues than possible hardware advantage. Ahh, yes. But single player also comes into discussion here. How many times you've heard someone "For god sake I've pressed the damn key! why didn't he move??!" or "WTF? it stalled for 1 second and now I'm dead??"

I have no idea what that has to do with anything.

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Quote: Got a link, or any information at all about this supposed systemic keyboard lag? I do not believe it exists. There are valid reasons to use a gamepad or arcade stick over keyboard, of course - accuracy of input, speed of input, and analog input capability. My keyboard for example. A cheap USB Genius Keyboard that came with my Mobo. It lags as hell (and I still don't know why) compared to my other PS/2 keyboards.

One crappy keyboard != endemic keyboard lag. The vast majority of gamers never have trouble with their keyboards, and do not even specifically pick a keyboard for gaming, much less get a gamepad to fight some widespread lag problem with keyboards which I maintain does not exist.

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Quote: Key jamming and ghosting are legit issues for users of low-quality keyboards but can always be rectified by switching to a high-quality keyboard. Ahh.... so we arrive at the original problem: Fairness of the game when dealing with different Hardware. The solution you're proposing is analogous to forcing everyone to buy a 4:3 monitor (or whatever the developer decided) or else you can't play the game.

No. I neglected to mention that games are already designed around those issues, so successfully that the majority of gamers are oblivious even to the possibility of these phenomena. A keyboard which jams and ghosts so badly that it's unusable is an exception, just as a keyboard with lag is. Replacing such a keyboard with a normal, functional one is the reasonable fix. Software cannot accommodate every deficient piece of HW in existence. The line of minimal requirements has to be drawn somewhere.