# Black bars with correct aspect ratio, or streched with not correct aspect ratio?



## MetoMeto (Jul 13, 2020)

As title said...
So I'll boldly assume that all of you have wide screen panels (monitors or TV's)

You know how when you play those older 4:3 games they have these black bars on sides on a widescreen panels, 
because wide screen was not a standard back than. So playing those games on a modern widescreen panels usually stretches the picture to fill the entire area.
However, that filling makes the picture to display incorrectly, stretched. Circle is not a circle but a ellipse.

I heard many people are not bothered by that, they even prefer it that way. I my self can never play a game that way unless its intended to be in 16:9 or at least close. It doesn't need to be prefect for me all the time, but i prefer CORRECT aspect ratio if i can. But 8:7 SNES games i prefer to play them in 4:3, they are stretched but by small amount and that's acceptable for me,
and also it gives this original vibe cause games where meant to be played in 4;3 anyway so its still a original experience sort of. 

But the bottom line is this: 
-Do you prefer correct aspect ratio or 
-You aren't bothered AT ALL if the picture is stretched whatever amount of percent, as long as it fills entire 16"9 widescreen.
You don't want any pixel to be lazy!

Ill make a poll, please vote if you like, i'm really curious to see the results, its a fun experiment 

By the way here are examples of what i mean:


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## Tom Bombadildo (Jul 13, 2020)

Black bars every day of the week if there's not a proper 16:9 hack of some kind. Stretching 4:3 to 16:9 looks fucking awful 99% of the time, so it's just not worth it to do. I'll live with black bars on the side.


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## Sonic Angel Knight (Jul 13, 2020)

I don't need distracting black bars. FILL MY TV WITH PIXELS! (Just no overscan please)


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## MetoMeto (Jul 13, 2020)

Sonic Angel Knight said:


> I don't need distracting black bars. FILL MY TV WITH PIXELS! (Just no overscan please)


I think i can agree with overscan with you, but not with stretching 
Do you find it distracting when 4:3 picture is being displayed on 4:3 monitor? no bars just narrower picture.


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## Sonic Angel Knight (Jul 13, 2020)

MetoMeto said:


> I think i can agree with overscan with you, but not with stretching
> Do you find it distracting when 4:3 picture is being displayed on 4:3 monitor? no bars just narrower picture.


No, it's fine. As long as the tv is filled. Black bars are distracting. I have attention problems.


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## MetoMeto (Jul 13, 2020)

Sonic Angel Knight said:


> No, it's fine. As long as the tv is filled. Black bars are distracting. I have attention problems.


I see... so bars are the main problem, not the 4:3 aspect.

Yes i can kinda relate to that. i got annoyed by this question mark on Wiiu gamepad screen on GBA VC games lol its soo distracting.


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## Armadillo (Jul 13, 2020)

Original aspect. Stretched picture is awful.


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## FAST6191 (Jul 14, 2020)

There is also the progressively stretched thing (middle fairly normal, gets more and more stretched as you go to the edges), which looks better than straight stretched until a character walks arms towards the camera or off screen onto it.

Still give me bars. Black if you can but coloured is fine (had a TV that did grey once, not my favourite thing but worked), less keen on the slightly less saturated and blurred effect that seems to be popular these days with various video types (seen it all the time online in games circles) that and to handle the results of people suffering vertical video syndrome (even seen that one on the news).

Straight stretched or letterboxed is walk out the room time (marginally less for letterboxed, especially if done properly), can no longer my friend or anything like that. Combinations of the two (marginal crop coupled with a stretch) can be better but still walk out of the room time.

Being a filthy hacker though https://www.wsgf.org/ and various emulators and mods do afford other options.


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## VinsCool (Jul 14, 2020)

I think it's pretty unanimous in the poll lol.


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## D34DL1N3R (Jul 14, 2020)

I have a neighbor with a DVD player connected to his HDTV with the picture set on zoom so all of his old movies fill up the screen. OMG! I cannot stand to watch a movie there.


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## DarkFlare69 (Jul 14, 2020)

I'm ok with minor stretches, some 16:9 games have small black bars anyway so it isn't "true" 16:9. I'm fine with stretching those out into full 16:9. But 4:3, hell no, that would look terrible.


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## mrnintendoguy (Jul 14, 2020)

It depends on the game to be honest. I played Mortal Kombat 2 on my SNES for the first time last week and it was in widescreen (stretched). I couldn't tell if it the SNES had widescreen output or what, but eventually figured out it was stretched (I'm dumb, I know). That game looked fine in widescreen. So yeah; depends on the game.


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## THEELEMENTKH (Jul 14, 2020)

I used to stretch the 4:3 PSX games to fill the 16:9 screen on my PSP wheb I was younger, nowadays I can't stand how bad it looks and I wonder how I managed to ignore that

So basically Correct aspect ratio with black bars >>>>> Stretched video just to fill the screen


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## mrnintendoguy (Jul 14, 2020)

THEELEMENTKH said:


> I used to stretch the 4:3 PSX games to fill the 16:9 screen on my PSP wheb I was younger, nowadays I can't stand how bad it looks and I wonder how I managed to ignore that
> 
> So basically Correct aspect ratio with black bars >>>>> Stretched video just to fill the screen


I mean younger me didn't give a crap about how games looked, what the frame rate was, etc. All that matters is that the game was fun lol.


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## MikaDubbz (Jul 14, 2020)

Growing up with a GBA and a ton of GB/GBC games that could easily swap between proper aspect ratio and stretched, I quickly grew to prefer the stretched display.  I can't think of an experience where it ever felt truly wrong.  Like I get that initially it looks odd, but you quickly get used to the stretch, and soon don't feel anything is wrong with the display at all.  I typically wont go out of my way to make a 4:3 game play in widescreen, but if I have the option to easily swap between 4:3 and stretched, I will often opt for the stretched display.


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## hippy dave (Jul 14, 2020)

Calling for any available moderators to ban anyone who votes "stretched", ty.


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## MetoMeto (Jul 14, 2020)

D34DL1N3R said:


> I have a neighbor with a DVD player connected to his HDTV with the picture set on zoom so all of his old movies fill up the screen. OMG! I cannot stand to watch a movie there.


letterbox for movies gives a special vibe...

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THEELEMENTKH said:


> I used to stretch the 4:3 PSX games to fill the 16:9 screen on my PSP wheb I was younger, nowadays I can't stand how bad it looks and I wonder how I managed to ignore that
> 
> So basically Correct aspect ratio with black bars >>>>> Stretched video just to fill the screen


When i play PSX games on my Vita i dont use 4:3 i strech to just the right amount, so its not to much streched and not to small. It kinda makes the picture looks bigger. its kinda a compromise i make there.

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hippy dave said:


> Calling for any available moderators to ban anyone who votes "stretched", ty.


lol


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## Stwert (Jul 16, 2020)

Black bars, always, doesn’t matter if it’s games, film, TV, I like the correct aspect ratio.


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## Shady Guy Jose (Jul 16, 2020)

I actually go a step further: especially in emulators, I am not okay with bilinear-scaled output, even in the correct aspect ratio. Give me nearest-neighbor scaling to the largest possible integer, even at the cost of small black bars on the top and bottom in addition to those on the sides, or I will pester you until you add that feature as an option (most modern retro emulators do this, and even Nintendo and Sony got that right in the Wii U VC for SNES games and the Vita PSX emulator, respectively).


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## Minox (Jul 16, 2020)

Shady Guy Jose said:


> I actually go a step further: especially in emulators, I am not okay with bilinear-scaled output, even in the correct aspect ratio. Give me nearest-neighbor scaling to the largest possible integer, even at the cost of small black bars on the top and bottom in addition to those on the sides, or I will pester you until you add that feature as an option (most modern retro emulators do this, and even Nintendo and Sony got that right in the Wii U VC for SNES games and the Vita PSX emulator, respectively).


For older games with a set resolution this is the same route I like to go. For anything where resolution is variable but not widescreen I go with black bars of sorrow.


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## Shady Guy Jose (Jul 16, 2020)

Minox said:


> For older games with a set resolution this is the same route I like to go. For anything where resolution is variable but not widescreen I go with black bars of sorrow.


Even with variable resolution, it's sometimes locked to multiples. Take Dolphin, for example: the largest resolution among its options that can fit into my screen is 2560×2112. However, fullscreen mode will try and scale that up to 2618×2160. I end up having to use Windowed mode or third-party apps such as Lossless Scaling to achieve my desired output.


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## emcintosh (Jul 16, 2020)

Stretching the GBA’s 3:2 ratio to the 3DS’s 5:3 actually makes the Boktai games look a bit better, as it makes the 45 degree angles of walls look closer to isometric 30 degree ones - this art style has horizontal surfaces undistorted, but vertical walls look a bit weird:
https://www.resetera.com/threads/rt...ranchise.8209/#lg=_xfUid-2-1594902890&slide=0


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## MockyLock (Jul 16, 2020)

Obviosuly, the 4:3 ratio.
Asking for stretch screen is already disrespecting the Videogame History.


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## UltraSUPRA (Jul 29, 2020)

I used to like stretched.

Then I came to my senses.


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## MetoMeto (Aug 5, 2020)

emcintosh said:


> Stretching the GBA’s 3:2 ratio to the 3DS’s 5:3 actually makes the Boktai games look a bit better, as it makes the 45 degree angles of walls look closer to isometric 30 degree ones - this art style has horizontal surfaces undistorted, but vertical walls look a bit weird:
> https://www.resetera.com/threads/rt...ranchise.8209/#lg=_xfUid-2-1594902890&slide=0


thats interesting. youre actually right!


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## banjojohn (Aug 5, 2020)

Never ever stretch....I hate that!

However, it's very misleading when you present a 4:3 picture from a (perfect) movie, that is originally in 2.35:1.


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