HD vs Full HD vs 4K. FPS vs Res. What are the benefits?

[Amadren]

I tried playing the same game on two different monitors, the first is a Samsung 21.5", 1080p, 60hz using Dynamic Contrast and plugged using an HDMI port and the second is a BenQ 19", 720p, 60hz pluggend with a VGA port. I always played with the highest setting and at 60fps. I saw no differences between both game. (Except that I saw wider at 1080p than 720p). Both were smooth and really good looking.

I tried:
The Witcher 3
World of Warcraft
Far Cry 3
Serious Sam 3 BFE.

So I think it has something to do with the screen size :/

 

[Foxi4]

So I think it has something to do with the screen size :/

It does - that, and the distance from the screen. If you pack 720 pixels on a tiny screen, those pixels will be smaller on a small screen than on a big screen, obviously. The bigger the screen the bigger the pixels, the closer you are to it the easier it is to see them. At some point resolution will reach a plateau where we won't be able to distinguish one pixel from another, at which point we'll just stop bothering with resolution, and we're getting there with 4 and 8K. As far as standard-sized screens are concerned, 1080p is perfectly fine - you don't need 4K.

 

[TecXero]

Most games don't feel very responsive to me at lower framerates, and I always prefer gameplay performance over graphics. There are some games I can still enjoy at 30fps, but it's rare. Resolution isn't that big of a deal to me. I have most of my home theater stuff set to 720p instead of 1080p just because my furniture is far enough away that I can't tell the difference.

 

[G0R3Z]

Most games don't feel very responsive to me at lower framerates, and I always prefer gameplay performance over graphics. There are some games I can still enjoy at 30fps, but it's rare. Resolution isn't that big of a deal to me. I have most of my home theater stuff set to 720p instead of 1080p just because my furniture is far enough away that I can't tell the difference.

I think it's silly how some people can honestly say that playing at 30fps is okay. It's a dreadful experience. I'd rather bump my game down to 720p than to play at 30fps.

 

[sarkwalvein]

I think it's silly how some people can honestly say that playing at 30fps is okay. It's a dreadful experience. I'd rather bump my game down to 720p than to play at 30fps.

It depends on the type of game, really.
There are many games where it doesn't really matter to have "just 30 FPS", like point and click games, visual novels, tactic RPGs, most turn based RPGs, long etc.
Of course it matters for action based games where your reflexes come into play like FPSes, platform games, racing games, etc.
E.g.: I am suffering Mass Effect 3 that runs at average 30FPS on my Wii U, but I couldn't care less if some Fire Emblem ran at 20FPS.

My rule of thumb for a home console game would be at least 720p, 30FPS with more FPS being more welcome than more resolution.

 

[FAST6191]

I think it's silly how some people can honestly say that playing at 30fps is okay. It's a dreadful experience. I'd rather bump my game down to 720p than to play at 30fps.

30fps is fine for basically everything* if you have proper motion blur (note that most motion blur seen in games is very poor), however so few games seem to want to do it so the higher frame rate does seem to become something to consider for people.

*see also how most videos you have probably ever watched have been 24 fps, 25fps or very occasionally 30fps.

 

[G0R3Z]

30fps is fine for basically everything* if you have proper motion blur (note that most motion blur seen in games is very poor), however so few games seem to want to do it so the higher frame rate does seem to become something to consider for people.

*see also how most videos you have probably ever watched have been 24 fps, 25fps or very occasionally 30fps.

Indeed. But for gaming, 30 fps is just not fast enough.

 

[FAST6191]

I maintain that if you were shown 30fps CGI/computer game footage with proper motion blur, which is to say relative to the object, distance and speeds displayed rather than some distant cousin to image morphing that games which try to do it pass off as motion blur, then you would be fine with it. The whole "30fps is cinematic" stuff that various game publishers have tried on is complete and utter horse shit but that is perhaps a different discussion.

The input/reaction time (ooh it is double...) thing has some marginal potential, especially at the ultra high end which is not where most people operate. However most of that is lost in the noise with latency of screens and probably latency of controllers* as well.

*this gets to be fun. If you kick it old school (and it is still a viable way so I am not complaining) and tie a controller read/debounce to vblanks rather than something a bit more stateful/event driven then it becomes a greater issue.

 

[Foxi4]

I think it's silly how some people can honestly say that playing at 30fps is okay. It's a dreadful experience. I'd rather bump my game down to 720p than to play at 30fps.

I always found 30 FPS to be perfectly fine as long as it's stable. Your brain will adjust to the framerate and the response time naturally without realizing it, it's when framerate fluctuates that you begin noticing issues. Stability of framerate is more important than framerate itself, unstable framerate is very noticable and gets you out of the game quickly.

 

[WiiCube_2013]

I for myself can see that the games I play in high definition don't always (almost always) never look as pleasing as the gameplay videos on YouTube but even still they're loads of fun to play. So yeah, this is something that doesn't go unnoticed but rather just let it slide as I don't mind it.

 

[Hungry Friend]

A stable 30fps is fine for games that don't require really, really precise timing like fighting games, old-school shmups, some racing games and some FPS games as well as some others but generally speaking I agree that a steady 30 is fine. If it's a choice between 1080p/30fps and 720p/60fps, I'll choose 720/60 every time however, even if that means less texture detail as well. Unless you're playing on a very large screen, resolution differences aren't going to matter much. There's a huge difference between 720p and 1080p on my 50 inch LCD TV but on my 23 inch PC monitor it's not all that noticeable.

Games have always had fluctuating framerates at times but during the 2600-SNES/Genesis eras, 60fps(50 for PAL games) was generally the target. When polygonal games began to take over, framerate/performance was often sacrificed for more graphical detail and it's been that way ever since. 2d games during the 32-bit era were almost always 60 as well. A surprising number of PS2 games are 60fps however.

 

[TecXero]

30fps is fine for basically everything* if you have proper motion blur (note that most motion blur seen in games is very poor), however so few games seem to want to do it so the higher frame rate does seem to become something to consider for people.

*see also how most videos you have probably ever watched have been 24 fps, 25fps or very occasionally 30fps.

Watching it, yeah that's fine, but playing it, it's not. Motion blur doesn't help make it feel more responsive, and even gives me a bit of a headache. That's why I couldn't enjoy Sonic Colors on Wii, which was a game dependant on reaction time. It can break some games for me. That said, there are still games I can enjoy despite the low framerate, like most of the third-person LoZ games. I'd still love to see them at 60fps, but they got them to where they feel responsive enough for me to enjoy them.

 

[FAST6191]

Watching it, yeah that's fine, but playing it, it's not. Motion blur doesn't help make it feel more responsive, and even gives me a bit of a headache. That's why I couldn't enjoy Sonic Colors on Wii, which was a game dependant on reaction time. It can break some games for me. That said, there are still games I can enjoy despite the low framerate, like most of the third-person LoZ games. I'd still love to see them at 60fps, but they got them to where they feel responsive enough for me to enjoy them.

I have not seen more than a tech demo try proper motion blur as it is seen in real life. Most games basically blur or try to interpolate a frame similar to the classical morph between two shapes transition type effect*, and yeah headaches, visual discomfort, reduced ability in games perhaps (watch a figure skater, or a vert skateboarder or anybody that spins around a lot and see how they move their head during a spin as it is a related problem), motion sickness as you can not focus on distant objects properly and all that jazz are expected if you do use the weaker stuff here. Real motion blur is a relative thing covering peripheral vision, distance to objects, speeds and all manner of other things, nothing too drastic really (maths wise I reckon I could set a 3 hour exam for 18 year olds that are learning physics to solve a short scene) but not entirely trivial. In real life the rendering is taken care of by reality itself and even crazy low shutter speeds on a camera are still enough to get something. I do not know why they are sinking so much money into light/shadow rendering when this could be a thing but hey.

*for example, just with less change as it is only between two frames and at many times a second as appropriate.


The reaction time thing is something of a... I do not want to say strawman as there is at least the kernel of an argument there that could apply to some people. When programmed in a somewhat sensible fashion though it is more or less only likely to be those that are basically this guy (so not me and probably not anyone else on this site, and I dare say it is not going to be a common ability even among the professional twitch game set)