Book II Video Resolution

[SomeUser]

People have resolutions ranging from 640x480 to 2560x1600 and beyond. It would be impossible to write graphics for all these resolutions. As mentioned before though, LCDs are extremely bad when it comes to scaling.

So as a "solution" I'd suggest the following:
The GUI, and only the GUI (buttons, text, etc, not item icons) exists in two resolutions. The original suitable for 800x600 and a double-res for 1600x1200. If double-res is active, item icons of the original res are used, but pixels are repeated 2x (essentially a 2x scale).

The main window scales to any resolution larger than 800x600, including widescreens, simply by repeating the background texture.
If the side bar is too short for the resolution (like 1024x768), fill the area below with artwork/texture to make it look complete still.

The player sees more or less tiles on the main window, depending on the size of your game window (1024x768 shows more tiles, with same tiles like 800x600), as was mentioned before by someone

A new button can be provided top left to allow 2x zoom for the game area. Again this is a pixel zoom, which can be done quite easily. This screenshot of Sim City 3000 shows how I mean it: http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/s ... tId,10462/

With this you should be prepared for any resolution between 800x600 and something as insane as 2560x1600.

[Galaad97]

There's one thing we must not forget as well, the game has an estimated development cycle of one year, one year and a half. So it will be out around what? Mid 2009? A great part of people nowaday sport at least 19'' LCDs, and among the few that retain their old CRTs are people who had good quality 21'' or some such CRTs.. (Although thats getting rarer and rarer).. So if you add to that another year, year and a half.. The number of CRT or smaller CRT users will be even smaller.

I would think that given that the best idea would probably be to include a 1280 * 1024 and possibly even a widescreen resolution of some sort like 1440*900 which has been suggested..

Of course I'd like 1680*1050 and higher to be supported, but I know that would be more work and not as many people can support those higher resolutions.. But I think the vast majority of people will be able to support 1280 * 1024 without any problem and seeing it wont be out for a while yet, that majority will only keep growing.

G.

[MtFR]

Are you people kidding me? This is a clearly stated old school game, and you're wishing for huge resolutions? HAHA. I personally have a 19" LCD with a native 1280x1024 but I'm using that just for my desktop. I like to play games in 800 to have that old-school pixel effect And when there's some new game with a lot of details then I make the sacrifice and turn it up to 1024

[thurauh1]

I'm fine with 1024X768 resolution. I still have a nearly 5 year old CRT screen which I use. I may get a 17 inch or 19 inch flatscreen in ½-1½ year or so, or if my CRT screen suddenly dies. (which I, of course, do not hope...).

There should also be less flaws etc. in the game (if there's any today?) when using the same engine with a little tweaking since Basiliskgames now knows the engine so well.

[Jude]

I don't mind 800x600 resolution, even though my graphics card and monitor (also an old CRT) can handle up to 2048x1546.

If the new game does have a higher resolution, I think there should be an option to play in 800x600 for those with laptops or those trying to make it run faster on their system.

Jude

[sarvadi]

Yes, 1024x768 would be nice. I have a 24" iMac so bring on the resolution!

So, right now the poll is favoring sticking with our current engine and enhancing it. If we bump up the resolution, what should it go to? 1024x768 is the obvious next step. Does everyone approve of this? If we go too much higher than that, we risk excluding users with lesser computers, but I think it should be group consensus as to what the next game will offer.

With this engine being 2D, we don't have the luxury of offering selectable resolutions like you would normally see with a 3D engine. Tiles don't scale well; when we try to scale everything, you quickly see gaps and seams between the tiles. We need to set a resolution now and stick to it through development.

[mkreku]

With this engine being 2D, we don't have the luxury of offering selectable resolutions like you would normally see with a 3D engine. Tiles don't scale well; when we try to scale everything, you quickly see gaps and seams between the tiles. We need to set a resolution now and stick to it through development.

That's odd. I thought it was a matter of drawing different number of tiles, not scaling them. When my computer class group and me made a small 2D racing game, we were able to offer three different resolutions (800x600, 1024x768 and 1280x1024). The way we made it was that we made three different front-ends (UI's, the ones showing speed, time and current place) that were static, one for 800x600, one for 1024x768 and one for 1280x1024. Then we calculated the amount of tiles visible on the screen at once, depending on the resolution selected. For example, the 800x600 users would get to see 10x9 tiles when centred while the 1280x1024 users would get to see 18x15 tiles. Then we just applied the correct UI on top of that, had different tables for the different interface updates positions and so on. It worked very well, even though it felt like almost an entirely different game in 800x600 than in 1280x1024..

If I had to choose, I'd settle for 1024x768 though. Especially if I can run it in windowed mode.

[Jude]

One thing you should check, especially for the Mac version, is the iMac and eMac fixed resolutions, and make sure whatever you choose falls into one of the fixed options allowed for them.

Jude

[joed100]

I'd go with 1024 X 768

[MobPwnzer]

I hope the game sticks with 800x600 myself. One of the adorable charms of this game is the "old school" look with the deep storyline. I fell in love with this game within a few minutes of playing the demo. And when I found that my laptop could easily handle it without becoming a molten slag of silicon, I loved it even more! If I want graphics, I'll go play Crysis or WoW or NWN2 or something. But I've gotten to the stage in my gaming hobby where the storyline is more important than the graphics or developing an"uB3r 1337" character, lol.

Keeping the resolution at 800x600 is my vote, but 1024x768 is acceptable as long as it doesn't tax my laptop.

[joshuapurcell]

My only request in relation to resolution is that there is a widescreen version available. I will say that you will be getting all different types of requests in this thread, so you won't be able to please everyone unless you make it so that the game can take up the entire screen but keep whatever resolution you made the graphics for.

[sarvadi]

My only request in relation to resolution is that there is a widescreen version available. I will say that you will be getting all different types of requests in this thread, so you won't be able to please everyone unless you make it so that the game can take up the entire screen but keep whatever resolution you made the graphics for.

I second this motion as I have a widescreen iMac.

[Epsilon]

I bought Book 1 to play on Linux, but while it tries to maintain the old school feel of games like Ultima, restricting resolutions isn't optimal for people with lcd screens or widescreen lcd.
LCD displays can only display one resolution, if you use a resolution lower than what the display is set then the image will just be stretched to fit, sometimes leading to distorted images, like say you're using a 1440x900 image on a 1680x1050 screen the characters end up looking fatter "wide" than intended.
Moreover having just a set number of resolutions because some people can't or won't run it higher than that on their screen it could end up being a bit restrictive in the future when people decides to upgrade their screens, or indeed if someone already has a screen supporting higher resolution but can't use it because it's only set to the widescreen resolution that people who are most outspoken have.
I myself have a 1920x1200 24inc widescreen and I found the 800x600 resolution to look a bit 'weird' but it was a very good game nonetheless, though I would've liked a native resolution so the image would've looked as intended.
I often find myself writing patches for old games like Syndicate or Xcom: Ufo to have a nicer display,games that old are of course excused, but it would be nice if a developer decided to include that support from the start.

[zanderohm]

I'm fine with it the current size, but if you wanna go big, injoy...
My only request is to keep it windowed instead of taking up the whole screen... I like to be able to jump back and forth from stuff w/o having to shut down the game...

blessingzzz

[recluse]

I guess I'd be one of your "lost." I have no intention of upgrading. But then, other requirements will very likely knock me out anyhow. I can barely run OSX5 on this clunker. Guess I'll have to be satisfied with Book 1.