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Do you play in Fullscreen or Windowed?

A topic by FearCode created Mar 01, 2023 Views: 891 Replies: 29
Viewing posts 1 to 11

Hi! Which way would you prefer to play a 3D First or Third person? Windowed or Fullscreen?

Both options are available in the game but I'm asking you which one would you prefer as default.

Please, assume mouse is either not applicable or handled properly in windowed (for instance, properly locked and not visible if gameplay requires it, like in first person).

Moderator moved this topic to Get Feedback
(2 edits)

Nice, the move for some reason made this post done 2hr ago go to the second page... just posting here so at least it bumps...

I am comfortable playing with either. In games that have both I regularly switch between first and third person. As for windowed / fullscreen I prefer fullscreen if it will be a lengthy gaming session otherwise it is too much of a commitment.

Makes sense, thanks for the feedback!

(+2)

To play, normally, fullscreen.

But by default, the first time it is launched in windowed mode.

Many games have weird resolutions or sometimes don't work right at first, if you force the first run in full screen mode and something doesn't go as it should, then it's a problem to exit the game.

A good and easy option menu. And if you can toggle it with alt-enter.


About first or third person, it depends a lot on the type of game and control.

For example, if it will be a doom type, that is, you aim and shoot, first person is better because the character takes away your vision area.

If it will be focused on melee combat or if it will have platform components, that is, it will interact a lot with the environment, better third view.

This is obviously my personal opinion, the best thing, if you can, is to implement both modes and for each player to select the one that is most comfortable for them. But the rule will be to avoid things that are uncomfortable for the majority, for example, many people complain about the platform in first person, because it is not intuitive.

Gameplay may resemble Fallout or Skyrim, as they allow for both, that's why I asked about 1st or 3rd person.

As for the fullscreen, right now if the OS does not allow fullscreen to be on, the engine automatically switches to windowed, alternatively I also detect the following: if the player at first time executing the game, just forces quit, next time it will switch to windowed.

But your idea about the Alt+Enter is very good! I remember doing that since windows XP, I will provide this shortcut as an option as well.

Thanks!

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No, I don't mean that the OS allows fullscreen with the resolution of the game.

For example the game is 16:9, my desktop is 16:10. The game does NOT fit on my desktop, the game will force a resolution change.

The hardware is compatible, the game runs smoothly, but in the process, it messes up my desktop.

For this reason, I prefer that the game is launched in windowed mode and allows me to access the configuration parameters before going to fullscreen mode.

About "skyrim", melee combat, 3th person. Aim with the bow, first person. That's how I play it.

Yes, that's why I'm considering 1st person by default.

And yes, the game resolution will change the desktop resolution if you go fullscreen (if desktop is not same res. as the game).

The game is quite pixel bound, this means that the higher your desktop resolution the heavier the game gets, that's why I force a resolution change to keep performance consistent and measurable. 

However, the aspect ratio is a very good point. I can actually change the game's aspect ratio to match the desktops, and resize the engine's internal buffer to a smaller version of the desktop size, so once swapping buffers they will be stretched back to the original size, this will not change the desktop resolution and also keep the performance consistent. I will have a quality setting for that feature, so user can decide.

Thanks a lot for the feedback!

So, here's what I'm planning to do with the fullscreen: It never changes your desktop resolution.

What it changes once it goes to fullscreen is the internal game resolution percentage. which is literally a value between 10% to 100% your desktop resolution. The default value is the percentage that is closer to the game's native resolution which is 720p by default. You can also change the games internal resolution in a separated menu.

Moderator(+1)

I always play in a window on my main computer, cause I do many other things all the time. And I always preferred 1st-person, it makes me feel like being right there.

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I see, do you often have to switch at the first time playing the game? Or most of the games you play are already windowed by default.

I feel the same for the 1st person.

Moderator(+2)

If a game starts in full screen by default, it's an instant close and uninstall for me.

(1 edit)

I see, noted! 

So for when you're playing a 1st person and you want to switch windows, you just press Alt+Tab and expects the game to automatically pause, right?

Alternatively you can pause the game yourself and click away, but that would take 2 steps, so I assume Alt+Tab will be quite important.

Moderator(+1)

Auto-pause on Alt-Tab is nice to have, but not a deal-breaker for me.

I usually play every game in full screen

I see, do you often switch to fullscreen in the option menu? Or is the game a no-go if it starts windowed?

If it starts windowed, I may play some time with It like that and if I like it, I will take the time to go to the options menu. But I really don't mind in which mode it starts.

I run almost all of my programs either full-screen or maximized.  Games, web browsers, file browser, command prompt, even my music player.  I can only focus my attention on one program at a time anyway, so why waste screen space for something I am not using right that second?

Do you usually have to change to fullscreen in games you play (for instance going to the option menu anc changing it)? Or is that a no go for you?

(+1)

I don't mind having to switch to full-screen, but I prefer a single keypress ('f' and 'alt-enter' are both commonly used) to having to navigate a menu.

Borderless windowed fullscreen.

The only reason to go old school fullscreen is demanding 3d graphics, and even those games run in borderless fullscreen nowadays.  It is just not necessary nor nice for  multitasking operating system to have exclusive Fullscreen by switching resolution.

Some engines like old renpy screw up on Desktop zoom. Resizing the window works fine, but if you use the fullscreen option,   it incorrectly zooms by 150% or whatever your Desktop zoom is.

3rd or 1st person depends on a lot of factors. If done right, both work. iirc skyrim would just scroll the view in till first and out till third. But other 3rd have the character walking more to the left side .

That's a good point, I'm taking care as well. In fullscreen, my engine does not change the desktop resolution it will resize its internal buffer to match the computer's desktop resolution (preserving the aspect ratio not to lose proportions).

You could also just use a launcher.

Yes I'm considering  having a lancher just before the game starts only for the first time you execute it though, otherwise it may be annoying.

Windowed makes the most sense, especially initially because it leaves the taskbar available, but if the game is engaging then I do like to switch to Fullscreen. 

If your game is in the style of Skyrim or Fallout then First Person would be my preference for default view.

Yes it's seems quite settled that windowed may be the default because of that.

Full screened for me. However, if the game automatically upscales to close to full screen, I'll go with that. I did a game jam, where I failed to make it automatically upscale, so the big complaint was "can't read settings in tiny window, to find full screen, 1 star."

Yeah, that's the solution I'm thinking about, so far games that I had developed in the past, in fullscreen, changed the desktop resolution  to match the game. But, the other way around seems to be the best solution.

However, I simply cannot allow the game to just upscale, because it may get heavier the higher your desktop resolution is, for instance, if you have a potato GPU but a 4k monitor, the game will run like crap, so the solution I have is to run the game in a smaller res and just upscale at the end after all rendering is done.

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With full screen, I see a lot of Steam discussion about "game is just a black screen" because their monitor can't handle full screen. So I don't recommend starting in full screen. Not only that, but using cloud to keep a full screen setting, might not be good, because people get new computers that might not work well with full screen.

If you do upscale, I highly recommend increments of 50%. Keeps it from looking awful, or stretched.

That's a good point, aspect ratio is not a problem, but when scaling up I will provide a option for how you want me to scale it up: 

"Nearest" will just stretch without filtering, it may result clearer image in best case and in pixelated results in worst case scenario

"Linear" will do a linear interpolation when scaling, it may result in smoother imager in best case and it blurrier in worst case scenario