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TheEndOfUs

Carmack: "Doom 4 will have 30 demons crawling all over you on there"

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PRIMEVAL said:

I don't see how 30 is a slideshow. That's Youtube's highest limit for frame rates. Basically what you see on TV, no?


Even disregarding the whole movie vs game argument, I tend to think we accept 24-30 FPS on videos because we're used to it rather than because our eyes can't see an improvement.

Have you ever watched a video at 60 FPS or above? Test audiences say it feels unreal or eerie (and as far as I know this is why we don't get that stuff), to me it feels incredibly real and immersive.

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PRIMEVAL said:

I don't see how 30 is a slideshow. That's Youtube's highest limit for frame rates. Basically what you see on TV, no?


You are correct; most all television programming is shot at 30 frames per second, while most all movies are shot at 24. Because 24 is the "magic number" I mentioned earlier, movies tend to look more authentic, while there is a unexplainable cheapness to seeing 30 frames per second, possibly because it inevitably reminds us of television programming, which obviously is more cheaply produced than full length movies. In the video game world, I suspect that having 60 frames per second would make aiming or general interaction more precise for gamers, which is probably why 24 or 30 would seem too choppy.

Sodaholic commented that "Ever pause a youtube video? Look at the game footage in one of AVGN's videos, every frame is actually 2 combined, turning 60 into 30, not noticeable when in motion." I'd like to add that he is talking about interlaced video, in which a video moving at 30 frames per second is divided into two frames, one that contains the even vertical lines and one that contains the odd vertical lines. It's known as 60i video. If you are watching progressive or "deinterlaced" video, in which all scan lines are represented per frame, it's known as 30p video.

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Isn't 48Hz the maximum perceived frequency, above which things start to look continuous for a human? In this context: doesn't it mean that anything above 48fps will look the same to the human eye, be it 60 or 600fps?

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printz said:

Isn't 48Hz the maximum perceived frequency, above which things start to look continuous for a human? In this context: doesn't it mean that anything above 48fps will look the same to the human eye, be it 60 or 600fps?


Not really. Human eyes aren't mechanical devices. You can draw an arbitrary line and say "beyond that it's smooth enough, below that it isn't" but you'll always find exceptions. First, not all people have the same vision; some have a finer eyesight than others. Secondly, the brightness level matters: if the light goes out for 1/60 of second in a brightly-lit room, you will probably not notice it. But if there's a flash of light for 1/60 of second in a completely dark room, you will certainly notice it!

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printz said:

Isn't 48Hz the maximum perceived frequency, above which things start to look continuous for a human? In this context: doesn't it mean that anything above 48fps will look the same to the human eye, be it 60 or 600fps?


Hell no. Have you ever tried looking at a CRT monitor in a high res at 60Hz? It's awful. Then crank it up to 85hz or so and tell me you can't percieve a difference.

That video that DRM linked is a really good showcase of the difference in a game. Just the first demonstration of the moving ball should be enough. Imagine trying to aim at that ball while it was jittering about like that.

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Then I hope 30fps is not far less than 35fps, so that if I'm used to vanilla Doom and Eternity, I'll be used for Doom 4.

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Gez said:

Not really. Human eyes aren't mechanical devices. You can draw an arbitrary line and say "beyond that it's smooth enough, below that it isn't" but you'll always find exceptions. First, not all people have the same vision; some have a finer eyesight than others. Secondly, the brightness level matters: if the light goes out for 1/60 of second in a brightly-lit room, you will probably not notice it. But if there's a flash of light for 1/60 of second in a completely dark room, you will certainly notice it!

Yeah, that's because light remains burned on the retina for a longer time, enough to be seen for even short flashes. And likely for this very reason, periodic flashes above a certain frequency will be perceived continuously (I think the hue and the brightness influence the critical refresh rate). And I'm trying to make an analogy with computer video fps here. Anyway, it's moot, because Id already said Doom 4 will be 30, less than 48Hz. On the other hand, I swear I couldn't see any difference between the hundreds Hz of a regular Doom 3 game (or GZDoom), and the forced 60 Hz of a Fraps-recorded Doom 3 (GZDoom) game. Or was the Doom 3 game (or GZDoom) designed to always cap at 60Hz?

And here's the thing on Doom 4's incoming limitation: if a shooter game asks me to hit a target moving as fast as that ball in DRM's posted video, it better be a rare or weak enough occurrence, or let me use area damage weapons (such as spread guns). Doom has the shotgun, which is pretty good for bouncy turbo monsters, no matter how jittery they are.

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printz said:

On the other hand, I swear I couldn't see any difference between the hundreds Hz of a regular Doom 3 game (or GZDoom), and the forced 60 Hz of a Fraps-recorded Doom 3 (GZDoom) game. Or was the Doom 3 game (or GZDoom) designed to always cap at 60Hz?


Do you get hundreds Hz if you set vsync on?

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I would imagine that higher frame rates beyond what your brain can process would still look smoother, because your brain would receive multiple frames at a time to interpret. Maybe I'm not thinking of it correctly though :/

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printz said:

On the other hand, I swear I couldn't see any difference between the hundreds Hz of a regular Doom 3 game (or GZDoom), and the forced 60 Hz of a Fraps-recorded Doom 3 (GZDoom) game. Or was the Doom 3 game (or GZDoom) designed to always cap at 60Hz?


Doom 3 caps at 60fps unless you turn the limiter off in the console. Dunno about gzdoom.

Everyone needs to bear in mind that Carmack said Doom 4 would be limited to 30fps on consoles. And only in the SP. He said nothing about frame limits on PC. I really heavily doubt someone like John Carmack would ever impose a 30fps limit on a PC game. There wouldn't be any gain in doing so.

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I finally checked out that video, and wow, what a difference. I can't help but wonder if a modern game would look acceptable if it ran at 24fps, BUT had realistic motion blur applied.

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As someone with midrange hardware from about 3 years ago who occasionally tries out games too advanced for his hardware, 24 FPS on a game, motion blur or not, is... playable. Watchable. Certainly not ideal, and depending on the game and engine it may cause input latency or a similar sort of input problem, but isn't -that- terrible. Unless you play everything at 60+ and think 30 is a slideshow or something ridiculous like that.

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Enjay said:

Not really, no. I have no particular anticipation for Doom4. The thought of the game neither excites me nor turns me off. That being said, I don't expect it to be particularly good and I will wait until it hits the shelves before I think about whether to buy it or not.

Basically, I don't have much faith in id any more and I see them as a company that produce an occasional mediocre game every few years or so. I think that those games get attention as much because of the company's now no-longer-accurate reputation as a fiery and innovative cutting edge game producer rather than based on what they have been doing in recent years. In fact, id really haven't done anything that impressed me this century.


as opposed to half life2? man, i havent engaged in one of those controversies in years. The last time i was really excited was when all the media pumping d3 vs hl2 vs u3 vs fc. Nothings really great happening in the fps industry in the past few years imo, black ops is just simply too trite for my taste

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AirRaid said:

Hell no. Have you ever tried looking at a CRT monitor in a high res at 60Hz? It's awful. Then crank it up to 85hz or so and tell me you can't percieve a difference.


Dis. I have a 20" CRT monitor running 1280x1024 @ 60Hz and it is very easy to tell the difference between say 30FPS and even 50FPS. That is one of the reasons I'm setting money aside to buy a new LCD monitor.

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GoatLord said:30 frames per second is a SLIDESHOW to you? Maybe it's because I'm a video production geek, but movies run at 24 frames per second...

as a "video production geek" you should know something about motion blur. look it up

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GoatLord said:

I finally checked out that video, and wow, what a difference. I can't help but wonder if a modern game would look acceptable if it ran at 24fps, BUT had realistic motion blur applied.

woops, disregard my last post ;)

yeah, it comes down whether or not motion blur at lower frame rate is more practical then no blur at higher rate

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Phml said:

Have you ever watched a video at 60 FPS or above? Test audiences say it feels unreal or eerie (and as far as I know this is why we don't get that stuff), to me it feels incredibly real and immersive.


I'd very much like to try it out. Where can I find such a video and what do I play it with?

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60 fps video isn't bad at all. I see it all the time previewing raw footage from my camera in 1080i mode. Interlacing aside, it's very smooth and nice to see (provided there's enough light for the camera to capture well and fast enough; it handles darker areas poorly), though it does make the fact that my hands are as steady as a paper bridge in a windstorm when it comes to holding anything steady in the air much more apparent than the old film standards. And really, it feels more like *gasp* natural human eyesight.

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Face23785 said:

I'd very much like to try it out. Where can I find such a video and what do I play it with?


A similar effect can be achieved if you go to a consumer electronics store and check out their 120 and 240 hertz TVs. The refresh rate is so high that even video shot at 24 frames per second will appear to be unnaturally smooth. Watch something like a CG movie and it'll look like a highly detailed video game. I think it's distracting, personally, but like everyone else I grew up watching standard refresh rates.

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Xeros612 said:

60 fps video isn't bad at all. I see it all the time previewing raw footage from my camera in 1080i mode. Interlacing aside, it's very smooth and nice to see (provided there's enough light for the camera to capture well and fast enough; it handles darker areas poorly), though it does make the fact that my hands are as steady as a paper bridge in a windstorm when it comes to holding anything steady in the air much more apparent than the old film standards. And really, it feels more like *gasp* natural human eyesight.


My camera can shoot in a special 60fps mode that is progressive. It looks...weird. I don't think it feels more like "natural human eyesight" because our vision has lots of motion blur, which would imply an overall lower "framerate" for our eyes. Certainly not 60.

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I still don't think 30 will please people. 100 maybe...

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I've always found 40fps to be the perfect fps untill above that just means nothing. I'm happy to play games when they hit 30-40 fps. Anything above doesn't make a difference and anything below makes a huge annoyance

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I've always found 40fps to be the perfect fps untill above that just means nothing. I'm happy to play games when they hit 30-40 fps. Anything above doesn't make a difference and anything below makes a huge annoyance

The difference between 40 fps and 60 fps is slight in terms of smoothness of picture (I can tell myself, but that's beside the point). The big difference is that most monitors update 60 times per second, whether or not your video card hits that mark. If your game is running at 40 FPS, video memory will update before the monitor finishes refreshing and you will get visible horizontal "tears" along the screen, as the monitor essentially splices two different pictures together.

This artifact is most apparent when there is a dramatic change in picture; for example, running through flashing lights or making quick camera movements will make the problem more obvious. This doesn't bother some people... but it really bothers me, and if it bothers you, you can fix it easily by turning on "Vertical Sync" if it's available in your options menu. This will lock the game's framerate to a fraction of 60 fps, thus keeping video memory and your monitor synchronized and preventing vertical tearing.

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Let's not do the "What FPS is okay for games?" argument again.

It's largely subjective anyway, but out of anyone in the industry, I trust Carmack to do what's right with regards to that stuff.

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