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Now my question is: If the FOV were something that the majority of widescreen users found appropriate (not changed to, but had originally been). BUT the 4:3 version still maintained the same FOV using added horizontal space instead of letterboxing, would we still be having this argument?
Yes, we would. It might not be quite as big an issue, but there's still a problem - explained in my next comment.
I basically want to know is: Do the members of this forum feel that Widescreen HAS to have a wider FOV for games than 4:3 in every case? And if so, why?
If the FOV isn't wider, it's not just a matter of there being less environment visible, it also changes the perceived perspective. As you may have noticed the vert- implementation has the effect of making widescreen looked zoomed-in in comparison to the 4:3. With a hor+ implementation 4:3 and widescreen look the exact same in terms of perspective/zoom, there's just a little extra visible environement on the sides in widescreen. The thing is that perspective/zoom has a much greater effect on the experience than how much of the environment you can see. To keep the game experience as consistent as possible you should keep the perspective/zoom the same for all aspect ratios and simply vary how much horizontal space is visible, to do that as the aspect gets wider, the FOV must get wider along with it.
If you wish to know my personal opinion it is that the developers, much like a movie director, are entitled to their creative vision and if they say they intended the fov to be this way I will take them at their word and enjoy the game as they delivered it. (However I am curious to try the fov hack after I complete the game and see how the experience differs for better or worse)
Yes it is their choice, but all art has standards by which it's judged. Say for example that you couldn't save your game, and they claimed that the lack of saves was a creative choice because they want you to play through the game in one sitting. Would you accept this, would you not criticize them for not having save capability like every other game on the market?
Many other video game developers have implemented hor+ widescreen, largely considered to be the correct, or at the very least, superior widescreen implementation because of the perspective/zoom issue as described above. Why should we not hold Bioshock to the same standards established by other games? So while it may have been their choice, it doesn't mean that it was the best one, or that we have to like it.
One of the great things about games is that criticism such as this can be much more easily addressed than other artistic mediums. Heck Racer_S did it in less than 48 hours and he wasn't even involved the game's development. So, we might seem spoiled for asking them to match a technical standard set by other games, but in the end we're really not asking for that much.
Thanks, that is honestly the first reasonable argument I've heard on this forum that didn't feel like a case of entitlement to me.
Now, sadly I am not a game designer (as much as I want to be) But I do want to make one last point about whether or not it's "simple" to make the fix. What about game balance? If the game was developed and play tested with the current settings, does a wider fov potentially make the game easier?
It's funny that you mention the idea of no saves, the first time I saw the vita-chamber in the demo I actually thought they had made that decision, to not allow saves, just reset you from the last vita chamber :P.
I think in the end, like you said Art is open to critique. You guys are certainantly allowed to not like the artistic decision and other people are entitled to agree with the artistic decision. I think it's a very interesting thing for future developers to consider, how do we manage to satisfy both 4:3 and 16:9 users when in the end we want them to both have the same experience.
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