Random Gaming Thoughts

[Sarge]

Sub-10s do exist, though! Some of the older Bravias like I have are there, which is why I'm not as concerned with this one being absolutely the lowest. Between it, and my big CRT, I should be covered for retro gaming.

[Xeogred]

We need OLED's to take off more. Those look amazing. There is no denying that LCD/LED's are never going to have blacks of the quality of CRT's, but those OLED's definitely look impressive from what I've seen.

Are Hz pretty important thesedays? I think both my 40" and 50" are 120Hz. It was weird showing one of my friends Doom on the PS4 and the game had screen tearing everywhere, I know his TV is a few years older though so maybe it's only 60Hz. I never had any tearing when I played it at my place. I'm just assuming the refresh rate has something to do with the framerates... no idea though. lol

[Sarge]

For gaming, it's not a big deal. Most console games don't support 120Hz anyway. It is important for 24p film content, because you get rid of the judder. (24*5=120, even multiple, as opposed to 60Hz. It's called 3:2 pulldown, if memory serves.)

[isiolia]

Are Hz pretty important thesedays? I think both my 40" and 50" are 120Hz. It was weird showing one of my friends Doom on the PS4 and the game had screen tearing everywhere, I know his TV is a few years older though so maybe it's only 60Hz. I never had any tearing when I played it at my place. I'm just assuming the refresh rate has something to do with the framerates... no idea though. lol

In general, screen tearing is from a mismatch of frame rate and refresh rate. You're seeing parts of multiple frames displayed as one. It'll crop up to some extent for any setup that isn't using some form of VSYNC, though that has the downside of introducing input lag.

On the PC side of things, high refresh rate displays can be very important. Hardware can actually push higher than 60fps on a regular basis, and there are more advanced sync options available. Freesync and GSync on the high end, which involve extra hardware in the monitor to ensure refreshing only on whole frames, without needing to cap anything.

With consoles, I'm not sure refresh rates higher than 60Hz are really utilized. Most games there can't even lock down 60FPS, and wind up synced to 30fps or whatever.

From what I can see, PS4 DOOM had a tearing problem that was fixed in a day 1 patch. Maybe when playing the game at your friend's house that didn't get applied?


Like Sarge said though, for film sources, you do want a refresh rate that 24 multiplies evenly into (and the feature set to display film that way). So it's worth getting for that.

[Xeogred]

Thanks for the info. Thought yeah you could be right about the patch, I don't think we patched it when checking it out.

Guess that all explains why some of my friends are talking up 144Hz monitors lately. I could do for a new one myself, but I PC game on my TV too so it's definitely not a priority.

[noiseredux]

did any of y'all grab that new Pokemon fangame before it was taken down? It looked good to me but I didn't get a chance to get it.

[Xeogred]

Has anyone here played Odallus: The Dark Call? It looks incredible. It's 70% off right now on Steam, $4.49.

[Forlorn Drifter]

did any of y'all grab that new Pokemon fangame before it was taken down? It looked good to me but I didn't get a chance to get it.

I did not, but I've heard some good things. You can still find it, but YMWV on safety of downloads.

Found a copy of Vanquish in the wild today for $1.50. A guy was going into the same Gamestop as me to sell it, and I asked about it. He said he'd give it to me for that price because "That's about what I will get anyway."

Also picked up a copy of LA Noire: Complete edition while I was there.

Other thought: I don't know if its just where I live, but it seems like there's been a large increase in the number of women I've seen working at game stores. Nothing more really to say, it just popped into my head as I realized every employee at the Gamestop today was a woman.

[Sarge]

Yes indeedy. Let's see if I can dredge up my commentary about it...

From Talking Time:

The other is Odallus. I'd had my eye on it for a while, and just wanted to snag it when it went on sale. Well, GOG dropped it to $10, and I bit. It's a lot of fun, actually, with some very Metroid-meets-Dracula X sort of play. Most of the action is pretty decent, although much like the dev's other title, Oniken, I could never shake the feeling that something wasn't quite right with the controls. Nothing that made anything unbearable, it just didn't feel as polished as I'd like. Might be an artifact of using Multimedia Fusion 2.

The game looks like a cross between a TG-16 and NES game. There's some really slick parallax effects, and some splendid spritework. The soundtrack's pretty decent, too. I think I spent a bit over six hours to beat it (100%), and it was certainly worth what I paid for it.

[Xeogred]

Nice. I think it'll definitely scratch that Metroid/Castlevania itch for me then. Buying time on smaller games before Deus Ex Mankind Divided drops haha.