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FBL 1.4 pixel perfect ini discussion


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Phil? Any words?

 

Probably in a few weeks. I'm taking a break from this right now because I feel like I'm getting a cold - which makes me more cantankerous and impatient than usual. :lol:

 

 

...cantankerous...

 

Never heard such word in my whole life.

One more added to my vocabulary.

=)

 

Hope you get better soon!

We need to make that XTV skin works together.

 

Regards,

Z.

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A quick question. How have you guys managed to achieve a 'pixel perfect' vertical size for rotated games? Surely it would require you to stretch the screen way beyond the top and bottom borders of your TV to get an image with no distortions.

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Ok guys, here's the thing; changes need to be made to the default screen sizes. The dimensions for vertical games are just plain wrong, no games look as they should. Also there are many games for which the scanline filter is not working correctly (not just rotated games). People shouldn't have to be manually tweaking their screens to get this stuff right, it should be right by default.

 

The thing is that different hardware uses different resolutions, as you know. So in order to get the scanlines uniform on as many games as possible my plan is to take advantage of the fact that FBL uses multiple cores. For example; Cave games run in a slightly different vertical resolution to Psikyo games so the Cave core and the Psikyo core will use different base values to keep the scanlines uniform and to appear more faithful to the original display.

 

The only problem with this (and I stress that it is the only problem) is that it's going to drop a nuclear bomb on some of the 'pixel perfect' ini files you've been working on since the changes will need to be made to base values upon which your values are applied. I've been trying to think of a way to do this that will cause as little disruption to your project as possible, but I'm struggling. All I can think to do is provide you with details about exactly which values I've changed, for which games, and by how much. For the most part I think it should be a fairly simple case of running a find and replace script through your inis to correct them. In any case I won't do anything just yet until I've had some feedback from you.

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Ok guys, here's the thing; changes need to be made to the default screen sizes. The dimensions for vertical games are just plain wrong, no games look as they should. Also there are many games for which the scanline filter is not working correctly (not just rotated games). People shouldn't have to be manually tweaking their screens to get this stuff right, it should be right by default.

 

Hej +T+!

 

Yes, this is the great crusade of Pixel Perfect. If the player uses bilinear and other linear modes, with scanlines turned off, there will be no problems in the screen at all, beside the (at least for me) horrible blur. But at the moment when the player start using scanlines, if the screen is not in correct size/pixel aspect ratio, the scanlines will be broken. And to start the game with scanlines ALREADY set up and perfect, you will need to start the game in pixel perfect. This is our quest... adding the correct dimensions to each INI.

 

For the vertical games, we can find easily the correct width (it's the height, but since the image is rotated, I call width). So, the scanlines get pretty correct, although they are in vertical orientation. BUT, for the height of the rotated image (width as in the original) things get a bit rude. Since most of the games become toooo tall for the TV screen, we choose for:

 

--- A super perfect pixel perfect, where A LOT OF IMAGE get cropped (overscan) both top and bottom, or

--- A partial pixel perfect, where you can shrink the image (yes I know, it gets a bit fat and flat) and have less overscan.

 

When you search for the pixel perfect, there are at least three instances where you can reach the "correct" point. You can get a very wide pixel perfect (wider pixels), a correct exact size pixel perfect (square pixels), and a very narrow pixel (narrow width pixels) perfect. It could sound confusing, but its is simple. You just need to play with the adjustments until the "waves in the image" disappear.

 

The thing is that different hardware uses different resolutions, as you know. So in order to get the scanlines uniform on as many games as possible my plan is to take advantage of the fact that FBL uses multiple cores. For example; Cave games run in a slightly different vertical resolution to Psikyo games so the Cave core and the Psikyo core will use different base values to keep the scanlines uniform and to appear more faithful to the original display.

 

Yes, this should do the trick for most of the systems presented in FBL rom list. CPS1 and CPS2 have all the very same width x height, except for Mercs and another one that is rotated, if I remember well.

 

Cave has its size, Psyko has it too...

 

But thing gets problematic in NeoGeo, since the "official" documentation out there in sites and forums preach NeoGeo as 320x224 screen size games, however there are many titles that are 304x224, verified and tested by me and few other comrades.

 

So, there are some different variables to take care off...

It couls be wonderful to be able to open a game ALREADY in pixel perfect, right from a clean install... just like CoinOPS, but I think this could be a devilish job.

 

In CoinOPS/MAME, if you check the game info while INSIDE the game (in game menu), it shows several data, like the screen size, refresh rate, rom name, etc etc. Maybe the game screen size is registered somewhere within the rom? Maybe it is possible to interpret this value and convert it the FBL screen size settings when opening the game?

 

 

The only problem with this (and I stress that it is the only problem) is that it's going to drop a nuclear bomb on some of the 'pixel perfect' ini files you've been working on since the changes will need to be made to base values upon which your values are applied. I've been trying to think of a way to do this that will cause as little disruption to your project as possible, but I'm struggling. All I can think to do is provide you with details about exactly which values I've changed, for which games, and by how much. For the most part I think it should be a fairly simple case of running a find and replace script through your inis to correct them. In any case I won't do anything just yet until I've had some feedback from you.

 

If you say me that this idea will not interfere or destroy the current INIs I am already using, this will be no problem at all. If you apply this new system, will my actual INIs (already set in pixel perfect and scanlines goold as gold) keep working normally?

 

By the way, I am sending you a PM with *all* my inis.

Please try some different vertical games to see how me and PhilExile use to play.

 

I bet you will dislike our settings for vertical games (with cropped data out of the screen) but I personally prefere to play this way instead of playing the image blurry and shrink-ed on a very small screen.

 

Please test:

- Battle Garegga

- Donpachi

- PacMan

- GunSmoke

- Vigilante

- Twin Hawk

 

Regards,

C.

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Hej +T+ and other guys,

 

For those who want to try my pixel perfect setup

you can download this pack:

 

http://fancyxbox.info/xtras/fbl/fbl_720p_pixel_perfect.zip

 

Please have in mind:

--- This is for 720p

--- This is NOT a complete set. It has MANY, when I say MANY I mean A LOT of games adjusted, but some will be missing the pixel perfect settings. All INIs where created using scripts and batch works, so, we can also have few games in wrong settings.

--- My TV for sure is different from yours, so, the image could be displaced a bit to the sides or to the top or bottom... But the pixel perfect size is intact! You will just need to move the image around X and Y axis (if needed, of course!)

 

Regards,

C. C. Cospe.

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