[EricF]

For the foreseeable future, I tend to believe that Open Rails will continue to make do with a lot of 2D cabs designed for 4:3 monitor resolution ratios. The recent improvements in the experimental versions is a huge improvement to how OR handles 2D cabs on 16:9 and 16:10 screens, but now there's another trend in monitors to be dealt with -- ultra-wide monitors at approximately 21:9. OR still works fine on an ultra-wide monitor, but it leaves the viewing area visually cramped in the vertical dimension, generally needing more panning up and down to view gauges and controls and then look out to the track ahead. It tends to create the impression of leaning up close to the cab windows and controls.

The simple solution is just to run at a different resolution/aspect ratio; for instance on a 3440 x 11440 monitor, setting resolution to 2560 x 1440 gives a 16:9 view, still at "native" pixel density by carving out a view in the monitor with black bars on each side, or "pillarbox" view. Unfortunately, OR doesn't have any means to run at a user-specified resolution in fullscreen mode -- it's locked to the Windows desktop resolution. To change the fullscreen resolution of OR, you must first change the Windows desktop resolution and then launch OR. Modern games generally have a user-specified resolution option which will cause the game to run at a chosen resolution in fullscreen mode, switching away from whatever resolution the Windows desktop is set for, and upon exiting the desktop resolution is re-established. Is this something that could be implemented in the video options for Open Rails?

I ask because I suspect that ultra-wide monitors will eventually become more and more common as time goes on. Consider, MSTS was designed around 4:3 CRTs and survived into the realm of 16:10 and then 16:9 LCD flat panel displays. Open Rails came into being with the idea that everything would move to 16:10 or 16:9, but now we've got even wider monitors to contend with. 21:9 can be very practical for productivity and for many games, but most cab views in trainsim content weren't designed with so much horizontal FOV, but limited vertical area in mind. As users adopt wider monitors -- either by choice or due to market forces and availability, it seems like having a more conventional and elegant solution to configure OR to run in a narrower aspect ratio in fullscreen would be worthwhile.

Would this be a good item to post to the Trello board? Ideas? Suggestions?

[thegrindre]

http://www.elvastower.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/I-Agree.gif All games I have give me a choice as to what screen res I want to use. I'd like to see ORTS offer the same.

http://www.elvastower.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/oldstry.gif

[James Ross]

EricF, on 08 September 2017 - 05:16 PM, said:

Would this be a good item to post to the Trello board? Ideas? Suggestions?

I've updated the roadmap card to reflect what we can actually do; in particular:

Quote

Note: As the game does not use exclusive mode rendering by default, this will not take advantage of the monitor's scaling or pillar-boxing. However, the game would deal with the scaling and pillar-boxing itself.

In light of this, I would suggest that perhaps what you want instead of a full-screen resolution control is simply a full-screen aspect-ratio control?

[EricF]

Aspect ratio control would indeed perform the same effect to allow users to select their preferred view, based on what looks best for the cab in use. Future-proofing is a good thing! http://www.elvastower.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/thumbup3.gif