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    Please do not post a support request without first reading and following the advice in https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/3/read-this-first

    Original Resolution / Aspect for each game

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    • dankcushionsD
      dankcushions Global Moderator
      last edited by dankcushions

      @caver01 so basically what your saying is that for pretty much everything the best way to play it and it look the way it did on tvs back in the day, is to set everything to 4:3 for horizontal games. And adjust for vertical games? I have all my consoles set to 4:3 and they honestly look great to me. I’ve been wondering what I would do for arcade because I would rather set all games to 4:3 and use a universal overlay if they will look right that way.

      not at all. all emulators run the correct aspect ratios by default. there are a handful of emulators that do not because of bugs, but they generally don't need to be used.

      i'm not sure why there's so much talk of changing configs in this thread. aspect ratios are correct by default. if you want to start messing with custom scaling, then you're giving yourself a problem to solve, because not all games had 'square' pixels.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
      • R
        rsn8887
        last edited by rsn8887

        Yes, in principle "core provided" should work and give 4:3/3:4 for almost all games. And it should give the correct non-4:3 aspect ratios for games such as Ninja Warriors arcade.

        But quite often it just doesn't work. I think these are just longstanding bugs.

        For example, in Sonic the Hedgehog, using the default Retro Pie settings, the screen is stretched to some kind of non-4:3 ratio. To fix this, I had to change the setting in the "emulator config" menu to force 4:3 for the Genesis emulator. How can such a popular game already cause this to fail?

        The "core provided" setting also fails with many vertically oriented games and many multi-screen games. It also gives the wrong aspect ratio when using the advanced "screen rotation" option, e.g. it does not switch from 4:3 to 3:4 when rotating a 4:3 game by 90 degrees.

        Once those remaining bugs are all fixed, nobody should have to manually change aspect ratios anymore. But in the meantime, a little fiddling with the "emulator config" menu is required, on a per-emulator basis. Alternatively, the correct settings could be made default to spare users from having to mess with this stuff.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • dankcushionsD
          dankcushions Global Moderator
          last edited by

          @rsn8887 said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

          Yes, in principle "core provided" should work and give 4:3/3:4 for almost all games. And it should give the correct non-4:3 aspect ratios for games such as Ninja Warriors arcade.

          But quite often it just doesn't work. I think these are just longstanding bugs.

          For example, in Sonic the Hedgehog, using the default Retro Pie settings, the screen is stretched to some kind of non-4:3 ratio. To fix this, I had to change the setting in the "emulator config" menu to force 4:3 for the Genesis emulator. How can such a popular game already cause this to fail?

          what emulator? "core provided" leaves the aspect ratio calculation up to the emulator, which is almost always what you want to do. i suspect something else is going on here with your config. can you show an example?

          The "core provided" setting also fails with many vertically oriented games and many multi-screen games. It also gives the wrong aspect ratio when using the advanced "screen rotation" option, e.g. it does not switch from 4:3 to 3:4 when rotating a 4:3 game by 90 degrees.

          only if the emulator hasn't been fully coded to account for this. lr-mame2003 and lr-fbalpha for example have no problems here, and are generally the ones that you should be using.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • retrocrazeR
            retrocraze
            last edited by

            Some good info here guys.

            So do you think I should set it to core provided to get the correct Aspect ratio for arcade games?
            Also, is there a way to shrink the image to smaller version in centre of my HD TV?

            dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • dankcushionsD
              dankcushions Global Moderator @retrocraze
              last edited by

              @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

              So do you think I should set it to core provided to get the correct Aspect ratio for arcade games?

              like i said, it depends what emulator you're using. lr-mame2003 and lr-fbalpha will use the correct aspect ratio when set to 'core provided'. lr-mame2010 has problems i believe.

              retrocrazeR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
              • retrocrazeR
                retrocraze @dankcushions
                last edited by

                @dankcushions said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                So do you think I should set it to core provided to get the correct Aspect ratio for arcade games?

                like i said, it depends what emulator you're using. lr-mame2003 and lr-fbalpha will use the correct aspect ratio when set to 'core provided'. lr-mame2010 has problems i believe.

                Im not even sure what emulator its using. I think its lr-mame2003.

                I will try these settings later tonight:

                Aspect Ratio: Core Provided
                Integer Scale: On

                Custom Aspect Ratio 4x

                If I set these do I have to make sure that any settings in retroarch.cfg are defaulted as well?

                ie... I have aspect ratio set to unset i think.

                I tried tinkering a little with the configuration editor but not sure what difference it made.

                dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                • dankcushionsD
                  dankcushions Global Moderator @retrocraze
                  last edited by

                  @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                  @dankcushions said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                  @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                  So do you think I should set it to core provided to get the correct Aspect ratio for arcade games?

                  like i said, it depends what emulator you're using. lr-mame2003 and lr-fbalpha will use the correct aspect ratio when set to 'core provided'. lr-mame2010 has problems i believe.

                  Im not even sure what emulator its using. I think its lr-mame2003.

                  I will try these settings later tonight:

                  Aspect Ratio: Core Provided

                  yes

                  Integer Scale: On

                  this will scale via integer values - this will not neccesarily give the correct aspect ratio. this is not the default

                  Custom Aspect Ratio 4x

                  same as above. this is not the default.

                  If I set these do I have to make sure that any settings in retroarch.cfg are defaulted as well?

                  ie... I have aspect ratio set to unset i think.

                  I tried tinkering a little with the configuration editor but not sure what difference it made.

                  like i said, the defaults are correct. if you've changed a bunch of stuff then it's difficult to say what you need to do to get back to 'normal'.

                  retrocrazeR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                  • retrocrazeR
                    retrocraze @dankcushions
                    last edited by

                    @dankcushions said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                    @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                    @dankcushions said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                    @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                    So do you think I should set it to core provided to get the correct Aspect ratio for arcade games?

                    like i said, it depends what emulator you're using. lr-mame2003 and lr-fbalpha will use the correct aspect ratio when set to 'core provided'. lr-mame2010 has problems i believe.

                    Im not even sure what emulator its using. I think its lr-mame2003.

                    I will try these settings later tonight:

                    Aspect Ratio: Core Provided

                    yes

                    Integer Scale: On

                    this will scale via integer values - this will not neccesarily give the correct aspect ratio. this is not the default

                    Custom Aspect Ratio 4x

                    same as above. this is not the default.

                    If I set these do I have to make sure that any settings in retroarch.cfg are defaulted as well?

                    ie... I have aspect ratio set to unset i think.

                    I tried tinkering a little with the configuration editor but not sure what difference it made.

                    like i said, the defaults are correct. if you've changed a bunch of stuff then it's difficult to say what you need to do to get back to 'normal'.

                    Your confusing me lol

                    If i go to all libretro configs, then into mame and arcade conconfig files. everything is more or less set to unset.

                    If someone can paste here what their settings are for retroarch / video settings. we can go from there.

                    caver01C 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                    • caver01C
                      caver01 @retrocraze
                      last edited by

                      @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                      Your confusing me lol

                      What he is saying is that if you leave well enough alone and don't add any extra configurations, lr-mame2003 will scale the game to fill your display using whatever aspect ratio is correct for the given ROM. Crucially, this might NOT be proportional scaling because the game image was often stretched to fill original arcade cabinet CRT displays (4:3). AND it is rarely integer scaling because using integer magnification would prevent the stretching needed in one direction or the other to reproduce the original aspect ratio. Besides, integers rarely multiply out to exactly fit your display's resolution. BUT it will look correct, or at least it should match the way it looked in the arcade.

                      My 4-player cocktail style cabinet built as a custom "roadcase"

                      retrocrazeR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • retrocrazeR
                        retrocraze @caver01
                        last edited by

                        @caver01 said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                        @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                        Your confusing me lol

                        What he is saying is that if you leave well enough alone and don't add any extra configurations, lr-mame2003 will scale the game to fill your display using whatever aspect ratio is correct for the given ROM. Crucially, this might NOT be proportional scaling because the game image was often stretched to fill original arcade cabinet CRT displays (4:3). AND it is rarely integer scaling because using integer magnification would prevent the stretching needed in one direction or the other to reproduce the original aspect ratio. Besides, integers rarely multiply out to exactly fit your display's resolution. BUT it will look correct, or at least it should match the way it looked in the arcade.

                        Thanks for the info.
                        I don’t want the image to fit my display, I just want it to be the games corrext ratio and potentially smaller on my screen with more black borders.

                        retrocrazeR UDb23U 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • retrocrazeR
                          retrocraze @retrocraze
                          last edited by

                          So, it’s a strange thing. When I set a resolution of 320x224 the game fits the screen and plays smooth but looks terrible.. When I set 640x448 the game slows down sometimes like my graphics card is keek.
                          Wtf
                          It’s as if RetroPie can’t handle Outrun!

                          caver01C 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                          • caver01C
                            caver01 @retrocraze
                            last edited by

                            @retrocraze nothing is worse than a keek graphics card. I hate when that happens.

                            What emulator are you using? What ROM? What computer? There are so many variables.

                            My 4-player cocktail style cabinet built as a custom "roadcase"

                            retrocrazeR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                            • retrocrazeR
                              retrocraze @caver01
                              last edited by

                              @caver01 said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                              @retrocraze nothing is worse than a keek graphics card. I hate when that happens.

                              What emulator are you using? What ROM? What computer? There are so many variables.

                              Lol!

                              I’m using a Raspberry Pi3 with RetroPie.

                              The rom I am trying to get playing smoothly is Sega Outrun on Mame.

                              caver01C rbakerR 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • caver01C
                                caver01 @retrocraze
                                last edited by

                                @retrocraze you still gotta be more specific. There are nine versions of MAME you could be using.

                                My 4-player cocktail style cabinet built as a custom "roadcase"

                                retrocrazeR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                • rbakerR
                                  rbaker @retrocraze
                                  last edited by rbaker

                                  @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                  Lol!
                                  I’m using a Raspberry Pi3 with RetroPie.

                                  Lol indeed.

                                  Anyway, here, try this.

                                  retrocrazeR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                  • retrocrazeR
                                    retrocraze @caver01
                                    last edited by

                                    @caver01 said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                    @retrocraze you still gotta be more specific. There are nine versions of MAME you could be using.

                                    I believe is Mame lr-mame2003. lol

                                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                    • retrocrazeR
                                      retrocraze @rbaker
                                      last edited by

                                      @rbaker said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                      @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                      Lol!
                                      I’m using a Raspberry Pi3 with RetroPie.

                                      Lol indeed.

                                      Anyway, here, try this.

                                      That really interesting!

                                      SO from what I read, that can run as a port on emulation station? I just need to get those versions of Outrun for it to work.

                                      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                      • RumblinBuffaloR
                                        RumblinBuffalo
                                        last edited by

                                        @caver01 @dankcushions I found this thread searching for correct aspect ratios for a few games. Generally speaking - I'm following the rule above that the default (core provided) aspect ratio is correct in lr-mame2003.

                                        However, I noticed in my setup that Mat Mania, when run on lr-mame2003, it appears too narrow, so I used a .cfg file to change it from 'core provided' to 1:1 and to me, that looks correct (and running the same rom on lr-mame2000 appears to set it at 1:1 as the 'core provided' ratio without manual config).

                                        @caver01 said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                        What he is saying is that if you leave well enough alone and don't add any extra configurations, lr-mame2003 will scale the game to fill your display using whatever aspect ratio is correct for the given ROM. Crucially, this might NOT be proportional scaling because the game image was often stretched to fill original arcade cabinet CRT displays (4:3). AND it is rarely integer scaling because using integer magnification would prevent the stretching needed in one direction or the other to reproduce the original aspect ratio. Besides, integers rarely multiply out to exactly fit your display's resolution. BUT it will look correct, or at least it should match the way it looked in the arcade.

                                        I was also curious about Mortal Kombat (which seems too narrow to me at 'core provided' ratio). But if I'm reading the above (and understanding it) correctly, as long as I use the 'core provided' aspect ratio in lr-mame2003, it should match the way it looked in the arcade. Is it too narrow looking because I'm not using an actual arcade screen that "stretched" the image?

                                        dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • dankcushionsD
                                          dankcushions Global Moderator @RumblinBuffalo
                                          last edited by

                                          @rumblinbuffalo said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                          I was also curious about Mortal Kombat (which seems too narrow to me at 'core provided' ratio). But if I'm reading the above (and understanding it) correctly, as long as I use the 'core provided' aspect ratio in lr-mame2003, it should match the way it looked in the arcade. Is it too narrow looking because I'm not using an actual arcade screen that "stretched" the image?

                                          no - the point is that core provide will do all the relevant stretching and/or squeezing that the actual arcade screen would have done. for example, mk had a standard 4:3 CRT so the aspect ratio provided by the core should be the same. mat mania is a 3:4 game so that should be 3:4 via core provide.

                                          RumblinBuffaloR 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                                          • UDb23U
                                            UDb23 @retrocraze
                                            last edited by UDb23

                                            @retrocraze said in Original Resolution / Aspect for each game:

                                            I just want it to be the games corrext ratio and potentially smaller on my screen with more black borders.

                                            If you're using libretro emulators (e.g. lr-mame 2003 or lr-mame2010) you can edit the game (rom) specific cfg file to set the size and position of actual "game area" on your screen.
                                            Check this file as example. That game "Spiders", plays correctly only in mame 2010 but that emulator has wrong default aspect ratio. That cfg fixes the problem.

                                            dankcushionsD 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
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