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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation (Gaming)

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Monday, November 23, 2020, 06:35 (1221 days ago)

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image. Halo and Destiny are both promising 120fps crucible, which means a split screen 30fps lock is guaranteed, and a 60fps lock very likely.

The tech is here for an uncompromised splitscreen experience.

So I wonder why we aren't seeing it? Destiny doesn't support it. We don't know yet about Halo infinite, but I'm leaning towards no. Black Ops 5 only offers two player splitscreen. Why?

I realize that a lot of you here may not have played splitscreen in… well a long time. Maybe it's not important to you. But I think it would be a shame to have a generation of young people for whom playing games with friends means alone in a room with your headset. I think it would be a shame if parents couldn't play with their kids.

I think this is where we should be using the power of these new consoles. Maybe they could create a resurgence of IRL play in this increasingly interconnected and isolated world.

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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by MacAddictXIV @, Seattle WA, Monday, November 23, 2020, 06:57 (1221 days ago) @ Cody Miller

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image. Halo and Destiny are both promising 120fps crucible, which means a split screen 30fps lock is guaranteed, and a 60fps lock very likely.

The tech is here for an uncompromised splitscreen experience.

Well, resolution and fps means less to splitscreen than screen size. I have a 55 inch screen that is set on the other side of the room to my couch. If I split that in half then it gets harder to play. And I'm fortunate enough to have a nice TV, not many people probably do.

So I wonder why we aren't seeing it? Destiny doesn't support it. We don't know yet about Halo infinite, but I'm leaning towards no. Black Ops 5 only offers two player splitscreen. Why?

I honestly think the biggest hinderence to split screen is the player UI, or HUD. Games, especially FPSers have gotten more complicated and thus the need for more UI to define what is happening to the character. If you suddenly took that away, you lose a lot how you play effectively. Bungie probably spends waaaaay to much time figuring out the perfect UI configuration. Now imagine if the UI designer said hey, lets scrunch that into half a screen. Now, the UI that normally would take up maybe 1/5 of the screen takes up half of the screen or is so small that it's harder to figure out what they mean.

Because of this I think splitscreen has been pushed to a more party type games or less serious FPS games like borderlands.

I'm not saying it can't be done, but it's a lot of work to get the couch experience, especially if it's not built from the start.

I also have to mention the Elephant in the room, COVID. I doubt anyone wants to try and sell splitscreen in this kind of an environment. It would be marketing suicide.

I realize that a lot of you here may not have played splitscreen in… well a long time. Maybe it's not important to you. But I think it would be a shame to have a generation of young people for whom playing games with friends means alone in a room with your headset. I think it would be a shame if parents couldn't play with their kids.

Don't take my comments above to say I am against splitscreen. I love splitscreen games. I have a buddy that I would play through games with and just shoot the breeze. He isn't a huge gamer (or wasn't at the time), but then I started him on Borderlands splitscreen and we had a blast.

I think this is where we should be using the power of these new consoles. Maybe they could create a resurgence of IRL play in this increasingly interconnected and isolated world.

So honestly, I don't think the console itself has anything to do with it. We could have been doing it for any console generation.

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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:16 (1221 days ago) @ MacAddictXIV

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image. Halo and Destiny are both promising 120fps crucible, which means a split screen 30fps lock is guaranteed, and a 60fps lock very likely.

The tech is here for an uncompromised splitscreen experience.


Well, resolution and fps means less to splitscreen than screen size. I have a 55 inch screen that is set on the other side of the room to my couch. If I split that in half then it gets harder to play. And I'm fortunate enough to have a nice TV, not many people probably do.

And people managed with CRTs that were less than 30 inches. The experience you describe is even better than the splitscreen of old days.

As far as UI, it can be figured out. If it works in a 1080p rendering mode, then just increase the size of everything a little to account for the smaller screen area.

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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by MacAddictXIV @, Seattle WA, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:36 (1221 days ago) @ Cody Miller

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image. Halo and Destiny are both promising 120fps crucible, which means a split screen 30fps lock is guaranteed, and a 60fps lock very likely.

The tech is here for an uncompromised splitscreen experience.


Well, resolution and fps means less to splitscreen than screen size. I have a 55 inch screen that is set on the other side of the room to my couch. If I split that in half then it gets harder to play. And I'm fortunate enough to have a nice TV, not many people probably do.


And people managed with CRTs that were less than 30 inches. The experience you describe is even better than the splitscreen of old days.

You were also much closer to the CRT. Also, the standard for playing games were farrrrr lower in those days. Also, I mentioned that UI in games are farm more complex, which degrades the area on the screen. You couldn't just put Destiny on an old CRT. Well, you could most definitely do it, but it probably would hardly be playable.

As far as UI, it can be figured out. If it works in a 1080p rendering mode, then just increase the size of everything a little to account for the smaller screen area.

Probably, I don't profess to know how to do UI really well. If it can be done, great! I'm all for it.

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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by uberfoop @, Seattle-ish, Thursday, November 26, 2020, 23:28 (1217 days ago) @ MacAddictXIV

You were also much closer to the CRT.

Loads of people likely weren't. Because the resolutions were so low, and the video signals fairly poor even for the resolution, there simply wasn't much to be gained by sitting super close. And in line with this, most SD CRT televisions didn't try very hard to accommodate close-up viewing: they tend to use pretty coarse masks or aperture grilles that can look pretty nasty at close range.

Like, here's a photo I took just now of my 20" Trinitron:

[image]

The vertical segmentation (the aperture grille) is plainly visible. The horizontal segmentation (scanlines) is visible as a shimmer when using standard interlaced content. For my eyes, both of these effects are very noticeable and distracting up to more than 3 feet away. When I'm actually gaming on this TV, I tend to sit at least 5 feet away. Pretty similar to the ~5-7' viewing distances I generally use for my 48" flat panel.

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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by MacAddictXIV @, Seattle WA, Monday, November 30, 2020, 06:14 (1214 days ago) @ uberfoop

You were also much closer to the CRT.


Loads of people likely weren't. Because the resolutions were so low, and the video signals fairly poor even for the resolution, there simply wasn't much to be gained by sitting super close. And in line with this, most SD CRT televisions didn't try very hard to accommodate close-up viewing: they tend to use pretty coarse masks or aperture grilles that can look pretty nasty at close range.

Like, here's a photo I took just now of my 20" Trinitron:


The vertical segmentation (the aperture grille) is plainly visible. The horizontal segmentation (scanlines) is visible as a shimmer when using standard interlaced content. For my eyes, both of these effects are very noticeable and distracting up to more than 3 feet away. When I'm actually gaming on this TV, I tend to sit at least 5 feet away. Pretty similar to the ~5-7' viewing distances I generally use for my 48" flat panel.

Well, I'm mostly talking from my experience of 15-20 feet with my current TV vs about 3 feet with my old CRT.

Even going from 10 feet to 5-7 feet would be "much closer" in my book.

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Minor pet peeve

by ZackDark @, Not behind you. NO! Don't look., Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:11 (1221 days ago) @ Cody Miller

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image.

It's not linear like that, because there is a lot of POV-based smoke and mirrors to hit top performance, which usually breaks down when you have more than one POV running around. I still think you have a point there. I was fine with losing performance in favor of splitscreen back on the N64, I am fine with it now.

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Minor pet peeve

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:13 (1221 days ago) @ ZackDark

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image.


It's not linear like that, because there is a lot of POV-based smoke and mirrors to hit top performance, which usually breaks down when you have more than one POV running around. I still think you have a point there. I was fine with losing performance in favor of splitscreen back on the N64, I am fine with it now.

Yeah. I'm not expecting 120fps for a 4 way splitscreen, but 60 seems doable.

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Minor pet peeve

by MacAddictXIV @, Seattle WA, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:38 (1221 days ago) @ Cody Miller
edited by MacAddictXIV, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:56

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image.


It's not linear like that, because there is a lot of POV-based smoke and mirrors to hit top performance, which usually breaks down when you have more than one POV running around. I still think you have a point there. I was fine with losing performance in favor of splitscreen back on the N64, I am fine with it now.


Yeah. I'm not expecting 120fps for a 4 way splitscreen, but 60 seems doable.

There was an odd bug in Borderlands 3 when I played that whenever your partner, on splitscreen, would open their menu it would absolutely kill the fps. It seemed very simple, but there are little things like that you don't realize could affect the game.

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Minor pet peeve, IIRC

by kidtsunami @, Atlanta, GA, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:49 (1221 days ago) @ MacAddictXIV

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image.


It's not linear like that, because there is a lot of POV-based smoke and mirrors to hit top performance, which usually breaks down when you have more than one POV running around. I still think you have a point there. I was fine with losing performance in favor of splitscreen back on the N64, I am fine with it now.


Yeah. I'm not expecting 120fps for a 4 way splitscreen, but 60 seems doable.


There was an odd bug in Borderlands 3 when I played that whenever your partner on splitscreen would open their menu with would absolutely kill the FPS. It seemed very simple, but there are little things like that you don't realize could affect the game.

Diablo 3 just has the menu take up the whole damn screen and the other 3 people need to just chill while you manage your inventory...

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Minor pet peeve, IIRC

by MacAddictXIV @, Seattle WA, Monday, November 23, 2020, 07:57 (1221 days ago) @ kidtsunami

The PS5 and Xbox Series X generation SHOULD be the glorious return of splitscreen. Think about it. With 4K the target, a 4 way splitscreen gives each person a 1080p image.


It's not linear like that, because there is a lot of POV-based smoke and mirrors to hit top performance, which usually breaks down when you have more than one POV running around. I still think you have a point there. I was fine with losing performance in favor of splitscreen back on the N64, I am fine with it now.


Yeah. I'm not expecting 120fps for a 4 way splitscreen, but 60 seems doable.


There was an odd bug in Borderlands 3 when I played that whenever your partner on splitscreen would open their menu with would absolutely kill the FPS. It seemed very simple, but there are little things like that you don't realize could affect the game.


Diablo 3 just has the menu take up the whole damn screen and the other 3 people need to just chill while you manage your inventory...

Yeah, that's the other problem with games that have giant inventory menus... It absolutely blows for splitscreen. Borderlands 3 was... harsh. Playable, but harsh. I can't imagine what it would be like for Destiny.

Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by FyreWulff, Wednesday, November 25, 2020, 06:02 (1219 days ago) @ Cody Miller

Halo Infinite's confirmed to have splitscreen.

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Halo: Infinite should have 2 player split screen on campaign

by kidtsunami @, Atlanta, GA, Wednesday, November 25, 2020, 06:19 (1219 days ago) @ FyreWulff

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Splitscreen should make a comeback this generation

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Wednesday, November 25, 2020, 07:49 (1219 days ago) @ FyreWulff

Halo Infinite's confirmed to have splitscreen.

For both multiplayer and for Campaign? Or just 2 player splitscreen for campaign?

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4 player split screen MP and 2 player split screen co-op

by kidtsunami @, Atlanta, GA, Wednesday, November 25, 2020, 08:30 (1219 days ago) @ Cody Miller

- No text -

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YES The time has come again!

by Cody Miller @, Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Wednesday, November 25, 2020, 10:42 (1219 days ago) @ kidtsunami

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