640x480 anymore?

#1 I know people still using 800X600, but no one that uses the old 640X480.

#2 I think you can put this under the question of "What are my minimum requirements going to be" obviously the lower you can make them the better, your not starting with a fan base thats going to upgrade machines for your game.

800x600 I'd say is pretty safe though, I tend to see no fps increase/decrease in resolution changes personally with TGE

#3 Yes, that's essentially what I'm saying. I just didn't think 640x480 was really used anymore, and I can't think of any machines left that support 640x480 that wouldn't also support 800x600...

#4 I have dropped to 640x480 occasionally just to be able to crank up the max AA settings in some high end games and see how it looks.

#5 I'd keep 640x480 in there, many people still use it to run newer games at a playable speed on older systems. My old Geforce 3 still plays most new games ok at that res and 16 bit. My newer system I run at 1024x768 and it plays everything.

Unfortunately there are a ton of indie gamers that have older systems still, so if your making a 3D game, its worth supporting it.

#6 640x480 isn't even an option on my display. i'm surprised at the number of casual games that use this as their only option. if i try to play a game that defaults to 640x480 i get a black screen with white text that says "unable to display this video mode", and it happens a lot more than you'd think.

#7 I have 2 LCDs that don't support 640x480 either.. Doesnt Windows XP require 800x600?

#8 A large number of people still use CRT monitors and have old pentium 2 computers. Even some of the new VAIO PC's can barely play games at higher than 640x480. Same with a lot of notebooks which are popular with indie gamers. I personaly would prefer a default of 800x600 but in this business its always better to cover as many bases as you can. Perhaps you need a profiler that checks the computer if it doesn't find a preset ini and makes an educated guess at a good setting for a particular system.

#9 My personal take on this: I'm leaving 640x480 in, but I do all my GUI creation at 1024x768 and then let the engine scale it to the other rezes. I'll check it in 640x480 only to make sure the elements are more or less readable and still roughly where I want them. Otherwise, I don't really care too much. =P

I do agree that a good default rez is 800x600.

#10 I've been able to go lower than 640x480 in XP...

#11 Minimun requirements for XP... says 800x600 or greater res. www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/upgrading/sysreqs.mspx

Seriously... 640x480 is the way of the ancient past.. I have some family members that just recently purchased their first computers ever (I know...) and they don't even run in 640x480!

Edit: Typo.

#12 I need to run UT2004 at 640x480 on my laptop to get 15fps.. then again my laptop is not for gaming. :P

#13 Including an option to run at 640 by 480 would increase your potential audience, as for a certain number of people it would be the only way your game could be run at a reasonal speed.

Most commercial games at least include the option to run at lower resolutions, even if they recommend it be run at higher ones. For example, TES IV: Oblivion (which only shipped on March 20th) defaults to 640 by 480 pixels even if it considers your machine to be suitable for "medium" detail settings.

#14 Doom 3 looks gorgeous even in 640x480.

#15 640x480 isnt an option on my display either... not even on my laptop :)

but a question i have, does it really take that much effort to include 640x480 support... and if not, why not put it in there?

#16 Just asking because some of the options for my HUDs make 640x480 a little impractical. But I can probably work around it with a little extra effort.