Hello everyone!! Just soliciting some opinions from you guys - I'm about to post on my website a wide-screen version of the demo for "The Fate Of It All". Since I've been out of the loop for a little while in the gaming community, I'm curious as to what you guys think:

a) How many of you are still using the older, square shaped PC monitors? I'm going to try to release two versions of "The Fate Of It All" - one for the newer wide-screen monitors, and one for the standard square shaped monitors - so both versions will fill the screens. But would love to get a feel for what the majority is using these days.

b) Also, it seems most newer indie games are being released digitally - for digital download. Personally, I prefer to buy my games in hard-copy, because I love to have a physical copy to add to my collection. How many folks care which way they get it? Any preference? If there is enough interest, I'm going to try to offer physical copies for purchase. Not just on CD, but in the DVD cases my other two games came in. I prefer those myself!

I have widescreen myself and as far as what I prefer for the release, I certainly don't mind a digital release as long as its DRM free so I can burn my own disk. What would be nice if you go the digital route is to include a file that has your disk graphics and the graphics for the insert to the DVD case. This way I can burn my own disk and print your graphics on it along with the DVD case graphics if that is how I chose to keep it. Truthfully I store all my burned DRM free disks in big binders.

The latest game from Darkling Room (The Crown series) released in a 4:3 resolution and it was not well received. You can read about it here and here.

I happen to like Steam so I am happy with that release but we have a lot of people here that love boxed versions.

Ana

Widescreen here.

I fought downloads for a long time but since that is mostly all that is available these days I was forced into them and really rather like them now, however, I would possibly still go for a disc if available.

dumb question here - what does DRM Free mean??

LOL...you have been away for a while

Digital Rights Management The term DRM is also sometimes referred to as "copy protection" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_rights_management

I have a strong preference for 4:3 aspect ratio over "widescreen." I use a 16:10 monitor (1920x1200) because I wasn't able to find a good 4:3 monitor for less than $1000. I tried 5:4 aspect ratio, but that wasn't ideal either, and with games that insisted on widescreen, half the screen was black and the picture this little strip going across, too small to be useful. So I got a 16:10 monitor that's able to display 1600x1200 resolution with black bars on the sides. I don't care for the way certain new games chop off part of the screen to create the non-widescreen version, but playing widescreen just feels unbalanced. I grew up with televisions that were 4:3 and I don't think I'll ever get used to "squint screens" that are too short.


I definitely prefer physical copies (as long as they're more than a naked CDR) and would certainly enjoy having a physical copy of "The Fate of It All" to go with my physical copies of "Harvest" and "The Arrangement."

I have both monitors and I prefer a square screen. I also love a DVD version of any game.

Thanks everyone for your feedback! I so appreciate it! It really helps me in my planning!!

Have you thought about doing a Special Edition release with Harvest and the Arrangement included if they will work on newer computers. And please let us know when the widescreen demo is ready.

I have a square one on my main computer, but widescreen on my laptop. I have always liked the old ones, but when it gets too old I guess I'll have no choice but to use wide even there.
I am however making my game in widescreen since I guess most people has it.

And the download thing, I will also only have that, but it will be DRM free. Hopefully I can make a cover for download, just like Mikael has (MDNA). There were some new rules this year regarding shipping that made it very complicated or expensive to ship, I have forgotten actually.

I have a square screen and would like to have a physical copy, but I can do the download as long as I can burn a disc. GreyFuss had a great idea about a Special Edition. I had Harvest and The Arrangement, but lost them when I moved. I would really like to have these games again. I would enjoy playing them again.

Actually GreyFuss - I've pulled out and dusted off my original game-burning development files for "Harvest" and "The Arrangement", and I've seriously considered updating them for a re-release, and yes, perhaps along with "The Fate Of It All". I've got Windows 10 - and will be sure that all three games work fine on my system. And I already know they all work fine on Windows XP. And BTW - the wide-screen demo of "The Fate Of It All" will actually have slightly more content in it than the first, standard demo release. But all content will be in the final version of BOTH the standard and widescreen releases of the game. Oh - and also, just so everyone knows - I'm not stretching 4:3 aspect scenes to be wide-screen, and I'm not chopping down wide-screen scenes to be 4:3, I'm actually rendering everything in 4:3, and then adjusting the camera lens of my graphics program and re-rendering everything as wide-screen. The exception is some of the original graphics files I created - some of those have been cropped to fit the wide-screen version.

What about Windows 7?

I've pulled out and dusted off my original game-burning development files for "Harvest" and "The Arrangement", and I've seriously considered updating them for a re-release, and yes, perhaps along with "The Fate Of It All".

Ooooooh !! That sounds very promising. I would LOVE a bundle of all three games

I would be looking to install to Win7 and I use a square monitor.
[Don't like "widescreen" myself.]

Oops! Forgot about Windows 7 - yes, games work fine on Windows 7.

I think the problem there wasn't so much that it was a full screen (I believe 5:4 aspect 1280x1024 was the minimum) aspect ratio but that it was a fixed high resolution where the vertical height was too high for some 16:9 laptops and monitors. People at Steam forums ***here*** and ***here*** reported the same issue. Since there was no smaller vertical resolution than 1024, the people with "squint screen" 16:9 monitors with height less than 1024 pixels couldn't play the game, despite that people with much older 1280x1024 5:4 boxy TFT monitors had no problem. So it wasn't just a matter of preference, they weren't able to play the game at all. If you had a 16:9 aspect monitor, it had to be at least 1920x1080.

A lot of shops advertise 720p on 15" laptops as if it were a good thing. But 720p is only 1280x720.

http://www.digitalcitizen.life/what-screen-resolution-or-aspect-ratio-what-do-720p-1080i-1080p-mean

Jenny 100 - thanks for the good info! I'm gonna go read the links you provided. I hope this doesn't prove to be too difficult for me - my games "Harvest" and "The Arrangement" were at a screen resolution of 640x480 and 800x600 respectively, if my memory serves me correctly.

For "The Fate Of It All", I'm doing 1024x768 for the 4:3 ratio - and I'm doing 1280x720 for the 16:9 ratio. I have a Toshiba laptop - widescreen, and "The Fate Of It All" fills the screen completely. So I hope this will work for most people.

Harvest and The Arrangement would work windowed, but it would be good if they could be made to use the full height of the monitor without being stretched full width on a widescreen. 640x480 looks like a postage stamp on some monitors unless the image is scaled, and not all widescreen monitors or graphics adapters will scale.

I would guess 1280x720 is pretty common on medium and small size laptops, so as a minimum resolution it should be fine.