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4:3 resolution without stretching for old games

HadesLV
By HadesLV
in Programs, Apps and Websites
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Go to solution Solved by bellabichon,

The only working way that I know, would be to manually change your display resolution in the Windows settings. It's inconvenient, I know, but I think it's the only way. Anyone else should feel free to correct me if i'm wrong. 

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Alot of older games do not have any kind of support for widescreens, and while alot of them do have widescreen mods/fixes, not all do, and those which do are not always complete. In particular I am trying to play a childhood favourite of mine Dungeon Siege 2, and even on steam where you would think they would have thought to implement a fix right into the game, since you're paying for it, they didn't(my fault really, should have read up on it previously, but it was cheap so whatever). I found some fixes online, but they were far from perfect. I know one solution is to force the game into windowed mode and then use a 4:3 resolution, but on my 1440p screen, 1280x1024 windowed looks so tiny that its unplayable.

So I am wondering if there is some way that I can 'simulate' a 4:3 resolution on my screen. What I am imagining is just having two big black bars on the sides of my screen, like you have with videos that are of a different aspect ratio. So that way, the game thinks I have a 4:3 resolution and I can 'fullscreen' it across the visible part of the screen and play like that. Is this something that is possible to do, or do I have to look for an old screen to play comfortably?

 

Thank you for any responses!

CPU: Ryzen 7 3700X

CPU Cooler: be quiet! Pure Rock

GPU: Gigabyte RTX 2070 Super Windforce OC 3X

Motherboard: MSI B450 GAMING PLUS MAX

RAM: 4x8GB (32GB) Kingston HyperX Fury Black RGB 3200MHz

PSU: BitFenix Whisper M 650W

Case: NZXT H440

SSD: 500GB Samsung 850 EVO (Boot Drive); 1TB Samsung 970 EVO (Primary Game Drive). 1,5TB total SSD storage.

HDD: 3TB Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM; 4TB Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM. 7TB total HDD storage.

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  • Solution

The only working way that I know, would be to manually change your display resolution in the Windows settings. It's inconvenient, I know, but I think it's the only way. Anyone else should feel free to correct me if i'm wrong. 

Main PC:

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X • Noctua NH-D15 • MSI MAG B550 Tomahawk • 2x8GB G.skill Trident Z Neo 3600MHz CL16 • MSI VENTUS 3X GeForce RTX 3070 OC • Samsung 970 Evo 1TB • Samsung 860 Evo 1TB • Cosair iCUE 465X RGB • Corsair RMx 750W (White)

 

Peripherals/Other:

ASUS VG27AQ • G PRO K/DA • G502 Hero K/DA • G733 K/DA • G840 K/DA • Oculus Quest 2 • Nintendo Switch (Rev. 2)

 

Laptop (Dell XPS 13):

Intel Core i7-1195G7 • Intel Iris Xe Graphics • 16GB LPDDR4x 4267MHz • 512GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD • 13.4" OLED 3.5K InfinityEdge Display (3456x2160, 400nit, touch). 

 

Got any questions about my system or peripherals? Feel free to tag me (@bellabichon) and I'll be happy to give you my two cents. 

 

PSA: Posting a PCPartPicker list with no explanation isn't helpful for first-time builders :)

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1 minute ago, bellabichon said:

The only working way that I know, would be to manually change your display resolution in the Windows settings. It's inconvenient, I know, but I think it's the only way. Anyone else should feel free to correct me if i'm wrong. 

Oh sweet, I didn't realize that it worked that way. I tried changing my resolution through Nvidia, and it just stretched the screen. Thanks, this is what I was looking for!

CPU: Ryzen 7 3700X

CPU Cooler: be quiet! Pure Rock

GPU: Gigabyte RTX 2070 Super Windforce OC 3X

Motherboard: MSI B450 GAMING PLUS MAX

RAM: 4x8GB (32GB) Kingston HyperX Fury Black RGB 3200MHz

PSU: BitFenix Whisper M 650W

Case: NZXT H440

SSD: 500GB Samsung 850 EVO (Boot Drive); 1TB Samsung 970 EVO (Primary Game Drive). 1,5TB total SSD storage.

HDD: 3TB Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM; 4TB Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM. 7TB total HDD storage.

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Just now, HadesLV said:

Oh sweet, I didn't realize that it worked that way. I tried changing my resolution through Nvidia, and it just stretched the screen. Thanks, this is what I was looking for!

You're welcome! I've done it before to get emulators working right, so it should work for you. 

Main PC:

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X • Noctua NH-D15 • MSI MAG B550 Tomahawk • 2x8GB G.skill Trident Z Neo 3600MHz CL16 • MSI VENTUS 3X GeForce RTX 3070 OC • Samsung 970 Evo 1TB • Samsung 860 Evo 1TB • Cosair iCUE 465X RGB • Corsair RMx 750W (White)

 

Peripherals/Other:

ASUS VG27AQ • G PRO K/DA • G502 Hero K/DA • G733 K/DA • G840 K/DA • Oculus Quest 2 • Nintendo Switch (Rev. 2)

 

Laptop (Dell XPS 13):

Intel Core i7-1195G7 • Intel Iris Xe Graphics • 16GB LPDDR4x 4267MHz • 512GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD • 13.4" OLED 3.5K InfinityEdge Display (3456x2160, 400nit, touch). 

 

Got any questions about my system or peripherals? Feel free to tag me (@bellabichon) and I'll be happy to give you my two cents. 

 

PSA: Posting a PCPartPicker list with no explanation isn't helpful for first-time builders :)

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