4k Gaming Question

[Paul Rudd]

When you play old games on PC using a 4k monitor and set the resolution to 4k in the settings, are you playing those games in native 4k resolution or upscaled 4k?

[thedude4bides]

It will be 4k but textures may still be weak and you may have to use a mod to get HD textures.  For example, Skyrim has an HD texture mod.  I was able to get FEAR to run in 3440x1440 but I was unable to find a better texture (at least one that was easy to install) so even though it was higher resolution it still looked like an old game.  

[Tusk2435]

2 minutes ago, A Random Dude said:

When you play old games on PC using a 4k monitor and set the resolution to 4k in the settings, are you playing those games in native 4k resolution or upscaled 4k?

If the game lets you choose 4K in its native settings, then native 4K (unless the game is coded differently); if you choose a lower res in the game (because it's not supported maybe) and you go into Nvidia control panel or Radeon settings and choose to upscale (or oversample, or supersample, depends on how it's called) then you're upsampling

[jones177]

I started playing at 4k back in 2015 when I only had a GTX 980. With that card I could play old games at 4k. New game I played at 2560X1440.

 

If 3840X2160 does not come up in the games menu there is usually an ini file that you can add it to.  A quick internet search will usually tell you where the file is located. 

I have even played DosBox games at 4k.

 

Popular old games sometimes have user made texture packs. This helps a lot with games like Mass Effect that had small textures to begin with.

 

Also some older games have a graphic mod called ENB. This modernizes the games look. Some ENBs are very powerful. My heavily modded Skyrim with ENB struggles to maintain 60fps at 4k with a GTX 1080 ti.

 

Rediscovering old games by playing them at 4k and adding mods is a hobby in itself.

 

You can get a good 4k monitor that can do a perfect 2560X1440 for newer games for about $350. The one I used for 2 years I first saw on LTT. 

 

[Paul Rudd]

3 hours ago, jones177 said:

I started playing at 4k back in 2015 when I only had a GTX 980. With that card I could play old games at 4k. New game I played at 2560X1440.

 

If 3840X2160 does not come up in the games menu there is usually an ini file that you can add it to.  A quick internet search will usually tell you where the file is located. 

I have even played DosBox games at 4k.

 

Popular old games sometimes have user made texture packs. This helps a lot with games like Mass Effect that had small textures to begin with.

 

Also some older games have a graphic mod called ENB. This modernizes the games look. Some ENBs are very powerful. My heavily modded Skyrim with ENB struggles to maintain 60fps at 4k with a GTX 1080 ti.

 

Rediscovering old games by playing them at 4k and adding mods is a hobby in itself.

 

You can get a good 4k monitor that can do a perfect 2560X1440 for newer games for about $350. The one I used for 2 years I first saw on LTT. 

@jones177 I already know all about that stuff. I just wanted to make sure of what 4k upscaling is. And I chose to take back my 4k monitor and exchange it for a 1440p 144Hz one. I really like both monitors so I might rebuy the 4k monitor eventually. It's under $300 now so once it goes on sale, it will be mine again. Then I can dual monitor that 28" 4k monitor with this 27" 1440p one.