The Great Debate. Why 60 over 30?

[x EvilErmine x]

However, frames are in essence a measure of motion over time. Humans do not have an unlimited capacity for perceiving things clearly in motion

Yes, however, I was objecting to the statement that humans see at 60 FPS. They simply do not. FPS is a measure but not a measure of how people see.

And I agreed with you and clarified what I meant by that. I simply took the liberty of assuming that most people were aware of the fact that the human eyes aren't camera lenses and that the brain is not a camera.

That's a bad gamble, most people do indeed think the eye acts as a camera if they ever even wonder how the eye works at all.

Interesting eye fact.

The most common type of chromophore[footnote]a molecule that detects light..kinda like the CCD in a camera[/footnote] found in the eye is the rhodopsin chromophore. The time it take for it to detect light and change it's molecular structure to react to that light is about 200 femtoseconds[footnote]A femtosecond is equal to 0.0000000000000001 of 1 second.[/footnote] So we can detect changes in light fantastically quickly, it just takes a lot longer for us to make sense of it.

OT

60fps is just perceived as being smoother to the human eye than 30fps. That's all there really is to it. Though it's not about your eyes really, they can detect changes in light very fast indeed. It's more about how your brain interprets the data your eyes are sending it.

 

[g7g7g7g7]

pfff, id love to have such a "bare minimum" car

Well maybe not bare minimum.

A Toyota GT86, or Mazda MX5 would be bare minimum.

But then the Mustang GT would equate to 45fps, a Ferrari 458 Italia 60fps, and a LaFerrari 120fps.

Most fun I have had recently was in 40+ year old Morris Minor 1000, although that was on a racetrack, so to say you can't have fun in a "basic" car is just silly, you can if it weighs nothing and has rear wheel drive.

But silly and totally incorrect car analogies aside,60fps is objectively superior to 30fps, I'm not saying 30 is terrible it just isn't as good. Of course things like RTS and turn based games don't need it but for anything in a player perspective be it driving, TPS, FPS or other having a lower framerate means worse control and gameplay.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

30fps is acceptable, but I like a solid 60fps. Even if I sacrifice graphics to do so. It's just a personal preference. No justification needed.

Justification is actually needed because the question asked specifically asked for it. There really are not that many reasons I can think of:

1) Smoother animation. Film and TV get away with relatively low frame rates (24 and 25fps) because they a built in mechanism that helps the image seem continuous rather than a series of discrete pictures played in rapid succession. Attempts to mimic this effect well are computationally expensive and thus aiming for a higher frame rate in general (thus reducing the time you spend looking at any particular image) is an easier way to hide this effect. Basically, the correct frame rate in this case is the minimum rate at which you can look at a sequence and not perceive it as a sequence of discrete still images. This number various considerably from person to person. Going beyond this minimum number offers further improvements to the perceived quality until you reach that person's limit (a biological factor easily in the hundreds of fps).

2) Input Lag. Regardless of how fast your input device polls you'll have to wait until the next frame to see the effect of your input. In the vast majority of games and for the vast majority of players, you'd be hard pressed to argue this as an actual problem. 1/60 of a second (the maximum extra time you'd have to wait at 30fps vs 60fps) is so insubstantial compared to actual human response time as to be negligible at best. Now, if you are dealing with a game with very narrow timing windows and your frame rate fluctuates between two extremes, then you'd have a pretty good basis for complaint. Here the problem is less about the lag itself than it is about variability of lag.

I've personally seen people go to some silly lengths for framerate though. Turning off all settings in Quake 3 to achieve rates above 130 fps was common which struck me as strange given that the display could only show the player 60 of those 130 frames.

 

[MrFalconfly]

pfff, id love to have such a "bare minimum" car

Well maybe not bare minimum.

A Toyota GT86, or Mazda MX5 would be bare minimum.

But then the Mustang GT would equate to 45fps, a Ferrari 458 Italia 60fps, and a LaFerrari 120fps.

Most fun I have had recently was in 40+ year old Morris Minor 1000, although that was on a racetrack, so to say you can't have fun in a "basic" car is just silly, you can if it weighs nothing and has rear wheel drive.

But silly and totally incorrect car analogies aside,60fps is objectively superior to 30fps, I'm not saying 30 is terrible it just isn't as good. Of course things like RTS and turn based games don't need it but for anything in a player perspective be it driving, TPS, FPS or other having a lower framerate means worse control and gameplay.

Didn't say "you can't have fun in a basic car". Obviously you can. I just doubted the Fiat Uno's capacity for fun on the roads.

Although if I was to go for a Hothatch, that'd probably be something like a Peugeot 205 GTi.

 

[Supernova1138]

I've personally seen people go to some silly lengths for framerate though. Turning off all settings in Quake 3 to achieve rates above 130 fps was common which struck me as strange given that the display could only show the player 60 of those 130 frames.

That's not as bad as the Counterstrike framerate junkies who insist on having 300FPS. I think with some of those old shooters, the speed the game ran at had an effect on the game's physics engine, and there were certain exploits that could only be done with ridiculously high framerates. The Counterstrike crowd insists on 300FPS because otherwise it seems to screw up their ability to move faster via bunny hopping.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

I've personally seen people go to some silly lengths for framerate though. Turning off all settings in Quake 3 to achieve rates above 130 fps was common which struck me as strange given that the display could only show the player 60 of those 130 frames.

That's not as bad as the Counterstrike framerate junkies who insist on having 300FPS. I think with some of those old shooters, the speed the game ran at had an effect on the game's physics engine, and there were certain exploits that could only be done with ridiculously high framerates. The Counterstrike crowd insists on 300FPS because otherwise it seems to screw up their ability to move faster via bunny hopping.

I don't think that applied to Quake 3 which allowed for fairly absurd exploitations of the bunny hop. In that case, the only advantage I saw was that characters were very highly contrasted with the background which, I suppose, might somehow make it very slightly easier to see and shoot them.

 

[Chaos Isaac]

My only real defense for 60 FPS is that, unlike movies, we react to what's happening in a game. Therefore the more we can follow the onscreen action in depth, the better. And that's what higher FPS does.

But that doesn't justify some of the vitriol about it.

 

[Zipa]

It looks and feels better its that simple.


All the stuff about it looking smoother or the human eye can't see above 30fps are just excuses to make consoles look less terrible.

That said it should be noted that 30fps for PC is terrible due to being up close to a monitor its far less of a problem for someone sat back using a TV.

 

[OneCatch]

The concept of the argument deludes me, I used to work in film, and having worked in mediums where films are shot in 23.9/25 fps upto 30 for PAL screening, i always prefered a lower frame rate, because the progression of frames feels more movie like (Not like.. sluggish 1-10fps because of lower level hardware) but I want to know what justifies the reasoning to complain if a game is 30fps, and not 60. I'm not asking for a cussing match, & i appreciate arguments on both sides, im more curious as to why.

I think that in most games lower framerates are more noticeable. Probably because filmmakers have had decades to come up with camera techniques which avoid most of the key problems - fast objects get blurred onscreen and camera movements tend to be either shakycam or steady, consistent movement, both of which reduce the obviousness of frame changes.
Games don't, by and large, do that yet. Sure, certain games experiment with motion blur, but it isn't able to completely alleviate the issue.
Perhaps a part of it is based on pure perception as well. It might be that lower framerates are more noticeable on a monitor sized screen a foot away than on a TV-sized screen a few meters away. Or perhaps it's something to do with wider Field of View in games to simulate periphiral vision. Or it might be input lag issues which aren't a concern in a film.
It might even be that one concentrates more as an active participant in a game than when watching a film (which is ultimately a passive and observational activity), which keys up one's reaction times, and thus you notice lower fps. Or perhaps that we more readily associate in-game camera movement as a facsimile of our own physical movement and more readily notice visual differences from real life, but maintain a degree of conscious separation from the disembodied and uninvolved camera which shows a film.

That's all educated guesswork, but all I can say is that it is massively noticeable to me personally. Anything below about 45-50FPS feels sluggish, and anything below 30-35 is often downright unplayable for me (on PC at least), not to mention giving me massive headaches.
I've got no problem with people who don't mind it, I don't care that the consoles might be locked to 30 (doesn't affect me), but my PC games need to play at a decent framerate for me to enjoy them properly!

 

[Crazy Zaul]

Because everyone can actually tell the difference between 30 and 60fps, cos 30 fps runs like absolute shit in comparison. 720p and 1080p however look exactly the dam same. Its like a really hard spot the difference puzzle. I haven't bothered to look at the comparison with my glasses on but that's part of the point, everyone can see the difference in frame rate no matter how shit their eyes are.

 

[themyrmidon]

Is 60 fps better than 30 fps? Duh.

However, I would rather have a solid 30 fps vs fluctuating 45-75 fps. The variance is what really messes with perception during gameplay. I say this as a PC gamer that loves to crank settings, and the more and higher the settings the greater the variation.

This is why GSync and Freesync are such a big deal. To eliminate the factor/multiple of 60 that frames are tied to greaty increases the smoothness of the image. I have yet to get a GSync monitor, but it will be my next major purchase.

Anytime people throw out framerate numbers now, which is every day, I'll just sigh and move on. Consistency matters more than the average.

 

[Programmed_For_Damage]

Because everyone can actually tell the difference between 30 and 60fps, cos 30 fps runs like absolute shit in comparison. 720p and 1080p however look exactly the dam same. Its like a really hard spot the difference puzzle. I haven't bothered to look at the comparison with my glasses on but that's part of the point, everyone can see the difference in frame rate no matter how shit their eyes are.

I agree with this 100% I can notice a difference between 30 and 60fps, but above 720p I really don't give a shit. One affects how a game plays, the other how a game looks. A game that looks average and plays smooth as butter will stick in my mind and is enjoyable (Titanfall for example), a game that looks awesome but is choppy and moves like treacle will only earn my ire.

 

[QuicklyAcross]

The great nondebate you mean?
Can we just throw that notion out of the window to begin with that games should try to be movies and vice versa, because it really never works consistently no matter how hard you try to go for that "cinematic/filmic"-essence.

Games are games, theyre interactive, higher fps reduces things such as input lag and makes for a better playing experience, yknow what a game is supposed to be about, playing it, not watching it.

 

[Zac Jovanovic]

Because it's not a visual thing.

While there is a definite difference between 30 and 60 fps visually, 30 is smooth enough with motion blur to not be annoying.

But the input delay skyrockets with lower FPS in games. 30+ms delay makes games feel awkward, sluggish and unresponsive, like your character is burdened or walking through water.
Anything where you control your character directly, like First/third person shooters, action RPGs, racers is almost impossible to enjoy at 30 FPS once you get used to 60.

Try one of the newer Need For Speeds that are locked at 30 FPS, then try it after unlocking FPS to 60. It controls so much better it's like a completely different game.

 

[Username Redacted]

The great nondebate you mean?

This. I also know that you can't produce a fighting game unless you can get it to run consistently at 60fps. Well you can try to do it another way but no one's going to touch your game.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

The human eye sees at about 60 FPS

What?! No, no, no, no. NO!

People need to stop saying crap like this. First it's people insisting that the human eye sees in 24 FPS since that's what movies do, then people start harping-on about 30 FPS because it's what most games run (especially on consoles), and now I'm hearing someone try to tell me that the human eye sees in 60 FPS. THE HUMAN EYE DOES NOT SEE IN FRAMES! The whole concept of "frames" is because linking a series of images (or frames) together is the only way that we know how to simulate motion on a picture. The way that the brain processes motion is completely different from that, and it isn't based on "frames" in any way shape or form.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

The great nondebate you mean?

Pretty much this. The only reason there seems to be any kind of discussion is because developers need to contrive excuses for why 30FPS has advantages over 60FPS in order to excuse the fact that the "next generation" of consoles is still struggling to meet 60FPS.

 

[Lilani]

The human eye sees at about 60 FPS

What?! No, no, no, no. NO!

People need to stop saying crap like this. First it's people insisting that the human eye sees in 24 FPS since that's what movies do, then people start harping-on about 30 FPS because it's what most games run (especially on consoles), and now I'm hearing someone try to tell me that the human eye sees in 60 FPS. THE HUMAN EYE DOES NOT SEE IN FRAMES! The whole concept of "frames" is because linking a series of images (or frames) together is the only way that we know how to simulate motion on a picture. The way that the brain processes motion is completely different from that, and it isn't based on "frames" in any way shape or form.

To quote myself later on:

I'm an animator. I know what frames are, and I know the human mind does not work in frames.

However, frames are in essence a measure of motion over time. Humans do not have an unlimited capacity for perceiving things clearly in motion--stuff can move so fast that all our mind can only interpret a blur, if it can interpret anything at all. So frames per second may not accurately reflect how the human eye and brain actually work, but it can at the very least act as a rudimentary reference for how fast the mind can process visual stimuli and at what point things begin to blur.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

The human eye sees at about 60 FPS

What?! No, no, no, no. NO!

People need to stop saying crap like this. First it's people insisting that the human eye sees in 24 FPS since that's what movies do, then people start harping-on about 30 FPS because it's what most games run (especially on consoles), and now I'm hearing someone try to tell me that the human eye sees in 60 FPS. THE HUMAN EYE DOES NOT SEE IN FRAMES! The whole concept of "frames" is because linking a series of images (or frames) together is the only way that we know how to simulate motion on a picture. The way that the brain processes motion is completely different from that, and it isn't based on "frames" in any way shape or form.

To quote myself later on:

I'm an animator. I know what frames are, and I know the human mind does not work in frames.

However, frames are in essence a measure of motion over time. Humans do not have an unlimited capacity for perceiving things clearly in motion--stuff can move so fast that all our mind can only interpret a blur, if it can interpret anything at all. So frames per second may not accurately reflect how the human eye and brain actually work, but it can at the very least act as a rudimentary reference for how fast the mind can process visual stimuli and at what point things begin to blur.

None of which addresses the fact that since the eyes don't see in a strict "frames per second" way, it's 100% misleading to make any kind of "the human eye sees in X FPS" statement. About all that can be said is that games tend to look choppy when the frames fluctuate, so it's better to have just 30 FPS than to "unlock" the frames and have them skipping around in between 30 and 60; and that games have generally been observed to look better at multiples of 30, hence why you don't see much discussion of in-betweeny numbers like 40, 45, or 50 (and most discussion about post-60 framerates tends to go with 90 and 120).