Do you like to play with Depth of field on?

[5homesinGeneva]

My Macbook was getting really hot while playing, so I decided to turn this off to see if that would help and it actually lowered the temp by 10 degrees celcius... anyway, I was upset at first, but now I don't think it looks 1/2 bad... what are your thoughts on "depth of field?"

[HOTSHOT]

tbh, i think the game looks better without it, so i tend to turn it off xD

[SPAWN]

I shut it off in every game I play.

[P0lT10n]

yep

[d45t]

I like it on. I think it looks good and it doesn't noticeably slow down the game on my rig.

[Shufflecat]

Off. It's great in a cutscenes, 'cause those are passive and deliberately composed like a movie. But in actual gameplay It'd only work properly or make sense if it used actual eye tracking tech.

In gameplay the screen is where your character's head is pointed, not where his/her eyes are pointed. Your own eyeballs are essetially the character's eyeballs in how they roam and focus within that field. No matter how the DOF effect determines where to focus, it's still just dumbly second guessing where you're actually looking, and when it gets it wrong (which it inevetibly does) it's annoying and immersion breaking.

[5homesinGeneva]

Originally posted by Pepe_DeJefe:

Off. It's great in a cutscenes, 'cause those are passive and deliberately composed like a movie. But in actual gameplay It'd only work properly or make sense if it used actual eye tracking tech.

In gameplay the screen is where your character's head is pointed, not where his/her eyes are pointed. Your own eyeballs are essetially the character's eyeballs in how they roam and focus within that field. No matter how the DOF effect determines where to focus, it's still just dumbly second guessing where you're actually looking, and when it gets it wrong (which it inevetibly does) it's annoying and immersion breaking.

I didn't know that it could affect aiming like that!

[5homesinGeneva]

Originally posted by d45t:

I like it on. I think it looks good and it doesn't noticeably slow down the game on my rig.

I think it looks really nice in "Arctic" places, and truth be told, I almost prefer it on for those environments... but I think it enhanced the Big Game's evironments (for me anyway) and it helped keep my computer cool... went from 91 degrees to 79 on average... which is the main reason I have it off anyway.

[Shufflecat]

Originally posted by Woah32:

I didn't know that it could affect aiming like that!

It usually doesn't in FPSs, as in that type of game it's typically locked to the screen's dead center, so whatever's the closest object in your reticle area is always the center of the DOF focus.

What It does effect is enviornmental awareness. BL2's DOF is relatively slight, but I've played games where it's super-annoying, as you can't as effectively "keep your eyes peeled": glancing around looking for threats/targets, or even just checking out the nice enviornments. Remember: the frame is only where your character's head is facing, not where their eyeballs are pointed.

In some games with a more adventure bias (compared to straight run-and-gun combat like BL) it's just horrible. The DOF algorithim focuses on whateverthehell it wants to based on some wierd distance metric, so your eyeballs are constantly fighting with the computer over what in frame you want to look at in any given instant.

Basically it's a junk feature shoveled in purely on the basis of "more graphics is better", with no regard for actual logic or function. Most graphical bling features like bloom and dynamic lighting, etc. actually serve a purpose in regards to making the game enviornment more realistic, but DOF outside of cutscenes is just nonsensical bling-for-the-sake-of-bling.

[Palehorse864]

I leave it off.

It would be pretty cool if properly implemented for iron sights. This is what the sight picture should look like on an actual gun if you want the best chance of hitting something.

thewalkingmanblog.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/propersightfocus.gif

The rear sight should be slightly blurry, your sharp focus is on the front sight, and the target is blurry because you're focusing your eye on the front of the gun.

Most games do a half way job of it. Either the gun is blurry and everything else is clear, or the gun is sharp and only really distant things get blur.

I think DOF works by putting thin blurring panes along the player's view. Every few feet, a non-physica polygon with shader gets put up to blur things slightly. When you stack them, things get more blurred as the distance increases.