Widescreen Gaming Forum

Hello,

I have a problem with 16:9-resolutions:

So I have a 16:10-monitor, with a native-resolution of 1680x1050, but the settings of the nVidia-drivers are so
that any 16:9-resolutions aren't stretched vertically to fill the 16:10-display, but they are letterboxed instead.
This is not the problem, the problem is that all games do this, except for 'BioShock'.
Somehow 'BioShock' overrides or ignores this so that it still fills the 16:10-display even though I set it to 1600x900, which is 16:9.
This is very unfortunate because a 16:9-resolution adds a lot to the image, plus the 16:10-resolutions stretch any 2D-elements.
But since it forces to fill the 16:10-screen, completely everything is stretched with a 16:9-resolution.

So the question is: Is there anything I can do to get it to letterbox as any other game would?
I get the idea there must be some Configuration-file I could edit to fix this.
It also caught my attention that there is a "FOV-lock", which I don't completely understand, and is not part of this problem.
But it does NOT have a "widescreen" tick-box or an option to set the aspect-ratio like many other games have.
Is it maybe possible to edit the aspect-ratio somewhere in the files?
It must be possible to get this right, because 'Rainbow Six: Vegas', also on the Unreal-engine, gets letterboxed as well.


Greetings!

Actually Bioshock is a Vert- game... so you would actually "see more" on 16:10 than 16:9 aspect ratio. Unfortunately there is no way to edit the setech on the hud/menus elements. But you can edit FOV pretty easely just go HERE and check Eyefinity solutions - with this you should be able to edit the game to any fov u like - not only tripplewide ones.

...Check if your monitor doesnt have the ability to letterbox nonnative resolutions - then you wont need any drivr solutions.

Actually, screenshots demonstrated it would add more to the sides. Switch between these:

http://widescreengamingforum.com/f/u/imagecache/node-gallery-display/contrib/dr/25/ingame_16x10.jpg
http://widescreengamingforum.com/f/u/imagecache/node-gallery-display/contrib/dr/25/ingame_16x9.jpg

Only, I think the trick is, when you use 16:9, that you have to pull back the FOV, to compensate for anything lost.
Like you said, the FOV can easily be changed.

Maybe I could do that indeed, to just make up for the width, but then the 2D-elements are still stretched vertically, which looks quite bad.
It does work when I change the desktop resolution to 1600x900, then the game will simply also show letterboxed like the desktop already would.
But I'd have to switch to that and only when playing the game, and it's quite a hassle to do that every time.

I can not understand why every other game simply rescales into the right aspect-ratio and only this game doesn't.
It's not my monitor doing it, it doesn't have the capability to rescale, I think it's from just before the time that monitors got that feature.
And it's especially strange since this game would specifically support only 4:3 and 16:9, yet it won't letterbox (or even force letterbox like 'Assassin's Creed').
I also don't understand that it's said it only supports 4:3 or 16:9, maybe because of the 2D-elements, but it does allow for 16:10-resolutions.
The only thing that seems to be contradictory is that it's about the only game that doesn't let a 16:9-resolution be letterboxed.
That goes against the use of 16:9-resolutions AND the fact that they included optional 16:10-resolutions in the menu.