I thought I would add some information to the bizarre widescreen capabilities in Far Cry. I played a lot of multiplayer Far Cry at a 4:3 aspect ratio when it was new, but never bothered to try the single player campaign. Now I've decided to try to correct that mistake and do it using my 16:9 aspect ratio DLP projector. I'm playing v1.4.
First off, "natively", when choosing an available widescreen resolution in menu such as 1280 x 720, the game is definitely not Hor+. When you simply choose this resolution, the world is cropped top and bottom, plus even a little bit side to side as well. It is mostly just Vert-, but I swear the sides are shaved a little.
Secondly, the "ZoomView.lua" modification hack described by neoWidescreen works pretty well, but you can't just enter the usual appropriate FOVs for 16:10 or 16:9 aspect ratios. In other words, even though 90 is probably the default FOV for 4:3, entering 100.39 for 16:10 or 106.27 for 16:9 still results in severe Vert- behavior. As you increase the FOV value in the ZoomView.lua file, you gain both height and width. neoWidescreen already reported that using an FOV of 108 works well for a 16:10 screen. He must have done this by trial and error. He also requested that someone else figure out the 16:9 value. Well, that is what I've done. If you change the FOV entry in the ZoomView.lua file to 121, you will obtain roughly the equivalent of Hor+ behavior. I carefully matched vertical heights with FOV set at 90 with a 4:3 resolution and then with FOV set at 121 with a 16:9 resolution. Is it perfect? No, but pretty darn close. One anomaly that I did notice at widescreen is that objects rendered at the very far right and left appear fatter or stretched side to side. This was easy to notice with round barrels. In other words, the horizontal increase in FOV that occurs isn't quite linear or proportional. But you do definitely gain horizontal real estate, and I think the compromise is worth it. Unfortunately, you won't see this change until after zooming your weapon once. When you start the game you don't have a weapon, so your first level will be played at Vert-.
Now that they are starting to sell LCD screens with resolutions of 1920 x 1080, perhaps more people will need this 16:9 FOV value. Remember, 121 works well!
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