Does enabling widescreen on games that support it require more cpu power?

[Dr_Hycodan]

Games like GoW 1 and 2 and shadow of the colossus. Does enabling widescreen in those games require more system resources?

[willkuer]

I would at least expect that. Possibly it only affects the GS thread though.

[Blyss Sarania]

Really depends on if the game is using software culling or not. PS2 doesn't support hardware culling, so even the parts of the scene that are off screen are normally rendered. This is why WS patches are relatively easy to make.

[willkuer]

Really??? But in an open world or large level scenario where is off screen?

[Blyss Sarania]

Really??? But in an open world or large level scenario where is off screen?

Offscreen = anything you can't see on your screen that's in the current area. This includes stuff behind other stuff, too.

Games like that(open world etc) will use software culling. These are the game that have "render fixes" in our widescreen patches.

Basically a normal WS patch just extend the horizontal FOV, and then whats already there will be displayed cuz it was already rendered. This is why our WS patch work on real hardware without slowdown - they aren't causing anything new to be rendered.

But some games use software culling. This allows them to produce higher quality graphic because the offscreen stuff is not being rendered. Modern hardware supports hardware culling which does this automagically, but back then it wasn't as common, and the PS2 doesn't. It can be done in software, but there is overhead. However, if the overhead is less than the work saved by the culling, it can be useful.

[Dr_Hycodan]

Do these WS patches don't introduce graphic anomalies? Even in letterboxed scenes, the extra width is letterboxed as well?

[Ryudo]

Do these WS patches don't introduce graphic anomalies? Even in letterboxed scenes, the extra width is letterboxed as well?

Not really. The majority of the games are glitch free.

There are only a few games where WS patches are iffy. Phantasy Star Universe is one of them where the minimap is misaligned because it also shifts around. Valkyrie Profile 2 requires an anti-cheat protection code to be enabled, otherwise it freezes the game after a battle.


[Edit]

Here's some screens that I took of PSU way back where it causes some misalignment issues.