4A Explains Metro's Locked FOV and How Adjusting it Might Break the Game

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  • Shawn Zipay
    Managing Communities 24/7
    • Apr 2003
    • 69279

    #1

    4A Explains Metro's Locked FOV and How Adjusting it Might Break the Game

    An adjustable FOV has become a common staple in most FPS games released on the PC platform. When a game doesn't include a wide enough FOV or adjustable FOV, it tends to make waves throughout various gaming communities.

    The latest to succumb to this is none other than Metro: Last Light that was released earlier today. The FOV has been a bit too narrow for many who have played the game, but there might just be a valid reason for it. In a forum post made on NeoGAF, a "brand manager" from Deep Silver passed along word from 4A about the locked FOV.
    The main reason for maintaining a fixed FOV is because we have 3D elements like the watch and weapon ammo that need to remain visible.

    In addition, all the game's first-person cut scenes and cinematics and each and every animation involving Artyom's hands - idle weapon animations, reloads, ladder climbing, melee attacks etc, - were created assuming the same, fixed field of view.

    Changing the FOV would break all the cut-scenes and animations - you would be able to see inside Artyom's arms, or they would appear to float in the air in front of you. Or worse.

    We had considered offering three FOV pre-sets, but this would still require significant work to re-do every animation, adjust the HUD and UI and other seemingly small but incredibly time consuming tasks.

    Even with a wider but still fixed field of view, Artyom's hands would look too far away. We know - we tried.

    Game performance is also tied to FOV - the amount of geometric detail we put in each scene has been partly determined by this set FOV, and setting a wider FOV would have a performance impact.

    The good news is that the team is looking at possible solutions. Until then, the next title update will allow players to directly change the FOV in the game's .cfg files. Just keep in mind that manually adjusting the FOV like this will probably result in a game that looks broken with the issues outlined above.
  • dvereb
    n00b!!!11!!
    • Sep 2026
    • 211

    #2
    "...In the immediate term - the next title update, due in the next few days will allow you to directly change the FOV in the .cfg files.

    This may well trigger a number of issues listed above - you have been warned!"

    Explain how it can't be done properly and then give the option to try it yourself anyway - perfect response. :)

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    • cikame
      Member
      • Jun 2011
      • 1799

      #3
      I've seen games where you can change FOV and the view models remain the same.
      Regarding cutscenes, i've seen games smoothly switch between gameplay FOV and cutscene FOV.

      Comment

      • CptainCrunch
        I am the 1%
        • Oct 2007
        • 12976

        #4
        CoD:W@W had that issue. When the FOV went beyond a certain point there was one gun that was not finished being drawn so you only saw the front part and it had no butt stock.

        That is called bad design.

        In this case it sounds like the FOV just stretches the image and not actually adjust the geometry to fit the monitor. Increased FOV should just shrink the screen and you would still see the watch and ammo, unless that is super tiny to begin with.
        Twitter: @CptainCrunch
        Battlelog/Origin: CptainCrunch

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