Far Cry 4 Dev Argues Resolution Doesn't Matter to Anybody

If you’re anything like me—god forbid—you’re probably not that invested in the whole Screen Resolution debate.  Even in a hobby as frankly inconsequential as gaming (we’re ultimately an entertainment industry, while we’re important economically and culturally we can’t exactly say we’re changing the world) there are more important arguments going on in the gaming sphere than the difference between 1080p and 720p.  Still, some people do care, and the debate has been addressed by a big name in the industry, so… here we go.

In an interview with Official Xbox Magazine, Far Cry 4 creative director Alex Hutchinson was asked about the resolution debate, and his answer was succinct and blunt: he doesn’t believe there is one.

"Five per cent of the audience is online commenting [about resolution], and 95 per cent are just buying them or not buying them.  We create these weird echo chambers for those issues, and sometimes I wonder, I don't think this is real."

When asked when people would stop caring, he answered in a similar vein, saying “I think they already have secretly." 

He then continued, to say

"It feels weird to me that people are cool about playing a sort of retro pixel game, and yet the resolution [in AAA titles] somehow matters. It's like: is it fun, is it interesting, is it new, is it fresh, are there interesting questions?  With the 4K TVs and things - somebody was telling me that with a 4K TV, to even see it, your living room has to be big enough to sit like 12 feet from the screen. I don't know the exact numbers, but it starts to get a little crazy. I'm just in it for the experience, I'll play a SNES game if it's cool."

He’s misinformed about that last bit: the truth, as I’ve researched, is the opposite—only if you’re within 10 inches from the screen or closer is a 4K TV have a noticeable improvement over 720p TV’s.   Still, his primary point, that most people are more interested in a fun game than graphical fidelity, is certainly something I’ve always believed.   So that’s validating for me,  but then, I could never afford to play the super-expensive, fancy games anyway, so my opinion doesn’t especially matter.

But yours, dear reader—yours does.  Give yourself a round of applause.  Or don't, I'm not your boss.