f13.net

As a person who probably has way too many toys, I'd been running out of ideas for new shit I absolutely needed to get myself.  So I went out and procured Nvidia's 3D vision kit and a brand new 120hz monitor bundle.  Surely, some of you other people around here have either done the same, or are at least curious about the tech.

I've literally just set mine up last night and have only managed to test it for about 15 minutes.  Of all things, I chose Battlefied 1942 (yeah, the one that's like 8 years old).  My graphics drivers claimed that 3D visiion would work "Excellent" for that game (there is a compatibility list that rates games), which I suppose is why I tried it out first.  So, I'm sure that I'll have plenty of negative experiences with this tech with other games, but I can say this much:  this stuff actually works.  In this particular case, I'd say it works pretty damn well.  The 3D really, really pops and the game was still completely playable.  To my surprise, the actual aiming and shooting mechanics seem to be improved with this added field of depth...I was actually worried that it might be the opposite.  No major artifacts, or at least, nothing that detracted from the amazing depth perception that I experienced.

Anyway, I thought I would start this thread for any of us that either have the tech or are interested in learning more about it.  The price point is coming down, so it may be something that has a chance of taking off.  I'm sure that if they actually begin designing games to take advantage of this technology, then it will be amazing.

Also, it'd be nice to start developing a list of games that work well (or not) with 3D visiion.  I understand that Left 4 Dead is supposed to be the most amazing visual experience in gaming when combined with this tech, for example, so I'm probably going to go grab that today.  WoW is supposed to be good, too, but I'm not sure I want to go back there...

I am not opposed to hand-me-downs and cast-offs, as well as donations.  :awesome_for_real:

I've had that for a while too, and I find it quite impressive. I have to add I've been a sucker for this kind of stuff since reading about VR experiments in the early 90s in my school days, including to owning an ELSA Revelator somewhere around 2000. The technology has come a long way since then.

Batman: AA and AION work great, it really added a lot to Batman: AA for me. WoW used to work great but they broke the depth of the interface layer implementation a few driver releases ago at NVidia when hotfixing Avatar. I seriously would recommend staying clear of WoW for the moment OR using a driver release from somewhere before around October or so, when the bug occured.

I hear RE5 is one of the showcase titles and should be pretty awesome too.

Random stuff I tried and liked: Test Drive Unlimited, Dragon Age: Origins, Sacred 2, Street Fighter 4 (Fighters are still 2d, but the backgrounds are 3d, I think it looks pretty cool).

Borderlands didn't exactly look good, although it has a "Good" rating - flickering/duplicated shadows all over the place. NWN2 had some problems too. Readying Cyrrex' post I actually noticed I never really tried a shooter out of fear of losing too much FPS, I'll give this a go with BF:BC2.

Biggest downside is that it reduces framerates by about 50%-30%, depending on the game. WoW was pretty much 50% loss, I've seen games where it scales somewhere better (Batman: AA), but 30% was the minimum. AION newbie land was rock solid at 60, never went below 60, not even in the capital cities. Can't comment on mass PvP though, didn't get that far.

I currently have the driver from the CD...I wouldn't normally keep it, but maybe I will if they've been introducing bugs recently.


For any of you following along at home, this is because your GPU has to transmit two images simultaneously (one right eye, one left eye).  Min specs probably require something like a 8800GT, but I suspect most things are going to require quite a bit more than that.

Sounds like a great app for SLI.

It is, I did do some SLI tests with it, and if the game scales, you gain a noticeable fps increase. Sadly, WoW for example is a terrible SLI app, scaling from 0 to somewhere like +20% or even WORSE framerates than without SLI.

What kind of GPU are you running Kageh?  Even with my GTX 285, I wonder how this is going to manage a few games.

i7, OC'ed to 3.6 Ghz. I did use it with 2x260s for a while, now I'm using an OC'ed 280 and sold the 260s. I think your card should do great, for added fun you could always try overclocking and see how much you can squeeze out of them, 285s should go up pretty high.

Tried a few more games.  Left 4 Dead is amazing in 3D.  I was laughing and squealing like a bitch when the zombies started running straight at me.

CoD4 also looks incredible.  I haven't decided yet if it's playable.  I guess I don't really want to play it again.

Can't get KOTOR to work...I think it's because I have the Best of PC version and it is having trouble recognizing that I've even launched the game.

Oblivion needs more testing.  My initial reaction is somewhat negative, but I didn't fiddle around with it much.  Also need to try an outdoor environment.

A little surprised to find out that for unsupported games, the 3D hardware doesn't even activate.  I guess I sorta thought that it would still attempt to work (or that I could force it to), but yield terrible results.

Hmm did you try toggling manually via CTRL-T? I could get it to work for the "unknown" games that way at least. I don't remember trying anything unsupported though. Worst I tried was Age of Conan, which had a bad problem with shadows, but was only rated "poor".

No dice...ctrl T only seems to work with games that are already supported.

Exactly WHICH 3d unit/kit are you using?
I've got an older entry-level 3d system and it was absolutely horrible, assuming the drivers even worked - which they didnt (when they did, it was only at mimimum resolutions).
Nvidia also discontinued their 3d support for quite some time.  Are you saying they've picked it back up again?  (I'm assuming due to the recent brash of 3d capable TVs, games, and movies out there these days)

What kind of resolutions are you running?

note: this tech does NOT work unless you're above 120Mhz... which means most people's desktop flat-panels are moot.  you're better off running it through your HD-TV

This is what we're using: (summary from NVidia marketing) http://www.nvidia.com/object/3D_Vision_Main.html

Basically it works the way that the graphics driver uses the z-axis information from the 3d game engine to render two, horizontally slightly displaced images at approximately the same offset they would show for your eyes. Frames are rendered alternative, one for the left and one for the right eye, and you are using a pair of shutter glasses synchronized to the timing the graphics card is producing the pictures with. That way, the left eye shutter is closed when the monitor displays the image meant for the right eye and vice-versa.

You need a 120Hz display to use it, but the driver itself is compatible with all NVidia cards AFAIK. You'll just need sufficient horsepower to render the doubled amount of images required for 3D. Some games scale better than halving frame rates, I assume because the graphics card can reuse certain rendering results or something like that.

NVidia used to market a bundle of the Samsung 2233RZ + glasses during spring/summer last year, but nowadays you can get the glasses to work with a few more displays. I use that kit myself, running games at 1680x1050 with a GTX280 usually without problems. I'd say if a game can do 50-60 fps consistent non-3d, it probably is enough to go 3D with it.

Since the 3d rendering relies on the driver, you don't need any special patches or whatever for the games to work IF the game engine can be parsed by the driver correctly. You do run into the occasional trouble with special effects, mostly stuff like shadows, coronas, lens flares and various light reflections or refractions with are applied without correct depth information by the game engines, but most of the stuff just works out of the box. And when it works good, it enhances the game unbelievably.

@Cyrrex: You can try renaming the game .exe, because - just like with SLI - the driver toggles based on the name of the executable. Just rename it to something supported.

Yeah, for the games that it works with, it's quite a site to behold.  Old CRT monitors that are 100hz or more will also work if you happen to have one laying around, as do a whole line of Mitsubishi DLP TVs for some reason.

@Kageh - interesting, I may have to try that. 

I played the Batman AA, and some racing game at the Nividia booth at CES, and was also blown away. Although I remember the guy saying it only works with the 8800 series cards and up.

Anyone tried this on a 120Mhz HDTV yet?  If it works, I may be inclined to purchase one for my 55LH90 and run a wireless setup from by box.

Not me, sorry. You could try the official forums for feedback on supported displays (http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showforum=40).

Vision:  To be honest, anything less than an 8800gt would work like crap anyway.  On average, this tech will cut your FPS in half when you're running it.

Ghambit:  A regular 120hz TV will apparently NOT work...they use frame interpolation (it fakes up an artificial frame using an algorithm and inserts it in between two legit frames to make it come off smoother).  These 120hz monitors are true 120hz.  I bought the Viewsonic monitor, which now can be had bundled with the glasses for $400 bucks.  I believe Kageh has the more expensive Samsung monitor.  I think they're roughly comparable, though, and that the Viewsonic has simply dropped in price recently.

Got the Samsung one, aye, it's a cool monitor but quite a bit overpriced for what you get in build quality. Aside from the 120Hz it features one meager DVI-D input and a flimsy stand that constantly wobbles and is not adjustable in height. Gaming quality is excellent though, no input lag at all, no smearing.

I read about 1080p 24" monitors that are 3D Vision ready finally coming out now (I believe Acer, Samsung and Dell all have a model ready), but I wonder how many games will be running great with 3d at 1080p on the current graphics cards.

Would this work on a 240hz TV or a Plasma?  I know the 600hz rating on Plasmas is bullshit, but what is it /really/?

http://www.nvidia.com/object/3D_Vision_Requirements.html is less than helpful. I'm sure my creaky ol' 60Hz 720p set wouldn't be able to run this (though why can't they just throttle it to 30fps doubled?), but then they list this under supported HDTVs:

Generic DLP HDTV mode

Thanks!  :oh_i_see:

Doesn't AMD have a similar type of package coming out? Can anyone verify if it is out yet/as good as the Nvidia 3D?

Nerf/Sky - there are a few reasons ordinary displays don't work.  First and foremost, in the early days of this tech there were compromises made to let it run at, for example, 30hz on each side.  Apparently it cause a lot of issues with users, so Nvidia this time around has simply stated that they won't let it do on anything less than 60hz per side.  Hence the 120hz requirement.  The reason that your plain old 120hz TV cannot accomplish this is because it isn't "true" 120hz.  Think about it for a minute.  A TV signal comes in at a max 60hz, so your 120hz tv isn't dealing with 120 frames per second.  It is dealing with 60, and drawing an artificial frame in between to smooth it out.  These 120hz monitors actually are dealing with 120 frames of interlaced signal per second (well, I guess it isn't interlaced when you're running in non-3D mode)  It isn't the same tech. 

If I remember correctly, DLPs are already 3D-capable displays, at least when it comes to whatever tech was in the Avatar game.

You guys are both running this on a pc monitor? My tv bit the dust and I'm in the market for a new hdtv, love dlp and thinking about one of the mitsus that is compatible with this tech. Mostly because samsung isn't making big led dlps anymore, but being compatible with this is a cool side benefit.

Worried about framerate hits, too. 8800gtx has been WICKED for 720p gaming, but bumping to 1080 will probably be noticeable, and doubling that...Maybe if I just set the game res to 720p?

Well...it probably depends on what you're playing.  Even with my 285 card, I'm getting what I would call unacceptable frame rate issues from CoD4, and even fucking HL2.  I may have other issues, or it may just be the games themselves.  Left 4 Dead (which is also a Valve game) runs brilliantly.  I would suspect that you'd struggle with an 8800gt for many modern games.  As a rule, it is going to cut your framerate in half, and sometimes even worse.

8800GTX, top of the 8 generation.

I don't really do much FPS gaming, though. I was hoping Anno1404 and Fallout3 worked good, I also have Batman AA which is a feature title. Burnout Paradise would be pretty cool, too. Not the most demanding stuff in the world.

I think you should be good for Burnout Paradise, not sure for Batman AA. What CPU are you using?

Anno is quite a framerate hog on my rig, sadly. I think that is an Anno thing :(

My last card was an 8800 GT (minus the X), and I'm sure it would struggle with the FPS games in 3D.  I played Fallout 3 on the 360, so I have no idea how that performs.  Anyway, I'm sure you'd be fine with some games. 

Tried Dragon Age on a whim for 5 minutes yesterday.  Expected it to not perform very well, and my drivers only rated it as "good" for 3D on startup.  Aside from a couple strange issues, it was actually fucking awesome.  The framerate even held up quite well.  That was just running around town, though...no idea how it'll hold up in combat.

I've got an e6600 C2D with 4GB RAM running W7. Going to see how that plays with the new set (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16889248051) for a while and then consider the glasses.

Pulled the trigger on the tv yesterday. Last night the fiance was Ms. Chuckles, joking non-stop about the 27" crt I pulled out of the basement. So I'm not going to tell her I bought the new set until it's delivered just to bust her (figurative) balls.

Rule of thumb IMO is pretty much "Would this still be playable at half the framerate"? Anything ending up in the 15-20fps range or below would probably not be playable.

You're my hero.

Got the new set in yesterday. Looks great, nice to game in a higher res but the gpu does struggle with some titles. Crysis always ran hot, even at 1280x720: five minutes put it into the 90C+ range. Frame rates were good (able to notch back FSAA with the higher res), I'm just concerned about heat.

Guy backed out of buying my 720p set, so no money for the 3d stuff anyway :)

You have an extra kidney, right?

Not any more, I guess.

TF2 is totally amazing. The first time I got pegged by a rocket was because I was just watching it fly at me. I'm pretty much a newb and didn't do anything but spam grenades and had a great time because it was so unreal looking.

Burnout is great, might take some getting used to the 3d effects. Batman AA was cool. Civ 4 (well FFH2) is giving me a bug with city names and pop #s, takes a few seconds to sync when zooming in or out and sometimes doesn't sync properly. Torchlight looks good but the 2d cursor and loot floaters is very disorienting. Tomb Raider Underworld wasn't working on my initial try.

Probably need to tweak things a bit more, but frame rates are solid on all those games. Batman froze a couple times but ctrl-alt-del fixed it somehow, so I didn't play it too long.

This tech is amazing when it works, and pretty good when it partially works. I'm astounded by how much it adds to immersion.

"Intuitive" 3D aiming is the one thing I'm still struggling with. I can't get the replacement "3D Vision driver aiming cursor" to work with W7 64-bit, and so I'm firing largely "by sight".

Driving/fighting games transitioned very smoothly to 3D play for me.

EDIT: clarification

The cursor seemed ok in TF2, but I play demoman, so I'm not really using the cursor... Based on the 2d cursor in Torchlight, though, I can see where it would be pretty bad. Haven't played with nvidia's laser sight.

The only thing that bugged me about Burnout was the breaking items flying into the camera were really distracting. Might have to play with the settings so there's not as much popout on them.

Finally found my Dawn of Discovery manual, game is gorgeous in 3d. Really, really nice. The detail and all the little dudes doing their thing is just amazing. Text is a bit tough to read at times (does he want 3 wood or 8 wood?), but I might need to tweak the tv set a bit. Map's a bit tougher to read for some reason. But wow, in the top three so far.

Tomb Raider: Underworld. Holy crap. Probably the best thus far. Amazing looking game and the 3d really improves gameplay imo. Read a forum post where a guy keeps his depth about 65% and then tweaks convergence to make it look good: I'm still learning how all that works, but it works in this title. Pulled back the convergence a bit and bam, everything is stunning and immersion is at crazy levels.

Far Cry 2. This one is both amazing and a shame. The 2d screen effect when you have malaria at the beginning is pretty bad...but when the antagonist points his pistol at you and it comes three feet out of the screen..just wow. The game world is incredible, much more immersive. Two big problems. One is the effects, smoke and fire are not rendered in 3d, so they shimmer and look really odd. The other is the gun sights, I'm trying to play with convergence to get them working properly. I got the pistol to a perfect convergence and then got an assault rifle and the back sight of the rifle was perfect but the front sight was off. Might have to tweak depth, I dunno. Those together may or may not be a deal-breaker, I'll have to play with it more, because the overall effect is so damned good in 3d.

LotRO isn't supported and looks bad. Might be able to tweak it to work, but I don't care for the game. Rumor is EQ2's team is working on support (woofrigginhoo!). More feedback as I work through some other stuff.

Good updates.

I signed up for a WoW trial just to see how it looked in 3D.  Pretty good, but it seems to have a lot of problems with the UI stuff....you get your tool bar set up and converged properly, and every thing looks perfect on screen - then you open up your map or journal and can't read a damn thing.  There doesn't seem to be any sweet spot unless you dial the depth all the way down, which I think detracts too much.

For grins, I think I'll install the original Far Cry and see how that works (it's one of my favorite all time shooters, so what the hell).

The UI problem with WoW is a bug that was introduced by NVidia when they fixed support for the Avatar game. Fix is in the works, but has been "in the works" for quite some time, if you know what I mean. The temporary solution is to revert to a driver somewhere pre-October 2009.

Spore. Had to drop the depth and tweak the convergence alot on this one, due to the floaty parts in the creature creator. So the 3d effect isn't quite as pronounced, and some of the games I've had issues with will probably also need to be dialed back a bit, which kinda sucks. I hope when things are more widely implemented, depth will be better overall. Also, moving to 1080p is a separate issue, the ui and icons are tiny as hell. LotRO's UI scaling ftw. Anyway, back to the 3d report.

Dragon Age. Well, my newbie mage was in his harrowing, the fade effects are tough on the eyes, same as the malaria effects in Far Cry 2. But it was looking ok. Had to set the convergence for much less popout because for some reason in conversations some npcs would be sitting uncomfortably outside the screen, but the text bar that sat on the 'window' would seem behind them but of course is actually in front of them on the screen. I've read popout isn't as good on LCD, I dunno. There was one scene talking to a sloth demon where they'd go to the reverse angle (my character speaking) and the demon's horns stuck a couple feet out into the room, and there was that gun-pointing sequence in Far Cry 2's intro that was eye-popping. I hope you guys are getting that level of popout, even if it has to be dialed back every now and again.

Anyway, as is the problem with most games, name tags are 2d so I had to pull depth way back to about 25%, and it was still a little odd. When you hit tab for item names at the 65% or so depth I like to play at, the tags were tough to match up to the item. I'd say the three biggest problems are name tag-type text, crosshairs, and 2d effects (like the smoke and fire in Far Cry 2). As an interesting aside, it definitely shows which devs and engines cut corners in the 3d engine.

Assassin's Creed. After setting up the damned controller (wasn't this game on the 360? Why are 360 buttons listed as button 1,2,etc? Bleh), the game didn't seem to have a ton of depth. It was late and maybe I forgot to bump up the depth from the last two games. I haven't played it, so by the time I got the controller set up and got through the tutorial I was not feeling like tweaking the 3d settings, and luckily the game crashed and I called it a night.

That seems to about sum up the problem areas with this tech.  There's really only so much they can do about these issues for past games, but for newer games I think we'll see less and less of this.  Left 4 Dead, for example...I don't know if it was built with 3D tech in mind, but it doesn't seem to have much problem with any 2d effects, and its own crosshairs work perfectly.  There is still a minor issue with a some 2D text over character names, but it's not a detractor.  Overall, I'd call that game virtually issue-free (even the framerate scales nicely).  I understand that Resident Evil 5 is one of the few fully compatible games, so I might have to give that a shot at some point.

Original Far Cry, by the way, is pretty sweet in 3D.  Great depth, minimal framerate issues and very little of the dodgy 2D effect.  Crosshair is the only issue that has stood out.  I understand why the don't have it, but I wish games had an option to turn off the damn crosshairs.

Played some more TF2 last night. It's too bad I suck so bad at that game (especially vs players who've been at it for years on the same maps). It looks so good in 3d vision. I'd really like to check out LfD/LfD2, but same as TF2, online shooters aren't very fun unless you're good at them :)

Loaded up Borderlands. Looks great in 3d, new cursor seems to work fine. Unfortunately, it's the first game where the framerates made it unplayable. Going to have to see what settings I missed, since just about every other game is playable (just makes my gpu run wicked hot).

Before reading this thead I assumed 3D gaming was still gimmicky and meh.  Now I find myself trying to convince that me getting a new moniter is good for her too because she'll get my current on then. :)

"Concince my wife" shehs, I need to quit making posts from my phone at work.

Shehs  :why_so_serious:

Ok, last night and this morning getting around to actually playing games! Tomb Raider works so well, I'm starting there. Played for a bit last night and the fiance walked in and laughed at the goofy glasses. Then I had her try them out, she was surprised how comfortable they were over her glasses. Then I started playing (which without the glasses on took me back to the band days of navigating under the influence of half a bottle of Yukon Jack), her comment "Oh wow, that is really cool!". I had her close one eye to see the normal "2d 3d" and she really liked the 3d effect.

This morning I played a bit more with convergence. Again, about 65% depth. Last night I was playing on the game profile default convergence, and it's cool that way. Then I remembered one guy's idea of dialing convergence on the avatar. With Tomb Raider, I set the camera to the default follow distance from Lara, then took off the glasses and dialed in convergence so she was converged to the naked eye. This centers her in the 3d world, so things behind her will pop out more.

It really adds a ton of depth imo, and overall I like the effect...but it does take some getting used to and it's not perfect. With convergence set like that, when the camera comes up against a wall and zooms into Lara, it's difficult (impossible?) to focus on her and the background, which when you think about it is kind of realistic. One or the other is in focus depending on where you're focusing. And some close objects popping out can have exaggerated overlap, if it's near the edge of the screen you might see it with one eye and not the other. But overall, I feel like it really enhances the 3d effect and I'm going to try to get used to playing like that.

I'll link a few 3d screenshots I took. The first one (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru001.pns) is Lara looking out over a large room. This kinda demonstrates the effect of being close to a wall, she's out of convergence by about half. The second and third shots are the same scene. Second shot (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru002.pns) is with my new convergence setting based on the default camera distance, the third (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru003.pns) is converged on Lara herself (which you can see without the glasses).

edit: Sorry about file size, gotta learn how to set the driver to take jps instead of pns!

The heck is PNS file anyways?  Probably want to convert it if you want anyone to actually see what you're talking about.

PNS = PNG stereo. It's two png files that a stereo picture viewer puts together to make a 3d image. Unfortunately, I think you'll need the glasses to see it, unless there's a program that can translate it into anaglyph (red & blue).

JPS would be JPG stereo, so smaller file size.

Interesting...the third screen is by far the most pleasing to the eyes.  I'd never thought of trying that, but then I don't know if I've had the right game to do it with.

While we're on it, are you playing that game with a 360 controller?  It looks amazing, but I can't imagine trying it with mouse and keyboard.

Yeah, 360 controller. The 3rd screen shows the difficulty of that nice convergence method, because the 2nd shot is set up with convergence on Lara using the default camera distance. All three shots are closer than the default distance, the first two using my regular convergence (on Lara at default) and the third tweaked to converge on Lara from the closer camera distance of the shot, to highlight the ideal convergence.

It's not horrid in the game, there are a few places where it really gets bothersome, but they're fleeting. Cutscenes, however, are awful. It's like someone standing too close to your face. If you watch cut-scenes through one eye it's not too bad :) I'm thinking maybe avatar-depth convergence and then dial it back a few notches. Shame, because avatar-depth convergence seems to be the best for the 3d effect in general.

My problem with Anno 1404 is pretty much the 1080p resolution making text hard to read, especially in 3d mode. I have a very slight screen bow on the DLP, so the edges are about a half pixel off...a non-issue for anything but Anno 1404 which has tiny, unscalable text along the sides (and fixed in 2d mode by the tv's guts). Too bad because the game is gorgeous in 3d, shouldn't be a problem for folks using regular monitors up close. Some shots: birdies (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/Anno4002.pns), larger city (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/Anno4003.pns), new settlement (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/Anno4004.pns). For convergence (again, 65% depth), I increase convergence until it looks odd against the UI, then decrease it slowly until it's just beyond the oddness. The third shot I linked is the kind I would use to dial that in, with the trees right under the minimap.

On a whim I decided to install Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, an unsupported title. It actually looks really good...except the fire and smoke effects. While not being 2d like Far Cry 2 (shame on them), there's some weird rotating bounding box. Not sure if it's just cosmetic or if later on it will affect gameplay. I could probably live with it. Here's a screen of it chopping thor in half (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/Game001.pns).

And a gratuitous Lara shot (http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru006.pns).

Installing Fallout 3 now. Some time this week I want to see if Fireworks will handle 3d image conversion, I don't have a copy at home. So another apology for the pns file format!

Fallout 3 seems good. I'll have to get my savegames brought over from my XP machines, forgot how loong the tutorial is. Have to pull convergence way back due to the pipboy and some overlay elements. Still looks great but doesn't have the depth (so to speak, depth setting 65% as usual) of Tomb Raider. Pipboy is rendered in 3d and looks cool, though. More on this one later, since other than appearing a bit shallow it seems to play nice with the 3d tech.

Medieval 2. Didn't work with my 720p monitor and the fiance is a fan of the time period, so this one will probably get a workout. Looks great in 3d, haven't messed with convergence yet. Getting behind archers when they unleash a volley...or better yet, watching the volley hit the targets from behind...I hope I can push the convergence with this one, because it's  :heart: My biggest fear is that I won't get much 3d time with it because the fiance will want to watch.

Well...buy her a pair of glasses!  Only 180 bucks!

I didn't know you swung that way. Maybe you do. Maybe you swing both ways. Who knows. You?

Eh, I didn't realize the spelling made a difference. I have more shoes than she does.  :drillf:

Got the service menu and turned off geometry correction, screen is now sharp in both 2d and 3d modes, what a difference. Thank god I don't mind fucking with the service menu :) TV was set up so oddly out of the box.

Anyway, Anno 1404 is better, but I still think I'd play it in 2d because although the text is now sharp, the shutter glasses add some odd shimmer effect, making it difficult to read a few things. I feel like a grandpa looking over my glasses to read the occasional bit of text.

With the new expansion, SOE put in the dev cycles to get the UI working in 3d. Works good, name tag depth was one of my main concerns and it works perfectly. Really good job at the implementation, even if there are still a few bugs like some shaders acting wonky. Most older titles have that, though. Biggest problem is when I logged in I felt like I was looking at EQ1, I think the game engine is finally showing its age. I know others have said that for a while, but I don't play as many slick graphical games. Jumping from Tomb Raider's lush environments to EQ2 is pretty jarring. And then I look at my character's quest log and the long line of heroic cockblocks....but that's another story...

Still mostly playing Tomb Raider Underworld in 3d, it's so amazing. If you don't own it and have the 3d setup, go buy it (I got it in the steam sale last year). Decided to go non-3d with Anno1404 because the text is kind of hard to read with 3d on, but it's still being crashy for me, was stable under XP :(

Yeah, I'm actually considering that game based on your comments here.

For grins, I downloaded the EVE client and a free 14 day trial.  I logged on for like ten minutes, just to check out the 3d implementation.  It would take some getting used to, but space in 3d is pretty cool.  The UI all remains 2D, which is a great idea up until the point that you realize that the cursor is as well....so, a 2d cursor that needs to select 3d objects in space.  A bit problematic, but I'm sure one could get used to it.  Not sure if I can motivate myself to slog through any more of that game, though.  It's the kind of game that I should love, but I just can't seem to want to dedicate the time to learning it all.

And I know I mentioned it already, but Far Cry (the original) in 3D really kicks ass.  Of course, part of that is simply because I've long considered it the best pure PC shooter (miles better than 2, IMO).  Really, though, the 3D implementation is nice...crawling around through the bushes playing cat and mouse with the AI is cool as hell.

I've got to find my other install disc, I was going to install Far Cry over the weekend. Love that game, too.

I made some red/blue glasses last night and tried a couple games.  I found myself trying to peer around corners when things popped out. Dunno if it will be the next big thing or not. I'd prefer projected images in a fog cloud or something for real 3d.

You can't really compare the red/blue version of 3D verus the active shutter/LCD tech.  It's really not even close.  And by the way, all the noise you are going to start hearing about 3D TV is this very same technology we're talking about in this thread.  I don't know if it's the next big thing, but be clear about this much:  this is no gimmick.  When it works as it is meant to, it is quite something to behold.

And if you're someone it works for.  Mostly it gives me a headache.

Yes, it's either something you'll get used to, or you are one of those people who can't take the 60hz flicker alternating in each eye.  Even though it doesn't give me a headache, I still have to get used to wearing it.

I don't notice anything funky visually unless it's sunny out, the bright light through the french doors flickers a bit. Close the shade on the one closer to the tv and it goes away.

Haven't found a workaround for the fiancee laughing at how dorky the glasses, though. Played another bit of Tomb Raider letting her wear the glasses, she really likes the tech and it fits comfortably over her glasses (part of why they look so dorky, they're like those boxy shades old people wear over their glasses).

Mentioned earlier I've done some time with EQ2 in 3D. It's a pretty good implementation, even if the game isn't as conducive to 3D as something like Tomb Raider. Scalable UI = good for 1080p, because as with Anno 1404, the text can be hard to read in 3d mode. Still trying to scale up a few elements, but mostly good. Main problem is that the game is really dark and playing with the gamma/brightness/contrast isn't getting to to look good and also bright enough to see indoors/at night. Also, I find I quickly glance at my keyboard a lot while playing (Ice Comet on the 6 key) and the glasses are too dark to see it in a darkened room, so I'm looking under them like I have bifocals or something. Not really problems with EQ2, but more my setup, I guess.

A couple EQ2 shots:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/EverQuest2001.pns
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/EverQuest2002.pns

Note the 3d name tags in the second shot. I'll get a conversation shot if I remember, the text bubble and answer buttons are also on the 3D plane of the speaker, so you can stand in front of them and block it, or the speaker can lunge through during an idle animation. The Iksar lunging idle animation is pretty cool in 3D.

And of course more Tomb Raider!
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru007.pns
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru008.pns
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/tru009.pns

Putting this up as a test. I just made the pns into a png, exported as jpg and renamed it jps. Hope it works, file size on pns is pretty bloaty.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3667682/EverQuest2001.jps

I just pulled the trigger on a new 23"/120 hz monitor and the nVidia googles. I can't wait to see this stuff in action!

Hooray!  Welcome to the club.  Of dorks.

So after a quick test, I have determined that my beloved projector is actually compatible with 3D!  Turns out that for some reason, many older 85hz DLP projectors work.  I think there will be more issues in general (Far Cry didn't appear to properly render colors in each eye), but this is potentially hugely awesome.

That's cool. I've mostly been playing FFH2, and due to some odd bug with city name tags I haven't been using the glasses with it. Sucks because it's such a tiny bug, only city name tags and only when zooming, they switch between proper placement and being offset to the left slightly, with the biggest problem being sometimes when you stop zooming they stay in the offset position. And I zoom in and out like mad.

Also been playing a little Far Cry 2, that games looks great, even if the fire and smoke effects are wonky.

FFH2 really inhibits my playing of other games, dernit.

Apparently, there will be some 3D streaming of the Masters this weekend for people with "3D ready computers."  I think that's us.  I'm going to see if I can figure it out.  They're also doing it for television.

I heard about that last night and was interested in what it meant. Unfortunately, I don't think my glasses will work with the tv without the pc, and I don't think the older sets have dedicated glasses like the new Samsungs. So I guess I'm also in the computer viewing boat.

Yeah, I don't think our shutter glasses currently work with any television set up (though I sure as hell hope Nvidia is working with these people), so it'll have to be computer streaming for now.  Not even sure how that's going to work yet, but hopefully it will become apparent.

Just open the URL in your 3d video player, apparently.

I'm trying to recall if I even have the video player installed.  Guess it was on the cd.

Installed the player.  Maybe I'm being super dense, but I don't see an option to paste in a URL...it was supposed to be under the File menu, but it isn't there.  Ideas?  By the way, here's the URL if you're interested (though it only works at certain times of the day, apparently):

mms://a424.l858442423.c8584.g.lm.akamaistream.net/D/424/8584/v0001/reflector:42423 (http://mms://a424.l858442423.c8584.g.lm.akamaistream.net/D/424/8584/v0001/reflector:42423)

http://www.nvidia.com/object/3D_vision_video_player_1.5.5a.html


Also:

2010 Masters Tournament 3D Live Broadcast Schedule (from www.masters.com/3D)
All times are Eastern Daylight Time. Check your timezone to ensure you don’t miss it.

    * Wednesday, April 7: 3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
    * Thursday, April 8: 4:00 - 6:00 p.m.
    * Friday, April 9: 4:00 - 6:00 p.m
    * Saturday, April 10: 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m
    * Sunday, April 11: 5:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.

Awesome....except, it wasn't so awesome.  It was in very poor quality/resolution, and there was no way to adjust the depth.  If this is what 3D TV is going to look like, then regular HD beats it all sideways.

The tech definitely has potential, with the drawbacks you mentioned to surmount. Slight choppiness in crowd shots, but it was also really cool. If they broadcast the NFL in 3d, even with that amount of compression, I'd consider watching it. I imagine they'll fix some of the compression issues for tv, but I'm not sure you can stream a 1080p 120Hz signal over the internet.

It does look cool, though. Welcome to being an early adopter :) I remember the days of less than a dozen HD channels.

I got my 3D stuff setup today. All I can say is  :heart: :drill: :heart: :drill:

GTA IV gets a couple big thumbs up. As with HUD games, have to dial back convergence so the HUD elements aren't out of depth. Need to turn off shadows, but the shadows were pretty wonky anyway. Main drawback is having to dial back texture res to medium, it put the memory usage on my 8800gtx (756MB) into the red on high textures. Still, it would chug in some spots; raining at night in a full-on police chase was a bit chuggy...but also completely awesome. I just started running people over because the effect was so cool.

For the health of my gpu, though, I think I'll stick to 2D. Pushed the heat levels into Crysis realms, 87C. Sizzle mah gpizzle.

DiRT2 - Game looks good, with some pretty major flaws.

In the 'menu' areas, it's all 3D stuff, with the camera pulled super close. Looks great...with convergence dialed way back. Way back. Might even think about dialing back depth (which I leave at 65%), if not for the second issue...it cheats on the effects. 2D lights, shadow and well, dirt. That last one really hurt playability imo, since it's a major portion of the gameplay (unless you're always in the lead, then nm). A few minor issues with HUD depth in the menus as well, but not game-breaking.

Ran really well, but the cheating on volumetrics is probably a game-breaker for most people. Far Cry 2's cheating is overlookable in most situations, but DiRT2 probably isn't.

Needed a change of pace from GTA4 (which I'm not playing in 3d due to the demanding engine, I might try to revisit it after tweaking down settings at some point). Popped in Dragon Age to pursue my career as an evil elven mage bent on destruction of all humankind. Games looks damned nice in 3d, though as with Dawn of Discovery, there are some issues reading the small fonts.

Just read that Mafia II is going to be 3d vision-ready. I'm probably going to need a new gpu at some point :| Shouldn't bitch, though, my 8800gtx is still performing quite respectably after more than three years of service!  Only GTA4 (in 3d) or Crysis put the sizzle on it.

I don't think anyone else is using a DLP, are you? Mitsubishi just announced a kit to make all their '3d-ready' DLPs compliant with the new standards. I'm trying to find out how much of a pita that's going to be, but there probably won't be solid solutions until later in the year (kit rumored to be released next month). My only fear is having to get behind the set to swap out emitters: nvidia emitter for pc gaming and the mitsu emitter for cable tv and movies.

Maybe if I can get a compliant blu ray drive for the pc it will only be a swap out for cable. So much fun being an early adopter...but it really is nice playing with the toys.

Finally got to Overlord from the xmas sale :) It's not a listed title, but it works well with 3d Vision. There's some issue with environment effects (heat shimmer and fog), not a game-breaker, not as bad as the fire and smoke in Far Cry 2, for instance. I have the amBX or whatever enabled, which is supposed to be some effect thingie, I keep forgetting to test the game with it off.

3D looks great and the game seems to be well-suited to it, static distance to your avatar, the minions point out of the screen, etc. The glasses + gamepad make this a great experience, just a nice, fun, mindless diversion after a day working out in the yard.

Didn't try ME2 in 3D, with 90º and 80%rh conditions in the living room, it was sizzling my gpu without 3D Vision enabled. Going to need a new gpu at some point for newer games.

Semi-necro.

Ordered the $2.50 version of KOTOR off of steam, for no other reason than to see if I could get that version of it to work with 3D Vision.  No dice.  I don't get it.  It's supposed to work well with this game, but I cannot even force it on for some reason.

Do you guys realise this (3D shutter glasses used with 3D video cards) has been on the market for over a decade? They were boxed together for a while in the late 1990s when I was a PC magazine reviewer. I've still got an old GeForce 2 box with the glasses and I used to play Quake 1 this way. It worked exactly the same as it does now, exactly the same experience.

The companies have dug out their old tech, which was a fad in 1999 and is a fad now. Yes, it works, yes, there is depth perception and yes, it's pretty. But no, you won't play games or watch TV like this long term because wearing the glasses is a hassle, it doesn't add any fun and it can have negative effects on real life depth perception (e.g. driving after playing a 3D game all day) when you do it longterm.

I sort of knew that, but so what?  For starters, I doubt they were operating on decent monitors at 120hz....Nvidia themselves have said that they stopped with the old tech for exactly that reason.  Second, games looked like ass back then compared to today.  Third, I'm sure the technology has improved all around (the glasses, the drivers, the games, the monitors).

I downloaded the Tomb Raider: Underworld demo yesterday (the one Sky has been on about), and it looks amazing with this stuff.  Mind blowingly good. 

You're probably right about the effects it can have, but this isn't the kind of thing you do all day. 

My 3d glasses killed a homeless guy.

*Necro*
3d is way to sweet (when it works) to let this die.

Per your recommendation, grabbed Underworld  a handful of other Tomb Raider games during this Steam sale. The wife was hooked & replaying all of them. Underworld looks friggin amazing. I watched her play for a bit. Got accused of staring at 3d ass. Guilty.

Anyway, please to be having more 3d recommendations!

Octodad worked fairly well in 3d.
Diablo3 is ass - apparently need a Helixmod.

Has anyone gotten Skyrim to work?

I need to dig the glasses out and see if they are working with my current setup. Sure, it's gimmicky, but when I'm in the mood for it, it's aaaamazing. Most of my recommendations should be here already, it hasn't worked in a couple years.

Don't remember if I mentioned Far Cry 2, that was good, iitc. I enjoyed driving in 3d in that one. Speaking of which, I bet Euro Trucker would rock in 3d...

Left for Dead worked well for it as well.

For me, it's a little more substantial than a 'gimmick'. When it works, it's pretty fuckin immersive. So much so that I'm hard pressed to buy anything that doesn't support 3d anymore. (one finger death punch exempt).

Hell, we're about to upgrade to 4k tvs, but I told the wife I'd rather have bigger 3d than higher res 2d since it's just a more unique experience.
It's the closest I'm going to get to the Holodeck dammit.

Ya Far Cry is pretty. Any game that has actually geometry for foliage feels nice (Just Cause 2).

I agree, I don't really consider it a gimmick when it's working well. It's really amazing, but I guess it's a matter of taste.

Games like Tomb Raider Underworld it's so far beyond gimmicky, playing it in 2d seems like a massive downgrade. I like a pretty healthy convergence spread, though. Lots of depth to it, I push it as far as I can without side effects.

I was poking around trying to troubleshoot (again) the issue I had back when. Seems it might be a faulty IR transmitter. As I said, I'll have to hook it up to all the new stuff and see if it works now...but a quick look at online stores shows it out of stock almost everywhere. Did nvidia orphan the project? Answered - https://forums.geforce.com/default/topic/793191/3d-vision/3d-vision-2-kit-supply-vanishing-/

Also, this might be dated, but a good list nonetheless: http://lists.bo3b.net/s3d/index.php

This also seems like a good site to bookmark: http://helixmod.blogspot.com/2013/10/game-list-automatically-updated.html

Found my emitter in 1 minute. 2 hours later, no idea where the glasses are.

 :oh_i_see:

That's a nice list.

I didn't realize the 3d catalogue goes pretty far back (psychonauts).  So many games to re-install and test now. W/ the Helix mods, this'll keep me busy well into next year.

I tried Never Alone - and the s3d works, just crashes after awhile. Some guys on the geforce forum are already working on it though.

On a productivity note - I can't find any solid leads to getting 3d creation software to display stereoscopic. I was at a Siggraph & asked Nvidia reps directly. They just kept telling me to buy Quadro cards. There's a couple links that show it works on Quadros, but I don't have that kinda of disposable cash. There's just got to be a way on consumer GPUs.

I'm starting to get really fucking pissed I can't find those goddamned glasses now.