The PS3 Display Problem

[EvianEverdeen]

So as many of you are aware, there are plethora of PS3 users complaining about a major problem with FFXIV:ARR improperly displaying its viewable area on the television. This thread is being created to inform players and the developers of this issue so that they can acknowledge it and ultimately fix it. This thread will also serve to debunk the failed solutions other players are posting in an attempt to help others. Not being able to see or read what’s on the screen is a major hindrance to gameplay and will ultimately result in a loss of money for Square Enix, because the game is quite unplayable and frustrating dealing with this problem.


My Setup:

Vizio 55” 1080p Widescreen HDTV
HDMI cables
US PS3 System (set to 1080p resolution and 16:9 aspect ratio)


The Problem:

The viewable area of the game as it appears on the television screen is cropped on all four edges. In other words, the picture is missing about an inch of viewable area on all sides of the display. Another way of looking at this is that the game’s picture is much bigger than what the television actually displays, leading to an absence of a viewable area that is still really there.


Why This Is A Problem:

This should be pretty self-explanatory. If a customer cannot properly read what’s on the screen or see what’s on the screen, then the customer is left with a poor gaming experience. Gameplay will be a hindrance to self and others and customer satisfaction will decline, inevitably leading to dismissal of subscription and game.


Failed Solutions:

1. Move and re-size your HUD menus.
This is the most common failed solution. While yes, you can move and re-size HUD menus, you cannot move or re-size them all. This also does not take away from the fact that there is still an inch of missing viewable picture on all four edges. So when I go into my crossbar menu and try to read descriptions of certain things like Actions, the description is cut-off and I am unable to read what my very own Actions even do.

2. Use an HDTV and HDMI cables.
Many users have commented telling the suffering players to invest in an HDTV and HDMI cables instead of using an old non-HDTV with composite cables. As you can see by my setup, I have both an HDTV with HDMI cables and I am still afflicted by the problem.

3. Change the settings to your TV and your PS3 to 720p instead of 1080p
For one, you typically cannot change the resolution of any television. Most televisions are capable of accepting a signal up to its specific standard (for example mine goes to 1080p), but it really only displays what the source (PS3 and game) is feeding to it. So I went into the settings of my PS3 and told it that my television is only capable of a 720p signal (as that’s the resolution the game recommends anyway) and launched the game. This did absolutely nothing and the problem remains.

4. Turn off the overscan setting of your television.
Most televisions do not explicitly use the word “overscan” in any of their system menus. For my Vizio television, overscan cannot perform when the picture is set to “Wide”. The other two options were “Stretch” and “Full” and neither of those solved the issue either. As far as my situation is concerned, overscan is off.

5. Adjust the horizontal and vertical alignment in your TV settings.
I was able to adjust the horizontal and vertical alignment within my television settings. In this menu, I was able to move the display up and down and left and right and finally able to see the missing viewable area. The problem with this is that moving the display vertically or horizontally one way lets you see more of a visual field on one edge, but less on the opposite edge. This became a zero-sum game. Furthermore, adjusting the picture for this game only led to sub-par results and resulted in other game displays being off alignment.

6. Change the aspect ratio of your PS3 from 16:9 to 4:3.
This is actually impossible to do with an HDMI cable setup. I would need to change to composite cables in order for the PS3 to display at a 4:3 aspect ratio. Aspect ratio options are also unavailable in my television’s settings.


How To Solve This Problem:

I initially brushed this off as a Beta-only problem, but it has now carried over into what is termed the final release version. Square Enix, if it was your intent to have this problem solved, you should have at least acknowledged the issue and let your customer base know that this is a problem you are working to solve. There has been no acknowledgment, let alone a fix for this issue, so your first step should be to let your customers know that this is a problem and you either plan or do not plan on resolving it.

Most other games automatically make you adjust display settings the first time you load it up, before you are even able to do anything OR there will be an option in the game’s visual settings to scale the UI or display (making what you see bigger or smaller in order to fit your television screen). FFXIV:ARR lacks both and I personally find this very poor on their part, as their visual settings only offer color and brightness settings, which can be adjusted on virtually any television anyway. In order to fix this problem, Square Enix, it would be likely that you would have to implement one or both of the above commonplace solutions.

Thanks for reading.

[JesseCuster]

I lose text on pop ups that appear anywhere in the lower left of the screen. I can't read what any of the buttons under the chat box say.

Thanks for this thread.

[Covate]

I know its not the "Real Solution" but if it helps in the meantime until they get you a good fix, you can move the chat box up by doing L1+R3 and moving the cursor over the chat tabs and holding I believe L2 to move the chat box.

[Ryuukishi]

Thank you for this. I posted earlier about this issue and met with some dismissive non-responses about how the settings on my TV must be messed up. It is an issue with FF14ARR specifically, not a problem with the console or television.

[EvianEverdeen]

I know its not the "Real Solution" but if it helps in the meantime until they get you a good fix, you can move the chat box up by doing L1+R3 and moving the cursor over the chat tabs and holding I believe L2 to move the chat box.

Moving and re-sizing all of the HUD you can does help some, but certainly not fully, because there's still missing viewable area everywhere. I've lost my desire to play this game, because not only of the frustrations dealing with this issue, but also, because of the lack of acknowledgement and resolution on Square Enix's behalf. I will not be ordering a subscription or playing this game until things get fixed.

With this and the many other problems and the lack of acknowledgement or resolutions, can anyone say we are on a train ride to the disaster that was 1.0? Alll aboard!

[XeuceDragunov]

This should be a simple fix for SE to implement display options game side.

[EvianEverdeen]

Any acknowledgement of this issue or a planned fix in progress as of yet?

[Kamina33]

Moving and re-sizing all of the HUD you can does help some, but certainly not fully, because there's still missing viewable area everywhere. I've lost my desire to play this game, because not only of the frustrations dealing with this issue, but also, because of the lack of acknowledgement and resolution on Square Enix's behalf...

It gives the impression that the PS3 was not a priority, and all players using this platform are consenting to a sub-par version of the game. Yes, it feels sloppy.

Although having said that, once I figured out how to resize and move my UI around everything looks pretty clean now. Of course, I had to figure out how to do this on my own. Most people passing by would possibly lose interest at how blown up the visuals are where the default setting are concerned. It would add considerable value to the PS3 version were this issue addressed.

Btw, looks like tomorrow they're going to upgrade their servers. Here's hoping 1017 is never heard from again. *fingers crossed*

[Arciel]

I'm having the same issue.. but as far as i know its only the left and right sides that have been noticeable cropped off.

I play on a HDTV with 16:9 and tried a bunch of things to remedy this, but the problem is client-based. It has to be fixed from within the game, because it seems like the default resolution of the HUD overlay always happens to be bigger than the game itself.

[dunzoprime]

Let's get this fixed! Even though I've customized it to where I can see everything, it's killing me knowing that there are areas on the screen I can't see...