Hi there,

we had some fun using PICO-8 yesterday on a Raspberry Pi which was connected to an old CRT TV. It looks very cool and authentic that way, however, something that would be really nice to have would be a "4:3 stretch mode", where the whole picture would be stretched into 4:3 format, keeping the 128x128 pixels but making them non-square (1:1.33333). This would look even cooler in my opinion (in fact, the NES also had a nearly square resolution but it was stretched in a similar manner when connected to a TV).

Would be cool to see that in a future version of PICO-8!

you can already do that with command line parameters:

-width n set the window width
-height n set the window height
-windowed n set windowed mode off (0) or on (1)
-pixel_perfect n 1 for unfiltered screen stretching at integer scales (on by default)
-draw_rect x,y,w,h absolute window coordinates and size to draw pico-8's screen

here's a pixel perfect 5:4 on fullhd:
pico8 -draw_rect 320,28,1280,1024 -width 1920 -height 1080 -windowed 0

I also use a Pi on CRT, and have fiddled with the horizontal size...but actually it looks better keeping the picture square. Otherwise circles etc look noticably stretched.

It is a bit different to old consoles, as with those, the developers would have the pixel aspect in mind when doing the graphics.

@minsoft: you're absolutely right, I wouldn't recommend this as a default setting.
though you could use it on purpose for some oddball game. a vertical arkanoid or pinball, a widescreen defender... how about 2 players split screen?

thanks ultrabrite, that's cool! i missed the "draw_rect" parameter somehow. i only fiddled with the other parameters and thought this was not possible.

thanks!

works nicely! gonna try that on my CRT at home.

and yes i agree, it shouldn't be the default mode, but i'm glad this is available, because i think it looks cool in 4:3, it's still "plausible" and i'd expect it to look pretty cool on a CRT, and it's cool that it's possible to try that at least :)

also try -pixel_perfect 0 for extra blurriness :)

no, that is actually not what i like :D

on a modern display, i actually prefer pixel perfect modes over blurry stuff or CRT emulation (except if it's done very well). but i really like the look of a real CRT screen, so i'm quite happy that the Raspberry Pi also offers analog video out (it's really amazing to have this option, along with HDMI) ;)

hey, one more reason for me to get a pi!
I still have a commodore 1084s around :) (had been watching tv on it 'til 2008)

you should :)

also, there is a special sd card image especially for using the Pi with PICO-8, check this out: http://guillermoamaral.com/read/picopi/

using PICO-8 on a Pi with a CRT monitor feels like using a very developer-friendly homecomputer :)

i tried it now on my Sony PVM, it's really cool and doesn't even have to be stretched, because somehow it almost fills the entire screen anyway! i expected the left/right borders to be larger, but it's already perfect, no need for manual stretching ;)

(this thread was originally started by me, but "horus_vent" is our team's account, now i have my own personal account)

Very cool. It occurred to me today to try this at home, so I searched on Pico-8 on CRT and found this thread. Let me ask those participating here, how are you doing it? RPi? Other device? Thanks.

bp