Playing these games on an HD TV doesn't feel right for me, and I wanted to see if anyone felt the same and took action to play the hardware on a CRT. For anyone who used an HDMI to Composite or Component to play the NES Mini on an older TV, I wanted to ask a few questions before I attempt hunting for the correct cable.
-What cable/converter box did you use?
-How does the picture scale? Does the 16:9 menu screen cut off, or does it scale horizontally leaving black borders on the top and bottom?
-Were there any other artifacts that wouldn't appear if I played a normal NES on the same TV? (Screen Tearing, poor sprite scaling, etc.)
@Seacliff I have no idea whatsoever, if that even works, but to get newer equipment connected to older screens, you'd simply have to look for an HDMI to (enter choice here) adapter.
Either of these should work to convert the signal to something that can display on an old CRT TV, but obviously, you'd have to adjust the settings, because a CRT might not be able to display 16:9 (or mangle the picture into an image squished between two massive black bars), so the best thing to do, would probably be to first set it to 4:3 on a modern TV, and then hook it up to an older one, otherwise chances are, that you'd be looking at that squished image, or on some older models CRT even only a black or blue screen because the screen can't display it...
As for artifacts: haven't noticed any playing on a modern TV, so I don't expect any to magically appear, if you display them on an older TV. Scaling and all that is also perfectly fine, so I don't expect any issues there either, regardless of on what screen you display the system.
But personally, I honestly wouldn't bother with all that. The system was specifically made to be displayed on a modern screen, just like the SNES Mini, and by means of the display option in the menu, I've set mine to display in scanline mode, and that looks almost exactly like I remember playing the games back then, so I'm definitely not in agreement that this should be played on an old TV.
If it was an original NES/SNES, then I would most definitely agree, but in this case, having to spend the extra cash for the converters and cables, and in my case hunting down a CRT screen, just isn't worth the trouble for me.
And as said, the system is tailor-made for modern TV's, so you'll get more out of it that way than on a CRT screen. Like two-thirds of the display options will become instantly useless...
Another important thing to take into account, and probably even the most important thing, is that the signal conversion from the adapters will more than likely create lag, and that is something that you REALLY shouldn't want in your games, unless you're so hell-bent on displaying the games on a CRT screen, in which case you will just have to come to terms with the accompanying lag...
It's specifically designed for modern TVs, hence the fixed 16:9 aspect ratio and other technical limitations. Due to the inherent nature of the Mini hardware, you will most likely be stuck with black bars surrounding the entire image, even if you are able to get the image to show up on a CRT TV.
If you want the (sigh) "authentic" experience, then track down an actual NES and the requisite cartridges. I don't understand why anybody would go through the trouble unless they are interested in third party games that are unlikely to be rereleased.
These emulations feel more authentic as they are not bound by the limitations of the technology that they were originally built around. While not a NES game, Sky Skipper looked surprisingly detailed for a game of its time (1981), and I feel that adding artificial blemishes in order to replicate old hardware is, frankly, stupid, when those scan lines and what not were never part of the original intent of the artists and developers. I'm sure that the makers of the game back then would have preferred a superior display if it had been made available to them.
I can understand the use of techniques to make a film or particular scenes from a film replicate a more nostalgic look (especially if they have been filmed on appropriate film stock/videotape), but to try and replicate this by artificial means is really glaring to me and I hate it. The term "remastered" gets thrown around a lot in the gaming industry these days (I feel that it is technically incorrect as mastering is a specific process that applies to film and audio, and in turn, remastering is an effort to preserve the integrity of the original work, as opposed to embellishing them for contemporary consumption), however, these ports and emulations of past games are more akin to film/audio remasters as the integrity of the original work is being preserved, albeit around the limitations (or advancements) of contemporary consumer technologies.
The filters in the Arcade Archives ports and Mini consoles look really artificial to me so I would never leave them on, but if people like them, then all the power to them, I guess. These games are undetailed as is and to detract from that limited detail is ridiculous to me. It makes as much sense to me as buying an old film that has been painstakingly remastered for Blu-ray or even UHD Blu-ray, and then converting and cropping that down to VHS because it evokes irrational feelings of "nostalgia".
The games were originally designed to look like "pixelated garbage".
The scanlines and CRT artefacts are merely due to the limitation of home entertainment equipment at the time. I suppose I can understand that one would want to play these games on old equipment, but artificially adding blemishes to these games on modern displays is just stupid. Some may try to rationalise it, but it is stupid.
Another huge peeve of mine is when people stretch out 4:3 content to 16:9, which only makes low quality content look exponentially worse. I would love to hear these people's opinions on phone-recorded portrait videos being stretched to 16:9.
I play nes classic, snes classic, and switch arcade games in thr best looking mode when I have observers since all my friends are tech-snobs. When I'm alone I turn on CRT filters and scanlines though. Just makes the experience more childlike to me.
@Silly_G I'm sure developers took into consideration the displays people are actually playing the game on. The pixelated look is artificial, and televisions back then did not have pixels. Same reason today anti-aliasing is such a big deal.
Same reason why we even buy these mini consoles. Other than that you might as well just hook your NES/SNES up to your LED tv. It looks terrible.
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Topic: NES Mini on 4:3 CRT Questions
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