Has 'adaptive sync' changed the "quest for FPS"?

[Amraam]

Now that gsync/freesync is sort of becoming the norm, does high FPS still matter as much, or are people just happy if it floats around 60-70 most of the time? I've never experienced 120FPS etc, as I've always gamed on a 60hz screen with VSync.

Now that fluctuating FPS doesn't matter quite as much, are people moving away from very high FPS gameplay?

 

[eddiew]

Probably depends on the games you play. Competitive twitch-reaction gamers seem to favour the high refresh screens, even when the price is a TN panel with poor colours.

Personally, I'm happy with a vsynced and solid 60 on an IPS (ideally wide-gamut) with really good colour reproduction. Don't think I'm very sensitive to framerate, really - as long as the backlight is flicker free, that'll do me. Heck, I used to manage Battlefield 1942 on a first-gen LCD screen with over 30ms response times

 

[old gamer]

Probably depends on the games you play. Competitive twitch-reaction gamers seem to favour the high refresh screens, even when the price is a TN panel with poor colours.

Personally, I'm happy with a vsynced and solid 60 on an IPS (ideally wide-gamut) with really good colour reproduction. Don't think I'm very sensitive to framerate, really - as long as the backlight is flicker free, that'll do me. Heck, I used to manage Battlefield 1942 on a first-gen LCD screen with over 30ms response times

same here, high refresh rate and fps are wasted on me as it all looks the same but this could be down to old age and poor eyesight

 

[Seanspeed]

No, I dont think it changes much in that regard.

Those who enjoy super high framerates aren't going to suddenly be fine with 60-70fps.

I think you're probably overestimating the impact and role variable refresh rate has. Its biggest benefit is simply not being tied down to locked divisions of a refresh rate to get a 'consistent' experience. So no need to hit only 30fps or 60fps or whatever anymore. Those numbers on a variable refresh rate(VRR for convenience here) display are completely arbitrary. Might as well be 73fps for all it matters in that situation(with the exception of games that have game logic tied to specific framerates of course...).

In terms of how smooth the image is, faster is still better. 40fps is still gonna be less smooth than 60fps, and 70fps will still be less smooth than 100fps. VRR displays can certainly help 'smooth out' a fluctuating framerate, but only to a degree. Larger or sharp variations will still be noticeable to those sensitive to fluctuations. VRR will only help some, along with eliminating tearing and minimizing input lag through not needing v-sync.

Lastly, especially with 'Freesync' options, you really need to pay attention to the range the tech works in. A large number of them dont offer VRR under 48fps, meaning if you drop under that, you're going back to your normal juttering and tearing type of experience.

Still highly worthwhile stuff, but not necessarily a miracle tech.

 

[ironsonic]

Personally? no.

I feel g-sync is like motion blur. It hides the downside of low frame rates, but it doesn't compare to the real thing- 60fps or 144hz. g-sync will not make 30hz feel like 60hz, and it won't make 60hz- feel like 144hz.

There are diminishing returns beyond 60-90 hz definitely, but 144hz is noticebly smoother and more importantly responsive.

The effect is most pronounced in FPS games such as Titanfall 2, Overwatch and battlefield, where the motion tracking for enemies are massively improved. So when Genji dashes, it wont be just a green line, you will be able to follow him. When you fire bullets in tf , the bullet trail whizzes in a line rather than just being a solid trail that appears. You can count the individual bullet casings in the minigun as you play doom rather than being a blur of brass.

 

[Rroff]

Personally I still need my 100+fps for online twitch type games, etc. however with G-Sync I now can find a happy compromise in single player stuff where the framerate is hovering around 60fps without having to make a trade off of either visible tearing or horrific input latency.

For MP games I tend to reduce settings to get a clear view and high sustained framerate anyhow whereas for single player I like to turn things up as much as possible.

I feel g-sync is like motion blur. It hides the downside of low frame rates, but it doesn't compare to the real thing- 60fps or 144hz. g-sync will not make 30hz feel like 60hz, and it won't make 60hz- feel like 144hz.

If you are talking about framerates falling to like 30-40fps then yeah it can't work miracles but does a little to mask the negatives - but the real bonus is where your framerate is hovering around 50-70fps with G-Sync you no longer have to either put up with horrific screen tearing (which is very noticeable around that level) to keep the game feeling responsive or turn on V-Sync to stop the tearing and put up with the horrific feel as the game bounces between the 30 and 60 (or 30,45,60) multipliers and the input latency that comes with that.