Words Worth Knowing: FOV
Words Worth Knowing was a vertical I wrote weekly explaining key pieces of gaming jargon to parents, guardians and teachers, as part of the larger overall GameHub outreach effort. The column ran for nearly two years and resulted in around 60 WWK articles. GameHubHQ.com closed in late 2017. This piece originally appeared on Oct 19, 2015.
Got 20/20 vision? Lightweight, in games, we can make it so that you can see out the back of your own head! The only problem, of course, is that it might make you thrown up. This week, we ask what is FOV, what do you need to know and why do you need to care?
What It Is: FOV = Field of View
What It Means: FOV stands for Field of View. It determines the arch of the camera, affecting how much of the world the player can see at any one time. Adjusting the FOV can increase a games's performance, or reduce motion sickness.
Why You Care: FOV, not to be confused with FOW, determines how much space around them a player can see when in the first-person perspective, ie in a body looking out the front with eyes. A larger FOV allows the player to see more of what is going on around them, and lessens the chance of them being blind-sided by enemies attacking from out their field of view. However, the larger the FOV, the more visual data the game has to render onto the screen and this can make the game run slowly. In addition, a greater FOV than their brain normally processes when moving around can make some players feel nauseous. Some games allow the player to adjust the FOV in the settings and many professional level players will try for as wide an FOV as possible, to allow them to see more of the screen at once.
