So since AGS can do 1920x1080 too now (and basically every other resolution) I'm throwing thoughts around for a project in HD and glorious 1920x1080.
Are there oldschool people around the AGS community that have graphics cards that won't even display this? Does Ponch have cowvision? Is 960x540 the better way to go and lose some details but make sure more people can play the finished game and the HD folks can just upscale to 2x resolution and have the HD?
Or rather 1440x810 (3/4 HD)? But this can't easily be upscaled to normal HD with a standard upscaling filter...
Well, I think it depends on what kind of graphics a game is supposed to use. Detailed photographic or painkingish graphics might benefit from high resolutions, but lower resolutions like 320 x 2xx or 640 x 4xx still do magic to some particular styles such as Pixel art.
Also, if you don't want to miss out from the tablet users, there're still many tablets who don't have extremely high definition displays.
So, I think any thing with horizontal resolution not higher than 1024 pixels should work for most people.
And yes, my graphics card could do full HD BUT, I'm still using a CRT(!) monitor whose maximum resolution is 1280 x 1024(with desktop set to 1024 x 768 as the refresh rate at full res. made me dizzy; playing games with the full res. is okay though), so I'm the first one to drop off with a HD game.:=
Yeah, I'm sure my graphics card could handle it, but my monitor is 1600x1200, so 1920x1080 would be simultaneously too high and too low.
I don't know that there is a "best" resolution, and any HD resolution should be rescalable anyway. (Though I believe AGS only does very naive downscaling?)
Even though(especially since) HD resolutions are rescable, one problem is text(which are essential to 90+% of adventure games).
Make sure that the font size is large enough for a HD game that the text should still be reasonably readable when the game is scaled to use a lower resolution. Also, on small HD displays (such as HD tablets and... HD phones) small texts are still a horror to read.
Not sure, I'm less likely to play a high resolution game (that can~t be scaled down) than a low res game. reason is mostly, that I don't play games exclusively anymore, so I still want free space on my screen for jumping out to the browser, use skype or ICQ, follow IRC, listen to music... etc
I made Lost Answers (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=53146.0) in 1280x720, I received positive feedback from those who played it. I didn't make it 1920x1080, I thought it would be too high.
The problem with making a game at 1920x1080 isn't a question of whether they have a good enough graphics card (I had a graphics card that could handle that resolution on a Windows 98 computer), but rather a question of whether they have a good enough monitor.
If the game can be downscaled without too much problem, then go for it. Otherwise, I recommend picking a resolution that more monitors can handle. I usually find 1280x720 to be a good compromise. There a few monitors which can't handle that resolution, but those are usually things like notebook computers.
Cornelius Cat has a resolution of 1280x720 and some people experienced problems there. Also, keep in mind that AGS is not super efficient with big resolutions and alpha.
I guess it all comes down to who your target audience is. Pro gamers will expect a high resolution and have the equipment needed for it, whereas casual games as well as the usual AGS crowd probably don't care much about the resolution and most likely will not have high-end hardware.