Gameplay Recording

[OldManWithers1]

Hello all, I'm in search for some information, and have had little luck in finding any... Basically I'm in search of some sort of recording software, or some way to record video gameplay on the computer. I essentially want to put together clips/fun videos for the people i play with, in the game i play. I just don't know of any software, or any way to record what's on screen, to later edit it, and do whatever with. I stumble onto this site by accident, and it seems like you guys actually know something, compared to the others I've found. Any help would be greatly appreciatated. Oh, and any suggestions on video editing software as well. Thanks.

JD

 

[Modeps]

http://www.fraps.com/

 

[OldManWithers1]

Holy geez! Thanks! Is there any others out like this? And you happen to know the quality of the recording by chance?

 

[Modeps]

Originally posted by: OldManWithers1
Holy geez! Thanks! Is there any others out like this? And you happen to know the quality of the recording by chance?

There's recording samples on that website. Fraps is the only one I know about, because it's the only one you really need to know about.

 

[Lonyo]

640x480 on the free version, and it kills your gameplay speed.
You have to run the game at 640x480 IIRC to cap the whole screen.
You can also only capture at 25fps.

It sucks for UT2004 recording (I tried it, wasn't very pretty), but ymmv.

 

[OldManWithers1]

Originally posted by: Lonyo
640x480 on the free version, and it kills your gameplay speed.
You have to run the game at 640x480 IIRC to cap the whole screen.
You can also only capture at 25fps.

It sucks for UT2004 recording (I tried it, wasn't very pretty), but ymmv.

Hmmmm... Kills your gameplay speed huh? Like how bad though? I currently have P4 3Ghz w/HT, and 2gig DDR400 ram. Should that be able to handle it, or will i still be bogged down? But you have to run the game at the resolution you want to record in, or did i misread that?

 

[OldManWithers1]

Oh and also, how big were the avi files when you finished recording them? As in, how long did you record some game play, and how large was the avi file when finished? I know you just compress them afterwards, but just curious.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: OldManWithers1
Oh and also, how big were the avi files when you finished recording them? As in, how long did you record some game play, and how large was the avi file when finished? I know you just compress them afterwards, but just curious.

Expect about 800MB per 30 seconds of video.

You can purchase the full version of fraps, it's maybe $30. It will allow you to record at 1024x768. What I usually do is set the game at 1280x960 and record at half-size. You can also record the audio.

I wish more games would have an instant replay feature like GTA3 and Vice City did.

 

[Lonyo]

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: OldManWithers1
Oh and also, how big were the avi files when you finished recording them? As in, how long did you record some game play, and how large was the avi file when finished? I know you just compress them afterwards, but just curious.

Expect about 800MB per 30 seconds of video.

You can purchase the full version of fraps, it's maybe $30. It will allow you to record at 1024x768. What I usually do is set the game at 1280x960 and record at half-size. You can also record the audio.

I wish more games would have an instant replay feature like GTA3 and Vice City did.

Yeah, big files.
But the GTA replay didn't really replay things, just an approximation (no idea how or why).
You will need to encode/compress the video files you output. They are big.

I had a 2500+ @ 2300MHz and 1GB DDR I think when I did it, and it killed my UT2004 frame rate.
Hyperthreading may help you out though, and the P4 is better at video (although that's encoding, cap might be different).

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: Lonyo

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: OldManWithers1
Oh and also, how big were the avi files when you finished recording them? As in, how long did you record some game play, and how large was the avi file when finished? I know you just compress them afterwards, but just curious.

Expect about 800MB per 30 seconds of video.

You can purchase the full version of fraps, it's maybe $30. It will allow you to record at 1024x768. What I usually do is set the game at 1280x960 and record at half-size. You can also record the audio.

I wish more games would have an instant replay feature like GTA3 and Vice City did.

Yeah, big files.
But the GTA replay didn't really replay things, just an approximation (no idea how or why).
You will need to encode/compress the video files you output. They are big.

I had a 2500+ @ 2300MHz and 1GB DDR I think when I did it, and it killed my UT2004 frame rate.
Hyperthreading may help you out though, and the P4 is better at video (although that's encoding, cap might be different).

What do you mean by...

But the GTA replay didn't really replay things, just an approximation (no idea how or why).

Seems like a perfect replay to me. Except no audio, but that didn't matter too much to me (I have made a few GTA "stunt" videos).

Also, I forgot to mention, hard drive speed (rpm's) play a big part in recording. Gameplay slows down while recording because your system is writing 20+ uncompressed bitmaps (per second) to your hard drive (I also recommend defraging your hard drive before recording, that helps tremendously). I bought a single 10k rpm Raptor, and that seemed to help fairly well.