during the time I was born TVs were small square boxes powered by glass tubes and turny knobs. I want to say 480p but tbh if you were using a junky 10 inch display at the turn of the century on satallite it was closer to like 240p. The jump from square 480p to widescreen 720/1080 was an actual graphical revolution for most people in a very big way, especially for watching movies that were shot in wide. In terms of games 1080p is both where 16:9 took off and the point where realistic looking graphics meet acceptable resolution for like skin pours and godrays shit like that. GTA5, TLOU and RDR are the examples that come to mind from the AAA 1080p era and their original states still probably hold up today.

When the 4k stuff finally came around and it was advertised as the next revolution I was excited man. However compared to going from 480 to 1080 it wasn’t a huge change tbh. It seems once you’re already rendering skin detail and individual blades of grass, or simulating atmospheric condition godrays, there isn’t much more that can be drastically improved just by throwing a billion more polygons at a mesh and upscaling textures. The compute power and storage space required to get these minimal detail gains also starts escalating hard. Its such bullshit that modern AAA games are like 80gb minimum with half of that probably being 4k textures.

I will say that im like the opposite of a graphics snob and slightly proud of it so my opinions on 4k and stuff are biased. Im happy with 1080p as a compromise between graphical quality and compute/disk space required. Ive never played a 1080p at maximum graphics and wanted for more. Im not a competitive esports player, im not a rich tech bro who can but the newest upgraded gpu and 500tb of storage. I don’t need my games to look hyperrealistic. I play games for the fun gameplay and the novel experiences they provide. Some of the best games I’ve ever played look like shit and can be played on a potato. Most of the games I found boring were AAA beautiful open worlds that were as wide and pretty as an ocean but gameplay wise it was as deep as a dried up puddle. I hopped off the graphics train a very long time ago, so take my cloud yelling with a grain of salt.