Your Smart TV hides a secret way to make video games look better

As is the case with other specific image modes for cinema or sports, in recent years Smart TVs have implemented all kinds of solutions so that we can play video games. If you’re not much of fiddling with your TV settings, you may have missed this mode that makes video games perform and look better .

Some TV brands like Samsung will detect your connected game consoles like Xbox Series X, Xbox One S/X and PlayStation and link them to Game Mode automatically, without you needing to adjust any additional settings. Connecting a PC or with other brands of TVs, you will have to do the setup by hand.

make video games look better

What benefits does Game Mode have on Smart TV

Activating or configuring the Game Mode allows you to obtain an image quality optimized for the video output of video games and, above all, low latency . Low latency allows for smoother gameplay without motion blur or stuttering, even on a large screen.

Through the use of these pre-established configurations that, for the most part, focus on reducing the added latency and the input-lag derived from it as much as possible, it is possible to easily eliminate the greatest number of elements that involve some type of image processing by the screen ; that is, they remove options and configure others so that representing an image is “simpler” for the Smart TV.

How to activate the Game Mode in the main brands

If your Smart TV is from Samsung , as we said before, it is automatically activated in the case of connecting a console. If you want to connect your PC or activate these settings manually, follow the instructions below:

  1. Press the Setting/123/Color button on the remote.
  2. From Quick Settings, navigate to Game Mode.
  3. Select Game Mode On and Game Mode should now be enabled on your PC.

The manufacturer LG emphasizes the importance of activating this mode, but not to be confused with the Games Image mode, it is a preset that optimizes the image parameters for video games while the Games Mode implies a difference in the treatment of the video signal.

  1. Access the monitor settings menu and go to the Image section. Here you will see the option Games Mode or Gaming Mode. You can turn it on or off from here.
  2. Please note that Game Mode can only be activated with video input sources, i.e.: RGB, HDMI1, HDMI2. Cannot be used with the Antenna video source.
  3. When activating the Games Mode, the image controls such as Contrast, Brightness, etc. are deactivated.

At Panasonic they do not limit themselves to telling how to activate this mode, but rather give a series of guidelines to achieve the best image quality when playing video games.

  1. Select the HDMI input where you have connected the console
  2. Select the picture mode in Game Mode
  3. In the picture menu, disable the ambient sensor
  4. In color temperature setting, select “Ambience 2”
  5. Adjust the sharpness to the value “30”
  6. Turn off all automatic adjustments:
    1. color remaster
    2. noise reduction
    3. mpeg remaster
    4. resolution remaster
  7. Under “Advanced Settings”, choose “Colour Gamut” and “DCI-P3
  8. Reactivate the ambient sensor
  9. Turn white balance back on
  10. Check that the “VRR” and “Bypass 4K 120 Hz” modes are activated in “Settings Options”.