Games are scaling widescreen even if laptop screen resolution is 4:3

I have a potato laptop with Intel UHD 620 graphics and a 940MX GPU.

So if you know, you don't have NVIDIA scaling options in the NVIDIA control panel when you are not using any external monitor. It shows only a limited options.

So I can control scaling using Intel GPU settings only.

I tried to play a game like NFSMW (2005) in 1024x768 resolution but it stretches it widescreen instead playing into 4:3 aspect ratio.

Same happens in earlier COD games.

But if a game have a dedicated option to play in 4:3, there's no problem. Example is Condition Zero and probably CSGO too. I can play it both widescreen and 4:3.

And it happens irrespective of what resolution I set on my laptop. It feels like games don't care my screen resolution and scaling.

I tried to set my laptop resolution in 1024x768 with maintain aspect ratio - which works fine on laptop screen (I can see black bars on my screen) but as soon as I launch any game in 1024x768, it will stretch it into 16:9. Which I don't want.

One possible reason could be:

Intel's GPU drivers for Windows 11 don't allow "Maintain Aspect Ratio" feature for 1920x1080 resolution of your laptop. It only accepts "Maintain Display Scaling".

So maybe that is the reason. But it would only make sense if I were trying to play game in 1920x1080. So I'm skeptic about this.

One way to "fix" this issue is play games in windowed mode as it respects the aspect ratio. But I don't like windowed mode.

I play only 3-4 games but I want to play all of them at 1024x768 and 4:3 ratio. So all of them have this problem.

Given all that, what could be the reason for this? And is there any workaround for this?

windows graphics-card

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How do I force a 4 3 aspect ratio in a game?

The games may be selecting a widescreen setting. Go into the Game > Options > Display settings to see if you can manually set a 4:3 playing resolution. Your monitor does not appear to have a 4:3 toggle switch on it, so if the above does not work, you may be stuck with what you have now..

How do you fix the aspect ratio on a game?

1. Press the CTRL + ALT + F11 keys, click on the Full Screen Scale option. 2. Your screen will resize after testing the game's resolution....In the work area:

Right-click and open Nvidia Control Panel.

select, "adjust the size and position of the desktop"

in the option "select a scale mode"

select the "full screen" option.

How do I fix my game screen is too big?

Open the Start menu and select Settings. Go to System. In Display, check the Scale and Resolution options, and adjust them to make your screen look proper. Setting to an option labeled (Recommended) is often the best choice.

Why 4:3 Looks So Good

Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Images: cottonbro, cottonbro, hitesh choudhary, Sora Shimazaki