Force the Aspect Ratio

QuakeForge assumes that all video modes are fullscreen, so if the ratio of your vid_width and vid_height settings is not 4:3, it will look good in fullscreen mode, but stretched out if you run QuakeForge in a window. This simple hack forces the aspect ratio to 1 so you can try a wide or narrow playing window without distortion.

Your feild of view in Quake is based on the width of your screen, so if you use a wide aspect window (like 600 x 300) then you lose some ability to see up and down, but if you use a tall aspect window (like 300 x 600) then you will see more stuff up and down. If you want to see more stuff to the left and right, you should also increase your feild of view by changing the "fov" console variable. Here's a list of different horizontal field-of-view settings (fov variable) that keep the vertical feild of view at the default level (3/4 of 90 degrees, or 67.5 degrees)

fov   width/height   application

 75   1.0   (1:1)    square window
 90   1.3   (4:3)    normal monitor and TV proportions (default)
105   1.7  (16:9)    wide-screen TV, letterbox or movie format
120   2.3 (wide!)    extra wide 120 degree view

BTW - to render a skybox or environment map within the game you need a 90 degree fov setting and a 1:1 aspect ratio (square) screen. You also need to be able to look straight up and down to get the top and bottom of the box.