I saw someone post a pic of Smash Bros Melee on Dolphin playing on his MB Retina screen, the game looked smooth as hell, then he says he straight up hasn't enabled any AA. Blew my mind. Imagine a world without aliasing *_*

I don't see any situation where the options would be 1080p no AA vs 720 or even 900p with AA. Not with cheap post process AA being available. And while I hope that forward+ renderers become more popular (yay for The Order 1886) most engines today use differed so MSAA is just too expensive for most cases even at 720p to be worth it so there is no 4X AA. There are so many different approaches to AA available to developers all with pretty different results.

Another variable is the upscale it's self, there is more than one way to upscale a cat. And they are not all equal by a long shot. Different methods can lead to very different results. Check out this thread for examples http://www.avsforum.com/t/1477339/so-youve-built-your-htpc-now-what-is-next-how-to-get-the-ultimate-picture-and-sound-quality-from-your-htpc-madvr-svp-xbmc-mediabrowser-jriver .

There really is not cut and dry answer to this question. There are a lot of variables that can have a big impact on IQ outside of resolution, visual style, upscaling, AA method, other post processing, type of renderer etc. Tho as a PC gamer I will always go for native res (or higher) I think there could be a place for reducing resolution to focus on greater pixel control for the developers as discussed here http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/digitalfoundry-tech-focus-does-pixel-count-matter?page=1 by people much smarter than I am.

I think you listed the right point.

Resolution is the only part of the graphics that have a fixed result not based in different techs... so first you need increase the resolution and after that try to use render AA, post AA, upscaling, etc... things that change the overall look of the image.

But everything works on PC only.

I believe there are one game that give you two options GT5: 1080p 2xAA or 720p 4xAA (different AA for each resolution but I don't remember now).

I always will prefer resolution over AA... so if I have a 1080p monitor I will try to reach 1080p first and after that try AA.

BTW LCD monitors works better (better IQ) in native resolution.

I play on a 92" 1080p projector screen and on a 15.4" 1080p laptop screen, with both I prefer native 1080p without AA over any upscaling solutions with AA.

Native resolution instantly looks better on an LCD screen, much easier on the eyes without the softness introduced by upscaling. I actually rather take a frame rate hit instead of dropping resolution.
Down sampling from 4K is even better but I don't have the capable hardware for that. I can make screenshots that way, but playing at 5 fps isn't a lot of fun.

AA solutions aren't always that great either, they easily miss sub pixel detail popping in and out. 4xmsaa doesn't always make it look better. 4xfsaa is the only thing that really works, which is the same as rendering at 4K and down sampling to 1080p (or is 4xfsaa at 1080p rendering at 8K, I can never remember if it's 4x the pixels, or 4x the width and 4x the height)

Sorry to jump in without reading much of the thread. I've always prefered a cleaned smoth image; even at the expense of clarity. Like, I actually prefer the use of Quinqux over 4x since it smooths artifacts from textures, which doesn't happen at 4x.

@OT I preffer crispiness and higher level of detail than "smooth blendness"

Of course, non native input on a LCD monitor is the suff of nightmares /slight exaggeration. They are designed for native res and that is it.

Not much of a difference between 900p and 1080p. 720p-1080p is a jump however. I'm not bothered by the 900p. I know this isn't what this thread is technically about.