Yeah, LCDs are nice but my brother uses a CRT and games that can't scale to my native resolution look much better on his (like Warcraft III, for example). Honestly I'd much rather have his CRT but my monitor was free, so...
I sometimes think the people that post in these threads are lying. I have an Athlon XP 3200 (crap I admit), two gigs of ram and a 7900GT, and I never run anything above 1024x768, and never at the highest settings. And yet stuff like City of Heroes runs into the single digits in big fights (note I think I'm barely running at medium settings), BF2142 chops up like hell in a big firefight (also barely medium settings), and I'm lucky if I get Oblivion running at a steady 30 fps out in the wilderness at medium settings. I honestly think computers hate me and run like shit just for me.
On topic, one thing computers won't have that the 360 will have is Rock Band, which is the big reason I'm not bothering with upgrading any time soon.
It all depends on whether you have an HDTV or not, if you have an HDTV, there's nothing like playing Oblivion, Forza, Gears and Dead Rising on a fatty 50" tv. I have oblivion for PC and 360, PC doesn't even come close, and yes I have everything turned up and all, just playing on a big screen with surround is way more fun to me.
So if you have the big screen, go for the 360, it'd be stupid not too.
I'm thinking of buying a 360 right now, instead of upgrading a PC. It comes down to the fact that, while I love my PC, the games that I am interested in are coming out for the 360 as well. Except the strategy ones, which don't require nearly as nice a computer usually.
Plus, as my computer is almost purely a gaming machine, I feel like a tool upgrading it very often when a $300 option exists. Using it for home theater, stereo, etc etc might mean you have more of a case for needing a nice computer, though.
I sometimes think the people that post in these threads are lying. I have an Athlon XP 3200 (crap I admit), two gigs of ram and a 7900GT, and I never run anything above 1024x768, and never at the highest settings. And yet stuff like City of Heroes runs into the single digits in big fights (note I think I'm barely running at medium settings), BF2142 chops up like hell in a big firefight (also barely medium settings), and I'm lucky if I get Oblivion running at a steady 30 fps out in the wilderness at medium settings. I honestly think computers hate me and run like shit just for me.
On topic, one thing computers won't have that the 360 will have is Rock Band, which is the big reason I'm not bothering with upgrading any time soon.
I have lower specs than those. Turn down the draw distance on oblivion, it makes it look better anyway. (you can see the seams on the ground textures and blatantly obvious sprite trees with it up).
I can't speak for the rest though. Clear out your harddrive and background programs?
Also, I when I say high settings, its everything on high except resolution, which is at 1024, and shadows usually on medium or low(as well as any other thing that might make it run slower but isn't very important).
RE: Too many replies to single out a specific one.
Saying a PC will play games "like crap" after 6 months is over exaggeration of the highest order. I'm running a 2.8GHz Pentium with Hyper-Threading, 1G RAM and a Radeon 9800Pro. Cost me a bit more then $1.5K Canadian 4 years ago, and that price is including EVERYTHING (mouse, K/B, monitor, case, harddrice, etc. EVERYTHING). The only game I've played since then that I can't run on max settings is C&C3, where I needed to scale it back a bit.
Get a decent PC and it will run great for years, and then fine for many more years, and then ok for ages.
But, really, it should come down to games if that's what your looking for. Where are the exclusives and how long can you live without them. My favorite exclusives are for the PC, and the games for the 360/Wii/PS3? I can wait to play, so I'll keep my gaming PC and wait on some nice price drops before jumping into the new consoles.
Your decision will differ depending on what games you want.
I have lower specs than those. Turn down the draw distance on oblivion, it makes it look better anyway. (you can see the seams on the ground textures and blatantly obvious sprite trees with it up).
I can't speak for the rest though. Clear out your harddrive and background programs?
This is my beef with PC gaming. I end up spending more time tweaking the games and windows to get better performance than actually playing the game. As much as I hate using a controller for FPS and such, it's really nice to know my game is running the best it can and there's nothing I should worry about fixing to up its performance.
RE: Too many replies to single out a specific one.
Saying a PC will play games "like crap" after 6 months is over exaggeration of the highest order. I'm running a 2.8GHz Pentium with Hyper-Threading, 1G RAM and a Radeon 9800Pro. Cost me a bit more then $1.5K Canadian 4 years ago, and that price is including EVERYTHING (mouse, K/B, monitor, case, harddrice, etc. EVERYTHING). The only game I've played since then that I can't run on max settings is C&C3, where I needed to scale it back a bit.
Get a decent PC and it will run great for years, and then fine for many more years, and then ok for ages.
But, really, it should come down to games if that's what your looking for. Where are the exclusives and how long can you live without them. My favorite exclusives are for the PC, and the games for the 360/Wii/PS3? I can wait to play, so I'll keep my gaming PC and wait on some nice price drops before jumping into the new consoles.
Your decision will differ depending on what games you want.
PS - And yes, God I love CRTs.
Nobody said it runs like crap after 6 months. We're talking more like 3-4 years when console developers are just finally harnessing the full power of the console while your gaming PC is struggling to run anything new at acceptable framerates. The great thing about a console is you only need to ugprade very 4-5 years, and at a much lower pricetag. $1500 every 4 years is a shitload of money compared to $500 every 4 years.
RE: Too many replies to single out a specific one.
Saying a PC will play games "like crap" after 6 months is over exaggeration of the highest order. I'm running a 2.8GHz Pentium with Hyper-Threading, 1G RAM and a Radeon 9800Pro. Cost me a bit more then $1.5K Canadian 4 years ago, and that price is including EVERYTHING (mouse, K/B, monitor, case, harddrice, etc. EVERYTHING). The only game I've played since then that I can't run on max settings is C&C3, where I needed to scale it back a bit.
Get a decent PC and it will run great for years, and then fine for many more years, and then ok for ages.
But, really, it should come down to games if that's what your looking for. Where are the exclusives and how long can you live without them. My favorite exclusives are for the PC, and the games for the 360/Wii/PS3? I can wait to play, so I'll keep my gaming PC and wait on some nice price drops before jumping into the new consoles.
Your decision will differ depending on what games you want.
PS - And yes, God I love CRTs.
Nobody said it runs like crap after 6 months.
You also don't have to deal with the rapid pace of hardware upgrades that are required to keep your PC in the "bare-bones" category for the next generation of PC games (that come out every 6 months and make your new PC look like a joke).
Yeah but the point about PC gaming is you have a period of about 6 months where your PC is top of the line and then it it outdated.
A PC will do that for 6 months after you get it. Then you'll have to turn down the details or upgrade.
All from the first page.
We're talking more like 3-4 years when console developers are just finally harnessing the full power of the console while your gaming PC is struggling to run anything new at acceptable framerates. The great thing about a console is you only need to ugprade very 4-5 years, and at a much lower pricetag. $1500 every 4 years is a shitload of money compared to $500 every 4 years.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
We should collectively write up a manifesto of console vs. PC advantages. All seem to apply here.
For me, I'd say the fundamental difference is whether you are more comfortable gaming on your couch or at your desk. Personally, although I appreciate the comfort of kicking back like a sultan on a pile of pillows, I feel more like I'm gaming when I'm sitting up with my nose practically jammed in to the monitor.
For the Xbox 360:
+ easy set up/out of the box readiness
+ runs at the same speed as every other Xbox 360
+ nice built-in matchmaking service
+ 3-year warranty (for the most common of deaths), single vendor helpdesk
+ games are built around standard controllers
+ easier for guests to play alongside
- monthly fee for multiplayer
- have to buy all maps/add-ins/games
- some games cost more than PC equivalent (Shadowrun, at least)
- cannot upgrade your own hard drive, are slave to Microsoft's prices ($170=120 Gb HD)
PC
+ expandable and upgradeable with your choice of components ($50 = 160 Gb HD)
+ many free legally downloadable games, map packs, skins, and horse armor
+ free multiplayer
+ keyboard and mouse, if you're in to that kind of thing
+ can go higher than 720p max resolution
- uneven playing field. Assuming no h4x0rz, the faster computers have an advantage in multiplayer.
- not for guest use, usually (1 keyboard, 1 mouse = 1 player at the computer at a time)
- warranty is usually 1 year on parts, offered direct from any number of manufacturers, some of whom may have "Lucky" in their trade name and/or hail from obscure Asian nations.
- can be difficult to get running well, takes regular maintenance and an awareness of what the term "most current driver" means.
- games built with controller in mind may not port well to KBM
- idiots, like Gearbox Software, may decide to omit essential co-op play when porting one of your favorite titles
- Some game makers (some with the initials EA) will throw half-finished code out the door, assuming you'll be happy to download the ~1 Gb patch two months down the road.
- Digital Rights Management software and other viruses. Fuck you, Starforce and your ill-begotten brethren.
- putting up with console fanboys declaring the PC dead, even in the face of overwhelming contradictory evidence
Oh, and I intentionally left out price. Who here doesn't have a computer at home? I'd assume that you could drop the equivalent price of a 360 upgrading that to game-readiness.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
Bullshit. I got a gaming PC about three years ago. Athlon 64 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, a gigabyte of RAM.
Oblivion was the first game that was outright unplayable. Then I got X3. Slideshow. GRAW? Notta chance, good thing I got it for $5 from Goodwill. SupCom? Only on the lowest possible settings, and then it looks worse than TA Spring.
For a console, after a few years, the games start to get more optimized. Compare a launch PS2 title, say, Oni, to a brand-new one, say, FFXII. After a few years with a PC, the games get less optimized. Inexcusable.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
Bullshit. I got a gaming PC about three years ago. Athlon 64 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, a gigabyte of RAM.
Oblivion was the first game that was outright unplayable.
RE: Too many replies to single out a specific one.
Saying a PC will play games "like crap" after 6 months is over exaggeration of the highest order. I'm running a 2.8GHz Pentium with Hyper-Threading, 1G RAM and a Radeon 9800Pro. Cost me a bit more then $1.5K Canadian 4 years ago, and that price is including EVERYTHING (mouse, K/B, monitor, case, harddrice, etc. EVERYTHING). The only game I've played since then that I can't run on max settings is C&C3, where I needed to scale it back a bit.
Get a decent PC and it will run great for years, and then fine for many more years, and then ok for ages.
But, really, it should come down to games if that's what your looking for. Where are the exclusives and how long can you live without them. My favorite exclusives are for the PC, and the games for the 360/Wii/PS3? I can wait to play, so I'll keep my gaming PC and wait on some nice price drops before jumping into the new consoles.
Your decision will differ depending on what games you want.
PS - And yes, God I love CRTs.
Nobody said it runs like crap after 6 months.
You also don't have to deal with the rapid pace of hardware upgrades that are required to keep your PC in the "bare-bones" category for the next generation of PC games (that come out every 6 months and make your new PC look like a joke).
Yeah but the point about PC gaming is you have a period of about 6 months where your PC is top of the line and then it it outdated.
A PC will do that for 6 months after you get it. Then you'll have to turn down the details or upgrade.
All from the first page.
We're talking more like 3-4 years when console developers are just finally harnessing the full power of the console while your gaming PC is struggling to run anything new at acceptable framerates. The great thing about a console is you only need to ugprade very 4-5 years, and at a much lower pricetag. $1500 every 4 years is a shitload of money compared to $500 every 4 years.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
Yet my experience is completely different. I'm at the point where every game I've been trying to play lately has done so poorly. I've defragged, updated all drivers, run virus and spyware scanners, etc. They just do not run well on a 4 year old PC if I want to stay at my monitor's native resolution (Was 1280x1024 when I was more into PC gaming). A lot of this is due to the developer's poor optimization (Titan Quest and NWN2 are just poorly programmed games), but that is exactly the point. 360 games are made for 360 hardware. There is no variation outside of the hard drive. PC games have to be made for innumerable hardware configurations, and due to this tend to require higher-end hardware to run at the same level as the 360 (for the same game).
And let's not even get into the massive differences in cost. You can spend money to keep a PC going for several years longer, but eventually you hit a snag (Vista, AGP -> PCI-E, etc).
I also realized I made a bit of a hyperbole earlier, and so I take that back.
Go with the 360, with the money you'll save over a PC, you can buy a stack of games (I'm looking at you, Rock Band). Or Hell, you could get a 360 + decent HDTV + 5.1 surround sound for the price of a semi decent gaming rig.
As much as I love PC gaming, I got sick of the upgrades, drivers, optimising and patches after a few years. I blew around £3,000 on a 3D rendering / gaming uber-rig with all the trimmings once. Never again.
Get a 360, kick back in your living room with a coupla beers and just enjoy the games.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
Bullshit. I got a gaming PC about three years ago. Athlon 64 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, a gigabyte of RAM.
Oblivion was the first game that was outright unplayable. Then I got X3. Slideshow. GRAW? Notta chance, good thing I got it for $5 from Goodwill. SupCom? Only on the lowest possible settings, and then it looks worse than TA Spring.
For a console, after a few years, the games start to get more optimized. Compare a launch PS2 title, say, Oni, to a brand-new one, say, FFXII. After a few years with a PC, the games get less optimized. Inexcusable.
dude 9700 pro? that card competed with geforce4, it is almost 5 years old now.
I'd mostly agree with that. Sorry, one of the few things that really piss me off is people trying to make PC gaming sound like some sort of computer hardware cock measuring contest where you've got to constantly upgrade or your stuck playing Tetris. It's really not that bad.
And yeah, PC gaming is always gonna be more expensive. But a PC is also far more useful for many things.
And you can cut out alot of that price if your not doing a complete overhaul. Keeping just monitor, case, keyboard and mouse and such already knocks a bunch off. Hell, most of the time you just need a new motherboard, processor, graphics card and RAM. The rest of your old PC can come along for the ride.
And try turning down the resolution. I run at 1024 x 768 and have for like 6 years now. I prefer it lower as it makes stuff easier to read.
And the nice thing about consoles is because their around for so long, you can wait it out for the price drops and pick up a mature system on the cheap when it's got a fantastic library already set to go. And most of those games are nice and cheap too. I just bought my PS2 for $125CND last Christmas. Very nice.
Which brings back another thing price related, which is I've found PC games tend to be cheaper on average. But that may just be my experience.
I'd say do both, honestly. Just pick the one you can't live without now, and wait for the price to drop on the other. Putting together a PC that'll run Crysis will be alot cheaper a few years from now.
After a few years with a PC, the games get less optimized. Inexcusable.
That's not true. Video card drivers can make a world of difference, as can a more refined version on OpenGL or DirectX. Your complaint is most valid when complaining about the PC game-makers habit of throwing half-finished code out the door, assuming you'll be happy to download the ~1 Gb patch two months down the road. That sucks. I'm adding that to my list of PC negatives.
Oh, and DRM. Fuck you, Starforce and your ill-begotten brethren.
You'll probably get 5 good years of xbox 360 gaming compared to only 3 years out of a decent PC. Although saying that, that the price/potential of quad cores means there's the possibility to extend that quite easily with just a small g/card upgrade - I certainly think now is the perfect time in the upgrade cycle to be buying a PC, a Q6600 and an 8800GTS should set you up very nicely.
As for cost we have it really lucky in the UK, the price of PC games is roughly half that of X360 games on a lot of new releases, combine that with the lack of live fees then it's a good time to be a pc gamer. Shame it's not the same thing everywhere.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
Bullshit. I got a gaming PC about three years ago. Athlon 64 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, a gigabyte of RAM.
Oblivion was the first game that was outright unplayable. Then I got X3. Slideshow. GRAW? Notta chance, good thing I got it for $5 from Goodwill. SupCom? Only on the lowest possible settings, and then it looks worse than TA Spring.
For a console, after a few years, the games start to get more optimized. Compare a launch PS2 title, say, Oni, to a brand-new one, say, FFXII. After a few years with a PC, the games get less optimized. Inexcusable.
You're doing it wrong. My Pentium 4 2.6GHZ and Radeon 9600 Pro let me play GRAW, although at really low settings, and it wasn't much fun anyways. Oblivion was playable enough for me to sink 50+ hours in to it, something I would NEVER have done with a 360 because no matter how much better it would look, there wouldn't have been any user-made mods for me to use.
A gaming PC that you don't constantly upgrade WILL become obsolete (comparatively) in half a month to a year. What does obsolete mean? It means you won't run things at 1680x1050 on the highest settings with 16xAF and 8xAA and still get ~60FPS. It doesn't mean you can't play the newer games. In fact, it doesn't mean the newer games will look worse. In many cases, they'll look about as good as games looked back when your PC was top of the line, because that's the level that your PC can run games at.
Your 360 games will look better over time with no investment of money (aside from the 10 bucks extra a 360 game costs compared to a PC game, yoink), and your PC games will look about the same, maybe a bit better or worse depending on the specific engine and the parts. And if you ever want to make them look spectacular again (far and above what the 360 will be able to manage as time goes on) you just spend ~$300 to buy a new part and you're suddenly on top of the game again.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
Bullshit. I got a gaming PC about three years ago. Athlon 64 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, a gigabyte of RAM.
Oblivion was the first game that was outright unplayable. Then I got X3. Slideshow. GRAW? Notta chance, good thing I got it for $5 from Goodwill. SupCom? Only on the lowest possible settings, and then it looks worse than TA Spring.
For a console, after a few years, the games start to get more optimized. Compare a launch PS2 title, say, Oni, to a brand-new one, say, FFXII. After a few years with a PC, the games get less optimized. Inexcusable.
dude 9700 pro? that card competed with geforce4, it is almost 5 years old now.
That card competed with the GeForce FX, not the 4. ATi's competition to the GF4 was the Radeon 8000 series.
Your 360 games will look better over time with no investment of money (aside from the 10 bucks extra a 360 game costs compared to a PC game, yoink), and your PC games will look about the same, maybe a bit better or worse depending on the specific engine and the parts. And if you ever want to make them look spectacular again (far and above what the 360 will be able to manage as time goes on) you just spend ~$300 to buy a new part and you're suddenly on top of the game again.
This just isn't true at all. Eventually you hit a major technology change, and are forced to upgrade or be stuck with aging hardware. Being required to replace your Motherboard/CPU/GPU/RAM to stay "above and beyond what my $400 console is doing" is not cheap.
I still haven't seen a PC game that goes above-and-beyond what the 360 and PS3 are capable of.
I sometimes think the people that post in these threads are lying. I have an Athlon XP 3200 (crap I admit), two gigs of ram and a 7900GT, and I never run anything above 1024x768, and never at the highest settings. And yet stuff like City of Heroes runs into the single digits in big fights (note I think I'm barely running at medium settings), BF2142 chops up like hell in a big firefight (also barely medium settings), and I'm lucky if I get Oblivion running at a steady 30 fps out in the wilderness at medium settings. I honestly think computers hate me and run like shit just for me.
On topic, one thing computers won't have that the 360 will have is Rock Band, which is the big reason I'm not bothering with upgrading any time soon.
You are so CPU limited that you might as well game at the highest video settings and resolution you can. It won't affect your framerate that much, and the game will better in motion without as many jaggies.
I still haven't seen a PC game that goes above-and-beyond what the 360 and PS3 are capable of.
Assuming you're not getting all nit picky with slightly better resolutions then yes, you're right. However you will see better looking games utilizing newer technologies on the PC well before the next generation of consoles.
I used to be a hardcore PC gamer because the graphics were superior to the console. But now I hardly touch my PC for games since I got my 360. Things have changed now that I don't have to stare at blurry SD resolutions on a console.
I think that whichever you choose you will enjoy. PC exclusives, KBAM support, mods, or a console you can rely on, one you don't have to upgrade, and one where every game made for the platform will work without fail (unless it's broken, of course). You also get native mic support (every game has it, aside from FFXI), achievements, a universal friends list, and an invite system.
Games like Bioshock are going to be the start of when games look better on PC (cause of higher resultion, though that is assuming using higher than 1080p; and cause of directx 10).
There are many advantages of owning a pc over a console, though both are still decent systems.
I'd say other advantages/disadvantages of a 360 are:
+Overall cost (you do not need to upgrade to run 360 games so it's a one time fee for the 5-6 year life cycle)
+Nicely setup multiplayer (for most games, Xbox live is done well. Obviously PC has more freedom if the developer so chooses and it's free, but ease of use would be given to Xbox live)
+Usually companies release games to Xbox/consoles first. (Usually ;p some titles of course are released at the same time, but some are only ported later to PC)
PC:
+Flexibility of what controls do you want to use (keyboard mouse? 360 controller? any other joystick?)
+Upgradeable
+More advanced games later in life cycle (even though this might require upgrading, within the life cycle of the 360, you will start getting more advanced games for the PC)
Since my CPU/motherboard are about 4 years old (athlon +2800) and my video card I bought over 6 years ago (Radeon 9700 pro), the only option I have is to buy a new computer and that would cost about double than what an xbox would be.
3-5 years down the road? The PC would be worth more and I would get more use out of it. In the mean time? That's a big expense that I really have to consider is it worth it.
That and with Halo 3, Assassin's Creed and Resident Evil 5 not coming soon to the PC (if at all, they should, but dunno for sure)...makes that part more difficult hehe
That and with Halo 3, Assassin's Creed and Resident Evil 5 not coming soon to the PC (if at all, they should, but dunno for sure)...makes that part more difficult hehe
Huh? The PC version is getting released simultaneously with the 2 other versions AFAIK.
That and with Halo 3, Assassin's Creed and Resident Evil 5 not coming soon to the PC (if at all, they should, but dunno for sure)...makes that part more difficult hehe
Assassin's creed is coming out the same time to 360/PS3/PC. Halo 3 will undoubtably come out for the PC 2-3 years later and poorly optimized. Depending on if Capcom learned it's lession, there are even odds of RE5 coming to PCs eventually too.
Pretty much every noteworthy FPS and RPG which come out for the xbox eventually find their way to the PC, though not alway's in a form which is optimized to the point of being playable. Other genre's, like rock band, not so much.
Games coming out for the Pc from the 360 later on isnt a bad thing. Microsoft basically has two platforms in that respect because I expect a LOT of games to use the Games for Windows branding. Crysis will. I think thats important.
You can play games that have the GFW branding with a 360 gamepad. So if cost isnt really such a huge issue both platforms are a lot more homogonous than people let on. The only problem is some big games for 360 are not coming to PC and some big PC games wont go 360. If you look at the exclusives then make your choice.
fyi: Mass Effect isnt coming to PC. But Gears of War is.
I think if Bioshock is your foot in the door game, as it were, then wait for the reviews. Only like 3-4 weeks till it is out so check the reviews then.
I dont doubt it will be blisteringly good but there may be some comparisons between the PC and 360 version (my thoughts, the 360 version will be the 'lead' version and be marginally superior, but the PC version is not a shoddy port, has its own dev team specificqally working on PC optimisation)
I'm in the same boat as you, OP. The thing that tipped my hand to buy a 360 is the fact that there is a measure of comfort to having a box that is going to play every single 360 game for years to come. Rather than buying a PC then in two years be like "Well, fuck, I can't run that."
I'm in the same boat as you, OP. The thing that tipped my hand to buy a 360 is the fact that there is a measure of comfort to having a box that is going to play every single 360 game for years to come. Rather than buying a PC then in two years be like "Well, fuck, I can't run that."
Other then the optimization, what in hell would be the difference between PC BioShock and 360 BioShock? I'm curious.
It usually comes down to "This version looks better" and "This version plays better with <k/b & mouse or gamepad>". That's about it.
Sometimes ports are just pretty shitty.
For example, Halo's PC port has no option for anti-aliasing, and required way higher system specs than it should have.
So ..... Optimization?
And I'd say Halo's worst offense was lack of Co-op Single Player.
Halo also had some really, really stupid control choices.
For example, the warthog was steered with the mouse. Yeah, I got a gameover during the escape from the exploding ship part.
I never had problems with the Warthog controls on the PC version. It felt better with a gamepad, no doubt, but I got used to the mouse pretty quick. That said, the PC port of Halo was an absolute mess... and Halo 2's port is supposedly even worse
Posts
On topic, one thing computers won't have that the 360 will have is Rock Band, which is the big reason I'm not bothering with upgrading any time soon.
So if you have the big screen, go for the 360, it'd be stupid not too.
Plus, as my computer is almost purely a gaming machine, I feel like a tool upgrading it very often when a $300 option exists. Using it for home theater, stereo, etc etc might mean you have more of a case for needing a nice computer, though.
I have lower specs than those. Turn down the draw distance on oblivion, it makes it look better anyway. (you can see the seams on the ground textures and blatantly obvious sprite trees with it up).
I can't speak for the rest though. Clear out your harddrive and background programs?
Also, I when I say high settings, its everything on high except resolution, which is at 1024, and shadows usually on medium or low(as well as any other thing that might make it run slower but isn't very important).
That's how you get your money's worth in games.
Saying a PC will play games "like crap" after 6 months is over exaggeration of the highest order. I'm running a 2.8GHz Pentium with Hyper-Threading, 1G RAM and a Radeon 9800Pro. Cost me a bit more then $1.5K Canadian 4 years ago, and that price is including EVERYTHING (mouse, K/B, monitor, case, harddrice, etc. EVERYTHING). The only game I've played since then that I can't run on max settings is C&C3, where I needed to scale it back a bit.
Get a decent PC and it will run great for years, and then fine for many more years, and then ok for ages.
But, really, it should come down to games if that's what your looking for. Where are the exclusives and how long can you live without them. My favorite exclusives are for the PC, and the games for the 360/Wii/PS3? I can wait to play, so I'll keep my gaming PC and wait on some nice price drops before jumping into the new consoles.
Your decision will differ depending on what games you want.
PS - And yes, God I love CRTs.
Nobody said it runs like crap after 6 months. We're talking more like 3-4 years when console developers are just finally harnessing the full power of the console while your gaming PC is struggling to run anything new at acceptable framerates. The great thing about a console is you only need to ugprade very 4-5 years, and at a much lower pricetag. $1500 every 4 years is a shitload of money compared to $500 every 4 years.
All from the first page.
Yet more rediculous hyperbole. As long as your not trying to run in 10k x 12k resolution or something insane of that sort, your PC will run games fine for a LONG time.
For me, I'd say the fundamental difference is whether you are more comfortable gaming on your couch or at your desk. Personally, although I appreciate the comfort of kicking back like a sultan on a pile of pillows, I feel more like I'm gaming when I'm sitting up with my nose practically jammed in to the monitor.
For the Xbox 360:
+ easy set up/out of the box readiness
+ runs at the same speed as every other Xbox 360
+ nice built-in matchmaking service
+ 3-year warranty (for the most common of deaths), single vendor helpdesk
+ games are built around standard controllers
+ easier for guests to play alongside
- monthly fee for multiplayer
- have to buy all maps/add-ins/games
- some games cost more than PC equivalent (Shadowrun, at least)
- cannot upgrade your own hard drive, are slave to Microsoft's prices ($170=120 Gb HD)
PC
+ expandable and upgradeable with your choice of components ($50 = 160 Gb HD)
+ many free legally downloadable games, map packs, skins, and horse armor
+ free multiplayer
+ keyboard and mouse, if you're in to that kind of thing
+ can go higher than 720p max resolution
- uneven playing field. Assuming no h4x0rz, the faster computers have an advantage in multiplayer.
- not for guest use, usually (1 keyboard, 1 mouse = 1 player at the computer at a time)
- warranty is usually 1 year on parts, offered direct from any number of manufacturers, some of whom may have "Lucky" in their trade name and/or hail from obscure Asian nations.
- can be difficult to get running well, takes regular maintenance and an awareness of what the term "most current driver" means.
- games built with controller in mind may not port well to KBM
- idiots, like Gearbox Software, may decide to omit essential co-op play when porting one of your favorite titles
- Some game makers (some with the initials EA) will throw half-finished code out the door, assuming you'll be happy to download the ~1 Gb patch two months down the road.
- Digital Rights Management software and other viruses. Fuck you, Starforce and your ill-begotten brethren.
- putting up with console fanboys declaring the PC dead, even in the face of overwhelming contradictory evidence
Oh, and I intentionally left out price. Who here doesn't have a computer at home? I'd assume that you could drop the equivalent price of a 360 upgrading that to game-readiness.
Bullshit. I got a gaming PC about three years ago. Athlon 64 3200+, Radeon 9700 Pro, a gigabyte of RAM.
Oblivion was the first game that was outright unplayable. Then I got X3. Slideshow. GRAW? Notta chance, good thing I got it for $5 from Goodwill. SupCom? Only on the lowest possible settings, and then it looks worse than TA Spring.
For a console, after a few years, the games start to get more optimized. Compare a launch PS2 title, say, Oni, to a brand-new one, say, FFXII. After a few years with a PC, the games get less optimized. Inexcusable.
User error.
Yet my experience is completely different. I'm at the point where every game I've been trying to play lately has done so poorly. I've defragged, updated all drivers, run virus and spyware scanners, etc. They just do not run well on a 4 year old PC if I want to stay at my monitor's native resolution (Was 1280x1024 when I was more into PC gaming). A lot of this is due to the developer's poor optimization (Titan Quest and NWN2 are just poorly programmed games), but that is exactly the point. 360 games are made for 360 hardware. There is no variation outside of the hard drive. PC games have to be made for innumerable hardware configurations, and due to this tend to require higher-end hardware to run at the same level as the 360 (for the same game).
And let's not even get into the massive differences in cost. You can spend money to keep a PC going for several years longer, but eventually you hit a snag (Vista, AGP -> PCI-E, etc).
I also realized I made a bit of a hyperbole earlier, and so I take that back.
Panel's native: 1280x800. Sometimes at 1024x768; if the game doesn't support widescreen then that's the best I can do, after all.
As much as I love PC gaming, I got sick of the upgrades, drivers, optimising and patches after a few years. I blew around £3,000 on a 3D rendering / gaming uber-rig with all the trimmings once. Never again.
Get a 360, kick back in your living room with a coupla beers and just enjoy the games.
dude 9700 pro? that card competed with geforce4, it is almost 5 years old now.
I'd mostly agree with that. Sorry, one of the few things that really piss me off is people trying to make PC gaming sound like some sort of computer hardware cock measuring contest where you've got to constantly upgrade or your stuck playing Tetris. It's really not that bad.
And yeah, PC gaming is always gonna be more expensive. But a PC is also far more useful for many things.
And you can cut out alot of that price if your not doing a complete overhaul. Keeping just monitor, case, keyboard and mouse and such already knocks a bunch off. Hell, most of the time you just need a new motherboard, processor, graphics card and RAM. The rest of your old PC can come along for the ride.
And try turning down the resolution. I run at 1024 x 768 and have for like 6 years now. I prefer it lower as it makes stuff easier to read.
And the nice thing about consoles is because their around for so long, you can wait it out for the price drops and pick up a mature system on the cheap when it's got a fantastic library already set to go. And most of those games are nice and cheap too. I just bought my PS2 for $125CND last Christmas. Very nice.
Which brings back another thing price related, which is I've found PC games tend to be cheaper on average. But that may just be my experience.
I'd say do both, honestly. Just pick the one you can't live without now, and wait for the price to drop on the other. Putting together a PC that'll run Crysis will be alot cheaper a few years from now.
Use a lower resolution. You'll barely notice the difference. Like I said above, I always run at around 1024x768, depending.
That's not true. Video card drivers can make a world of difference, as can a more refined version on OpenGL or DirectX. Your complaint is most valid when complaining about the PC game-makers habit of throwing half-finished code out the door, assuming you'll be happy to download the ~1 Gb patch two months down the road. That sucks. I'm adding that to my list of PC negatives.
Oh, and DRM. Fuck you, Starforce and your ill-begotten brethren.
As for cost we have it really lucky in the UK, the price of PC games is roughly half that of X360 games on a lot of new releases, combine that with the lack of live fees then it's a good time to be a pc gamer. Shame it's not the same thing everywhere.
You're doing it wrong. My Pentium 4 2.6GHZ and Radeon 9600 Pro let me play GRAW, although at really low settings, and it wasn't much fun anyways. Oblivion was playable enough for me to sink 50+ hours in to it, something I would NEVER have done with a 360 because no matter how much better it would look, there wouldn't have been any user-made mods for me to use.
A gaming PC that you don't constantly upgrade WILL become obsolete (comparatively) in half a month to a year. What does obsolete mean? It means you won't run things at 1680x1050 on the highest settings with 16xAF and 8xAA and still get ~60FPS. It doesn't mean you can't play the newer games. In fact, it doesn't mean the newer games will look worse. In many cases, they'll look about as good as games looked back when your PC was top of the line, because that's the level that your PC can run games at.
Your 360 games will look better over time with no investment of money (aside from the 10 bucks extra a 360 game costs compared to a PC game, yoink), and your PC games will look about the same, maybe a bit better or worse depending on the specific engine and the parts. And if you ever want to make them look spectacular again (far and above what the 360 will be able to manage as time goes on) you just spend ~$300 to buy a new part and you're suddenly on top of the game again.
That card competed with the GeForce FX, not the 4. ATi's competition to the GF4 was the Radeon 8000 series.
This just isn't true at all. Eventually you hit a major technology change, and are forced to upgrade or be stuck with aging hardware. Being required to replace your Motherboard/CPU/GPU/RAM to stay "above and beyond what my $400 console is doing" is not cheap.
I still haven't seen a PC game that goes above-and-beyond what the 360 and PS3 are capable of.
Assuming you're not getting all nit picky with slightly better resolutions then yes, you're right. However you will see better looking games utilizing newer technologies on the PC well before the next generation of consoles.
I used to be a hardcore PC gamer because the graphics were superior to the console. But now I hardly touch my PC for games since I got my 360. Things have changed now that I don't have to stare at blurry SD resolutions on a console.
Couch vs Desk. Consider which you prefer and choose your platform accordingly.
I mentioned some of those before, but still.
There are many advantages of owning a pc over a console, though both are still decent systems.
I'd say other advantages/disadvantages of a 360 are:
+Overall cost (you do not need to upgrade to run 360 games so it's a one time fee for the 5-6 year life cycle)
+Nicely setup multiplayer (for most games, Xbox live is done well. Obviously PC has more freedom if the developer so chooses and it's free, but ease of use would be given to Xbox live)
+Usually companies release games to Xbox/consoles first. (Usually ;p some titles of course are released at the same time, but some are only ported later to PC)
PC:
+Flexibility of what controls do you want to use (keyboard mouse? 360 controller? any other joystick?)
+Upgradeable
+More advanced games later in life cycle (even though this might require upgrading, within the life cycle of the 360, you will start getting more advanced games for the PC)
Since my CPU/motherboard are about 4 years old (athlon +2800) and my video card I bought over 6 years ago (Radeon 9700 pro), the only option I have is to buy a new computer and that would cost about double than what an xbox would be.
3-5 years down the road? The PC would be worth more and I would get more use out of it. In the mean time? That's a big expense that I really have to consider is it worth it.
That and with Halo 3, Assassin's Creed and Resident Evil 5 not coming soon to the PC (if at all, they should, but dunno for sure)...makes that part more difficult hehe
Huh? The PC version is getting released simultaneously with the 2 other versions AFAIK.
Assassin's creed is coming out the same time to 360/PS3/PC. Halo 3 will undoubtably come out for the PC 2-3 years later and poorly optimized. Depending on if Capcom learned it's lession, there are even odds of RE5 coming to PCs eventually too.
Pretty much every noteworthy FPS and RPG which come out for the xbox eventually find their way to the PC, though not alway's in a form which is optimized to the point of being playable. Other genre's, like rock band, not so much.
You can play games that have the GFW branding with a 360 gamepad. So if cost isnt really such a huge issue both platforms are a lot more homogonous than people let on. The only problem is some big games for 360 are not coming to PC and some big PC games wont go 360. If you look at the exclusives then make your choice.
fyi: Mass Effect isnt coming to PC. But Gears of War is.
I think if Bioshock is your foot in the door game, as it were, then wait for the reviews. Only like 3-4 weeks till it is out so check the reviews then.
I dont doubt it will be blisteringly good but there may be some comparisons between the PC and 360 version (my thoughts, the 360 version will be the 'lead' version and be marginally superior, but the PC version is not a shoddy port, has its own dev team specificqally working on PC optimisation)
It usually comes down to "This version looks better" and "This version plays better with <k/b & mouse or gamepad>". That's about it.
Sometimes ports are just pretty shitty.
For example, Halo's PC port has no option for anti-aliasing, and required way higher system specs than it should have.
So ..... Optimization?
And I'd say Halo's worst offense was lack of Co-op Single Player.
:roll:
/sigh
Halo also had some really, really stupid control choices.
For example, the warthog was steered with the mouse. Yeah, I got a gameover during the escape from the exploding ship part.
I never had problems with the Warthog controls on the PC version. It felt better with a gamepad, no doubt, but I got used to the mouse pretty quick. That said, the PC port of Halo was an absolute mess... and Halo 2's port is supposedly even worse