How the hell can he say that PC gaming is fading away because of on-board graphics? Who the fuck buys a $300 dollar computer and decides to run a brand new game well? First on the box there are minimum requirements, then you will be asked if you want to upgrade that computer like 4 times before you make the purchase, because the guy you're buying it from will tell you it's shit for games and want to make some more cash on a better model or a GPU. Another point would be a game doesn't need to look photo realistic to be a good game, if you create a game that is addictive and fun to play it can look like shit and people will still play until their eyes bleed. If PC gaming is dying it's because of dinosaur cocksuckers like this complaining about "how back in the day...", instead of designing a decent fucking game. Fuck Epic and their whiny fuck-face dip-shit employees.
You are giving computer buyer's far, far to much credit. Read the box? Listen to the sales person? Do research?
The worst part of the integrated graphics is that in ads from Best Buy or Circuit City they laud these things as if their fast because of the CPU or the large amount of RAM and give the illusion that it'll run Crysis at max settings.
It really REALLY irks me.
My girlfriend's still mad at me for "being a selfish jerk" by telling her that her $400 HP probably wouldn't be able to run Crysis.
How the hell can he say that PC gaming is fading away because of on-board graphics? Who the fuck buys a $300 dollar computer and decides to run a brand new game well? First on the box there are minimum requirements, then you will be asked if you want to upgrade that computer like 4 times before you make the purchase, because the guy you're buying it from will tell you it's shit for games and want to make some more cash on a better model or a GPU. Another point would be a game doesn't need to look photo realistic to be a good game, if you create a game that is addictive and fun to play it can look like shit and people will still play until their eyes bleed. If PC gaming is dying it's because of dinosaur cocksuckers like this complaining about "how back in the day...", instead of designing a decent fucking game. Fuck Epic and their whiny fuck-face dip-shit employees.
You are giving computer buyer's far, far to much credit. Read the box? Listen to the sales person? Do research?
Come now.
This is exactly the reason some people prefer console gaming. Hardware failure aside, if you have a 360 (or Wii, PS3...) , and the game box says 360, then it will work. No research (or even talking to salespeople or reading boxes) required.
Edit: Of course some people probably get home and say, "I need a controller to play this, WTF?"
surely, the average human being is just as educated on computers and computer gaming as nerds who post on penny-arcade and live and breathe the internet?
surely, the average human being is just as educated on computers and computer gaming as nerds who post on penny-arcade and live and breathe the internet?
how is somebody supposed to know the difference between an 8500 and an 8600, or that they're both terrible for gaming?
Much less the "XFX - Fatal1ty GeForce 8500 GT Graphics Card" and the "XFX - NVIDIA GeForce 8500 GT Graphics Card" - both 512MB and 500MHz PCIE. If they even make it that far in the description. Most peoples' eyes glaze over after the 2nd or 3rd acronym.
Pemulis on
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KageraImitating the worst people. Since 2004Registered Userregular
edited March 2008
Oh god, it has the name of the greatest cyberathlete ever it MUST ROCK.
How the hell can he say that PC gaming is fading away because of on-board graphics? Who the fuck buys a $300 dollar computer and decides to run a brand new game well? First on the box there are minimum requirements, then you will be asked if you want to upgrade that computer like 4 times before you make the purchase, because the guy you're buying it from will tell you it's shit for games and want to make some more cash on a better model or a GPU. Another point would be a game doesn't need to look photo realistic to be a good game, if you create a game that is addictive and fun to play it can look like shit and people will still play until their eyes bleed. If PC gaming is dying it's because of dinosaur cocksuckers like this complaining about "how back in the day...", instead of designing a decent fucking game. Fuck Epic and their whiny fuck-face dip-shit employees.
I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about. People walk out of Best Buy with two-thousand dollar machines and integrated graphics. They have no idea what system requirements are or what the numbers mean. Then they buy say Bioshock and are pissed because it won't run. I've seen it happen multiple times on this very forum.
august on
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KageraImitating the worst people. Since 2004Registered Userregular
Piracy is certinally a concern (It fucked up the Dreamcast pretty bad)
I always thought it was the PS2 that fucked up Dreamcast. Everyone was waiting to buy one of those and didn't give ol' DC the chance it deserved.
I don't particularly believe that to be the case either. At least not in the US.
The Dreamcast was alive during the transition from dialup to high speed internet. CD burners weren't common stock in PCs, and the knowledge wasn't "easily" available.
Not that I advocate piracy or anything, but I don't think it's a big factor in what happened with the Dreamcast. The blame can firmly be placed on Sega.
Neither side is innocent. The pc industry sells boxes with no gaming capability without clearly denoting them as such, and that has to hurt the industry. If you are selling a pc game, and most of your customers have to purchase an additional, exceptionally expensive piece to get it to run, and require research and knowledge to get past the deliberately confusing jargon the graphics cards industry uses, well yah, they have a point about being mad. But on the other hand, despite being perfectly aware of these problems, they continue to go full steam ahead making products that only run well on bleeding edge computers, if your lucky. He has a point, but has to acknowledge his own role in the clusterfuck that is the pc/games market.
To be fair, buying expensive usually works if you get something with the right label. It just costs a whole damned lot and leaves you with no understanding of what you're doing.
If you haven't been eating, sleeping and breathing computers for a decade, you're probably not going to be able to cross the divide from "woefully ignorant" to "somewhat informed", no matter how easy it is to find the information you'd require. Remember the golden rule, people are stupid.
That includes me, but at the least I'm capable of building a house, skinning a deer, starting a fire and putting a gaming rig together in such a way that it will not explode.
I guess what I'm trying to say is who drops a bunch of cash on anything without asking a question or two? It would be like buying new tires for your car, they might not be the right size, but they are tires so it should all work out. If anyone ever did this they should have their money taken from them. Regardless, my main gripe here is with Epic not some clueless PC buyer.
Not all games need to be photo-realistic, I have a pretty decent computer and I still play games like fallout and jagged alliance etc. because they were fun, UT eXtreme XX!! just isn't fun anymore. Rehashing the same gamer over and over again finally caught up with them and people didn't buy it. Yet games that had similar game-play but had some tweaks that were cool and fun did sell, so clearly the industry is at fault and not Epic for putting fresh paint on a rundown house and calling it a brand new mansion.
Sunstrand on
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augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
Neither side is innocent. The pc industry sells boxes with no gaming capability without clearly denoting them as such, and that has to hurt the industry. If you are selling a pc game, and most of your customers have to purchase an additional, exceptionally expensive piece to get it to run, and require research and knowledge to get past the deliberately confusing jargon the graphics cards industry uses, well yah, they have a point about being mad. But on the other hand, despite being perfectly aware of these problems, they continue to go full steam ahead making products that only run well on bleeding edge computers, if your lucky. He has a point, but has to acknowledge his own role in the clusterfuck that is the pc/games market.
What does "run well" mean? Most games scale reasonably well to mid-range hardware. No one should expect shit to run well on integrated graphics, though. Every PC game would look like sub-PS2 quality if that were the case.
I guess what I'm trying to say is who drops a bunch of cash on anything without asking a question or two? It would be like buying new tires for your car, they might not be the right size, but they are tires so it should all work out. If anyone ever did this they should have their money taken from them. Regardless, my main gripe here is with Epic not some clueless PC buyer.
Not all games need to be photo-realistic, I have a pretty decent computer and I still play games like fallout and jagged alliance etc. because they were fun, UT eXtreme XX!! just isn't fun anymore. Rehashing the same gamer over and over again finally caught up with them and people didn't buy it. Yet games that had similar game-play but had some tweaks that were cool and fun did sell, so clearly the industry is at fault and not Epic for putting fresh paint on a rundown house and calling it a brand new mansion.
cool, tell me more about how the madden series is driving EA to bankruptcy
Given no prior knowledge of computers, how do you pick one to buy?
The way most people tend to think when dealing with stuff they don't know about: The more it costs the better it must be.
In the case of video cards, while they probably won't get the best performance for their money by taking this philosophy, they'll still probably do okay. As long as they're buying online, anyway. Retail will rape their wallets.
Anyway, entirely unrelated: One thing I found interesting in that article was how external graphics solutions are emerging. I could definitely see something marketed as "plug this into your computer to play games!" working pretty well. If it was pushed hard enough.
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
Damn, I have NO idea how to choosea video card from that list, they all have similar specs.
Yeah, I'm always confused by video card offerings, and I have at least a general idea of what I'm doing. I have no idea how an average consumer would be expected to handle this.
Thing is, they aren't really marketing to the average consumer. They expect anybody with enough know-how to open up their computer and swap parts to also care enough to do a little research. A pretty reasonable expectation, in my opinion--it's not like there aren't plenty of "best video card in X price range" guides out there.
That said, I do agree that there are far too many different models on the market. It's also frustrating how many different manufacturers there are for what is essentially the same technology. But what can you do? It's a form of outsourcing that makes things cheaper for Nvidia and AMD (ATI).
OremLK on
My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
0
augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
I guess what I'm trying to say is who drops a bunch of cash on anything without asking a question or two? It would be like buying new tires for your car, they might not be the right size, but they are tires so it should all work out. If anyone ever did this they should have their money taken from them. Regardless, my main gripe here is with Epic not some clueless PC buyer.
Not all games need to be photo-realistic, I have a pretty decent computer and I still play games like fallout and jagged alliance etc. because they were fun, UT eXtreme XX!! just isn't fun anymore. Rehashing the same gamer over and over again finally caught up with them and people didn't buy it. Yet games that had similar game-play but had some tweaks that were cool and fun did sell, so clearly the industry is at fault and not Epic for putting fresh paint on a rundown house and calling it a brand new mansion.
Your personal animosity against Epic has nothing to do with the fact that barely anyone who owns a pc owns a pc that can run games that look like anything a current-gen or even previous-gen system can handle.
The fact that you think the dude at Best Buy or wherever is warning people that they won't be able to play games on their new expensive desktop pretty much proves you're totally divorced from reality.
that was a great interview and everyone getting pissed and saying "rah rah rah UT3 sucked rah rah" either didn't read the article or are completely missing the point.
I know how to solve this problem. Let people use USB keyboards and mice to game on a console. Put out a lightweight version of Windows that runs on the 360 with no fuss, add a 500gb internal hard drive, and BAM! You have a very good gaming PC for basically no money. Maybe something for the next gen.
Accomplishes two things: 1) kills off the high end PC hardware market so they can allocate their energy towards making crazier consoles and 2) makes it cheap and affordable.
Honestly they wouldn't even need to do that. Just removing the requirement for games to be controllable by the 360 gamepad would be enough. You could clearly label a game as needing keyboard & mouse and then off you go. It would take less time and adjustment than completely rethinking the PC business.
I know how to solve this problem. Let people use USB keyboards and mice to game on a console. Put out a lightweight version of Windows that runs on the 360 with no fuss, add a 500gb internal hard drive, and BAM! You have a very good gaming PC for basically no money. Maybe something for the next gen.
Accomplishes two things: 1) kills off the high end PC hardware market so they can allocate their energy towards making crazier consoles and 2) makes it cheap and affordable.
Honestly they wouldn't even need to do that. Just removing the requirement for games to be controllable by the 360 gamepad would be enough. You could clearly label a game as needing keyboard & mouse and then off you go. It would take less time and adjustment than completely rethinking the PC business.
The xbox 360 isn't a computer. Even if they put windows on there, not a single program you run on your PC would be able to run on it. Especially not any games. Different CPU.
I know how to solve this problem. Let people use USB keyboards and mice to game on a console. Put out a lightweight version of Windows that runs on the 360 with no fuss, add a 500gb internal hard drive, and BAM! You have a very good gaming PC for basically no money. Maybe something for the next gen.
Accomplishes two things: 1) kills off the high end PC hardware market so they can allocate their energy towards making crazier consoles and 2) makes it cheap and affordable.
Honestly they wouldn't even need to do that. Just removing the requirement for games to be controllable by the 360 gamepad would be enough. You could clearly label a game as needing keyboard & mouse and then off you go. It would take less time and adjustment than completely rethinking the PC business.
No, you are wrong and don't understand PC/Console games industries.
PC gamers want PCs. They want customisable hardware, mods, indie games, niche games that probably couldn't be made with the license fees ascociated with consoles, massive forewards and backwards compatibilty, custom input, custom hardware, full control over the contents of their hard drive.
Console gamers want consoles. They want ease of use, no installs, no compatibilty issues, standardisation.
Nothing is wrong with these, and there is massive overlap of the two groups, but to say that the biggest (or main, or even only) difference between console and PC games is the input method would be very, very, wrong.
This is a bit off subject but I was browsing through those video cards and saw that some were offering a free t-shirt with purchase... checkout out the picture of this t-shirt
PCGA should streamline things. Customisability is great, but getting rid of redundant choices would be even better. It's kind of like the thing with XBox 360 and it's harddrive. It isn't entirely necessary to have one, as per MS's spiel, but it borks over the development process big time, and the average Joe is none the wiser.
Yeah, Sweeney's point is that the PC hardware market is incredibly bloated, and I'd like to add that it is purposefully confusing. I don't know why hardware manufacturers really feel the need to obfuscate their products even further. It's just a terrible business idea that is now biting them in the ass.
I know how to solve this problem. Let people use USB keyboards and mice to game on a console. Put out a lightweight version of Windows that runs on the 360 with no fuss, add a 500gb internal hard drive, and BAM! You have a very good gaming PC for basically no money. Maybe something for the next gen.
Accomplishes two things: 1) kills off the high end PC hardware market so they can allocate their energy towards making crazier consoles and 2) makes it cheap and affordable.
Honestly they wouldn't even need to do that. Just removing the requirement for games to be controllable by the 360 gamepad would be enough. You could clearly label a game as needing keyboard & mouse and then off you go. It would take less time and adjustment than completely rethinking the PC business.
No, you are wrong and don't understand PC/Console games industries.
PC gamers want PCs. They want customisable hardware, mods, indie games, niche games that probably couldn't be made with the license fees ascociated with consoles, massive forewards and backwards compatibilty, custom input, custom hardware, full control over the contents of their hard drive.
Console gamers want consoles. They want ease of use, no installs, no compatibilty issues, standardisation.
Nothing is wrong with these, and there is massive overlap of the two groups, but to say that the biggest (or main, or even only) difference between console and PC games is the input method would be very, very, wrong.
No you are wrong and making all kinds of generalizations about gamers. PC gamers in particular. Massively inaccurate generalizations.
Gamers will play games. I think the criteria for what a gamer wants is pretty simple:
A) The game runs The game offers the experience I want
C) The game is fun
Currently, PCs generally fail miserably at A but offer the unique experience that fulfills B. This unique experience may include sitting upright at a desk looking at a comparatively small monitor, but certainly includes a keyboard and mouse. The vast majority probably don't care about their hardware and only want a system that will adequately play the games they want to play. The elite gamer geeks who have more money than sense are the only ones looking for your "custom" this and that, and I don't think there is too many of these people, because I have yet to encounter one outside the internet. Therefore, I would suggest that there are not enough of these people to sustain the PC games market. As far as forwards compatability goes - LOLROFLLMAO JESUS - you can't be serious. That is a real laugh. You are speaking from some idealized gaming pulpit so far above the clouds, you can't see through them to what the normal people want. I would go so far as to say you have absolutely zero business sense.
Here's a hint: the first Geforce 9000 card is not a GTX. It is not what the hardcore gamers want. It is something targeted towards the everyman... the people who will buy in volume.
As far as niche or cultish games or whatever, newsflash. XNA Creator's Club. Put out whatever you want for the 360 for some nominal fee per year. Peer reviewed. Released for download. Out it goes. All the niche and cult games you could ever want. Best part is, they are cross platform between the PC and 360.
You can keep your full control over your system if you want. Why do you want full control? To keep the system running well. Why do you want your system running at 100%? To increase productivity or keep your games running smoothly. What causes a PC to slow down? Connecting it to the internet, running lots of files, BitTorrent, movies, MP3s, iTunes and other junk programs, etc. Basically everything. If you completely separated one half of your computer's utility (the aforementioned tasks) from the other (gaming) and then offloaded the gaming portion to a console built ENTIRELY for that purpose, you would then be left with fairly light requirements for what you need from your computer to handle productivity and surfing and that.
If you were playing Dwarf Fortress on your 360 with a keyboard, I doubt you would care your 360 is powering the experience. The "edge" the PC used to maintain over consoles by virtue of its rapidly advancing hardware is gone. The graphical differences are minimal even for power users, multiplayer experiences are now better on the consoles, the depth of the games is improving (hampered only by controller restrictions)... there is no reason for the PC to continue at a gaming platform.
I know how to solve this problem. Let people use USB keyboards and mice to game on a console. Put out a lightweight version of Windows that runs on the 360 with no fuss, add a 500gb internal hard drive, and BAM! You have a very good gaming PC for basically no money. Maybe something for the next gen.
Accomplishes two things: 1) kills off the high end PC hardware market so they can allocate their energy towards making crazier consoles and 2) makes it cheap and affordable.
Honestly they wouldn't even need to do that. Just removing the requirement for games to be controllable by the 360 gamepad would be enough. You could clearly label a game as needing keyboard & mouse and then off you go. It would take less time and adjustment than completely rethinking the PC business.
The xbox 360 isn't a computer. Even if they put windows on there, not a single program you run on your PC would be able to run on it. Especially not any games. Different CPU.
I said maybe next generation. The convergence between consoles and PCs reached new heights with this latest generation, especially the 360 and PC. The same code can compile for 360s and PCs already! The biggest engine out there right now is cross platform between the 360, PS3 and PC. Cryengine will be soon as well. Everything runs on every platform now, but it is certainly easier and a more consistent experience on the consoles.
Seriously, you guys don't need worry about to reading the rest of it.
OoooOOOoooh
I was speaking from experience there. I spent how much? on an 8800GTX that about 10 months later had its ass thoroughly kicked by a game called Crysis... I could point out the logical fallacy you commit with your post there, but would be more interested in seeing a point-by-point response first so we could have some intelligent discussion.
Seriously, you guys don't need worry about to reading the rest of it.
OoooOOOoooh
I was speaking from experience there. I spent how much? on an 8800GTX that about 10 months later had its ass thoroughly kicked by a game called Crysis... I could point out the logical fallacy you commit with your post there, but would be more interested in seeing a point-by-point response first so we could have some intelligent discussion.
I don't think Crysis can be held up as an example for anything, good or bad. It was made with the soul intention of humbling geeks PC's, something I don't think was a good idea anyway. I am willing to bet your 8800GTX plays damn near everything else just fine.
Seriously, you guys don't need worry about to reading the rest of it.
OoooOOOoooh
I was speaking from experience there. I spent how much? on an 8800GTX that about 10 months later had its ass thoroughly kicked by a game called Crysis... I could point out the logical fallacy you commit with your post there, but would be more interested in seeing a point-by-point response first so we could have some intelligent discussion.
I don't think Crysis can be held up as an example for anything, good or bad. It was made with the soul intention of humbling geeks PC's, something I don't think was a good idea anyway. I am willing to bet your 8800GTX plays damn near everything else just fine.
Well I don't know about his PC, but I'm able to play Crysis just fine with everything on High (heck, a couple of things set to very high ( I'm a fan of the light rays, OK? )). Looks frigging incredible with the added Natural mod. This is at the 2nd highest resolution as well (1440 x 900 ). But you're right, the very high settings were just meant for expandability of the engine. It doesn't mean the game looks crap now, it means that the game can look even better in future. They also exist as a tech demo of the engine itself, for obvious reasons. Heck, the game looks awesome even on medium settings. I've never understood the "ZOMG, you can't run Crysis completely maxed out, it shows how crap PC's are" line of thought. That's really the wrong way of looking at it. The game was designed with future hardware advancements in mind, and if you can honestly say it looks crap playing on modern hardware then I can't really help you there.
I mean, I remember when John Carmack was talking about the then upcoming Doom III, and how it was going to include texture sizes and details that you wouldn't feasibly be able to use until future generations of cards with 512MB RAM. That didn't make Doom III look any less awesome at the settings it ran at then, it was just an option for expandability.
OT, but it's also the first game that got me properly interested in level design, enough to actually try tutorials and things. If you haven't tried it, do so, the Sandbox editor is a really amazing piece of work.
Posts
You are giving computer buyer's far, far to much credit. Read the box? Listen to the sales person?
Do research?
Come now.
My girlfriend's still mad at me for "being a selfish jerk" by telling her that her $400 HP probably wouldn't be able to run Crysis.
This is exactly the reason some people prefer console gaming. Hardware failure aside, if you have a 360 (or Wii, PS3...) , and the game box says 360, then it will work. No research (or even talking to salespeople or reading boxes) required.
Edit: Of course some people probably get home and say, "I need a controller to play this, WTF?"
look at this shit
how is somebody supposed to know the difference between an 8500 and an 8600, or that they're both terrible for gaming?
WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE GOOD OL' DAYS OF PLUG'N'PLAY??
Much less the "XFX - Fatal1ty GeForce 8500 GT Graphics Card" and the "XFX - NVIDIA GeForce 8500 GT Graphics Card" - both 512MB and 500MHz PCIE. If they even make it that far in the description. Most peoples' eyes glaze over after the 2nd or 3rd acronym.
Seriously, how many people even know who that is?
Given no in-depth knowledge of computers and far too much time looking at charts on tomshardware, how do you pick one to buy?
I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about. People walk out of Best Buy with two-thousand dollar machines and integrated graphics. They have no idea what system requirements are or what the numbers mean. Then they buy say Bioshock and are pissed because it won't run. I've seen it happen multiple times on this very forum.
The way most people tend to think when dealing with stuff they don't know about: The more it costs the better it must be.
And now everyone knows how Monster sells overpriced cables.
I don't particularly believe that to be the case either. At least not in the US.
The Dreamcast was alive during the transition from dialup to high speed internet. CD burners weren't common stock in PCs, and the knowledge wasn't "easily" available.
Not that I advocate piracy or anything, but I don't think it's a big factor in what happened with the Dreamcast. The blame can firmly be placed on Sega.
If you haven't been eating, sleeping and breathing computers for a decade, you're probably not going to be able to cross the divide from "woefully ignorant" to "somewhat informed", no matter how easy it is to find the information you'd require. Remember the golden rule, people are stupid.
That includes me, but at the least I'm capable of building a house, skinning a deer, starting a fire and putting a gaming rig together in such a way that it will not explode.
Not all games need to be photo-realistic, I have a pretty decent computer and I still play games like fallout and jagged alliance etc. because they were fun, UT eXtreme XX!! just isn't fun anymore. Rehashing the same gamer over and over again finally caught up with them and people didn't buy it. Yet games that had similar game-play but had some tweaks that were cool and fun did sell, so clearly the industry is at fault and not Epic for putting fresh paint on a rundown house and calling it a brand new mansion.
What does "run well" mean? Most games scale reasonably well to mid-range hardware. No one should expect shit to run well on integrated graphics, though. Every PC game would look like sub-PS2 quality if that were the case.
cool, tell me more about how the madden series is driving EA to bankruptcy
edit: and the sims
The average consumer.
These people, right here. The guys who don't know how to use google, or a map. Them. Cast aside your faith in humanity, it is misplaced.
In the case of video cards, while they probably won't get the best performance for their money by taking this philosophy, they'll still probably do okay. As long as they're buying online, anyway. Retail will rape their wallets.
Anyway, entirely unrelated: One thing I found interesting in that article was how external graphics solutions are emerging. I could definitely see something marketed as "plug this into your computer to play games!" working pretty well. If it was pushed hard enough.
Yeah, I'm always confused by video card offerings, and I have at least a general idea of what I'm doing. I have no idea how an average consumer would be expected to handle this.
That said, I do agree that there are far too many different models on the market. It's also frustrating how many different manufacturers there are for what is essentially the same technology. But what can you do? It's a form of outsourcing that makes things cheaper for Nvidia and AMD (ATI).
Your personal animosity against Epic has nothing to do with the fact that barely anyone who owns a pc owns a pc that can run games that look like anything a current-gen or even previous-gen system can handle.
The fact that you think the dude at Best Buy or wherever is warning people that they won't be able to play games on their new expensive desktop pretty much proves you're totally divorced from reality.
Accomplishes two things: 1) kills off the high end PC hardware market so they can allocate their energy towards making crazier consoles and 2) makes it cheap and affordable.
Honestly they wouldn't even need to do that. Just removing the requirement for games to be controllable by the 360 gamepad would be enough. You could clearly label a game as needing keyboard & mouse and then off you go. It would take less time and adjustment than completely rethinking the PC business.
The xbox 360 isn't a computer. Even if they put windows on there, not a single program you run on your PC would be able to run on it. Especially not any games. Different CPU.
No, you are wrong and don't understand PC/Console games industries.
PC gamers want PCs. They want customisable hardware, mods, indie games, niche games that probably couldn't be made with the license fees ascociated with consoles, massive forewards and backwards compatibilty, custom input, custom hardware, full control over the contents of their hard drive.
Console gamers want consoles. They want ease of use, no installs, no compatibilty issues, standardisation.
Nothing is wrong with these, and there is massive overlap of the two groups, but to say that the biggest (or main, or even only) difference between console and PC games is the input method would be very, very, wrong.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowImage.aspx?Image=00-995-043-03.jpg%2c00-995-043-04.jpg&S7ImageFlag=0&WaterMark=1&Item=N82E16800995043&Depa=1&Description=AMD+free+gift+-+Phenom+T-shirt
Is that a design or the most wrinkled shirt ever?
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
wait
wait
Unreal tournament 3 is out?
No you are wrong and making all kinds of generalizations about gamers. PC gamers in particular. Massively inaccurate generalizations.
Gamers will play games. I think the criteria for what a gamer wants is pretty simple:
A) The game runs
C) The game is fun
Currently, PCs generally fail miserably at A but offer the unique experience that fulfills B. This unique experience may include sitting upright at a desk looking at a comparatively small monitor, but certainly includes a keyboard and mouse. The vast majority probably don't care about their hardware and only want a system that will adequately play the games they want to play. The elite gamer geeks who have more money than sense are the only ones looking for your "custom" this and that, and I don't think there is too many of these people, because I have yet to encounter one outside the internet. Therefore, I would suggest that there are not enough of these people to sustain the PC games market. As far as forwards compatability goes - LOLROFLLMAO JESUS - you can't be serious. That is a real laugh. You are speaking from some idealized gaming pulpit so far above the clouds, you can't see through them to what the normal people want. I would go so far as to say you have absolutely zero business sense.
Here's a hint: the first Geforce 9000 card is not a GTX. It is not what the hardcore gamers want. It is something targeted towards the everyman... the people who will buy in volume.
As far as niche or cultish games or whatever, newsflash. XNA Creator's Club. Put out whatever you want for the 360 for some nominal fee per year. Peer reviewed. Released for download. Out it goes. All the niche and cult games you could ever want. Best part is, they are cross platform between the PC and 360.
You can keep your full control over your system if you want. Why do you want full control? To keep the system running well. Why do you want your system running at 100%? To increase productivity or keep your games running smoothly. What causes a PC to slow down? Connecting it to the internet, running lots of files, BitTorrent, movies, MP3s, iTunes and other junk programs, etc. Basically everything. If you completely separated one half of your computer's utility (the aforementioned tasks) from the other (gaming) and then offloaded the gaming portion to a console built ENTIRELY for that purpose, you would then be left with fairly light requirements for what you need from your computer to handle productivity and surfing and that.
If you were playing Dwarf Fortress on your 360 with a keyboard, I doubt you would care your 360 is powering the experience. The "edge" the PC used to maintain over consoles by virtue of its rapidly advancing hardware is gone. The graphical differences are minimal even for power users, multiplayer experiences are now better on the consoles, the depth of the games is improving (hampered only by controller restrictions)... there is no reason for the PC to continue at a gaming platform.
I've just distilled your post for everyone else.
Seriously, you guys don't need worry about to reading the rest of it.
I said maybe next generation. The convergence between consoles and PCs reached new heights with this latest generation, especially the 360 and PC. The same code can compile for 360s and PCs already! The biggest engine out there right now is cross platform between the 360, PS3 and PC. Cryengine will be soon as well. Everything runs on every platform now, but it is certainly easier and a more consistent experience on the consoles.
OoooOOOoooh
I was speaking from experience there. I spent how much? on an 8800GTX that about 10 months later had its ass thoroughly kicked by a game called Crysis... I could point out the logical fallacy you commit with your post there, but would be more interested in seeing a point-by-point response first so we could have some intelligent discussion.
I don't think Crysis can be held up as an example for anything, good or bad. It was made with the soul intention of humbling geeks PC's, something I don't think was a good idea anyway. I am willing to bet your 8800GTX plays damn near everything else just fine.
Well I don't know about his PC, but I'm able to play Crysis just fine with everything on High (heck, a couple of things set to very high ( I'm a fan of the light rays, OK? )). Looks frigging incredible with the added Natural mod. This is at the 2nd highest resolution as well (1440 x 900 ). But you're right, the very high settings were just meant for expandability of the engine. It doesn't mean the game looks crap now, it means that the game can look even better in future. They also exist as a tech demo of the engine itself, for obvious reasons. Heck, the game looks awesome even on medium settings. I've never understood the "ZOMG, you can't run Crysis completely maxed out, it shows how crap PC's are" line of thought. That's really the wrong way of looking at it. The game was designed with future hardware advancements in mind, and if you can honestly say it looks crap playing on modern hardware then I can't really help you there.
I mean, I remember when John Carmack was talking about the then upcoming Doom III, and how it was going to include texture sizes and details that you wouldn't feasibly be able to use until future generations of cards with 512MB RAM. That didn't make Doom III look any less awesome at the settings it ran at then, it was just an option for expandability.
OT, but it's also the first game that got me properly interested in level design, enough to actually try tutorials and things. If you haven't tried it, do so, the Sandbox editor is a really amazing piece of work.