Oh how i miss the old days of PC gaming.

[Streeteh]

*sigh* well, i ate my own words and forked out for Bioshock 2 despite being underwhelmed with the first. Is the second a better game? To be honest i couldn't tell you. The PC version for me has been plagued with little annoying bugs that have me dropping in and out of the game constantly. I'd been out and onto google for a solution to no less than three bugs within my first 20 min play session. First the mouse sensitivity refused to change, then the hacking tool didn't work correctly and now i can't loot corpses.

The first Bioshock was a horrendous mess too, it took me over an hour to get it running due to sound issues. I eventually found a solution but dear god was it a runaround (reinstall audio codec, set as windows xp compat, disable dx10).

Add to that my Mass Effect 2 game where Shepard kept getting stuck all the bloomin' time and achievements not unlocking correctly and then there was Dragon Age where mana regen was bugged and my character fell down a chasm just as i quick saved so i had to start from scratch as i was eternally stuck in a pit. I'm feeling fairly fed up of PC gaming at the moment, anyone else feeling utterly put off of investing in PC games these days? It's becoming a rare occurrence to find one that functions correctly.

Disclaimer: All of the above are widespread issues, it's not just my system having them.

[cheets]

Last game I tried to play on my pc was Far Cry 2, it wouldn't run so not bothered since then and just use my 360 its hassle free and I don't care about the frame rate or graphics.

Less time to mess on games, PC gaming was great when I was a teenager.

[Streeteh]

Graphics really don't bother me, it's the price that keeps luring me back onto the PC. For example, bioshock 2 cost me £27 and came with a free copy of bioshock, dragon age was again £27 and mass effect 2 cost a piddly £25. That's a good £10ish cheaper than the average release day console title. The better graphics and (in the case of shooters) preferred control methods are pleasant bonuses too. Fortunately i think ShopTo accidentally mispriced a load of PS3 exlusives so i've got all of the big ones preordered for £32 each, cheap enough for me to not need to venture back to PC gaming... at least for now.

[Jonny69]

I like modern pc's because I don't have to press the Turbo button to play Sopwith :D

[Mark]

Graphics really don't bother me, it's the price that keeps luring me back onto the PC. For example, bioshock 2 cost me £27 and came with a free copy of bioshock, dragon age was again £27 and mass effect 2 cost a piddly £25. That's a good £10ish cheaper than the average release day console title. The better graphics and (in the case of shooters) preferred control methods are pleasant bonuses too. Fortunately i think ShopTo accidentally mispriced a load of PS3 exlusives so i've got all of the big ones preordered for £32 each, cheap enough for me to not need to venture back to PC gaming... at least for now.

How much did you spend on the gaming PC though? I'll wager more than the console. Would you have spent that much if you didn't intend to play games on it? If not, the 'savings' on games are a false economy. :)

If some of the pundits are right, the trend towards user-friendly but functionally dedicated computing devices (Xbox, iPad, et al.) is likely to continue - adding further impetus to the demise of the PC as a gaming platform.

IMO, PC gaming isn't worth the hassle/expense - though that doesn't mean I wouldn't play some of the older, less demanding games like Q3 if the mood took me. In fact, maybe I should install it again.

[Streeteh]

How much did you spend on the gaming PC though? I'll wager more than the console. Would you have spent that much if you didn't intend to play games on it? If not, the 'savings' on games are a false economy. :)

Last thing i bought was approx 2 years ago, a new motherboard, ram and CPU. The cost, after reselling my old gear, was approximately £90. Nearly another year before that was a new graphics card which cost me £100. So that's £190 in three years, considering i also use it for other things i'd say it's worked out about as expensive as console gaming. I'd also say i can't see myself upgrading again for a long while yet, my current hardware is more than sufficient.

In short, i don't agree with these claims that hardware costs silly money if you want to play PC games. It doesn't, you just have to buy smart. My 8800GT for example still runs all of todays games on high settings (bar crysis), it cost me £150 new (then minus the £50 i sold my old card for) nearly three years ago, people who spend £300 on the newest graphics cards every few months are just mental imo.

[Mark]

Totally agree with you on that last point. My last purchase of anything 'current generation' (at the time) was a Radeon 3850 - and that was forced due to not owning any PCI-e cards and wanting an HDMI-capable card to keep future options open. I recall that being about £100 too, and it still does everything I need it for (admittedly that doesn't include gaming).

[divine]

How much did you spend on the gaming PC though? I'll wager more than the console. Would you have spent that much if you didn't intend to play games on it? If not, the 'savings' on games are a false economy. :)

I wouldn't have spent £110 on a graphics card. The rest would have been exactly the same spec.

PC gaming isn't necessarily always ultra expensive, especially if you have other reasonably demanding uses for your PC that you need to buy for anyway. Obviously a sole gaming machine is far less cost effective but how many people really buy a PC for gaming and nothing else?

[Haly]

In short, i don't agree with these claims that hardware costs silly money if you want to play PC games. It doesn't, you just have to buy smart.

:)

My laptop although nothing overly impressive can run DiRT2, ME2 and Bioshock 2 on medium without any noticeable difficulty. Admittedly I've never been one to notice FPS rates unless they're ridiculously low/stuttering but I'm happy with it.

I've always been the same even when I was pretty much a PC gamer only for a brief time. I'd have a decent specced PC but nothing ridiculous like some did. Just enough that the games I wanted to play could run on medium. The idea of having to spend a fortune seems a fallacy to me unless you're someone who gets worryingly excited over benchmark scores :p


Hope I don't come across the problems you've had though Streeteh! Currently only got Bioshock 2 for the PC although hopefully being sent a console copy sometime soon.

[Flibster]

I miss the games of old, but not the hassles of old.

EMM386, EMS, XMS.... :shocked:

Although, some of the crap to go through now to get a game to run is almost as bad. GTA4 for example..GFWL, Rockstar live thing...

The stupid levels DRM have reached really piss me off. I cancelled my Bioshock2 preorder because of it.

[Jingo]

I picked up gta4 on the cheap from steam, and despite having a nice system the performance of the game is shocking.

I certainly can't be bottomed to fiddle and finely tweak settings etc as the pleasure in gaming for me is derived from being able to fire up some escapist fun for short periods.

Xbox = turn it on, pick up controller, games play as they should.

That's my opinion on what might seem to be the future of PC gaming, although it's certainly not all bad; L4D, TF2 and other steam multiplayers are still very enjoyable (if only I had more spare time!) :D

[Garp]

"Good old days of PC Gaming"? When were they then :D

For as long as I remember there have always been hassles with gaming on the PC, you pay the price for better graphics and superior control interface.

I hate to think how many hours I spent grappling with memmaker, qemm386 etc. trying to break 600k of free base memory just so I could play Frontier: Elite II. In those days you had to know your hardware intimately, how sound cards were configured etc. etc. because you had to set them up (usually by invoking a separate config file).

Eventually DirectX and OpenGL came along and all of a sudden devs found their lives a lot easier and gamers could breath a little easier too. No more faffing about with crap.

But along with that games have been getting more and more complex and what the average gamer wants has changed. We want freedom, we want choice, we want to do what we want to do and not necessarily what the game maker wants. Game testing is a nightmare these days, because there is nothing you can do to replicate what end users might do. Games are so complex they even fail to run properly on games consoles too at times.

[Justsomebloke]

I Love my pc.

[NokkonWud]

Graphics really don't bother me, it's the price that keeps luring me back onto the PC.

I'd go console every time, sure it's £40 new (although BioShock 2 Rapture edition was only £30 new on Xbox360 from Zavvi), but you can sell your games on, often for 3/4's the price, so it's actually cheaper, you don't get those stupid PC bugs and they just *work*.

I don't miss the days of PC gaming at all. Drivers, updates etc.. all feel like a thing of the past. This generation consoles really have kicked on and for what I get I'd rather pay that money every day of the week over the cheaper (and quite often, inferior) version on the PC.

[divine]

I picked up gta4 on the cheap from steam, and despite having a nice system the performance of the game is shocking.

There are two caveats to GTA 4s performance:

1 - it was a lazy port that didn't have a great deal of effort put into it and the way it tries to render things is somewhat arse backwards compared to other PC games so it cannot always take proper advantage of PC hardware.

2 - it looks vastly better than the console version, if you ran it at the same sort of settings it used for the consoles, it will run a surprising amount faster. It does really like a quad though (even a slow one), as it was designed to make use of the multicore CPUs in the consoles.

[Will]

I like modern pc's because I don't have to press the Turbo button to play Sopwith :D

:D

I liked the Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe.

I still think I have a copy of Monkey Island 1 on 5.25 floppies somewhere too! :cool:

I still think having to set up your config.sys and autoexec.bat with different modules into low and/or high memory was awesome fun! :D

[Justsomebloke]

I still think having to set up your config.sys and autoexec.bat with different modules into low and/or high memory was awesome fun! :D

I have to admit that my PC is my Hobby & I Love messing/Tweaking it it's just what I like doing. :cool:
My console is for Forza 3 & I am Loving that as much as BF2. :shocked: They are two completely different set ups though & Both have a Big part in my life.
I tweak Forza 3 More than I tweak my PC that's for sure. ;D
I feel privileged to have Both systems running Perfectly though & I know I get the best for me from them both. :cool:

[Belmit]

The only thing I miss from my PC days is the control system. I'm very happy these days to do without having to update drivers, patch games, try different resolutions and getting random crashes etc. but having played HL2 on both PC and console it does make me long for the old mouse and keyboard combo.

Plug and play gaming is a decent enough compromise though I guess.

[Treefrog]

Totally agree with you on that last point. My last purchase of anything 'current generation' (at the time) was a Radeon 3850 - and that was forced due to not owning any PCI-e cards and wanting an HDMI-capable card to keep future options open. I recall that being about £100 too, and it still does everything I need it for (admittedly that doesn't include gaming).
That X850 I bought off you is still doing well :)
I was checking out GPUs @ hardwaresecrets.com and was pleasantly surprised at just how good it is! I'd need a 3850 or 4850 to get any worthwhile improvement in data throughput.
Thanks again and if you plan on upgrading from the 3850 in the future I may well be interested ;)

Entropia is bugfix after glitch after update after 'undocumented feature' and I know it annoys a lot of other players there too. it does seem that everything now is more focussed on graphics rather than gameplay. The gfx are nice but you can only look at the scenery for so long ...

Gameplay ftw!

[Briggykins]

The only thing I miss from my PC days is the control system. I'm very happy these days to do without having to update drivers, patch games, try different resolutions and getting random crashes etc. but having played HL2 on both PC and console it does make me long for the old mouse and keyboard combo.

This is also the case for me. While I can't really say I've ever had a major problem getting a game working since probably Direct X 3, it's undoubtedly true that console gaming is much easier to get going. But I'm so welded to a mouse and keyboard that I just can't play my usual games on a gamepad (though I'm not saying it's impossible - I'm sure there are a great many console players who would destroy me even without a keyboard). So when PC gaming finally goes under, as unfortunately I'm sure it will, I'll be one of those clinging to the wreckage.
That said though, I didn't realise how much fun race games were until I started playing them on the console. Horses for courses I guess.

[Pumpkinstew]

I had similar issues to Streeteh with Fallout 3. I got it on launch day and never got it through the opening cutscene.
My preference now is to get a game on Xbox over PC because I know it will work. And if it's PC exclusive (like an MMO) then you can have more confidence that the devs will have done a better job of testing it instead of just handing over the 360 code to a third party to do a shoddy port of.

[Dymetrie]

Well I don't have a super computer, just an X2 4400+ with 4GB RAM and an 8800... Yet I don't have to tweak any of the games that I play at all, and they all run perfectly.

Although, saying that then GTA IV does judder every now and then, but that could be linked to my wallpaper rotation :p

Oh, and almost every game I have sets itself to 'high' settings automagically...

Much better than my old Acorn Electron where I had to fiddle with the volume wheel on the tape recorder to even get games to load!

[loki]

Well I don't have a super computer, just an X2 4400+ with 4GB RAM and an 8800... Yet I don't have to tweak any of the games that I play at all, and they all run perfectly.

Although, saying that then GTA IV does judder every now and then, but that could be linked to my wallpaper rotation :p

Oh, and almost every game I have sets itself to 'high' settings automagically...

Much better than my old Acorn Electron where I had to fiddle with the volume wheel on the tape recorder to even get games to load!

This

It really bemuses me when the (often false) argument of it costs £x (insert overinflated cost of choice) to play games on a decent PC or supposed driver or patch issue is the death knell of PC gaming. Quite often the people who go on about patching issues are the ones that haven't really played anything on PC for some time. If you want to justify playing the latest games at the best possible quality by having to build an uber PC then knock yourself out but it's completely unnecessary.


I buy my games through Steam, they load and they work, all on high settings, no messing on with incomparability issues and it install patches when released by the dev exactly the same way as it does on PSN or XBL. Maybe my experience is different to other people and I have just fallen lucky by building my PC and everything works all the time everytime out of the box so to speak :confused:

[Admiral Huddy]

I still love PC gaming but it's only one half of the interest tbh .. not just the gaming but tweaking around and so forth.. I have tried the Xbox but i find the controller to fiddly and I just can't seem to lock on to a target. My son finds it very amusing.

I haven't upgraded in awhile though.. my 8800GTX plays Bioshock 2 and MW2 at 1920 with AA no problems