At last, PC gaming is looking better: [Archive]

Admiral Huddy

17-05-2007, 09:05

When I first saw Lost Planet advertised on TV, I was begining to feel a bit down about PC gaming in general... but hey

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/lostplanet/images.html?om_act=convert&om_clk=gsimage&tag=images;img;4

I hoping this is a decent game and a good portal. It looks surperb although I don't know to much about it.

There are some god titles coming: Crysis, Bioshock, HL2 Episode 2, Alan Wake, Unreal 3, Portal, Spore, Medal of Honor Airbourne, Tomb Raider Anniversaries, Hellgate London etc. oh and a new expansion pack for CoH \o/

All of a sudden, things look better compared to this time last year :)

Haly

17-05-2007, 09:07

I think it got reasonable write ups for the 360, but it's meant to be hard iirc.
Hopefully the conversion process from gamepad to keyboard will go well and it won't feel too consoley. :)

Admiral Huddy

17-05-2007, 09:13

Let's hope so. Halo 2 is a doomed failure so the platform need a decent shooter. With Crysis a long way off yet, this will be a goof fill-in. Hopefully!

I'm puzzled as to why PC gamer missed this as a forthcoming title. Are they asleep or something?

Haly

17-05-2007, 09:15

I've not read PC Gamer in a long time, it didn't seem as good as it used to be then it went and published an article about women in games that imo was unbelieveably patronising so I cancelled the subscription.
I get PC Zone now till I get round to cancelling it. Much better read though. :) And it had about 4-6 pages on Lost Planet iirc.

Admiral Huddy

17-05-2007, 09:22

oh yes I remember that article.. caused quite a stir iirc ..

PC zone is worse.. I used to like a mag called PC|G... used to be a little more of an enthusiasts magazine. IT wen under with out any warning which was a shame :(

Haly

17-05-2007, 09:31

I tend to just read Edge or Games, both multi format but more mature reads if you ask me. :) Especially Edge which has a lot of industry based news rather than just jumping on the hype machine.

Admiral Huddy

25-05-2007, 09:30

According to Gamespot.. Lost Planet is to be the first DX10 game but a DX9 game will also be available.

I'm a bit confused by this..

1. How are they going market/retail two different versions of the game? It'll cause no end of confusion for the casual gamer, let alone cost.

2.Since this is a port of an xbox version, i'm sceptical as how and why the developers would bother with a dx10 version when it's already a dx 9 game. Doesn't make sense?? Therefore, I'm wondering if the dx10 version is just commercial PR to sell the game and corners will be cut.

Not that i'm complaining.. this sounds like a great game. Looking forward to hearing some reviews.

semi-pro waster

25-05-2007, 09:56

1. If there are two versions I'm guessing they'll probably just package one as "Vista edition™" and leave the ordinary version (DX9) as it is.

2. It is the same with Halo 2, clearly a DX9 (or even DX8.1) game but some of the multiplayer functionality is done in Vista apparantly. I don't know what they would do to improve the gaming experience in DX10, maybe tag on a couple of additional graphical features plus different/better multiplayer code?

The screenshots look decent enough and I hope it does turn out to be a good game but I tend not to have high hopes for console ports in general. :)

Dutch Guy

25-05-2007, 10:08

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/lost_planet_demo_directx_10_performance/

More info and benchmarks, strange that DX10 performance is down though :undecided:

Admiral Huddy

25-05-2007, 10:50

Yes, this is what makes me think that the interface isn't being used as should be.. Maybe the code has gone through some conversion routine rather than being writen as a native DX10, thus making the code inefficient. Given the time element they have had, creating a DX9 and DX10 would be two seperate projects.

Zirax

25-05-2007, 17:09

Tomb Raider anniversary - hmmm a nice update using the new engine. However compared to Tomb Raider Legend, there does not appear to be the effort made with the textures. The levels kinda look rushed together and the camera has been messed with, causing annoying jerks.

Other than that its pretty good.

You missed one game though, Theme hospital or hospital tycoon. Now that will be a cracking game when it comes out. Bloaty head anyone?

I have also just pulled down the demo of lost planet

Haly

25-05-2007, 17:15

They're remaking Theme Hospital?
Oooh, finally a PC game that might interest me :D

Admiral Huddy

25-05-2007, 17:18

. The levels kinda look rushed together and the camera has been messed with, causing annoying jerks.

You sound just like my Mrs... :D

Let us know how Lost Planet looks :)

Zirax

25-05-2007, 17:45

They're remaking Theme Hospital?
Oooh, finally a PC game that might interest me :D

http://www.codemasters.co.uk/hospitaltycoon/index.php

Looking at the screenshots it doesn't look bad. They need to make an updated Evil Genius, a sequel or something..... that was excellent.

"Welcome to my underground Liar"
"Magma"

Sitting there in your chair you get to feel like Dr Evil

Haly

25-05-2007, 17:53

Oooh might be good. Theme Hospital was fantastic, one of my favourite PC games of all time I think :D
Definitely have to keep an eye on Hospital Tycoon. :)

I never really played Evil Genius, have to try it sometime as I do have a copy somewhere.

Zirax

25-05-2007, 19:01

You sound just like my Mrs... :D

Let us know how Lost Planet looks :)

Blatent console port and it still has the xbox controller settings in the menu. It looks pretty good but putting the motion blur on full makes the game unplayable.... simply its all a blur.

1920*1200 Full settings looks good on my dell, but you can't get around that the game isn't optomised for the pc and its a cheap console port. My 1900xtx clocked heavily can't cope (thus making it much quicker than hte 1950xt), I think its more coding issues than whats being displayed on the screen. This game is something that is making me look at an xbox though.... you just can't get away from it any more.

The enemy's all have their weak points as yellow areas which maybe hard to hit with a console controller but makes it insanely easy to hit with keyboard and mouse.

In summary for Lost coast, good on an xbox, not a pc game

edit: shamelessly nicked from another forum but for crysis dx9 vs 10
http://download.gametrailers.com/gt_vault/t_crysis_dx9vsdx10_hunter_h264.wmv

Now that would be worth going to dx10. I probably will upgrade my pc again eventually, but I will wait till the tail end of the year and get a quad core and 8800ultra. Or if the new 2900xt's on the die shrink clock well, then one of those instead.

Admiral Huddy

29-05-2007, 12:05

Zirax

29-05-2007, 16:25

.. tis the way things are going I'm affraid.. As said in the PC gamings future thread.. I can't see how the development companies would invest in PC techonolgy, when the mass market is in consoles and it's easier to develop. It deosn't make financial sense anymore to produce and all out PC game apart from the odd exceptions. Odd exceptions aren't enough as far as I'm concerned.. not at the price of state of the art components.

I have to agree I'm afraid (and sorry for being mr. negative at the moment :embarassed: ). Years back pc's were more highly valued bits of kit that would warrant spending the money. Now all most people want a pc for is internet, email and word. So now they have to code a game that deals with pc world 500 quid jobbies all through to Uber 2k gaming machines.

Or they do a console game thats limited to set hardware and then do a port. If the port works then great, otherwise tough.

Lets be honest though the xbox 360 looks cracking in HD, which is part of the problem with people now thinking... ok pc gaming looks a smidgen better, but is it worth 1k machine + games or an xbox and a load of legal games for the price of the pc.

Daz

29-05-2007, 16:47

Haly

29-05-2007, 16:56

That's the kicker isnt it. For the price of an uber gaming rig, you could get yourself a 360, a PS3, a Wii and probably a big high-def TV and have just as good, if not better an experience all for the sacrifice of your keyboard and mouse.

My PC's these days are all dead powerful, but also relatively cheap (bang for buck wise) just because I dont have to spec them for gaming anymore. For anyone that's just office/internet etc then you can get a lot of power for just £300 these days (ask Haly).

Quite :D Mum just bought a dell PC with Core2duo E5300, 1gb ram, 250gb hd, dvd writer, 19" tft and XP for £293.
And I managed to get the same deal albeit with vista for £193 as parents are buying the monitor off me. (Which admittedly I'm regretting atm due to the work situation but it's still a good deal :p)

Got no interest in PC gaming anymore really as I've got the 360 and a PS2 which will keep me busy for games.

testpattern

07-06-2007, 10:48

i think there are a couple of things keeping pc gaming going:

1 - it is constantly evolving. hardware upgrades mean that games look better and better and physics systems also get better...we'll see what happens with physx. yeah the xbox360 looks great now but it will look the same in 2 years whereas a pc in 2 years will have evolved and probably look better. but yeah downside is you have to keep outlaying to keep up.

2 - consoles have never been terribly good at making strategy, rpg or fps games. maybe this will change but the pc is still the main proponent for these types of games.

but i guess this is just like that mid-90s super nintendo vs megadrive (by the way the super nes sh/ts all over the megadrive. not.).

Haly

07-06-2007, 10:59

Not sure about consoles being poor at making rpg games. It entirely depends on the type of RPG, if you're thinking Baldur's Gate style then yes the PC is much better. But when you look at the huge amount of Japanese RPGs for consoles ranging from Chrono Trigger, Phantasy Star, Shining Force, Final Fantasy etc, I'm not so sure there.
As a big RPG fan I've always found the majority of good RPGs on consoles, mainly the SNES, PS1 and more recently the PS2.

leowyatt

07-06-2007, 11:07

Strategy games don't really work for me on the 360, but I need to try the LOTR and C&C games to see. I think FPS work really well as I think Gears is proof (I think they are more of a challenge on a console than the PC)

RPGs I haven't really play many, started Fable 1 which was awesome and have to get back into that. So I think RPGs on something like the 360 would work really well and I don't see any reason they would be better on a PC.

testpattern

07-06-2007, 11:14

Haly

07-06-2007, 12:13

I'd say they were terribly good then :p Or at least the ones I posted. Both formats have their crap RPGs and their good ones :D Although personally I tend to just play them all eventually :embarassed:

Zirax

07-06-2007, 12:15

As a heads up, hospital tycoon is out tomorrow. I'll be nabbing a copy of this :)

Haly

07-06-2007, 12:16

I'll be acquiring it hopefully :D

Dutch Guy

08-06-2007, 13:45

2 - consoles have never been terribly good at making strategy, rpg or fps games. maybe this will change but the pc is still the main proponent for these types of games.Strategy games are CPU limited so that makes a PC a good platform compared to consoles, FPS games (imo) play a lot beeter with a mouse and keyboard than a controller but I disagree about RPG's

I am a big fan of Final Fantasy and those games alone were enough to justify buying a PS1 and PS2, now the wait is for Final Fantasy XIII for the PS3

Haly

08-06-2007, 13:53

I can't decide with FPS games, I find them difficult to compare. I played Counterstrike for many years and loved it, and using the keyboard and mouse, yet I still feel at home with Gears of War and Shadowrun with a controller.
I'm not a huge fan of FPS games these days but the few that I do like I get really into.

Daz

08-06-2007, 14:03

Strategy games are CPU limited so that makes a PC a good platform compared to consoles
Do you still hold to that even with these current generation consoles (Wii aside)? Particularly the cell processor, give it 18 months for the devs to get their heads around it and there's some serious CPU power there.

semi-pro waster

08-06-2007, 18:07

Do you still hold to that even with these current generation consoles (Wii aside)? Particularly the cell processor, give it 18 months for the devs to get their heads around it and there's some serious CPU power there.

I think the CPU power is there or near enough for the 360/PS3 but I don't think the controllers are really suited to it, if we are talking about a game that involves selecting and manipulating troops then a mouse is infinitely better than a joypad. Also if I'm playing a console (rare) then I want a game I can just pick up and play, that isn't something that you normally get with strategy games.

If the new consoles have a mouse and a decent context sensitive right click (or similar) then I see no real reason why they couldn't do a good strategy game on them though. I have to admit I still probably wouldn't play it though - not least because I'd have to buy the console plus a TV to begin with. :D

Dutch Guy

11-06-2007, 16:16

Do you still hold to that even with these current generation consoles (Wii aside)? Particularly the cell processor, give it 18 months for the devs to get their heads around it and there's some serious CPU power there.With the current consoles it can change as they have the CPU power to beat a PC but they are highly specialized so it will take time to develop a good game using the CPU power that is available.

Zirax

15-06-2007, 22:09

Just a word of warning, do not buy the bastardisation that is hospital tycoon. Its like the sims but somehow worse. The _original_ theme hospital managed to have bloody actor voices, but somehow this version only manages "blah blah.... blah?? bleh!!"

Seriously after 10mins it drove me nuts. This could have been a very very good game, hell just rewrite theme hospital into a modern engine and it would be a winner. But no EA had to try and better it. So you get a predefined hospital and you can only build an 8*4 room 10*12 etc. So there is no fun of squeezing in the most stuff you can while maintaining some kind of walkway.

As for the reason for sims babble speak? Why pay voice actors when you can have generated blah blah and simply change the text. I mean seriously its disgusting. Very very pissed at this as I was hoping for a half decent game, avoid :angry:

Oh an 1900*1200, no aa or AF. The camera is clunky and jumps around. Looks alright until you zoom in on the characters.... hello mr octagon face :/

Haly

15-06-2007, 22:22

Awww :(
I'll stick with Theme Hospital then!

Daz

19-06-2007, 10:11

http://www.britishgaming.co.uk/?p=2146

You can soon (now?) buy Geometry Wars on Steam :)

Davey_Pitch

19-06-2007, 10:32

This could have been a very very good game, hell just rewrite theme hospital into a modern engine and it would be a winner. But no EA had to try and better it.

It's made by Codemasters I think, not EA :) Shame about it though, I was looking forward to something that may recreate the spirit of Theme Hospital which was a very very good game.

Zirax

19-06-2007, 10:35

It's made by Codemasters I think, not EA :) Shame about it though, I was looking forward to something that may recreate the spirit of Theme Hospital which was a very very good game.

Good point, codemasters used to make decent games

Davey_Pitch

19-06-2007, 14:00

Good point, codemasters used to make decent games
They still do from time to time, they're releasing a game called Overlord on PC and Xbox 360 and it's got some pretty good reviews so far. Not tried the demo myself yet though.

Daz

19-06-2007, 14:03

I loved the 360 demo, so much character in the game :)

Zirax

19-06-2007, 14:10

They still do from time to time, they're releasing a game called Overlord on PC and Xbox 360 and it's got some pretty good reviews so far. Not tried the demo myself yet though.

Aha thats the one that I saw a video of recently. That does look pretty good. I didn't realise they were still going, I thought they had gone under the ea banner. Besides.... who wants to be good when you can be evil :D

Daz

19-06-2007, 14:13

*fond memories of Dungeon Keeper*

Admiral Huddy

19-06-2007, 14:54

The previews of Crysis look better and better as time goes on. The nano suit looks awesome. With the release of Bioshock, Valve games, CoD4 Modern Welfare etc. it's going to be a busy second half of the year for PC gaming. Unlike last year which was pretty poor.

Daz

07-07-2007, 13:56

Gears of War coming to PC (http://www.britishgaming.co.uk/?p=2205). Didn't see it coming but it makes sense. It'll be interesting to see if they do what they did with Shadowrun and lock some online functionality to gold subs.

Pickers

09-07-2007, 10:52

what kind of machine is Crysis going to need to run??!! :eek:

Stan_Lite

09-07-2007, 12:58

what kind of machine is Crysis going to need to run??!! :eek:

From what I've been able to glean from the interweb.

Minimum Requirements:
CPU: Athlon 64 3000+/Intel 2.8ghz
Graphics: Nvidia 6600 or ATI X1600 - Shader Model 2.0
RAM: 1GB
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 256k+
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX9 with Windows XP / Vista

Recommended Requirements:
CPU: Dual-Core CPU (Athlon X2 / Pentium D / Core 2 Duo)
Graphics: Nvidia 7800GT or ATI X1800XL Pro (SM 3.0)
RAM: 1.5GB+
HDD: 6GB
Internet: 512k+ (128k+ upstream)
Optical Drive: DVD
Software: DX9 with Windows XP / Vista

I would imagine most PC gamers would be able to meet, at least, the minimum requirements (or am I living in cloud cuckoo land?).

Haly

09-07-2007, 13:13

I couldn't :p
My graphics card doesn't exist ;D

My old PC however could just about match it, maybe, if I overclocked it.

Stan_Lite

09-07-2007, 13:18

I couldn't :p

..................most PC gamers ................

;)

Since you've gone over to the dark side, you don't qualify :p

Haly

09-07-2007, 13:27

I'd be a PC gamer if it offered me something that made it worth switching back :p

Davey_Pitch

09-07-2007, 14:32

Stan_Lite

09-07-2007, 14:45

The only thing on my current PC that doesn't meet those specs is the graphics card, as I'm still on an X800 XT. Still, the machine I'm hoping to build in the next few months (assuming I get the money) would be more than enough to run it :)

On one site I looked at, it was suggested that the X800 would be able to handle it but would probably be at low settings which would reduce the enjoyment of the game.

I'm looking forward to seeing how it looks on my current rig (may have an upgrade before the game is out ;) ).

NokkonWud

09-07-2007, 15:36

Hopefully I will have a job by the time the game is released, that would cover me for a Graphics Card which is all I need, especially now that I have a 24" Dell monitor :o.

semi-pro waster

09-07-2007, 18:36

The only thing on my current PC that doesn't meet those specs is the graphics card, as I'm still on an X800 XT.

The X800XT is better than the X1600 series, it does support shader model 2.0 but not 3.0 which was the cause of a fair few (pointless) fanboy wars.

I see I could play Crysis at minimum levels on my current PC which is 3 1/2 years old now but not much more than that. :)

Davey_Pitch

09-07-2007, 19:44

The X800XT is better than the X1600 series, it does support shader model 2.0 but not 3.0 which was the cause of a fair few (pointless) fanboy wars.

Ah right. You can tell I've let my hardware knowledge slip, two-three years ago I could tell you the best pieces of kit without so much as a glance at a hardware website. Now I have to do research to even know what's available :D

Darrin

10-07-2007, 03:48

All I can say is :

http://www.jumpgate-evolution.com/

There is no way in hell a console will ever be able to match that game. Or its predecessor, Jumpgate. (http://www.jossh.com/terminal_civilian.html) The sheer amount of in-game and third party website data that we go through with that game could never be accomplished with any console. And also I don't think you can hook a Saitek X52 to an XBOX, can you? :evil grin: Joystick required, baby. No way around it.

I much prefer the dynamic economy and community of Jumpgate to any other game I've ever played. No two flights are ever the same. Yes, Jumpgate is a very niche game, pretty much only for sci-fi geeks that like to fly. And the learning curve on it is nothing short of insurmountable, but it is VERY addicting. I've been playing it since 2000, and I'm still going strong.

Stan_Lite

03-08-2007, 08:40

Release date for Crysis announced as 16th November link (http://www.custompc.co.uk/news/601180/crysis-release-date-revealed.html)

The article seems to suggest that current DX10 hardware may struggle - we'll just have to wait and see. I'm really looking forward to this, I hope I'm not disappointed.

Admiral Huddy

06-08-2007, 15:50

I'm sure this due to poor drivers Stan, I read a simular article elsewhere.

If it was to be that none of the current DX10 games could actually play DX10 games, there'd be an outcry and possibly the death of PC gaming since people will loose faith in the platform. I'm sure they won't let this happen but if it was, I too would have to consider where my loyalities and lay.

Admiral Huddy

05-09-2007, 12:23

Superb!!!

Gears of War on PC 6th November with extra levels and mods. Some of which where left out of the 360 version.

About time.. The PC is having a very busy and different 2nd half of the year.. :) More games than time to play them.