General Discussion

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Originally posted by Locklain

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Originally posted by Housam

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Originally posted by Helliconia

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Originally posted by Locklain

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Originally posted by RiftScorn

Rubbish. After i have paid mortgage, tax, food, fuel, travel expense, utility bills, kids stuff, kids school stuff, clothes for my back - THEN i worry about keeping my PC to date. All of sudden PC updates do become a lot more expensive.
Come back when you've grown up kiddo.

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No offense but if you can't afford to keep an up to date computer then you can't complain about the requirements being too high. The whole gaming scene can't stop moving ahead because some people don't update their computers to play the latest and greatest.

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And if people like yourself didnt equate 'the gaming scene moving ahead' with better graphics, higher requirements etc, then we wouldnt need to update our pcs so often.

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WHAT...why shouldent we get some eye candy...if pc games didn't update there graphics then it will fall far behind the consoled and die...

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This is happening already. PC gaming has been a dying breed for some time. Within the next generation of Consoles we will more then likely see the consoles equal if not surpass the PC in detail and cost. Then everyone will be happy. . .

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im not sure about detail..but cos defiantly...as we saw with the ps3 and 360...prices where extremely high on release

To the OP...wtf, you don't PAY from your own pocket £10,000 a year, you get a grant (which you can pay back when you have a wage higher than x without interest) and since you're a uni student you should be tight for cash unless mummy and daddy are paying a lot for your stuff or you're working your butt off.

You don't need a good pc to be a pc gamer but if your pc doesnt meet the min specs and you don't have a lot of cash then consider buying a console.

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Originally posted by unherdninja
Well First,
If you think a game needs to have great graphics to be good then you arent a true pc gamer IMO.
Second,
If you have the love for PC games then thats all you need to be a PC gamer. Hell when I first started out I had a basic stock hp computer. I played warcraft 3, red alert, WoW, and a few others. Ive upgraded my PC a lot since then but I'm still playing those same games :P...Recently added EVE to my collection.

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actually...it is important....its nice to have eye candy...also a game in 2008 i expect to have good graphics...i still play will play games UO and 2D RPG from the early 90s....and love them..

Originally posted by unherdninja

Well First,

If you think a game needs to have great graphics to be good then you arent a true pc gamer IMO.

Second,

If you have the love for PC games then thats all you need to be a PC gamer. Hell when I first started out I had a basic stock hp computer. I played warcraft 3, red alert, WoW, and a few others. Ive upgraded my PC a lot since then but I'm still playing those same games :P...Recently added EVE to my collection.

You are right that a good game doesn't need good graphics, but people want a good game to come with good graphics.  Lets take the Kotor games for example.  Both were good games for their time as well as had very nice graphics.  Take the same story make it a 2D 3rd person overhead game.  Would it still be as enjoyable as it was with how everything was implemented?  Though I guess that would be hard to imagine.

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Originally posted by Man1ac
To the OP...wtf, you don't PAY from your own pocket £10,000 a year, you get a grant (which you can pay back when you have a wage higher than x without interest) and since you're a uni student you should be tight for cash unless mummy and daddy are paying a lot for your stuff or you're working your butt off.
You don't need a good pc to be a pc gamer but if your pc doesnt meet the min specs and you don't have a lot of cash then consider buying a console.

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i don't...in the UK we have student loans...and i chose not to get it...i do pay £10000 a year...

No one is arguing that you shouldn't have to update your computer.  No one is arguing that game develpoment companies shouldn't improve their ability to produce games at higher levels of graphics quality.

Whats being argued is that the gaming companies are placing way too much stock in the value of graphics quality at the cost of other, far more meaningful parts of a games existance.  They can produce the highest quality, most realistic looking graphical representation of a pile of dog poo.  While it may be the most realistic looking pile of dog poo, it is still just a pile of dog poo.

The most important parts of a game, the parts that really matter in the long run, do not require huge amounts of processing power.  As such, they don't require top of the line rigs to play on.  I think what most people here are arguing,.. Let's get the parts of the game that really matter down pat, then let's work on how pretty it is.

Quick replies to a few issues brought up here.

Graphics - we're about to hit the glass ceiling of what we can do in real-time. Within the next couple of graphics card generations, the newer advancements won't even be perceptible to the human eye. In short, we're reaching the point where we won't even be able to notice the higher resolutions, faster frame rates and more advanced lighting effects. Damn good thing because now we can concentrate more on making good games rather than pretty games for a change.

Price - When you look at the number of PC exclusive games, the price of upgrading to the latest and greatest hardware simply doesn't justify itself. Sure, it did back in '98 withe games like Half-Life, Tribes, Red Alert 2, Baldur's Gate, etc., on the market. Right now, most PC exclusives are either glorified tech demos (Crysis) or Slower paced strategy fair (Sins of A Solar Empire). That is if they aren't knock off tycoon games and Sims 2 expansions. Nothing to get excited about really.

Working - And I mean the games working. Everyone here has probably had the experience of buying a game that didn't work on their computer. Some of you may have even had a computer that exceeded the recommended specs for the game and it still didn't work. If you build your PC custom, this happens quite a bit with newer games. Not as much as it did in the days of DOS, but it's still a roll of the dice once you install. I don't have this issue with console games. Having the all the shiney new components doesn't guarantee that every game will run on your system.

The above issues cover pretty much why I moved back to consoles. I still play games on my computer, but normally they're online games that are infinitely replayable. On my computer right now, I have TF2, BF 2142, UT3 and Guild Wars. I don't need a top of the line system to run any of those. Although I have to run UT3 in 720p and it still strains my system sometimes.

LOL

Name me 1 game which deserve that I upgrade my computer.

The best MMO out there is City of Villains (not even a close call, it outmatch each and every other MMO soo easily it is presponderous), it runs fine on a computer which was top-notch in 2003.  A computer which is more recent?  Why?  I hardly see any use for it.

I have 2k on the side ready...for 2 years now.  And no game is even remotedly worth that I spent this money.  Make a good game and we will talk again.  Release crap with high requirements and I will just laugh at your sillyness.

Non-MMO wise...Civ IV: Beyond the Sword/Medieval Total War (the 2nd also runs well, but I don't like it so uninstall it) also run extremely well.  I am starving for good games, and there are not just coming.  Go ahead, focus on this PvP/FPS/Whatever, I can wait.

LOOKING FOR A GAME...and/or a girl!  :P

Originally posted by Anofalye

LOL

 

Name me 1 game which deserve that I upgrade my computer.

 

The best MMO out there is City of Villains (not even a close call, it outmatch each and every other MMO soo easily it is presponderous), it runs fine on a computer which was top-notch in 2003.  A computer which is more recent?  Why?  I hardly see any use for it.

 

I have 2k on the side ready...for 2 years now.  And no game is even remotedly worth that I spent this money.  Make a good game and we will talk again.  Release crap with high requirements and I will just laugh at your sillyness.

 

Non-MMO wise...Civ IV: Beyond the Sword/Medieval Total War (the 2nd also runs well, but I don't like it so uninstall it) also run extremely well.  I am starving for good games, and there are not just coming.  Go ahead, focus on this PvP/FPS/Whatever, I can wait.

 

LOOKING FOR A GAME...and/or a girl!  :P

This is how I base whether I upgrade or not.  If a game comes out I want to play and my computer can't handle it I upgrade.  If not I don't upgrade but continue to save for future upgrades.  It works really nice with automatic deposit into separate bank accounts one just for computer upgrades