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The Problems With Porting Games
mr_sifter writes "There's a large lexicon of monosyllabic, four-letter words for describing something you don't like — but only PC gamers use the word 'port' with such a fervent degree of repulsion. Common complaints about console ports include meager graphics options, dodgy third-person camera angles, poorly-thought-out controls and sparsely distributed save points. In this feature, Bit-tech talks to developers of games such as Dead Space, Red Faction and Tales of Monkey Island to find out why porting games between the three major consoles and the PC is so difficult. Radically different CPU, graphics and memory architectures play their part, as do the differences in control methods and the rules Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo set about how games should work on their systems."
And I thought port was just some kind of wine... :|
Life is too good to waste... Read!
The PC port of RE4 did not even contain a option to exit the game and even though it was a FPS did not allow mouse control.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Mac is also a PC.
If done right, almost any FPS should be portable from console to PC, and be FAR better on PC. (Mouse + keyboard is a superior control mechanism for FPS games.)
Most RPGs aren't too bad either, especially if you plug in a joypad to the PC.
Of course, frequently ports are NOT done right - the PC port of Final Fantasy VII is a notorious example of a port being done so lazily as to break compatibility very rapidly within about a generation of hardware releases. Nowadays it's often easier to get the PSX version running in an emulator than to get the PC port working.
Even after you just use these game types you still end up with far too many good games that you can't change the controls. The most recent example of this is the pc version of Arkham Asylum (batman game). A standard usb analog stick logitech pad messes up and has the up be down, down be up. And there is no way to fix it. Every pc game should either have customizable controls or tested well enough so they know that all devices are going to work with it. Sigh...
Am I the only one here wanting that? Seriously!! It's not like linux doesn't run great on high end hardware or anything. So, don't worry about the poor little consoles for a moment and PORT to Linux!!
No, the moderator just plays PC games and works for a video game store.
--Forest C. Adcock--
Wow, first time I feel old due to a whippersnapper like yourself not knowing history.
A short description that glosses over many finer points and is probably a bit loose with terminology:
in the 80's IBM came out with the IBM-PC (Personal Computer). This took off like a rocket, especially for business users. Unlike Apple, IBM allowed other companies to make computers based on their architecture- these were known as IBM-PC compatible, or "PC Compatible" for short. This was in contrast, to your Amiga, Mac, and several other incompatible systems that were available at the time. You could also not run "PC" software on Macs or any of the other systems, and vice versa, aside from emulation software that didn't work very well.
You have an interesting point- that Macs are pretty much PC's these days, but its only partly anything to do with the OS, its roots are meant to distinguish between different hardware/software architectures and what software you can run on them (back in ye olde days, there were several vendors offering a DOS, or Disk Operating System). Since Apple now uses the same hardware as "PC's" and bootcamp put an end to any real barriers to turning your Mac into a PC, there really is no difference anymore.
However, any reasonably experienced computer person will probably always call a machine made by Apple a Mac, until one can buy OS X and just put it on any old PC they have laying around without jumping through hoops.
It does not, nor has it ever meant "Personal Computer with Microsoft Windows Operating System installed".
You must be 2 years old then. Apple has been using a decades plus old campaign that says exactly that.
They're often called "rail shooters."