Heh. I'm not the one claiming to have a magically unfixable computer. That would be you. Despite the fact that the software and hardware has been shown to work for thousands of others, somehow your problem is unfixable and that's the fault of the PC just being too complicated. Right. And I'm the brick wall.
You mean, like the illusion that owning a handgun will somehow protect you from violence? Or the illusion that, in a truly violent situation, you will have the wherewithal to use your gun safely and effectively?
Sure. It happens quite often. http://www.guncite.com/kleckandgertztable1.html Even the very conservative estimates put the number at over half a million per year. The most thorough survey puts it at around 2 million per year.
And you're being an arrogant, condescending troll who needs to stop worshipping PCs as if they were Gods.
I'm not being arrogant, and I'm not trolling. You simply do not understand how PC troubleshooting is done and you probably don't have the right hardware and software to do it. That's not me being arrogant. It's simply stating the facts. If you took that PC to a real repair shop, they could fix it. Insisting that your problem is somehow magically unfixable is simple ignorance.
Just because my PC has an impossible problem doesn't mean that they all do.
There's no such thing. Something is broken and needs to be fixed. You just don't know what needs to be fixed. It's not magic. You're simply showing your ignorance of the subject.
PCs are complicated, some problems are extremely difficult to properly identify and correct. Years of effort and hardware replacements have done nothing to solve this one. Maybe you'll have a different attitude when you encounter a similiar problem.
Sorry. But if you sent that PC to someone that has the hardware and software to diagnose the problem, and the experience and knowledge to use those tools, they could fix it in a matter of days at the most. Like I said, get an extended warranty and you won't have to worry about it. My PS2 stopped reading discs after a couple years too. That's why it's a brick sitting in the garage right now. That doesn't mean that all PS2s are junk or too difficult to maintain.
And I could overclock my Xbox and add a 500 Gb HDD, but that would make a PC vs. Xbox comparison quite silly since overclocked CPUs and larger HHDs are not standard for Xboxes. Bringing up PC gamepads is particularly silly when PC controls are compared with console controls. Gamepads are an exception, not the norm.
They aren't the exception if you want to play platformers or sports or fighting games on the PC. Any PC gamer that plays those games has a gamepad. Just like gamers who like flight sims or space sims have flight sticks of some sort. PCs are designed to be flexible and make use of a huge array of peripherals. Consoles are not. Deal with it.
You seem to have this attitude that PCs and consoles are somehow mutually exclusive.
I don't have that attitude at all. Like I said before, I'm planning to get a Wii, just as soon as I can find one in my area. You said that the PC is useless if you want to play a game that isn't available for it. My point was that you can point to a ton of games that aren't available one one platform or another. It doesn't mean anything.
A powerful trick that sells well, but, like Guitar Hero, a single-trick novelty.
Guitar Hero is a good game. It's fun. What else is it supposed to be? Do you want it to make you breakfast too? Change your oil maybe? What exactly is it that you're expecting from a game?
How would you know? How would you know how much or little I understand about PCs or how long I have been using them? You have no idea.
Your comment about trying every possible configuration gave me a pretty good idea of how much you know. That, along with the fact that you weren't able to fix the problem. PCs aren't magical contraptions. There is a way to make them work. The millions of working ones are testament to that.
It means that I've tried changing every setting I can think of, tried different drivers, and tried running with a clean unaltered install of XP and a tweaked and customized install of XP. I also tried running without certain drivers and I tried altering BIOS settings. And again, not one person has been able to figure out what the problem is. It sounds like you're the one who doesn't understand anything about PCs if you think they're exceedingly simple machines that you just "set up properly" and then everything just works.
Never said they were simple. I just said that I know how to set them up. I've built many PCs myself, and fixed more than I can remember. Sometimes the fix is something that doesn't occur to you right away. Like a few years back, I was having some strange problems with my own PC. It wouldn't start up sometimes unless I completely removed the power cord for a minute or two and then plugged it back in. Pretty bizarre behavior, and I thought of all sorts of possible problems, from a bad power supply to a bad motherboard, faulty power switch or power connector. Tried switching to a different power cable. After none of those things panned out, eventually I figured out that the problem was the BIOS and I had to flash it to a new version. That fixed it. Between learning yourself and asking questions of others online, you can develop the understanding of how to fix all kinds of problems. Saying you tried everything is simply a way of saying that you have no idea what the problem is and haven't thought of the answer yet. I'm sorry you're having trouble, but it's not indicative of PCs in general being broken. You might want to rethink your methods for ruling out certain problems, especially hardware and driver problems. Another option woudl be to just purchase prebuilt computers from Dell or another company and get the extended warranty so that they'll help you fix any problems.
But let's just forget about games like GRAW, R6v, GoW, RE4, MP and so forth... they don't fit the dogma that consoles == shit, so it's best not to mention them.
I didn't say that consoles == shit. I said that they just aren't good at certain genres of games. I never tried the console version of R6v, but I did try GRAW on both console and PC, and the PC version was almost a different game. The console version was a straight-up run-n-gun shooter. Run to cover, shoot stuff, run to cover, shoot stuff. Very linear, very little in the way of tactics. The PC game was much more open, more difficult, and required more strategy and tactics. GoW is a different sort of game, and one that, I agree, works pretty well on the console. But it's not an FPS, and I do believe that the PC could do it better still, simply due to better controls. PC games tend to have much better enemy AI as well, which makes the game more interesting, but also requires more precision in the controls for the player to be competitive against them.
And I've played FPS games on consoles. So?
See above. PCs have better controls, don't need autoaiming, have larger, less linear levels, generally much better enemy AI, and can generally be tweaked to the user's preferences to a much greater degree. If I wanted to, I could plug in a dual-shock style controller and play it that way, but that would be like playing with oven mitts on my hands compared to using the mouse and keyboard.
A gamepad does not count, and since the only practical difference between the PC and the Xbox (in terms of playing games) is the controller, saying that Psychonauts controls fine on the PC with a gamepad does little to bolster your argument againts consoles.
Umm.. a gamepad sure as fuck does count. I have one sitting right here that works just fine for games that it is appropriate for. Why in hell shouldn't it count? It's part of the PC's flexibility, something that consoles are lacking in (although the Wii is promising with its control scheme, good to see them finally trying to do something new rather than trying to make every damn game type work with the gamepad).
Same goes for the PC. I would not want to play Tekken or Zelda on my PC.
I don't see why not. Plug in a gamepad and they should play just like they do on the console. That's one type of game where the gamepad is quite appropriate, and the PC can do that just fine. The real strength of the console is that I can sit in the living room with my friends and play. PCs generally aren't good for that. Playing single-player or online is where the PC is best.
Which makes it the opposite, and therefore most definitely not the same. Games getting better does not mean that that PC is getting worse. That's what I meant by the TP thing and the XBox vs XBox 360 comments. Just because XBox 360 games have better graphics and the XBox can't play them, it doesn't mean that the XBox is worse than it was before. It simply means that games are getting better.
It has nothing to do with me. The problem is not in the hardware, since everything has been changed at least once. If the problem is in the software, it probably can't be fixed since every possible configuration has been attempted and nobody has the faintest idea what the problem is. Don't go claiming that the user is stupid just because the PC has a problem.
It's just rather obvious that you understand little about PCs. Every possible configuration? What does that even mean? It sounds like you're just randomly trying things and not getting it to work. I build PCs all the time. The software works fine when you set it up properly. It works for many many people out there. I'm not claiming you're stupid. I'm just saying you don't know how to set up a PC properly. Those are two very different things.
Don't know about the general population, but I had no idea about that until people mentioned it here on slashdot. The CDs are in the CD part of the store, then I assume it is a CD. Same goes for DVDs.
And that's what they want you to think. And it's understandable if people don't know all the guidelines that go into those logos. However, the bottom line is that if you buy a DVD and it doesn't play in your player, you should return it and demand your money back. Let the stores deal with the manufacturers.
Which is in practise the same thing I just said: your PC "degrades" and becomes gradually less and less able to run the newest games, and eventually it won't run them at all. It's not a dumb argument, it's an irrefutable fact. If it weren't, my X800 would run Crysis.
It's not the same thing at all. Your XBox 360 can't play Twilight Princess either. That doesn't make it less capable than the Wii. The PC doesn't degrade at all. The games simply get better. The graphics you see do not get worse. Let me know if you manage to get your XBox to play XBox 360 games.
Consoles don't need that option, and the standard unchanging hardware is one of their benefits.
I'm not disagreeing that it has its benefits. I'm just pointing out that it also has its drawbacks, which is a fact as well. You take the good with the bad.
The performance issue with my computer has persisted through every hardware revision and nobody has any idea what's causing it, and regardless of what drivers or system settings I use nothing ever changes. As far as I can tell it's not a hardware or a software issue, so it must be magic. Shit like that is why I find consoles more enjoyable to use.
In my experience, when the problem can't be attributed to the hardware, then it's almost always attributable to the user. The only other alternative is an environmental factor, which is quite rare, but possible. I once helped a guy out who's computer kept getting corrupted. Turned out there was some sort of power transformer a few feet from his office window on the other side of a fence that was screwing it up. He moved it into a room on the other side of his house after I reinstalled everything for him and it ran fine after that. But usually, it's the user doing something wrong. Something that they're installing is generally screwing things up. It's quite obviously not the PC's fault, since millions of people have computers that run just fine. So yeah, if you can't make it work, and you don't know anyone else that can, then you should probably stick with a console. But don't go claiming that PCs are too hard just because you couldn't keep one running properly.
How do you know? You said you're a PC gamer. Have you done it? It's fine, all you need is a flat surface for a ball mouse or anything for optical. TV tray, hardback book, seat of the couch.
I use a mouse with my laptop all the time in all sorts of places. I know what's comfortable and what isn't. Using a mouse in the living room is not comfortable, and not something that most console gamers even consider to be an option. When the prospect of wireless keyboard and/or mouse comes up, I always hear console gamers saying that if they wanted to use those they'd play on the PC.
It doesn't? 1080P is 1920x1080. Lets check Gateway's website. Hmm they only have one monitor that supports that resolution, all the rest are lower. Their entry level monitor is a 1024x768 one. That's the same resolution as my Windows machine. The majority of desktops out there in the home are running with displays less than 1080P.
First of all, Gateway is not a good place to buy PC stuff. Second, go check out Dell's site. You can get an excellent monitor there that has a response rate that makes it great for gaming and a native resolution of 1920x1200 for about 600 bucks. While that's not much better than the best HDTVs out there, it is better, and it's not even the best you can get. Some of the newer ones have native resolutions of 2560x1600.
You can get nice 1080i sets for under 400 these days. I've seen a 1080p for around 600. Those aren't the super huge monsters, but normal size screens.
Sorry man, I've spent the last 2 months researching HDTVs since I'm planning to buy one soon. You can't get a nice 1080p for $600. I don't doubt you could buy one for that price, but it won't be a good one. I'm leaning towards a 56" Samsung DLP set right now, but I may still go LCD if I can find a good deal.
You're forgetting one thing and I'm surprised considering how low your slashdot user number is: Linux. The PS3 runs it, so does the PS2, its officially supported, not some hack.
Again though, who cares that you can run Linux on it? Who is actually planning to use their console like a PC? Doesn't that defeat the purpose of the console to begin with? The consoles have been becoming more and more PC-like with each generation, but there are limits to how far they can go before they actually start negating some of the benefits of being a console in exchange for the benefits of a PC, along with the associated drawbacks as I mentioned in another post. If you want a PC, get a PC. If you want a console, get a console. You can have both. I plan to get a Wii because it is fun to play and does things that PCs don't currently do, and I can play with friends in my living room. That's where consoles win out in my opinion. You can have a more social experience playing with others in the same place rather than just communicating online. That's not something you can really duplicate with a PC right now.
This is a completely pointless argument. I'm buying a console for gaming. What does it matter that I can watch porn on my PC and troll Slashdot? What's the connection? PCs and consoles aren't mutually exclusive.
It had a very good point actually, which is that the price difference isn't all that much. I can build a top of the line gaming PC from scratch for less than $2500. I never spend that much on my own, even when I've done a complete rebuild. I just built a completely new PC earlier this year, replaced everything except my monitor for $1500 and it can handle every game I've tried with no problem. When it does start to struggle with the newer games, probably next year, I may upgrade the video card for another $250 or so. I'll be able to get a good DX10 card for that price by then.
360 + HDTV = 1000-1200 euros, which is still far cheaper than buying a top-of-the-line gaming PC, and both purchases have a considerably longer lifespan too. While your PC "degrades" over time (you have to compromise on graphics quality over time until your system just can't run anything anymore), a console stays the same for the duration of its lifespan.
That's the dumbest argument I've heard yet. PC capabilities don't "degrade" over time. The games and graphics get better over time, and require better hardware to run at the highest levels. I can turn down the detail a bit and get good performance with graphics staying basically at the same level as when the PC was new. If I want the nicer graphics, I can upgrade my vid card to a newer one. Consoles don't have that option.
Your comparison is obviously biased since you're only accounting for the genres that are strongest on the PC and discounting everything else in existence. However, the FPS/third person genre has been done succesfully on consoles, and in cases like GRAW, R6V and SCDA the X360 versions have reportedly been much better than their PC counterparts.
Not sure what you've been reading, but the PC version of GRAW was much better than the console version. The console version was very linear and mostly just a run-n-gun game. The PC version was more open and required a lot more in the way of tactics. It was harder in general. Of course I focused on the genres that the PC is strongest in. That was my point. That the PC does some types of games very well that the consoles can't seem to do well at all. Yet the PC can handle pretty much any type of game that the consoles can do since you can get the same types of controllers for the PC.
I'm shifting away from PC gaming for the time being because it's much too expensive and the endless technical problems and performance issues are starting to get to me. I don't get any nerd satisfaction from spending years wondering why I often get 10-20 FPS in CS:S with the absolute minimum graphics even though I've replaced every component at least once.
That's the only decent argument about PCs. They do require more knowledge to use properly. If you know what you're doing, you don't have technical problems and performance issues. But it's really not all that difficult. With all the news out there about identity theft, spyware, viruses, etc., you'd think that people would use a bit of common sense. But they don't. I know I certainly get tired of being asked to fix people's computers all the time because they can't be bothered to run firewall software or to use some common sense and not download every piece of spyware that offers them free smilies for their IM app. Some people just shouldn't use PCs. Consoles are perfect for them since they limit what you can do in general, and thereby also limit the harm you can do. That means they have to be tightly controlled, which is why they'll never have the variety of games and game mods and add-ons that PCs get. And they'll likely have to pay for most of the things that PC gamers get for
It's not a hardware issue. If Doom 3 can be controlled with acceptable comfort on the Xbox, so can RTS games.
Yeah, we've seen what happens to FPS games on consoles. Deus Ex 2 and Thief 3 are good examples. They take what was a great game, and shrink the level sizes down to about 1/8 of what they used to be, design an interface that is a lot more cumbersome, just because they have to work within the confines of the controller, and then they also have to do things like auto-aiming and crappy enemy AI to make up for the lack of precision in the controls.
They have, and there are genres that have been in limited supply on the PC because consoles are just better at them.
Not really. PCs can do anything that the consoles can do. I've played platformers and sports games on my PC. Psychonauts played just fine on the PC with a gamepad. The reverse is not true, however. Consoles have limitations that make them unsuitable for certain types of games.
Again with the rigid mind set, why not use a mouse in the living room. Mice come in optical and wireless varieties now. just sit the thing on the couch beside you.
It's not a rigid mindset. Using a mouse for a console is just not comfortable. I'm far from being the only one who thinks that.
Because it isn't better. The UI sucks, just because the keyboard has a lot of keys doesn't mean you should use them all. Keyboard controls sucked for action games in 1987 and they still suck in 2007. And it costs too much money to keep up with the hardware, not to mention the Windows annoyances.
No, the UIs have gotten better over time. Maybe you just haven't played the games. Warhammer and Company of Heroes have pretty good interfaces. Supreme Commander has an excellent interface.
I don't play Madden, but I do know they add new stuff and tweak the gameplay/graphcis every year and it's not just new rosters. And it does come out every year, it's not like they're wating for John Madden Football Forever 1998 to be released in 2007. That's the way it works in the console world, they make money, they release often. Game series do gradual evolution over their releases rather than big jumps once every 5 years.
Yeah, well I don't want to pay the same price I paid for a game last year just to get an incremental upgrade. I can get that kind of thing for free with patches, map packs and mods. If they want another 50+ dollars from me, they'd better give me a new game, not a glorified patch.
Sometimes it seems to me that when PC gamers complaints are met, they just find some other "problem" that isn't a problem to justify their dislikes on consoles.
That's just because the consoles (and console developers) have so many shortcomings to make up for.
Or in the past year when consoles supported high resolution displays they say that no one has them or wants to pay money for them, or that they don't have a tV because they're sitting at their PC all the time.
Two things. HDTV still doesn't touch PC resolutions, and console gamers are always comparing the cost of console gaming versus PC gaming, while completely forgetting to include things like the TV that they dropped 2 grand on, or their surround system, etc. Yeah, you can use those for other things as well, but I can use my PC for a LOT of other things as well.
But they have proven it, over and over again, can't you see?
No, I don't. I haven't seen one decent RTS, RPG or FPS on the consoles yet that can touch any of the major PC games in those categories. UT3 will be released on consoles as well. Wonder how different it will be from the PC version. I doubt we'll see a good RTS anytime soon. Certainly nothing up to the level of CoH or SupCom. RPG is probably possible, but they definitely haven't done it yet. Oblivion is a joke on consoles, even worse than the PC version (which is pretty bad, yay for mods!).
Does the Command & Conquer series, Warcraft, Starcraft (N64 only), Dune 2000, and Warzone 2100 ring a bell? The controls aren't bad, combo buttons help, and on the PSone there's also mouse if you want it, which every RTS on the thing supports.
Every time I've read a review of a console RTS game, they always talk about how the controls suck. Yeah, the PSone mouse might have helped the 3 people that actually owned one, but really, who uses a mouse in the living room? Why not just go play on the PC if you're gonna do that and get an all-around much better experience?
You just mentioned how RTS's "need" mice and keyboards and you don't mention the PS2/PS3 with their USB ports?
Like I said, that stuff is just not comfortable to use in a living-room environment where most people have their consoles. Unless someone figures out how to make a better controller that doesn't require a desk to use it properly, the controls are going to continue to suck. The Wii could probably pull it off if it weren't for the resolution problem.
Or they use the "I can download a mod and keep playing the same game for 5 years and not have to buy new ones" argument. (Which actually hurts developers)
Oh come on. Hurts developers? More like it makes them work a little harder and try some new things. Every time some modder creates something new and different, it expands our choices in general. I guess you think we should just be able to shell out money for the next Madden update every year instead of getting anything fresh?
I just want the PC snobbery to end, it was old in 93, and it's old now. There isn't a single game or genre that couldn't be done and done well on a modern console if the devlopers of said game put their minds to it. That includes flight sims for those hard core Tom Clancy/Dan Brown lovin greybeards (USB HOTAS)
It's not snobbery when the consoles haven't shown that they can do games just as well as a PC. When they step up and actually start doing what you claim they can do, then maybe you'll have an argument. Let me know when that happens.
It would be nice to seem some strategy, RTS or american style RPG's on a console. I know it's possible to make the controls workable.with just a dual shock/sixaxis.
RTS's have been tried before. I don't remember the names of the games that have done it, but the controls sucked horribly compared to mouse/keyboard control. It just made everything difficult. The main drawback for RTS games is really the resolution issues. It's not as bad as it used to be as long as you have an HDTV and a console that can both do 1080, but how many people have that? Even then it's still lower res than you get with a PC, and a high resolution can make those games much nicer to play since you get a better view of what's going on. The Wii probably has the most potential for giving you good control over it, but it suffers from the resolution problem worse than the others. I just don't see RTS games doing well on consoles at least for this generation.
As for RPGs, it could probably be done, but console gamers miss out on all the nice game-life-extending mods that get made that really can add a lot of replay value to a game. Even if they did get access to them, they'd most likely have to pay for them as if they were an expansion pack. Look at Epic. They're well-known by computer gamers for releasing a lot of free extra content for their games. That's one of the reasons their games have been so popular with gamers. Look what happened when they tried to release that kind of content for free to console gamers. They are forced to charge for it. Sad.
It is much better for all of us for them to flash their lights, get out of the congestion and be on their way, even if that is going to get another donut.
If there is an emergency, then they can do so, and I see it happen sometimes. If there isn't an emergency, and they aren't responding to a call, then they don't have any reason to be exempt from the laws. It just creates more of a headache for other drivers, without any benefit. Sure, an emergency could happen, but it could happen a few blocks back the way they came from just as easily. There's no reason to exempt them.
It's a real shame they won't sink a few million dollars into making a game that 50 people will buy just to make you happy. If they did, I wouldn't have to read such tortured baseless rants.
Yes, because Fallout 1 & 2 were such crappy games that nobody bought them, right? Why would they ever want to create such a thing again? I mean why would they even buy the rights to create such garbage? Oh yeah, because you're wrong.:) If they don't want to make a Fallout game, then they should just go make something else. If they do want to make a Fallout game, then that's exactly what they should do. Otherwise we end up with another tortured license, like Shadowrun.
Of course they'l want to mass produce it, they want to sell lots of copies and make money! Of course they'll want it on all the consoles, they want to sell lots of copies and make money.
Which is one of the reasons that it will probably suck. With the focus on the consoles, the PC roots will be left behind and we'll end up with an Oblivion or Deus Ex 2 type of screwup with the entire interface being retarded and completely inappropriate for the PC. There will be all kinds of compromises made in the gameplay to facilitate the consoles and the mass-market focus. It won't be a Fallout game. It will be something that seems more like a game that is trying to immitate Fallout, but falling woefully short of the mark. I just don't believe that they can do the game justice with all of the conflicts of interest they're going to have to deal with.
He used the keyboard for movement and the stick for aiming. Don't remember if he used reversed y-axis or not. Apparently it could be done. I just couldn't figure out why anyone would want to do it.
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Heh. I'm not the one claiming to have a magically unfixable computer. That would be you. Despite the fact that the software and hardware has been shown to work for thousands of others, somehow your problem is unfixable and that's the fault of the PC just being too complicated. Right. And I'm the brick wall.
Sure. It happens quite often. http://www.guncite.com/kleckandgertztable1.html Even the very conservative estimates put the number at over half a million per year. The most thorough survey puts it at around 2 million per year.
I'm not being arrogant, and I'm not trolling. You simply do not understand how PC troubleshooting is done and you probably don't have the right hardware and software to do it. That's not me being arrogant. It's simply stating the facts. If you took that PC to a real repair shop, they could fix it. Insisting that your problem is somehow magically unfixable is simple ignorance.
There's no such thing. Something is broken and needs to be fixed. You just don't know what needs to be fixed. It's not magic. You're simply showing your ignorance of the subject.
Sorry. But if you sent that PC to someone that has the hardware and software to diagnose the problem, and the experience and knowledge to use those tools, they could fix it in a matter of days at the most. Like I said, get an extended warranty and you won't have to worry about it. My PS2 stopped reading discs after a couple years too. That's why it's a brick sitting in the garage right now. That doesn't mean that all PS2s are junk or too difficult to maintain.
They aren't the exception if you want to play platformers or sports or fighting games on the PC. Any PC gamer that plays those games has a gamepad. Just like gamers who like flight sims or space sims have flight sticks of some sort. PCs are designed to be flexible and make use of a huge array of peripherals. Consoles are not. Deal with it.
I don't have that attitude at all. Like I said before, I'm planning to get a Wii, just as soon as I can find one in my area. You said that the PC is useless if you want to play a game that isn't available for it. My point was that you can point to a ton of games that aren't available one one platform or another. It doesn't mean anything.
Guitar Hero is a good game. It's fun. What else is it supposed to be? Do you want it to make you breakfast too? Change your oil maybe? What exactly is it that you're expecting from a game?
Why does it matter that it's not standard? I plug it in and it works. Seems good enough for me.
Ok, and you can't play a game on the 360 that's not available for the 360 either. What's your point?
Your comment about trying every possible configuration gave me a pretty good idea of how much you know. That, along with the fact that you weren't able to fix the problem. PCs aren't magical contraptions. There is a way to make them work. The millions of working ones are testament to that.
Never said they were simple. I just said that I know how to set them up. I've built many PCs myself, and fixed more than I can remember. Sometimes the fix is something that doesn't occur to you right away. Like a few years back, I was having some strange problems with my own PC. It wouldn't start up sometimes unless I completely removed the power cord for a minute or two and then plugged it back in. Pretty bizarre behavior, and I thought of all sorts of possible problems, from a bad power supply to a bad motherboard, faulty power switch or power connector. Tried switching to a different power cable. After none of those things panned out, eventually I figured out that the problem was the BIOS and I had to flash it to a new version. That fixed it. Between learning yourself and asking questions of others online, you can develop the understanding of how to fix all kinds of problems. Saying you tried everything is simply a way of saying that you have no idea what the problem is and haven't thought of the answer yet. I'm sorry you're having trouble, but it's not indicative of PCs in general being broken. You might want to rethink your methods for ruling out certain problems, especially hardware and driver problems. Another option woudl be to just purchase prebuilt computers from Dell or another company and get the extended warranty so that they'll help you fix any problems.
I didn't say that consoles == shit. I said that they just aren't good at certain genres of games. I never tried the console version of R6v, but I did try GRAW on both console and PC, and the PC version was almost a different game. The console version was a straight-up run-n-gun shooter. Run to cover, shoot stuff, run to cover, shoot stuff. Very linear, very little in the way of tactics. The PC game was much more open, more difficult, and required more strategy and tactics. GoW is a different sort of game, and one that, I agree, works pretty well on the console. But it's not an FPS, and I do believe that the PC could do it better still, simply due to better controls. PC games tend to have much better enemy AI as well, which makes the game more interesting, but also requires more precision in the controls for the player to be competitive against them.
See above. PCs have better controls, don't need autoaiming, have larger, less linear levels, generally much better enemy AI, and can generally be tweaked to the user's preferences to a much greater degree. If I wanted to, I could plug in a dual-shock style controller and play it that way, but that would be like playing with oven mitts on my hands compared to using the mouse and keyboard.
Umm.. a gamepad sure as fuck does count. I have one sitting right here that works just fine for games that it is appropriate for. Why in hell shouldn't it count? It's part of the PC's flexibility, something that consoles are lacking in (although the Wii is promising with its control scheme, good to see them finally trying to do something new rather than trying to make every damn game type work with the gamepad).
I don't see why not. Plug in a gamepad and they should play just like they do on the console. That's one type of game where the gamepad is quite appropriate, and the PC can do that just fine. The real strength of the console is that I can sit in the living room with my friends and play. PCs generally aren't good for that. Playing single-player or online is where the PC is best.
Which makes it the opposite, and therefore most definitely not the same. Games getting better does not mean that that PC is getting worse. That's what I meant by the TP thing and the XBox vs XBox 360 comments. Just because XBox 360 games have better graphics and the XBox can't play them, it doesn't mean that the XBox is worse than it was before. It simply means that games are getting better.
It's just rather obvious that you understand little about PCs. Every possible configuration? What does that even mean? It sounds like you're just randomly trying things and not getting it to work. I build PCs all the time. The software works fine when you set it up properly. It works for many many people out there. I'm not claiming you're stupid. I'm just saying you don't know how to set up a PC properly. Those are two very different things.
And that's what they want you to think. And it's understandable if people don't know all the guidelines that go into those logos. However, the bottom line is that if you buy a DVD and it doesn't play in your player, you should return it and demand your money back. Let the stores deal with the manufacturers.
It's not the same thing at all. Your XBox 360 can't play Twilight Princess either. That doesn't make it less capable than the Wii. The PC doesn't degrade at all. The games simply get better. The graphics you see do not get worse. Let me know if you manage to get your XBox to play XBox 360 games.
I'm not disagreeing that it has its benefits. I'm just pointing out that it also has its drawbacks, which is a fact as well. You take the good with the bad.
In my experience, when the problem can't be attributed to the hardware, then it's almost always attributable to the user. The only other alternative is an environmental factor, which is quite rare, but possible. I once helped a guy out who's computer kept getting corrupted. Turned out there was some sort of power transformer a few feet from his office window on the other side of a fence that was screwing it up. He moved it into a room on the other side of his house after I reinstalled everything for him and it ran fine after that. But usually, it's the user doing something wrong. Something that they're installing is generally screwing things up. It's quite obviously not the PC's fault, since millions of people have computers that run just fine. So yeah, if you can't make it work, and you don't know anyone else that can, then you should probably stick with a console. But don't go claiming that PCs are too hard just because you couldn't keep one running properly.
I use a mouse with my laptop all the time in all sorts of places. I know what's comfortable and what isn't. Using a mouse in the living room is not comfortable, and not something that most console gamers even consider to be an option. When the prospect of wireless keyboard and/or mouse comes up, I always hear console gamers saying that if they wanted to use those they'd play on the PC.
First of all, Gateway is not a good place to buy PC stuff. Second, go check out Dell's site. You can get an excellent monitor there that has a response rate that makes it great for gaming and a native resolution of 1920x1200 for about 600 bucks. While that's not much better than the best HDTVs out there, it is better, and it's not even the best you can get. Some of the newer ones have native resolutions of 2560x1600.
Sorry man, I've spent the last 2 months researching HDTVs since I'm planning to buy one soon. You can't get a nice 1080p for $600. I don't doubt you could buy one for that price, but it won't be a good one. I'm leaning towards a 56" Samsung DLP set right now, but I may still go LCD if I can find a good deal.
Again though, who cares that you can run Linux on it? Who is actually planning to use their console like a PC? Doesn't that defeat the purpose of the console to begin with? The consoles have been becoming more and more PC-like with each generation, but there are limits to how far they can go before they actually start negating some of the benefits of being a console in exchange for the benefits of a PC, along with the associated drawbacks as I mentioned in another post. If you want a PC, get a PC. If you want a console, get a console. You can have both. I plan to get a Wii because it is fun to play and does things that PCs don't currently do, and I can play with friends in my living room. That's where consoles win out in my opinion. You can have a more social experience playing with others in the same place rather than just communicating online. That's not something you can really duplicate with a PC right now.
It had a very good point actually, which is that the price difference isn't all that much. I can build a top of the line gaming PC from scratch for less than $2500. I never spend that much on my own, even when I've done a complete rebuild. I just built a completely new PC earlier this year, replaced everything except my monitor for $1500 and it can handle every game I've tried with no problem. When it does start to struggle with the newer games, probably next year, I may upgrade the video card for another $250 or so. I'll be able to get a good DX10 card for that price by then.
That's the dumbest argument I've heard yet. PC capabilities don't "degrade" over time. The games and graphics get better over time, and require better hardware to run at the highest levels. I can turn down the detail a bit and get good performance with graphics staying basically at the same level as when the PC was new. If I want the nicer graphics, I can upgrade my vid card to a newer one. Consoles don't have that option.
Not sure what you've been reading, but the PC version of GRAW was much better than the console version. The console version was very linear and mostly just a run-n-gun game. The PC version was more open and required a lot more in the way of tactics. It was harder in general. Of course I focused on the genres that the PC is strongest in. That was my point. That the PC does some types of games very well that the consoles can't seem to do well at all. Yet the PC can handle pretty much any type of game that the consoles can do since you can get the same types of controllers for the PC.
That's the only decent argument about PCs. They do require more knowledge to use properly. If you know what you're doing, you don't have technical problems and performance issues. But it's really not all that difficult. With all the news out there about identity theft, spyware, viruses, etc., you'd think that people would use a bit of common sense. But they don't. I know I certainly get tired of being asked to fix people's computers all the time because they can't be bothered to run firewall software or to use some common sense and not download every piece of spyware that offers them free smilies for their IM app. Some people just shouldn't use PCs. Consoles are perfect for them since they limit what you can do in general, and thereby also limit the harm you can do. That means they have to be tightly controlled, which is why they'll never have the variety of games and game mods and add-ons that PCs get. And they'll likely have to pay for most of the things that PC gamers get for
Yeah, we've seen what happens to FPS games on consoles. Deus Ex 2 and Thief 3 are good examples. They take what was a great game, and shrink the level sizes down to about 1/8 of what they used to be, design an interface that is a lot more cumbersome, just because they have to work within the confines of the controller, and then they also have to do things like auto-aiming and crappy enemy AI to make up for the lack of precision in the controls.
Not really. PCs can do anything that the consoles can do. I've played platformers and sports games on my PC. Psychonauts played just fine on the PC with a gamepad. The reverse is not true, however. Consoles have limitations that make them unsuitable for certain types of games.
It's not a rigid mindset. Using a mouse for a console is just not comfortable. I'm far from being the only one who thinks that.
No, the UIs have gotten better over time. Maybe you just haven't played the games. Warhammer and Company of Heroes have pretty good interfaces. Supreme Commander has an excellent interface.
Yeah, well I don't want to pay the same price I paid for a game last year just to get an incremental upgrade. I can get that kind of thing for free with patches, map packs and mods. If they want another 50+ dollars from me, they'd better give me a new game, not a glorified patch.
That's just because the consoles (and console developers) have so many shortcomings to make up for.
Two things. HDTV still doesn't touch PC resolutions, and console gamers are always comparing the cost of console gaming versus PC gaming, while completely forgetting to include things like the TV that they dropped 2 grand on, or their surround system, etc. Yeah, you can use those for other things as well, but I can use my PC for a LOT of other things as well.
No, I don't. I haven't seen one decent RTS, RPG or FPS on the consoles yet that can touch any of the major PC games in those categories. UT3 will be released on consoles as well. Wonder how different it will be from the PC version. I doubt we'll see a good RTS anytime soon. Certainly nothing up to the level of CoH or SupCom. RPG is probably possible, but they definitely haven't done it yet. Oblivion is a joke on consoles, even worse than the PC version (which is pretty bad, yay for mods!).
Every time I've read a review of a console RTS game, they always talk about how the controls suck. Yeah, the PSone mouse might have helped the 3 people that actually owned one, but really, who uses a mouse in the living room? Why not just go play on the PC if you're gonna do that and get an all-around much better experience?
Like I said, that stuff is just not comfortable to use in a living-room environment where most people have their consoles. Unless someone figures out how to make a better controller that doesn't require a desk to use it properly, the controls are going to continue to suck. The Wii could probably pull it off if it weren't for the resolution problem.
Oh come on. Hurts developers? More like it makes them work a little harder and try some new things. Every time some modder creates something new and different, it expands our choices in general. I guess you think we should just be able to shell out money for the next Madden update every year instead of getting anything fresh?
It's not snobbery when the consoles haven't shown that they can do games just as well as a PC. When they step up and actually start doing what you claim they can do, then maybe you'll have an argument. Let me know when that happens.
RTS's have been tried before. I don't remember the names of the games that have done it, but the controls sucked horribly compared to mouse/keyboard control. It just made everything difficult. The main drawback for RTS games is really the resolution issues. It's not as bad as it used to be as long as you have an HDTV and a console that can both do 1080, but how many people have that? Even then it's still lower res than you get with a PC, and a high resolution can make those games much nicer to play since you get a better view of what's going on. The Wii probably has the most potential for giving you good control over it, but it suffers from the resolution problem worse than the others. I just don't see RTS games doing well on consoles at least for this generation.
As for RPGs, it could probably be done, but console gamers miss out on all the nice game-life-extending mods that get made that really can add a lot of replay value to a game. Even if they did get access to them, they'd most likely have to pay for them as if they were an expansion pack. Look at Epic. They're well-known by computer gamers for releasing a lot of free extra content for their games. That's one of the reasons their games have been so popular with gamers. Look what happened when they tried to release that kind of content for free to console gamers. They are forced to charge for it. Sad.
If there is an emergency, then they can do so, and I see it happen sometimes. If there isn't an emergency, and they aren't responding to a call, then they don't have any reason to be exempt from the laws. It just creates more of a headache for other drivers, without any benefit. Sure, an emergency could happen, but it could happen a few blocks back the way they came from just as easily. There's no reason to exempt them.
Yes, because Fallout 1 & 2 were such crappy games that nobody bought them, right? Why would they ever want to create such a thing again? I mean why would they even buy the rights to create such garbage? Oh yeah, because you're wrong.
Which is one of the reasons that it will probably suck. With the focus on the consoles, the PC roots will be left behind and we'll end up with an Oblivion or Deus Ex 2 type of screwup with the entire interface being retarded and completely inappropriate for the PC. There will be all kinds of compromises made in the gameplay to facilitate the consoles and the mass-market focus. It won't be a Fallout game. It will be something that seems more like a game that is trying to immitate Fallout, but falling woefully short of the mark. I just don't believe that they can do the game justice with all of the conflicts of interest they're going to have to deal with.
Because there's no compelling reason to exempt them from traffic laws in non-emergency situations.
Now ask him how many unsolved cases his department has. Not all criminals are stupid. The stupid ones just get caught.
He used the keyboard for movement and the stick for aiming. Don't remember if he used reversed y-axis or not. Apparently it could be done. I just couldn't figure out why anyone would want to do it.