I hate modern games.

[PunterCam]

Or more accurately, the way they either run, or don't.

10 years ago the minimum specs weren't actually enforced, so to speak - you could have a computer well under the required spec and still run the game. Nowadays it just says 'no. can't do it. not good enough computer'.

I'm really only ranting because of my own incompetance - I ordered a new video card for my mac pro in order to give the new starcraft a go, but I didn't fit it when it arrived and it's since made its way into the depths of my flat, never to be seen again... But I feel since my old video card has enough ram, blizzard should let me run the damn thing. If it runs a bit slow it runs a bit slow - you've presented me with the minimum specs, I'm not going to sue over a few fps.

It annoys me. I used to run pentium games on 486s all the time, and sure they jerked, but you got by. This is hardly progress. They've actually taken time to stop me trying to run it. Miserable people.

If there's a completely justified reason why it simply can't run, I absolutely stand by everything I've just written.

 

[wolfeking]

I agree man. I dont even see the point of now running a game when it dosent meet the requirement. This has been going on for a while though, at least with EA games. The MOH: Airborne wouldnt run on a dell i had even though the vid. card was equal to spec, just not a "supported Manufacturer". When will it go back to the days of almost anything would work if you jury rig it enough???

 

[philaaay]

I totally agree with you guys! I recently just picked up the new Xbox 360 S because I got sick and tired of all the glitches, incompatibility, etc. that I ran into while trying to play BC2, MW2, etc. At least with console gaming, the games will run without having any "requirements" and whatnot, let alone the system itself costing around the same price, if not less, of a high-end video card, just ONE of the components needed for a computer that's capable of running those games.

I guess they have those strict requirements because they want the user to experience how pretty the game can be, but they fail to understand that gameplay in itself is the main factor of what makes a game great. I feel like more and more manufacturers focus their games on graphic quality rather than gameplay, with a few exceptions of course. Don't get me wrong, I love how the graphics look on PC compared to consoles, but it's getting to that age where the balance of gameplay and amazing graphics are getting closer and closer - it's just that the hardware is still too expensive for most of us to purchase and build a quality machine to play these games "the way they're meant to be played."

Good example of this for PS3 is MAG - graphics are definitely not what the PS3 is capable of (still good though), but they sacrificed a bit of it to make the game capable of 200+ players or so on multiplayer. That's awesome.

 

[MovingMan]

Yeah, most new games require you to buy a new computer, or make drastic upgrades in an old computer (which is sometimes a challenge). I recently bought a great refurbished desktop PC that has ran every new game I've tried on it (Runs Starcraft 2 brilliantly). But before I got it, I had been trying to play games on my 'not built for gaming' laptop, which frustrated me so much.

If you want to play lots of new games, invest in a new desktop PC. They're very affordable these days, and easy to upgrade. Going refurbished/reconditioned is good too (just because it's refurbished doesn't mean it's going to fail, it probably didn't even fail in the first place, the original owner could have returned it for any reason, or it could have been a display model.)

 

[lion149]

Most people need a PC whether for school or work etc, so that’s about $300, add the other $350 it would cost to get a 360 or ps3...and you have a $650 pc that can play most modern games.

That being said, console gaming is so much easier and I continue to do the majority of gaming on a 360. I only bring up the first point because I am tired of people always saying "you need $1,000 pc to play games"...you don't, the statement is false.

In regard to PunterCam's statements, it is a double edged sword, i see why the game makers would employ such a requirements, we have all seen it, your buddy is like "oh man this game is awful, its glitchy it crashes" then you find out he is playing crysis with a Pentium 3. I respect your point though, maybe when the game is launched a disclaimer pop-up to tell the user when it recognizes a pc that doesn’t meet the requirements would be the best balance?

 

[philaaay]

lion149, you have a great point - I remember when I used to save up money to buy a video card to put in my family's HP PC (6800 GT AGP I believe it was) so I could play Doom 3 and Half-Life 2 very well. Of course to today's standards, it's not considered the best, but back then, I felt like I had a monster gaming computer, all because of a video card upgrade. And you know what, even video cards like the 7950 GT and 8800 series can still play some modern games well, even if they're considered "old" now. I'm still running 4850s because I can run most games at max while getting 40-50 FPS and because I could care less about DX11.

Technically, yes, you can play most modern games out there just by simply upgrading the video card and PSU (most desktop computers now are quad-core with 4 GBs of RAM or more) and it's like you said, invest $300-400 in a computer that's needed for work/school and invest the other $300-400 in components (GPU and PSU) rather than a console and voila! You have a computer now capable of running modern games.

I think what I noticed on here is that if someone asks in a thread for help in upgrading their current desktop PC, most people respond with things like, "if you're going to upgrade the GPU, you have to get a new PSU, but then your CPU is going to bottleneck your performance, blah blah" and before you know it, they're saying things like, "It's better to just build a new computer, etc."

I think we're forgetting that some people here really can't afford to build a PC, let alone want to go through the hassle of trying to build it, even if you can refer to this forum for help and whatnot. Some people aren't looking to dedicated gaming machines to run every possible game at max, but most of them are probably just normal PC users who do everything from business to school to surfing the net and want to be able to play modern games very well on their current setup.

Just because someone wants to get an performance exhaust and intake for their car doesn't mean you tell them, "Naw, you're better off buying a WRX STI or the new Camaro.

Sorry for the long essay.

 

[applemao]

"oh man this game is awful, its glitchy it crashes" then you find out he is playing crysis with a Pentium 3.

lols on that one, i've done it!!!!

but i definitely agree with everyone on this. games should be considered good not just because of graphics (ahem crysis) but because of the inventive gameplay. tf2 doesn't even have real looking people, but the gameplay style is what makes it popular.

 

[vnsmith]

I pretty much agree with all your post.. you just have to make the most out of what you have..

 

[russb]

philaaay i think that was a very good post,thank you.

 

[TristanPerry]

Yep, it can get pretty annoying. I tried playing the Napoleon Total War demo the other day and it was really glitchy and buggy graphics-wise (with a Radeon HD 5850). People were saying online that it's an ATI driver fault, but I hadn't had such an issue with any other game. Either way, it's annoying when some PC games work fine, and others don't seem to want to work at all.

 

[russb]

This is my gaming computer.

Novateck.

Processor: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T
Memory: 4GB DDR3 1333Mhz
Harddrive: 1TB 3.5" 7200rpm SATA Hard Drive
Case: Antec Three Hundred Case
Graphics: ATI Radeon 5770 1024MB GDDR5 Graphics
Power Supply: 700W Professional Power Supply
Motherboard: AMD 890GX Chipset

This being a gaming computer so Novateck told me when i ordered this thing
then i think it should be able to play any PC games no matter how old they are.

 

[Adamus]

I agree completely, I rarely play new video games on my PC, I use my Xbox for it but a while ago I got a cheap copy of Empire: Total War from a friend and I wasn't able to play it.