PC Gaming, too expensive!! - Page 2

I've been a PC guy all my life...had the Commodore VIC-20, then the Commodore 64 and the 128 after that. But I have always been a buyer, not a builder, which has been expensive for me. The Commodore's were all bought for my brother and I by our parents...after that it was all me. First it was a Gateway with a 486 and 1X CD-ROM...everyone was SO JEALOUS! Haha! Then, years later, a Dell...then another Dell (hate Dell)...then built my own with a friend's help...then an Alienware (sigh). Now I am, for the first time, going to be building my own SOLO for my kids...I am going to stick with my Alienware (sigh) for another year...this build is going to replace the one I handed down to my kids that was built in 2001. Depending how this solo build goes I am committing myself to build all future PC's and never buy another pre-built again. Anyway, back to the topic at hand:

I have been a "hardcore" (sort-of) PC gamer all my life. I love PC's...and always hated consoles. I never had any interest in them. Then my friend got Tomb Raider (yes, the first one) for the PS (yes, the first one). I was wowed but not enough to get a console. Ended up getting my oldest son (he was my ONLY son at the time) a PS2 though. He loved gaming on the PC but all his friends had PS2's (because, he said, their parents couldn't afford a PC). I still couldn't get into it though. Then I had a good friend get the XBOX (yes, the first one) and go on and on and on about HALO. Well, my brother got a great opportunity to get a great deal on the new 360 when they first came out so I said what the heck...then the same great opportunity for the PS3.

So believe it or not, I know have the two PC's, the XBOX 360, and the PS3. My wife and three kids (that is how far the fam has come) are ALL gamers...they use all of the above, as for me, I'm still mainly a PC guy but love the 360...and here's why...(this was ultimately the point of my post):

I buy the game, take the game out of the box, I put it in the 360, and I play it. As a long time PC guy, there is just something so damn refreshing about that! From dealing with playing "TELENGARD" on the tape deck (yes, the games came on actual cassette tapes for those of you that are not old enough to remember, yet blow me away as far as PC knowledge goes ), to dealing with SSI Baseball, Impossible Mission, Summer Games, Beachhead, and the like on a 5 1/4 floppy in the 1541 Drive for the C64, to Pirates and Tony LaRussa Baseball on 3.5" diskettes in my Gateway floppy drive, to Baldurs Gate and Dark Forces on CD for my Dell's, to Half-Life and Earth 2150 on CD for my home build with friend, to RTCW and HL2 (the latter on DVD-ROM) for my Alieanware (Sigh).

Do you know how much it sucked installing Tony LaRussa baseball? It was something like 12 Diskettes...and about 6 more if you wanted the stadium pack installed, and another 3 or 4 if you wanted the face pack! Haha! Baldur's Gate took about 45 minutes to install! Black & White, the original one, gave my wife and kids nothing but problems with every patch I installed to fix the other stuff that was giving them problems!

But my 360? Man, I just slide it in and play! Damn that feels good! With that being said, I still prefer PC gaming (love my mouse and KB), but it is such a pain in the butt to install this stuff, deal with key codes, patch it up, and then all that troubleshooting because something is creating a conflict with something else. Now, for one, this is a by product of one of the benefits of PC over console, it does SO MUCH MORE than play games...but the software and utilities you use to do so much more, or to protect yourself from others doing stuff to you, creates hassles at many times...damn those damn conflicts! Haha!

I could never go to console and leave PC completely...never, but man do I wish we could get to a point where we slide the game in and play....which will probably never happen...if for no other reason than all the customization in PC world (which is yet another reason that makes PC'ing so much fun)...

Looking back at my post...did I actually have a point?


13Bravo -- USHA!!

Heck no! I'm totally with you on that! Unfortunately, I still have WAY too long hiccups regularly with HL2 but I am sure that is due to my system (running p4 3.2 EE with 2X512 mem). My point, if I had one...as mentioned in the last line I am not sure if I actually had one, was that it is nice to be able to buy a game, unwrap it, slide it into the drive and play it. As opposed to having to install it, patch it up, deal with software/hardware conflicts, patch it up some more, deal w/more SW/HW conflicts, etc. Obviously it isn't all that bad for every game title, and I NEVER speak for anyone elses experience as I can only speak to my own, but I have had 25 years of dealing with issues instead of JUST playing the game. Now, I wouldn't trade any of it...it's been a great ride! However, as someone who never "consoled" to all of a sudden having the PS3 AND the 360 in my house, I just found it damn refreshing to throw the game in and play...nothing more, nothing less. It just felt plain good. But I still prefer PC gaming...maybe that's hypocritical, maybe it isn't...it just is what it is...I think...

Saying that a console @ 500 (or whatever it is for americans, I don't know cause I live in australia) is cheaper than a PC is all well an good, but a good TV for it will cost quite a lot (like >1000), whereas for 1500 odd you can build a killer system with a monitor that looks just as big because you sit closer to it.
Plus, PC's can do many different tasks, play movies, msn, email, word processing etc.
I personally wouldn't buy a console simply because games cost a fair amount more (usually, why is that?).

Your reasoning is a little single sided when comparing the extra costs of buying a HD tv vs buying a computer that can do a lot of other things besides playing games. A new HD tv can also be used for other things than gaming, so if you really want to do a cost comparison in that sense you also have to budget in what other computer needs you have and how much money you want to spend on home cinema. Only then can you compare pure gaming costs.

The worst thing yet is that not all games are available on any platform and that really complicates issues when trying to decide to go for which platform. As a consumer I hate platform specific games because I want as much decoupling as possible between the hardware and the software in order to have maximal flexibility in choosing my games and the hardware that has to come with it. That is why I still favor the PC as my favorite gaming platform, even when Microsoft is trying to shove Vista down our gaming throats with their dx10 platform coupling crap.

neee, you can have it quite cheap. For example, I just upgraded my 8800 GTS 320 to 8800 GTX and made $80 profit. How? Well, I sold the 8800 GTS for $400... in Poland

And you can get those GTXs used for quite cheap from craigslist

EXACTLY! OK, I want to play Crysis as it is "meant to be played". I have to buy VISTA for $300.00. It’s a hog, so I buy a faster CPU for $500.00. Then, I buy one or two 8800 series cards for another $600.00 or more. Now my mother board isn't for Intel since I was a bleeding edge gamer and have an AMD system. I buy a $250.00 Intel board so I can use a QUAD core CPU this spring. My old memory won't work so off I go there, too. After all that plus all the upgrade installation time I then say PC's are apples and that a game on a PC is SO much more different than a console for games (nope, there not, outside of the keyboard and mouse. Funny, those two items are dirt cheap!).

Sorry you all, but I used a 300MHz PII for eight years at work and only upgraded it because it wouldn't run a bloated new O.S. called XP that runs even more bloated software, not because it wouldn't run office apps just fine (My 200MHz did too!).

When you divide the objective, the prices will concore you every time. PC's are so divided. There is no optimization to really do ANYthing anymore. It has become so "open" that even the basic O.S. barely works. Why is LINUX so popular, or gaining support? Because it is optimized to TASKS! No other good reason, really. It's just more of a hammer and not every other tool in the tool box. Just open your console screen in XPSP2, the icons blink on one by one as if you flipped switch for each and every one. SLOOOOW is all I can say.

I contend that PC's are about the same cost, adjusting for inflation, as they once were but run basic tasks poorly by comparison and are indeed expensive to run games on. If PC's were designed to run office apps, and not be TV's, game machines, ETC. you'd see a big speed improvement. In the old days, games used the office app programs. Now, it is the opposite. Just look at the Vista hourglass (and pay much more for it, too). Who the hell needs that to run WORD?

The question remains, are you willing to pay for engineering blunders and oversights that coagulate a single box called a PC, or are you willing to optimize a platform at an amazing price point called a console? Take your pick. Before you PC fan boys squelch me, I own a PC and not a console..and I do play games. Man, is it ever expensive!

r30

While I don't completely agree with your price comparison arguments, I feel that you raised a great point about the terrible direction that OS's are going. Back in the day, one of the aspects of using a PC over a mac that I enjoyed was the stripped-down nature of the OS. Now both MS and apple are in this war to build huge, resource-hogging OS's that have a thousand 'functions' that we will never use but require contant patching.

I found a few discussions about 'bloatware' associated with Vista, but they curiously focused on pre-installed third party apps that come with Dells or whatever. To me, the whole dang OS is bloatware - the interface, the 'security' features, etc.

XP is hardly better - if an OS needs performance or security updates every week, then there is something fundamentally wrong with it.

I dunno, just my 0.02.

C

OH!! and quite using Crysis as a benchmark. Everyone knows its a HOG! everyone knows you need en ungodly system to run it. But it's just one game. Use a different game like, UT3, COD4, Team Fortress 2, any other new game. You don't need galactic power to run any of these and make it look good. My PC cost $1400 a year ago... well plus a monitor. I need a PC anyways and could have made a decent one for $1000 but I upgraded the video to play games. Ohhhhhh $350. less than a console or the same.

And to be on the gamer side, if I had an HD tv I might buy a console for $400. But Im not getting an HD tv just to play games. I have a 24" samsung flat tube tv. It's great cause i want an hour a day.

I own a 360 and a PS3 and a Wii. But PC gaming is FAR superior. And don't forget, with the consoles, you'll need to shell out another $600 on a display (probably more like $1000).

I don't think you can do your Income Tax on any console to date.

the ONLY reason why console users feel satisfied is that they do not have to go to a graphics menu to tweak the settings for a good performance/quality ratio , since the game manufacturer has already done that , and they are actually charging you for tweaking settings !!!! (a game costing 40$ on pc costs you at least 55$ on console) , i remember a few years ago when NFS UG was brand new my friend (who had played it on his ps2 ) came to see my (then) brand new rig (athlonxp 2100 + 9600xt + 1gb ram ....... ) run it . it turned out on the ps2 version there was no such thing called as motion blurr !!!!
what i`m trying to say is the comparison of games running on pc and consoles is ridiculous (a high end pc absolutely KILLS any console) ........... BUT , having a high end pc (and more importanly keeping it highend!!!)costs fortunes.
but still having a pc , you have the advantage of being able to tweak the settings the way it pleases YOU (being satisfied with your gaming is most important , isn`t it ?) ........ now if you`re too lazy to tweak your game and want the manufacturer do that for you then go buy a console and pay EXPERTS to decide which graphical features you need and which you don`t !!!!
the hell with it , if you`re that lazy just forget about gaming , go buy satellite and watch TV allday long !!!!

ps: i had my old system till 2 months ago (exactly 3.5 years) , and i only felt the need for upgrade in the last 8-9 months, i now have a core2duo e6750 + 8800gt512 + 2gb ram ....... , it cost me overall about 900$ but i could sell my older pc for 300$ , so in reallity it cost me only 600$ and i`m sure i won`t be needing any major upgrading in the next 3-4 years ( i might add an extra 2gb ram next year for switching to vista )

Tweaking settings does not make the PC better. Consoles run just fine and for the newer consoles they can run on the 1920x1080. The nice thing is people don't have to fight with drivers, hope their system will run a game or deal with the same frustrations PC users do.

People want to play games more than they want to fiddle with all the crap to get it to work. Also they don't want to pay 300 extra dollars to get a game to run. Only if you buy 20 games do you notice the price difference between console games or PCs.

As for a display the newer LCDs will hook into your PC. Seems like I would rather buy a 46" LCD with a slightly lower resolution (1920x1080) than the super high resolution monitors.

I love PC gaming, but it is the games that don't translate into consoles that I enjoy playing. FPS and fighting games are perfect for consoles and do it well.

If everybody does as you recommend, "all your games" will equate to 0 in no time.

There are other threads where you can express your view on software piracy, let's keep this topic clean, and lets assume that there will be enough decent customers around to support your anti social habit.

most game makers complain about pc gaming not being a good business

there have been many articles about this http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/po [...] rates.html

the problem is that game developers decide to make a game that only 5% of the pc gamers can run, and probably only 20% of that 5 % will be interested in the game, then probably 10% of that 20% will pirate the game because they didn't feel like bending over backwards and jumping through a million hoops for the drm to let them play the game

then they complain that not enough people are buying the game.
while i understand that graphics are good to have, but theres no point in doing overkill and giving up gameplay in favor of better graphics. when you get a game that has extremely good graphics, the wow effect only last about 5-10 minutes. if you have crappy game play, no one is going to buy the game, they will pirate it just to get that 5-10 minute wow effect then delete the game

i'm not saying make games look like crap, just make them look good and work fine on the videocards that most people have.

games designed for the more midrange videocards still look better than many console games and more people can run it.

look at some of the most successful games. you will see that they stay popular for a while, and they sell like crazy because more people are actually able to run the game.

console is so successful because many people have them, and when a game cones out, 100% of them are able to run the game

when a new pc game comes out, only like 5% of the people are able to run it the way it was designed to run.

even if they can add a super low quality setting to the game, the really good looking games generally have crappy game play, no one wants a game that looks crappy and has crappy game play. so they just don't buy it

i rather have a game that will run well on geforce 6-7 series cards and have good gameplay than to have ones that require you to have dual 8800's

game makers don't get good business for pc gaming so they move to console gaming . it doesnt matter of piracy stopped 100%, with out piracy, the games wouldn't sell at all. before FEAR started to get pirated, the multiplayer sucked. you were lucky to find more than 3 people in a server. so i didn't play the game until some time later when it became pirated (when fear was NEW, you could get it for $5 on ebay because people didn't find ffa with 3 people exciting.

pc gaming would be much more successful if they would make it more computer friendly (game developers seem more focused on making the games harder to run than making them fun to play)

and as many articles say, it is better to ignore the pirates instead of fighting them with drm. (as in the article i posted) they wind up more successful, and has no effect on the level of piracy. most game drm is broken with in a few hours of a game release. a 5 hour delay on piracy doesnt help you much, and getting your game DRM'ed is very expensive so it is just a loss of profits

game developers need to also stop saying that oh we lost $5 million to pirates. those people wouldn't have paid for the game anyway. and some people will download the same game more than once, and a torrent hit and a complete download are 2 different things. (of average trackers can get 200 millions hits in a few days, but only 100-200 complete downloads of a pirated game )

there is no drm that doesn't inconvenience the end user, the problem is that cracked games have 100% no drm,which = 100% no inconvenience from it, while the legit users are stuck jumping through hoops to just play the game

with console games, you just pop the cd in and play, no serial or other crap needed
(same as with many cracked, game, download> no install needed> launch the game and enjoy)

legit copy: unpackage box > look for cd key > make sure your connected to internet for activation> start the installation > click no for installing gamespy (aka gamespyware advertising) > enter in your 50 digit cd key > enter it in again because you made a mistake on 1 of the letters > double check the cd key to make sure it is type d in this time> type it in again because that 0 was really an o > wait 15 minutes for installation to finish > activate the game > launch the game> error, cd1 must be in the drive> insert cd1 > play the game

cracked copy: download> launch game and enjoy

which seems easier to you?

look at movie piracy. what stops you from getting that pirate copy of it?
well one thing, uncompressed 1080P looks much better than, out of focused 320x240 cam with people walking in front of the cam and coughing and talking in the background, and no bass because camcorder mics only pick up 100-14000hz

the real thing has better quality so you go for the real thing
while there some people who are happy with the out of focused cam (idiots don't even know how to use a camcorder and have the nerve to record a movie) they wont pay to see the movie anyway

EA does that and it was cracked before the game came out because crackers got a hold of the beta copies

the problem is that it will cost the company 200-300 thousand dollars to DRM their game, and the most they can hope for is a 1-2 day delay in the piracy of the game

pirates do the work so others don't have to, most pirate games have been said to not even require an installation. a simple download and play.

if pirates can make the game not need an installation (and still work with patches and other addons ) why cant the developers do it?

pirates have made pc games run just like console games, no install needed. thats 1 of the problems.

why don't people get pirate cable tv?, the reason is that it i not as good as the real thing.

but when the pirate copy is better than the real thing, then you have a problem.

why do you buy iphone instead of the hiphone? the video toms hardware made should answer that for you.

a full game crack is making the entire thing a download and play and depending on the game, the exe may add a registry key into your registry to make patches and mods detect it as being installed

they already do that, but the problem is that they have cracked copies that cant be banned, and if they use a more complex banning method then you see thousands of cracked servers spring up which allow banned cd keys

most legit servers also patch their server to allow invalid cd keys so they can get more players in their server



if you check the Rulez bf2 server (really popular, they allowed invalid cd keys because they get more players that way and they also make more money with the banner in the loading screen banner they put, which helps cover the cost of the server)

the best way to stop piracy is to offer something the pirates cant offer. quality. you pay for your movies because the pirate copies are 99% of the time blurry and have poor sound that sounds like the pirate hid the mic in his/her butt so no one would notice. while the video looks like they stuck a garbage bag over the lens or smeared bird crap on it

for movies, pirates cant offer quality. for games, pirates offer more quality and convenience. (the same convenience of consoles, no install just download or insert game disk and play)


piracy is a business and the only way to win it to make something better than what pirates can offer.

sell game cheaper (people are more ok with spending $20 on a game they never tried before, than spending $60 for it)

offer other incentives for using non pirated like no installation needed
discount card for half off if they make an expansion to the game

and try to provide all of the convenience of the pirate copies and have no drm and piracy for the game will most likely stop because the legit copy will be convenient and it will feel safer as it is less likely to contain a trojan

An 8800GT can be had for £129.99 (512mb), thats $260.

At the end of the day, if you can't afford it don't buy it. No one is forcing you to buy something to play games on.

OK, I get your point, but heres one for you...why didnt you just get a console way back when? Because maybe they were limited to pong? And once a game its downloaded from cd its done. The coming of the 780G for a igp that really can play games, the ideas that the game makers are pushing out , like everything being done on the internet just may elimanate consoles. This article astounded me, as this is exactly how I feel about the future of gaming period. Read it, good stuff http://www.extremetech.com/article [...] 507,00.asp So, you want easy? Its coming. You want better graphics like a pc and still easy? Its coming. You went where the best was, early on. Have the consoles caught up? Yes. Will they last? Thatll be decided in a few short years

yep

if you hate people not buying your games then try making it so that they can actually run the game

really lol hdtvs are like 800 + dollars while a monitor with a similar resolution is like 200. But seriously, it depends on what you like to do. If your really good at gaming then a console generally isn't the way to go because its more about luck than skill... honestly it is... but every household has a computer, or should have a computer... most 600 dollar computers, which you need, come with the equipment to play most current gen games at low detail settings, now granted its not as "purty" as a console but you get to play generally better games and still have the ultimate multi-media platform.


or you could hack a xbox 360 and turn it into a normal comp =P get a 300 medium level computer lol (probably not even possible yet)

I priced out a 'decent' rig yesterday. Dual core processor, 2 Gigs of ram, ATI 3850, mATX motherboard and Case, dvd burner, mouse / keyboard, an OEM copy of Vista and a logitech gamepad ... everything except a monitor.
Came out to $750.

$750 - $400 (for a PS3) =$350. That's 350 for everything a console can't do. Email, Internet, PORN. 350 sounds reasonable for the added features.

Here's my opinion.

First of all nowaday's, I decent gaming PC may only cost you slightly more than a console. Most people usually have a monitor keyboard mouse speakers etc.

in january I built this system for just over 700 dollars. What was a launch ps3? 599? now xbox and ps3 are hovering around 400. Dont get me started on the wii due to its availability.

MSI p6n platinum
c2d e6750
2gb ddr2 corsair
300gb seagate sata
eVGA 8800GT 512
Arctic cooler freezer pro 7

Everything (aside from crysis I assume, i dont even own it) runs smooth and the graphics are superior to consoles. It will not be a requirement for me to upgrade over the next 2-3 years, but if I want better graphics I will. If I dont mind adjusting the graphics level of future games to remain on par with what I am experiencing now, its not an issue. A consoles graphics level remains the same throughout its life span, where as pc gamers have the OPTION of making it better. Until this upgrade, I was rockin my p4 2.4ghz HT 1.5gb ddr gf4ti/6800gt(the only thing I upgraded in this system ever) for 4 strait years, with full enjoyment being able to play everything I got. Yes things get outdated quickly, but you dont NEED to upgrade just because its out dated, Ps3, xbox, wii are already outdated by computer capability, consoles just don't have the option to upgrade. PC gaming is only expensive if you make it so, by feeling you need to have the latest and greatest all the time.

Brought up a good point, computer manufacturers and pc part manufacters are decieving to non techie consumers too. I mean 3-500 dollar basic PC's are a dime a dozen and dont inform people of what it is not capable of. Much like there was a topic earlier about sellers slapping titles like "EXTREME GRAPHICS" on a GF MX card.
Essentially spoiling people into thinking having to spend more than 500 dollars on a PC is ludicrous. IMO PC gaming is as cheap as its ever been before. I was wowed with how cheap i was able to construct a more than gaming worthy PC when I retired my 4 year old dinosaur that was still truckin along at the time. The first PC I personally bought (before I delved into building, so I guess my first and last preassembled pc) cost me 2100 dollars in 1999, that got me a 600 mhz AMD Athlon (I believe 1ghz had just hit the market) Voodoo 3 128 megs of ram, 20g hdd, cdrom, Soudblaster, 56k modem, floppy drive. That system would have been considered about mid range at the time, my current pc would qualify about mid range but cost me 1300 dollars less. that pc also experienced slow down in age of empires, and C&C: tiberian sun. I have yet to experience any slowdown in any new game i have purchased (I dont own crysis, but that doesnt count anyway)

Lets not forget the real problem is the operating systems. Each operating system gets bigger and bigger leaving the old systems unable to run games they should.

My girlfriends computer runs Sam and Max season 1. Sam and Max required a 1.5 ghz proc, 512 meg of ram, and 32 meg video card for xp/vista. Her basic cheap dell has win2k a 900mhz celeron processor and 256 meg of ram. She bought a PCI graphics video card for 60 bucks. Her system is 7 years old.

It stutters here and there (not a big deal in adventure games). The voices are smooth and the loading takes a bit of time. Other than that it runs fine at 800x600. She probably represents a large untapped gamers market. They will buy games (thank you Half Price books for 7 dollar games), but only if they can play them.

You can buy the cheapest dell computer with windows xp for about 360 dollars. 1 gig of ram, a 1.6 ghz celeron, integrated video and sound. This means a home user only needs to buy a video card for about 60 dollars. Simple instructions on how to uninstall the drivers and put in the pci card would help. Funny thing is you can get a better computer for 428 dollars (1.8 core 2 duo and 256 mb video card) installed for cheaper but it has vista and still only 1 gig of memory.

So a gaming machine of about 450 dollars with tax and shipping. Also almost none of the hassle of scratch building your own system (which most people are afraid of).

I still find it ironic that Warcraft 3 is still played more by my group than the newest rts and part of that is because we can play it on old laptops.