Has PC Gaming Died over the past year or so?

[Qdos]

again give me some examples, which ports are you talking about? i can spit out non sense as well... fallout 3 and dawn of war 2 require Games for windows live and both are excellent games that play with no problems. when there is enough evidence to prove sth then its a fact.



i never encountered a single problem neither i've heard from anyone that bought gears LEGALLY! who needs fifa when we got pro eve and how about the xbox 360 version of football manager? saints row 2? come on... i'm talking about first class games like DMC4, Mass effect, fallout 3, assasins creed. sure xbox360 got a better 3d version of worms, no one is going to care about it though.

Gears of War - as people have said, GFWL didn't work for a lot of people, myself included. It was so bad I returned the game. Resident Evil 4 is universally acknowleged as one of the worst console to PC ports, just do a quick google and you'll see. Metal Gear Solid 2 refused to work on any system without an Nvidia card in it. Final Fantasy 7 for some reason ran all the music on midi (ouch) Halo 1+2 were far inferior on PC, sluggish controls and stuttering framerates, even on beasts of PCs. And without getting into the Fifa vs Pro Evo argument (spoiler alert: Fifa is now the better game) the port is also poor. Even GTA 4 has had issues with framerates on the PC port.

Like I said before, there are cases for and against PC ports, some of them are fantastic, others not so - but we're getting away from the crux of the argument and surely making such a fuss about console ports shows a lack of PC originality?

 

[rypt]

but we're getting away from the crux of the argument and surely making such a fuss about console ports shows a lack of PC originality?

Console ports are the main PC games now though, there are very few PC first or PC exclusives

There are also huge missing segments in the PC gamespace - no longer do we have an F1 game - nor a Forza 2 rival (with much better graphics), Grid is close but different game concept really

 

[AWPC]

Gears of War - as people have said, GFWL didn't work for a lot of people, myself included. It was so bad I returned the game. Resident Evil 4 is universally acknowleged as one of the worst console to PC ports, just do a quick google and you'll see. Even GTA 4 has had issues with framerates on the PC port.

Only thing wrong with RE4 on PC is uninformed people like you slating it without knowing all the facts that its the best version of any platform and has gfx which even rival RE5 in places! I agree it should have looked like this from the start but once you patch it & download a few mods it looks fantastic (yes thats right there is a thriving RE4 mod scene something the consoles cannot ever do):
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=12300399&postcount=16
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=12299617&postcount=13
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=12299277&postcount=10
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=13649099&postcount=20
http://z6.invisionfree.com/Resident_Evil_4_PC/index.php?showtopic=1631

GTA4 is a long way ahead on the PC as well. You need a quadcore plus a decent gfx card and the reward is a highly detailed virtual city to run amok in. Console versions look terrible and have poor FPS plus crippled gfx as the hardware is not powerful enough to give a decent experience. They should have made it PC only but R* are not silly as they know it would never have sold over 13m copies on the PC (no PC game has ever sold much more than 4m copies and that was back in the 1990's I believe).

GOW PC again is much better than the X360 version. Much higher quality gfx + 5 extra levels + all the paid for DLC from the X360. Sure the savegames broke for many (mainly pirates!!) as you needed to enter your LIVE access key (something pirates would not have would they) and if you played without being connected to LIVE you can only continue from your Online profile so your save games appear to be lost until you connect to LIVE again. Think it tells you this somewhere in the game manual or FAQ but again mainly pirates were affected by this. They patched it so it would pick up your savegames either way when they realised it was affecting people who had bought the product as well. The expired digital certificate was inexcusable but only a simple mistake. Pirates are so dumb they even complained about this on Epic's GOW forum!! (and people wonder why GOW2 is not looking likely to be coming to PC anytime soon).

GFWL is not perfect but its getting there and a very useful tool for MS to combat piracy. Most of the issues relating to it are security measures like blocked firewalls & or port no's. MS have comprehensive technical info on this for those that need it but you cannot blame MS if their users have security measures can you. If they went the other way and installed GFWL so that it automatically opened up the port's & added firewall entries then they would get a class action lawsuit (and people wonder why MS are not supporting PC gaming as much as they used to).
http://www.gamesforwindows.com/en-US/Support/Pages/default.aspx
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/937424

PC gaming is waning for sure but lets be factual about the games which are out and about which do offer superior experiences to the console versions.

 

[rypt]

GTA4 is a long way ahead on the PC as well.

GTA4 was no-where near being optimised for the PC though

 

[AWPC]

GTA4 was no-where near being optimised for the PC though

If you compare 720P console version vs PC @ 720P PC is still much better looking. PC running GTA4 @ 1080P or higher pushes out over double the pixels of the crappy looking console version so it has to render at least twice the amount of polygons. PC GTA4 is not perfect port wise but its still the best version by far. Yet still it sold very few copies as most people had aleady bought it on the consoles 7 months earlier. X360 +PS3 could hardly even run it in places the FPS drops even with low details were shockingly bad.

Nothing is optimised for the PC now. No-one is putting much effort into PC coding for games. I bought several PC games on the X360 as well and found surprising differences graphically with the PC lacking shader FX & detail in places even though it has superior hardware the coders are not spending much time to use it

Valve's Source engine runs well but it should do as it at least 5 years old and Valve coded it properly to begin with. Most PC games now are X360 ports using MS XNA Game Studio tools to translate the code so straight away they lose a large percentage of performance as its all generic to ensure high compatibility. Coding to give decent performance used to be the norm and 9 years ago it was unheard of for buggy uncomplete games to be released to the public. Nowadays is the opposite as the complex nature of optimising means no-one is spending the money to fix this as the costs are way too high. Its easier for them to target consoles as the hardware is fixed so less hassle and piracy is a lot less. Now MS are making NXE mandatory for new games X360 piracy will drop off again.

 

[DreXeL]

Now MS are making NXE mandatory for new games X360 piracy will drop off again.

LOLWUT? Where on earth did you get that idea from?

NXE does nothing extra to combat piracy, and if you are talking about the latest wave of games that have the NXE update on the disc not booting on modded consoles, that lasted all of a week, a new FW revision has been released that boots these games perfectly.

 

[PESolution]

Well, I never really felt angry at any point of typing any of those posts, if I remember I was alt tabbing between WoW and this forum for most of them - at no point was I in a rage smashing away at my keyboard whilst frothing at the mouth... but since neither you or any of the other morons in this thread have been able to give anything other than gibberish in your reasoning for the death of PC rather than any actual facts / numbers I guess trying to get personal will have to do?

Then you extrapolate from all this I'm a grammar nazi? sounds about as solid as your immense reasoning and research that led to your conclusion on the PC gaming industry.

So, whilst it's nice that when you read my posts you imagine an emotionally visual crescendo of violent keyboard mashing, I just don't think my heart is in it enough for this to warrant anything more than a mild eyebrow raise. As soon as I alt tab back to WoW this thread is gone from memory, if it falls off the first page, then forever so QQ.

Did you read the first half of my post? I never said it had died, i was asking the question, and what i wanted was advice on what i had been missing out on, not yourself trying to be unecesarrily articulate and show off your 'hard man pc till i die' e-peen.

 

[thecremeegg]

Lol. If that were the case PC gaming would have died before it even started.

Hardly, of all my mates, only probably 8 play games on their pcs? Everyone else plays on a console. They all own cheapo laptops that run facebook and word and have no interest whatsoever in gaming on them.

This has been the case for years, and even more so now due to the increased interest in the console market from women and the older generations alike

 

[Streeteh]

well me and many others including reviewers didnt encounter any of these problems.

That's great, doesn't stop it being a very widespread issue for everyone else. Just because not everyone is affected by an issue doesn't mean it is therefore null and void.

Quote from a popular website that nominated gears of war as game of the year : "The PC version of Gears of War is everything the 360 version was and more."

A popular website also called FarCry 2 the best shooter since Half Life 2, if i looked hard enough i'm sure i could find a popular website that criticizes the port (but i'm not going to bother before anyone asks).

btw what kind of problems did you encounter using games for windows live?

Terrible matchmaking which would take ages and usually fail and the rather glaring issue that you had to pay for a gold sub back then which effectively split the community in two, killing the multiplayer within weeks.

 

[Qdos]

Only thing wrong with RE4 on PC is uninformed people like you slating it without knowing all the facts that its the best version of any platform and has gfx which even rival RE5 in places! I agree it should have looked like this from the start but once you patch it & download a few mods it looks fantastic (yes thats right there is a thriving RE4 mod scene something the consoles cannot ever do):


GTA4 is a long way ahead on the PC as well. You need a quadcore plus a decent gfx card and the reward is a highly detailed virtual city to run amok in. Console versions look terrible and have poor FPS plus crippled gfx as the hardware is not powerful enough to give a decent experience.

PC gaming is waning for sure but lets be factual about the games which are out and about which do offer superior experiences to the console versions.

Soooo... to play RE4 as intended, you need to download a host of files and mods, some of which are approaching 2gb in size? Hmm, think I'll stick with my Xbox version which worked out of the box.
And to play GTA4 better than the console version (which isn't nearly as bad as you make out) you need to have spent an absolute boatload on a top spec PC? I'll pass thanks.

Yes, let's be factual - of course PCs offer superior experiences once they've had a load of mods applied to them and are running on a top end PC. But the whole point of consoles is that you can just slip in the disc and get on with it.

Again, people are getting away from the original point and descending into fanboyism and insults. Why the whole console vs PC debate was brought up in the first place is beyond me (although I might be to blame for that one).

 

[Duran]

Terrible matchmaking which would take ages and usually fail and the rather glaring issue that you had to pay for a gold sub back then which effectively split the community in two, killing the multiplayer within weeks.

i'm tired of this argument but i'll only comment on this. thats live for you, same things apply to the xbox360 live. matchmaking sucks. geow pc multiplayer didnt die because of these reasons but cause it sucks. host advantages and shotgun whores easily ruin sth that wasnt any good to begin with. the only reason the online of the first geow became popular on xbox360 live is that there were no other games that offered decent multiplayer at that time. once halo3 and cod4 came out, geow was neglected.

Like I said before, there are cases for and against PC ports, some of them are fantastic, others not so - but we're getting away from the crux of the argument and surely making such a fuss about console ports shows a lack of PC originality?

first of all console ports are only a few. the others are called multiplatform games and most of them are developed with PCs in mind, if they come out later on PCs sometimes is only because its easier to "milk" console users first. secondly any console focused game can work on a good rig. on the other hand there have been lots of pc games that cannot work on consoles due to their countless limitations. finally, since mgs2 there have been hundreds of multiplatform games that work better on Pcs, the number of console superior versions is totally insignificant as you can see.

 

[Qdos]

first of all console ports are only a few. the others are called multiplatform games and most of them are developed with PCs in mind, if they come out later on PCs sometimes is only because its easier to "milk" console users first. secondly any console focused game can work on a good rig. on the other hand there have been lots of pc games that cannot work on consoles due to their countless limitations. finally, since mgs2 there have been hundreds of multiplatform games that work better on Pcs, the number of console superior versions is totally insignificant as you can see.

Going to stop arguing with you now as you just constantly argue everything as an absolute. You don't even see that I'm agreeing with you in principle as you feel you have to be right about this subject, which can never happen as it's purely a matter of conjecture and opinion. There's no facts or figures that can prove your point, or mine. Which I've forgotten anyway.

"most of them are developed with PCs in mind, if they come out later on PCs sometimes is only because its easier to "milk" console users first." - Prove it. That's your opinion and you know it.

"any console focused game can work on a good rig" - Yes, but your talking about spending £600+ in order to make a game look slightly shiner as opposed to a console costing £140. That's not great economics and console uptake vs PC on games such as CoD4, Gears of War and Bioshock would bear me out on that.

"the number of console superior versions is totally insignificant as you can see." - Nope, I don't. As I said, it takes a larger spend and a lot more fiddling to make a slightly better version than the console original, plus many of the big name ports, which I named earlier were significantly poorer on PC. I'd hardly say that makes console versions "insignifcant"

Yeesh, and I thought console fanboys were bad!

 

[NVIDIA_x64]

Gears of war on PC is just epic DX10 4x AA = WIN runs like a dream GFWL works great aswell better than the pos on the 360

As for all those who said it was **** play it with Patch 3 installed and the new games for windows live you will not have a problem

People need to understand the Xbox 360 is nothing more than a toy that is 3 years old with poor GFX that costs nothing but small change (£100) compared to the power of high end PC's.

 

[Shamikebab]

They are less of them but I swear the PC fanboys are worse than any console fanboy.

 

[skankmaster]

These days, I use the PC for FSX, and more and more facebook online games, specifically mafia wars and Lexulous. I get more and more picky with the kind of games I play these days - it needs to be addictive and totally draw you in, like tetris was. I think the last game I played was farcry2, but its nowhere near as fun as the original IMO.

I think gaming is whatever you want to make of it, whether its sneaking in a few mins online here and there, i-spy, or revisiting old games.

 

[Duran]

Going to stop arguing with you now as you just constantly argue everything as an absolute. You don't even see that I'm agreeing with you in principle as you feel you have to be right about this subject, which can never happen as it's purely a matter of conjecture and opinion. There's no facts or figures that can prove your point, or mine. Which I've forgotten anyway.

1)"most of them are developed with PCs in mind, if they come out later on PCs sometimes is only because its easier to "milk" console users first." - Prove it. That's your opinion and you know it.

2)"any console focused game can work on a good rig" - Yes, but your talking about spending £600+ in order to make a game look slightly shiner as opposed to a console costing £140. That's not great economics and console uptake vs PC on games such as CoD4, Gears of War and Bioshock would bear me out on that.

3)"the number of console superior versions is totally insignificant as you can see." - Nope, I don't. As I said, it takes a larger spend and a lot more fiddling to make a slightly better version than the console original, plus many of the big name ports, which I named earlier were significantly poorer on PC. I'd hardly say that makes console versions "insignifcant"
Yeesh, and I thought console fanboys were bad!

1) i told you again some things are facts. playing fallout 3 or mass effect, unreal tournament 3, fear 2, mirrors edge, burnout paradise etc etc with the controller of your choice, much higher resolution, 60+ fps, 4x aa 16 AF and mods makes the pc version the superior one. the same websites like ign, gamespot etc that post console comparisons regularly agree that the pc version is always ahead. thats not an opinion, its a fact. end of story.

Capcom builds every game with pcs in mind, they stated that they delay the pc versions for silly reasons. same for other companies that delay some of their games with the excuse of piracy ( endwar, mirrors edge), sure you can find all xbox360 games pirated days or even weeks before release...

2)yeah it suits you nice to use the cheapest and even useless (without a hdd) version available. you know you can buy a pc for £200, its not going to give you the best experience though. you're paying on average £250 to buy a console that just plays games and needs a HDTV for a decent experience and you wouldnt give £600 for sth that has unlimited capabilities? everybody needs a pc, you may as well upgrade it to play games... plus the FACT that pc games are cheaper and console addons like wi-fi are bloody expensive.

3) the only games you mentioned that are superior on consoles are fifa and 2 games from like 10 years ago. halo 1 played perfectly on my pc back then, same for halo 2. i can name 10 games that are better on pc for the last year alone.

you better stop arguing because you got nothing... you pay more for pc gaming in the short term but you get the better experience and save in the long term.

there is a big difference between console and pc fanboys. most pc fanboys know what they are talking about and use common sense, logic and facts. on the other hand console fanboys...

P.S sorry but when ignorant people come saying that one of my hobbies is dying, i have to argue with that.

 

[Shamikebab]

1) i told you again some things are facts. playing fallout 3 or mass effect, unreal tournament 3, fear 2, mirrors edge, burnout paradise etc etc with the controller of your choice, much higher resolution, 60+ fps, 4x aa 16 AF and mods makes the pc version the superior one. the same websites like ign, gamespot etc that post console comparisons regularly agree that the pc version is always ahead. thats not an opinion, its a fact. end of story.

You need to look up the definition of fact. That is not fact it is opinion. It may be a widely held opinion but it is still opinion. Many people prefer the games you've listed on consoles and have their own reasons for it, that is an opinion as well.

 

[snowdog]

You need to look up the definition of fact. That is not fact it is opinion. It may be a widely held opinion but it is still opinion. Many people prefer the games you've listed on consoles and have their own reasons for it, that is an opinion as well.

Their own reasons are mostly stupidity or laziness, they can't be arsed plugging in their tv to their pc and using a wireless controller... They think they need to sit at their pc using a keyboard or mouse to play a game... Or they are too lazy to set up their up properly for games. One of my mates has been playing at 1024x768 and default settings for years while he has a 16:10 screen, and based his experience on that thinking his 360 is much nicer, but he was just too lazy or stupid to understand you need to do some basic things to make the pc gaming experience good.

Many console fanboys suffer from total incompetence, another guy today argued Rome total war is a stupid game because it did not work maxed out on his ''brand new'' laptop while being an ages old game... Appears he had some Intel GMA rubbish in it... They think a new pc or laptop should play all games fine, even though they are simply complete idiots when picking their pc/notebook systems. They simply think a new pc is a new pc, also thinking you need to spend thousands on making a good pc... While often a 70 quid 8800GT would do it...

 

[Shamikebab]

Their own reasons are mostly stupidity or laziness, they can't be arsed plugging in their tv to their pc and using a wireless controller... They think they need to sit at their pc using a keyboard or mouse to play a game...

Still reasons. And they are valid to some people.

 

[snowdog]

Still reasons. And they are valid to some people.

Stupidity or laziness is not a reason, it's a handicap.


It's like saying a Fiat panda aut is better than a Ferrari F430 because it has an auto gearbox because someone is to incompetent to change gears manually.