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Anyone else simply just had enough?

I gave up on modern PC gaming completely this year. Way too expensive for me now. I sold my gaming PC and bought a cheap used office PC for £100 to do basic productivity and surfing the net and got a PS5 with a years PS+ sub for about £500. So far this year I have completed 14 games and not once have I wished I was playing on a high end gaming PC. In fact the best game I have played this year has been Super Metroid!
 
Asus tax is a well known thing... In the olden days, £30-50 would be enough extra to get a top tier cooler as opposed to a reference model. Nvidia's Founders Edition models kinda broke the mould, but they're actually relly nice coolers for the ones I've had (780ti, 3060ti).
If I was going to spend more than £100 over the base price, I'd be far better off just getting whatever model has waterblocks available, but as I already have WC components it's an easier decision... the buy in price to move from air to water is pretty high now.
If I'm staying on air though, I would pay a bit extra for a better cooler so it's a bit quieter/cooler. The cooler on my 7900xt pulse is great, I've never been conscious of hearing it while gaming and it was the cheapest model when I bought it.

As for games, I'm constantly debating with myself whether games are **** now, or I've grown out of it, or maybe it's because I drifted off from the group I used to play games with. Either way I think I'm just addicted to chasing the hardware dragon, I'm constantly fighting the urge to upgrade despite not having really got into a game in months/years that didn't already run fine on my system.
I will say though, that it's nice to be able to either play older games on my handheld, or completely maxed out on desktop for games I could hardly run when they launched!
 
I did find it difficult to make myself play games in recent years, I've been ignoring sales on my Steam wishlist and such. Of course it helps having people to play with. But after being lucky enough to get a 9070XT at MSRP recently... it's been a few months and I'm slowly being dragged back in to just play stuff on my Steam backlog, especially folks convincing me to join them for multiplayer on some titles in our backlogs.

Overall, yes I'm sick of the nonsense. But there's always smaller developers and such who make great games that can just help forget about all of it. Little factory builders or even just visual novels, help pass the time and provide satisfying stories or experiences, far away from the AAA rubbish.
 
I'd feel the same way were it not for the advances in PCVR, motion and haptics. In this area its never been so good as it is now where as most other genre's just repeat the same formula imho held back by the need for cross platform compatibility.

So it depends where your interests are, it not all about FOMO that is an oversimplification.

On the topic of Nvidia expectations and performance.... yes things have got more expensive and the fab reduction processes are more complex but don't forget Nvidia charges the highest margins via its monopoly market position. In a healthy market the margins should reflect the value and gains on offer imho but that hasn't held true for a long time now so we are as consumers being exploited very heavily and I don't blame anyone for feeling cynical or fed up with the situation.
 
I had enough a few years ago, running the rat race for gpus and gaming in general just got boring. Hence why I got rid of my 3080ti a few years ago and bought an old Vega card. Pc's in general don't interest me much anymore. I honestly miss the late 90's and early 2000's of pc's where overclocking was interesting and we had new stuff every so many months. Now its just meh after meh and prices are hitting the ceiling. Probably some of this is down to getting older as well, most of my pc time is spent on youtube and gaming barely factors into it anymore, maybe 20 mins a month if that before i get bored and turn the game off.
 
My thoughts very quickly are that, yes, gaming in general has gone downhill a bit. But I'm also old now (38) so I think it's both this and in general, games being not as fun as 'back in the day'. But rose tinted glasses when looking back is of course real, so need to take that into account as well. For example, I played the original Call of Duty a lot and then moved to World of Warcraft along with a lot of the community when it released. Both games now would look appalling but at the time, it was some of the most fun I had gaming.

Times moves on and you either move with the times, or you don't. There isn't a right or wrong way IMO, but all I would say is that hanging on in the hope that it becomes as much fun as back in the day is futile. Find what you enjoy and enjoy it. Doesn't need to be the latest and greatest. Like everything, things change and how it was back then has now passed.

With regards to the value of GPUs nowadays and performance hikes you get vs cost: sure, I completely get it. It's definitely nowhere near as good as it used to be. But we are where we are and it's unlikely to change, so you can of course weigh up if it's worth continuing with PC gaming or not. The value (and I use the word value very lightly) comes now from upgrading every 2-3 generations IMO. The cost stinks but this will give you a noticeable step in performance. Moving from a 3080 10GB to an AIO 5090 has been game changing for me with my 4k 240hz monitor. It cost a lot and isn't feasible for everyone but a massive step up in performance. I'll hold on this card until the 7000 series most likely. It won't be worth that much when I get rid of it but spreading the cost of it over the length of time I plan to keep it, it's not so bad.

I think the 5090 is fine, cost stinks but fine. The 5080 and lower cards are not right IMO in terms of price/performance but they've been generally hoovered up and nVidia can of course refresh them with Supers when they need to. The Supers - when they come - should have been the base for 5080 and below but I can see why Nvidia did what they did from a commercial perspective.

The stagnation really comes from a lack of competition IMO, not that it excuses it but means you can get away with it. It was best when AMD and Nvidia were competing all through the tiers of GPUs. Last period I was big into PC gaming I tried so many different cards both AMD and nVidia. Remember trying 7950 crossfire and other diff set ups :). Good times.
 
I agree with you in most of your post. However, I squarely don't agree with two points:

1) What's a "good" game is in the eye of the beholder, but I feel in the past two years there's been a deluge of quality games, so many I don't have time to play. I've now got Space Marines, Indiana Jones, Alan Wake 2, Clair Obscur, Kingdom Come 2, Elden Ring sitting installed and unfinished -- not because I'm not enjoying them, but because there are so many good AAAs out there. And these are just the big AAAs. I did a few-month detour just playing recent, smaller games last year: Pentiment, Lorelei... And then there's BG3 which has been eminently replayable and is a pinnacle of gaming.

2) Drivers have never been perfect, and considering API and engine complexity and new rendering tech, they're better than ever (my experience on both my 5090 and 9070xt). I've seen a few blips here and there, but can't think of a single game-breaking issue I've seen. The situation is a far cry from issues in the past e.g. when dx10 first was picking up steam, Physx, or even a few years back during the first throes of RT.
 
Rusty0611 said:
My thoughts very quickly are that, yes, gaming in general has gone downhill a bit. But I'm also old now (38) so I think it's both this and in general, games being not as fun as 'back in the day'. But rose tinted glasses when looking back is of course real, so need to take that into account as well. For example, I played the original Call of Duty a lot and then moved to World of Warcraft along with a lot of the community when it released. Both games now would look appalling but at the time, it was some of the most fun I had gaming.
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I still play play WoW most days and it's still fun for me. Obviously it's had a lot of updates since back in the day though. It even has ray tracing now! As for the wider discussion, there are very few games these days which really hook me. I thought I was the problem and just couldn't finish games any more, but then Clair Obscur came along and I played 40 hours and finished it whilst barely noticing the time passing. It's the most I've enjoyed a new game in a long, long time.
 
Aretak said:
then Clair Obscur came along and I played 40 hours and finished it whilst barely noticing the time passing. It's the most I've enjoyed a new game in a long, long time.
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Absolutely this. I was starting to get the stage of having had enough with games and gaming, but found Clair Obsucr on game pass and it's magnificent. On a 3080 it is working well enough, and wonder how much more performance I actually need - Current prices of GPUs have completely ruled out an upgrade for me, and even the reduced graphic levels are not exactly bad. Once tweaked, the top few tiers of settings of modern games are not all that different if you are invested in the game, and this is even true on Clair Obscur where half the wonder is the imagery.
 
lovelyhead said:
I gave up on modern PC gaming completely this year. Way too expensive for me now. I sold my gaming PC and bought a cheap used office PC for £100 to do basic productivity and surfing the net and got a PS5 with a years PS+ sub for about £500. So far this year I have completed 14 games and not once have I wished I was playing on a high end gaming PC. In fact the best game I have played this year has been Super Metroid!
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Sorry if this sounds mean but if thats rhe case why are you in the graphics card section?
 
Bassmansam said:
Sorry if this sounds mean but if thats rhe case why are you in the graphics card section?
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Equally mean : Did you yourself read the original post / thread title ? Since when did anyone actually need to own a graphics card to post in this section of the forum ?

Anyhoos, I too have drifted away from the gaming and for many reasons similar to above. The chase of latest and greatest hardware wasn't being matched by the gaming experience ... with a lot of games losing my interest fairly quickly.
 
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harmattan said:
What's a "good" game is in the eye of the beholder, but I feel in the past two years there's been a deluge of quality games, so many I don't have time to play. I've now got Space Marines, Indiana Jones, Alan Wake 2, Clair Obscur, Kingdom Come 2, Elden Ring sitting installed and unfinished -- not because I'm not enjoying them, but because there are so many good AAAs out there. And these are just the big AAAs. I did a few-month detour just playing recent, smaller games last year: Pentiment, Lorelei... And then there's BG3 which has been eminently replayable and is a pinnacle of gaming.
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I very much agree with this, in fact you've listed many of the exact same games that interested me, out of those Space Marine 2 and Clair Obscur are the only games I've managed to get around to playing (both are excellent btw) and the rest are on the backburner.

The last couple of years have been some of the best for the sorts of games I enjoy in a very long time, there's been some utter pap don't get me wrong but by and large my issues are more time related than anything else, followed by poor generational GPU uplift and skyrocketing costs. I don't necessarily mind paying for something in the £600-700 region if it's a solid product, but that just hasn't been the case.
 
mid_gen said:
People got so spoiled in the 90s/00s when hardware performance gains were easily obtained with every die shrink, which came long easily enough, when the fabs didn't cost the same as a small country.

Anyone expecting anything more than incremental hardware improvements is just not living in reality. Do people think nVidia are just sitting on some magic tech to give double performance from the same power budget or something?
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Doesn’t help though when Nvidia decides to use 50 and 60 class dies in 70 and 80 class cards.
 
I stopped buying new cards when they started costing more than my first car. As with the op, I could easily afford it, but I have a strong sense of "value" and the new gen cards are way off. I barely game anymore anyway, interesting though my 17 year old son games constantly, but, he's just not that interested in the "pretty" in a game, he spends the sum total of zero time in the settings, just leaves stuff "auto" and plays, not sure if this is a Playstation generation thing. Him and his friends also don't seem to play the latest and greatest triple A titles either, closest I think he's come are RDR2 and Eldon ring he definitely values gameplay over graphics.
It does feel like the obsession with all the settings max'd is an older gen gamer thing, I guess because we came from a time when we got excited about the loading screen dump and lived the progression from there.
As for the games themselves, I agree with the sentiment about game mechanics, I don't want to spend days learning to craft and mod and endless other nonsense. I much prefer simpler gameplay that has nuance, so the more you play, you realise the subtle ways in which you can improve, so it feels like a skill.
 
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I used to buy the best I could.
Joined in on the benchmarking threads. Trying to get to the top etc.

However, Even with a 3* bump in salary. I can't condone spending whats needed to do that anymore.

So i now have a laptop with a 4080, and just use that for gaming and work.

Its fine.
Money spent on kids instead.
 
I've never bought the halo I've always bought the optimum.

Quest 3 over high end Pimax.
Fanatec CSL 8Nm over whatever their high end 15Nm + wheels and pedals are.
7900xt, bought on promo, over 4090 halo.

And it's good. But the problem now in the GPU space particularly is the mid range isn't the optimum when it used to be. When the halo is the optimum, that's fine if you have the money to outlay but if you don't or don't want to spend that much you're screwed because lower tier products aren't good value so I won't buy them.
 
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