Consoles are maybe good for pc gamig?

DooMeR · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:20

I been thinking about this recently after all the talk that pc gaming is dead and so on. We are mainly getting ports of console games but is that bad thing?

A will give a few examples, Fallout 3, street fighter 4, re 5, gta 4, need for speed shift, grid, batman, left for dead, call of duty 4, mass effect. Plus many more games i forgot, these are all games that appered on console and pc, imo they all look better then the console versions and they all run at better frame rates.

But becasue all these games are also made on consoles i think that keeps the System Requirements down, which i belive is a good thing as we dont have to upgrade every year to play the latest pc games. I dont feel like i need to have the latest hardware to enjoy the latest games.

I always found it very dissapointing when a new pc game got released only to find it ran like turd on my system, but now i feel my pc is good for at least another year and i cant really see any games in the pipeline that my pc will stuggle to run as there mainly all console ports. Which of course saves me a lot of money.

Just wondering other peoples thoughts on this.

Columbo · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:23

Left 4 Dead and Call of Duty 4 are not console ports and were released yonks before the console equivalents.

DooMeR · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:26

yeah but they all came out on console which kept the system req down. Well i i suppose l4d runs on the source engine, which most pcs can run anyways. But it still looks a lot better on pc.

james.miller · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:28

Made no difference, they were ports of the already released PC titles. Cod4 ran well anyway, but it was still a night and day difference in the visuals between the pc version and the console versions. From what we've seen of console > pc ports so far, the majortiy of them run quite badly. ie, gtaIV. Its onyl those built from the ground up to run on the pc that seem to excel - such as capcoms console ports SFIV and Devil may cry 4

Deific · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:29

CoD4 would have failed miserably if it were a console port, luckily it wasn't.

Biohazard · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:32

DooMeR said:
these are all games that appered on console and pc, imo they all look better then the console versions and they all run at better frame rates.

I thought GTA4 COD4 L4D etc were better graphically and quicker on a fast PC?

:confused:

McGray · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:32

ManCuBuS said:
Left 4 Dead and Call of Duty 4 are not console ports and were released yonks before the console equivalents.

I thought COD4 was released for console and PC on the same day....?

james.miller · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:35

Biohazard said:
I thought GTA4 COD4 L4D etc were better graphically and quicker on a fast PC?

in the case of gta 4 yes it is if you have a monstor pc to run it on. if you havent got a dual core forget it, which imo shows it isnt well optimised at all.

DooMeR · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:37

All the games i mentioned barring gta run at 60+ fps on full graphics and 1920 res would that be the case if all the games i mentioned was pc exculsives like crysis was.

The same with arma 2 thats a pc only game but i bet i couldnt run it at 60 fps on full graphics with no slow down.

All i am saying is we are getting a lot of games that look great and run great which are way better then the console versions without the need to upgrade every 5 mins, imo its a good thing.

And i too thought cod 4 came out on console the same time as pc cause i remember playing it on my friends ps3 and thinking it was turd compaired to the pc one.

As for gta 4 it was a dissapointmeant for many pc gamers, but it still looked a lot better and ran a lot better then it did on consoles (if you had a decent pc).

Biohazard · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:38

james.miller said:
in the case of gta 4 yes it is if you have a monstor pc to run it on. if you havent got a dual core forget it, which imo shows it isnt well optimised at all.

hmm not trying to be snotty but would have thought a lot of fast computers are dual if not quad etc by now but I don't keep up on hardware too much. my near two year old e6400 @ 3.85 still rips most things apart, quickly.

there must be much much much quicker with other forum members rigs..

james.miller · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:38

DooMeR said:
All the games i mentioned barring gta run at 60+ fps on full graphics and 1920 res would that be the case if all the games i mentioned was pc exculsives like crysis was.

*looks at your sig*.....

well...yeah.

Biohazard said:
hmm not trying to be snotty but would have thought a lot of fast computers are dual if not quad etc. my e6400 @ 3.85 still rips most things apart, quickly.

i meant quad core.

Squark · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:42

Biohazard said:
I thought GTA4 COD4 L4D etc were better graphically and quicker on a fast PC?

Thats what he was saying, the PC versions are better than the console versions

Goldfingers · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:57

I see your point.

However lets put it this way, you've spent probable the cost of 3-5 xbox 360's on your system right? And the games you are playing are the same ones that a cheapo 360 plays with ease.

So you have all this excess power which could be put to use with much better graphics, physics etc. But instead is wasted as we are only getting console ports.

Dosen't bother me a great deal, as my pc cost peanuts. But people like you must feel at least a little bitter.

DooMeR · 2 Oct 2009 at 11:58

james.miller said:
*looks at your sig*.....

well...yeah.

My pc is a year old now though ( apart from the ram) and its quite tame compaired to a lot of the i core monster rigs on this forum. plus most of the games i mentioned apart from gta run good on modest pc. As i have most of them installed on my older 2nd pc which has a 8800gts in and a average dual core.

DooMeR · 2 Oct 2009 at 12:11

Goldfingers said:
I see your point.

However lets put it this way, you've spent probable the cost of 3-5 xbox 360's on your system right? And the games you are playing are the same ones that a cheapo 360 plays with ease.

So you have all this excess power which could be put to use with much better graphics, physics etc. But instead is wasted as we are only getting console ports.

Dosen't bother me a great deal, as my pc cost peanuts. But people like you must feel at least a little bitter.

Not at all, if i get 2 years out of my pc to me thats value for money, i built my pc my self which i also enjoyed doing. I used to be into consoles i have owned just about every console durring my childhood and teenage years. I know many people that have gone thorugh 2-3 xbox 360's cause they keep breaking, i myself went throguh 3 normal xbox's.

The games also cost more when they come out, console gaming can be just as expensive as pc gaming, i know a few freinds that have all 3 consoles and they properly spent more money then i have on my pc, considering they also bought a hd tv just to get the most out their consoles.

The thing with pcs the games age much better then console games i know all the games i have will stay with me as i upgrade. These days i find it hard to play on consoles, i also find them so laggy and blury some of the games make me feel sick when playing them. I'm not anti console at all but when ever i'm at my mates hosue having a few beers and such i get bored very fast and i notice the laggy and blury bits more then proberly some one whos more used to console gaming and they distract me from the game. It makes me look forward to getting home and firing up l4d or tf2 and other such games.

james.miller · 2 Oct 2009 at 12:17

DooMeR said:
My pc is a year old now though ( apart from the ram) and its quite tame compaired to a lot of the i core monster rigs on this forum. plus most of the games i mentioned apart from gta run good on modest pc. As i have most of them installed on my older 2nd pc which has a 8800gts in and a average dual core.

they dont run at 60fps on a modest pc with all the goodies up full, 1920x1200 i can tell you that. It makes little difference if the pc is a year old, thats still £250's worth of gpus even in todays money. that is not anything like the average pc.

Tripnologist · 2 Oct 2009 at 12:25

Goldfingers said:
However lets put it this way, you've spent probable the cost of 3-5 xbox 360's on your system right? And the games you are playing are the same ones that a cheapo 360 plays with ease.

That would be a great comparison, except for...

1. You're not including the price of a TV in there for the xbox because why? ... because the tv is used for more than just gaming.

2. I don't know about anyone else but I certainly use my PC for far more than just games.

A more likely comparison would be to take an average home computer and calculate the cost of a decent videocard and maybe some more ram which would be the only real additions required for gaming.

DooMeR · 2 Oct 2009 at 12:30

james.miller said:
they dont run at 60fps on a modest pc with all the goodies up full, 1920x1200 i can tell you that. It makes little difference if the pc is a year old, thats still £250's worth of gpus even in todays money. that is not anything like the average pc.

My other monitor is a 22 inch and my other pc is about 3 years old now. And i mainly use it as a lan pc for when my friends come round but it runs most of the games i want it too, odvisouly i have to turn the aa down a bit on some games but other then that it runs fine and can easily compete with a console. in temrs of frame rate and graphics.

james.miller · 2 Oct 2009 at 12:45

Tripnologist said:
That would be a great comparison, except for...

1. You're not including the price of a TV in there for the xbox because why? ... because the tv is used for more than just gaming.

2. I don't know about anyone else but I certainly use my PC for far more than just games.

A more likely comparison would be to take an average home computer and calculate the cost of a decent videocard and maybe some more ram which would be the only real additions required for gaming.

where do you draw the line though? yes many people use their pc's for things other than gaming, but you can bet the hardware would have been chosen with the gaming in mind, otherwise, in the case of the OP, he probably would have stuck with onboard graphics, a basic cpu and 2gb of ram, and i bet that goes the same for most people building pc's intending to play games.

Goldfingers · 2 Oct 2009 at 12:49

Tripnologist said:
That would be a great comparison, except for...

1. You're not including the price of a TV in there for the xbox because why? ... because the tv is used for more than just gaming.

2. I don't know about anyone else but I certainly use my PC for far more than just games.

A more likely comparison would be to take an average home computer and calculate the cost of a decent videocard and maybe some more ram which would be the only real additions required for gaming.

Sorry but that's just not valid at all. Why should I value in the TV, to make a fair comparison the pc and 360 should be using the same screen that cost the same amount of money.

Yes you use your pc for more than games, 99% of people use their pc for web browsing, watching youtube, microsoft office etc. All of that could be done on a pentium 4 with onboard graphics and 1gb of ram ~ £100 worth.

And most peoples home pc's are dell's, which would need a new mobo,ram,graphics card, case, psu to be put up to gaming standard.

So what is the point im making? A cheap PC (~£350-500) provides a better quality gaming experience than a 360 for gaming at the moment. An expensive PC is just overkill. And my view is that, ports are bad because they don't make full use (barely even partial use) of an expensive pc. Thus causing people to waste money.