The end of a gaming era....

Schizo · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:46

It was weird getting up this morning and not turning on the PC,sat and watched some YouTube videos on my normal TV which felt weird as I spent 99% of my time at the desk.

As time goes on I'm sure it will jsu become the norm not wanting to turn the PC on.

iv-tecman · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:46

Andr3w said:
I seem to spend a lot of time these days opening a game and playing it for 5 minutes, then close it down and opening another for 5 minutes....rinse and repeat!

I don't know if my age is the problem or I'm not finding gaming as engaging as I once did, but I'm really struggling with gaming as a hobby right now. I also find a open a game, spend half hour and get bored and close it down. I never used to be like this with gaming. Hopefully its just a phase, as I've got a fairly good spec PC

divinebeetle · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:47

Love my PC and would not sell although I'm not very interested in AAA gaming at the moment. My go to are Elder Scrolls Online and Assetto Corsa currently.

Between work and other hobbies I don't spend loads of time gaming, so don't tend to burnout on it too often!

Glaucus · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:48

Nasher said:
I still game exclusively on PC. Because, well, it's just the best way to game and has been since the early 90s.

But the gaming industry is in a bad way atm, the big studios keep pumping out utter ***** and gamers who don't remember when things were better keep lapping it up :/

i don't know, you just need to look at the smaller guys and stay away from the big developers. kickstarter, steam greenlight etc has opened up a whole new world in the last 5 years or so.

wingman · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:48

Nasher said:
But the gaming industry is in a bad way atm, the big studios keep pumping out utter ***** and gamers who don't remember when things were better keep lapping it up :/

I don't believe this is the case, we live in a golden age of gaming, there's more AAA content being pumped out than a normal functioning adult has the time or inclination to enjoy.

Good times IMO.

jaffveyda · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:50

Every time when I want to play some games recently I am browsing the games that I have and end up not playing anything. I don't know if it's just me or the games are not that interesting any more.I think I am too old.

Nasher · 31 Oct 2017 at 11:51

wingman said:
I don't believe this is the case, we live in a golden age of gaming, there's more AAA content being pumped out than a normal functioning adult has the time or inclination to enjoy.

Good times IMO.

Yes but 80% of it is crap. Ubisoft, Activision, EA, etc now just pushing half-baked games designed around loot box gambing.

Where are the proper servers, mod support, etc? Also many are just poorly written. Modern FPSs are especially lacking compared to old ones. Even the overly-hyped Overwatch is using server tech from last century ffs. 20 tick servers straight from 1998...

Shocky-FM · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:07

No way would I downgrade to a laptop, but an iMac? WTF? Not sure if serious.

Desktop is essential, laptops are not powerful enough and iMacs are are just overpriced Apple rubbish

No reason you can't have consoles as well though, they're not that expensive and they do more than just gaming these days, so their usefulness is extended quite a bit.

Glaucus · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:09

Shocky-FM said:
No way would I downgrade to a laptop, but an iMac? WTF? Not sure if serious.

Desktop is essential, laptops are not powerful enough and iMacs are are just overpriced Apple rubbish

No reason you can't have consoles as well though, they're not that expensive and they do more than just gaming these days, so their usefulness is extended quite a bit.

not powerful enough, what land do you ive in, have you seen the power of the 10xx series of gfx cards, also not all games are power hungry beasts, in fact the power-hungry games are often becoming the more **** games to play. As developers try and recoup the massive costs of producing the game.

Sankari · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:10

I could never give up my PC. Nothing else comes close to it for gaming.

dowie · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:11

Shocky-FM said:
No reason you can't have consoles as well though, they're not that expensive and they do more than just gaming these days, so their usefulness is extended quite a bit.

indeed, a big factor in buying my PS3 back in the day was the fact it was a blu ray player too, in fact given that some other blu ray players cost the same or even more than it at the time then it was well worth the money, being able to play GTAIV, GTAV and red dead were bonuses in a way

can also use it for Netflix and amazon prime on the old non-smart HD TV it is hooked up to

Scottland · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:21

I did it a few years ago, got a laptop and an Xbox (360) and a small desktop machine in the office that I barely used. After a couple of years I ended up gravitating back to using the office and eventually started to game in there again. I found myself enjoying it much more than I'd ever done on a console, although I only seem to get a few hours a week in on average, I still enjoy it as a bit of respite from the real world.

Nasher · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:22

Glaucus said:
not powerful enough, what land do you ive in, have you seen the power of the 10xx series of gfx cards, also not all games are power hungry beasts, in fact the power-hungry games are often becoming the more **** games to play. As developers try and recoup the massive costs of producing the game.

The mobile cards are no where near as powerful as the full desktop versions. But also heat causes throttling on laptops. Shrunk gaming hardware crammed in to a small plastic box isn't easy to keep cool.

jaffveyda · 31 Oct 2017 at 12:28

They are closer to PC version in the Gtx10XX series than they ever were in the past.

Glaucus · 31 Oct 2017 at 13:18

Nasher said:
The mobile cards are no where near as powerful as the full desktop versions. But also heat causes throttling on laptops. Shrunk gaming hardware crammed in to a small plastic box isn't easy to keep cool.

not any more, there are plenty of laptops with man enough cooling to not throttle,
on top of that the 10xx ranage of gfx cards are very close to each other. you seem to have the opinion of 3 years ago.

Beasty · 31 Oct 2017 at 13:28

I've never not had a desktop but there was a couple of years where it would rarely be switched on and I'd just use use my laptop. Now I've moved out of my parents I've got a nice little mancave with my PC in and a wall mounted TV hooked up to it and sky q multiroom.

MoRT489 · 31 Oct 2017 at 13:37

I can't imagine getting rid of my desktop any time soon, as I'm still holding on to the idea that I'll get to do a second playthrough of Crysis one day

Before my second child was born I would game about 2 hours a week during naptime on a saturday (a far cry - no pun intended - from the gaming days of old 2 hours every day, more at the weekends), but now that I have two kids I have no free time that doesn't involve them or my wife and evenings I'm just knackered. I'm thinking of getting a laptop so that I can work from anywhere in the house when I need to and something capable of playing BFBC2 for a quick bash if I ever get a spare hour, which is far more likely if I don't have to shut myself away in a separate PC room

I've got a PS4 but my preferred genre is FPS and I just can't get on with a joypad for that. Looking at the Razer Blade Stealth, which should be fine for the older games I'm into (BFBC2, BF2, BF3 - still need to finish Metro 2033 and Metro LL).

Shocky-FM · 31 Oct 2017 at 13:42

Glaucus said:
not powerful enough, what land do you ive in, have you seen the power of the 10xx series of gfx cards, also not all games are power hungry beasts, in fact the power-hungry games are often becoming the more **** games to play. As developers try and recoup the massive costs of producing the game.

Yeah, good luck keeping them cool and quiet when playing demanding games.

Good for short benchmarks but that doesn't tell the whole story, I won't even touch the FE cards because they throttle, a laptop would be a nightmare.

Nasher · 31 Oct 2017 at 13:45

Glaucus said:
not any more, there are plenty of laptops with man enough cooling to not throttle,
on top of that the 10xx ranage of gfx cards are very close to each other. you seem to have the opinion of 3 years ago.

The cooling still isn't there for long gaming sessions. Look at the size of coolers on full size GPUs and CPUs, they are half the size of a whole laptop. On GPUs those are often only just enough to keep it from throttling. On a Laptop with equal performance but a much smaller surface area, no chance, it's probably going to shorten the life of the components significantly as well. It's going to ramp up to it's max temperature within minutes and then throttle back.

Glaucus · 31 Oct 2017 at 13:50

Nasher said:
The cooling still isn't there for long gaming sessions. Look at the size of coolers on full size GPUs and CPUs, they are half the size of a whole laptop. On GPUs those are often only just enough to keep it from throttling. On a Laptop with equal performance but a much smaller surface area, no chance. It's going to ramp up to it's max temperature within minutes and then throttle back.

itis there, look at reviews. there are several laptops that do not throttle even under artificial 100% loads.