Vista- PC gamings saving grace or the beginning of the end?

[melchy]

In the end people end up spending less when you buy a PC so I don't see what the whole buying a console is cheaper holds any water. It costs more if the truths known in the long term.

Take a looks at games for a start console games new can be anything from £34 to £44 (£50 a game on Xbox 360 release) where a PC game new can be from around £14 to £29 and how much do these 32" LCD HDTV TVs cost these 360 users buy cost?

I mean the amount of money you save on games like Fear Quake 4 and Tomb Raider Legends and so on that can be picked up for about £15 can be used to get a new graphics card or cpu. The amount of free games out there is also a great way of saving money. Do you think there will be many XBox 360 mmofps and mmorpgs that will have no monthly fees I don't think so.

So in the end I don't think being a PC gamer is more expensive.

You dont need an expensive HD Tele for the 360, a sub £200 19" Widescreen TFT and a VGA cable will do the job nicely. The HD tele issue always seems to be brought up to counter the PC expense arguement when in fact you dont need an HD TV at all to enjoy HD gaming on the 360. How many people play games on PC's on screens bigger than 19" or 20", not many of us. Why do you suddenly need a big screen for the 360, when everyone thinks its perfectly acceptable to play on a smaller screen on PC ?

As far as im aware WoW is coming to the 360 and no doubt it will have a monthly subscription. I believe Final Fantasy XI already has. You pay a monthly fee for the same games on the PC. Also £40 a year (cheaper if you look around) really isnt bad at all for all the free exclusive content you get on Live and for the simplicity of getting into online games quickly with it. Live is also coming to PC with Vista i believe, it may even be the case that games like Halo 3 wont be able to be played online outwith Live which means PC gamers may have to pay the subscription fee in due course as well.

Whether all that has been mentioned in the thread is good or bad for PC gaming, i dont know. You could argue either way. Certainly the constant upgrades does get a bit wearing after a while, but i think in many cases upgrading a PC is as much to do with a hobby as it is to do with game performance. Some people (myself included) just like to tinker with new hardware

 

[ben_j_davis]

You do need a HD tv to get XBOX360 games looking at their best, but its not a necessity, neither is having upgrade your PC every 6 months. I was running games at perfectly exceptable resolutions and detail on an amd athalon 3200+ and a 9800 pro. The new consoles are simply trying to copy things that PC's have been doing for over a decade.

 

[saguy]

I have spent a fortune over the past 10 years keeping my PC top end so as to play the latest games at the highest graphical settings possible. I will never be happy lowering the graphical settings allowing me to play on a mid range setup. That's the problem, I am a compulsive up grader and graphics addict and I recon I am not the only one.

I have to make a break away from wasting large amounts of cash on upgrades so come Vista I may just take the plunge and go for a console. The Wii looks the most promising based on price and originality. It is weird that I find the least graphically powerful of the next-gen consoles to be the most appealing.

 

[ben_j_davis]

Things only really start to slow down when you start increasing AA and drawing distance etc. I dont need to run games at 1900*1200 with HDR+8AA+16AF etc to enjoy PC games.

 

[Psyk]

Well whether the gaming features on vista will work out, kudos to MS for not neglecting the PC as a gaming platform. With the Xbox it wouldn't have been all that surprising if they tried to steer gaming away from the PC.

 

[Mana]

games on the xbox 360 are now being patched thru live and map packs etc are being released. the argument that pc games can be patched and consoles are not is void now.