PC Gaming = World of Suck

[Handruin]

I've yet to see how they make it easy to hate them. You've complained about them since 2002 (almost a decade now), yet I've not had a single problem with them.

Need to reinstall your games after a machine rebuild? Very easy. Need to coordinate a game with friends? So easy. Maintaining and patching 80 games as they each release updates on their own schedule? So easy. Keeping saved games and fun screen shots together. All included and easy. Keeping stats on in-game activities...included.

Steam makes it incredibly easy to gain access to many indie games that would otherwise be lost in the crowd except those that are entrenched in the fields of indie game development. I'm happy to be able to support the numerous indie developers and also get great discounts on games. I'm completely satisfied with the concept of considering the game being rented. If Steam goes under, I've gotten my money's worth from the dozens of $5-$10 games I've bought. Gifting games for friends is also incredibly easy and valuable.

 

[Mercutio]

Ever seen multiple LAN parties ruined because of Steam outages? 'Cause I have.

In the end, there's no way I'm going to find Steam acceptable until I can keep and play the games I pay for without the involvement of that software. Something that's happening to Valve software someplace else in the world should have absolutely no impact on my ability to play and enjoy my single-player-with-no-online-component video games.

For a correct implementation of online game distribution, see Gog.com.

 

[Mercutio]

Oh look. Steam was hacked. Awesome.

 

[Chewy509]

It maybe dual monitors. IIRC, I had to jump through some hoops to get Quake 3 to play
with my old 3 monitor setup, and, it wasn't worth the effort.

I've never had a problem getting Q3 working on a modern PC...

However I tend to push people to using the ioQ3 engine instead...

http://ioquake3.org/

 

[Mercutio]

I really thought Quake got progressively weaker. Original Quake had a solid single player game and interesting weapon balance (ran out of ammo under water? Hope your next weapon wasn't the lightning gun.). Quake 2 was sillier and I didn't like the weapons as well and Quake 3 just felt like UT done poorly. I didn't look at Quake 4 at all.

I might be alone on this one, but since my impressions are almost entirely formed by the single player experience, there wasn't much going for Quake 3. Or for that matter any of the generic WWII or present-era shooters.

 

[Howell]

Will this make up for it: http://www.gamethemesongs.com/MechWarrior_2_-_Intro.html ;-)

Heaps more at: http://gamethemesongs.com/

PS. I've always liked these:
http://www.gamethemesongs.com/Quake_II__-_Full.html
http://www.gamethemesongs.com/Total_Annihilation_-_Full.html

Great Site!

http://www.gamethemesongs.com/Outlaws_-_Full.html

The subtle kettle drums really get me.

 

[Chewy509]

I might be alone on this one, but since my impressions are almost entirely formed by the single player experience, there wasn't much going for Quake 3.

But I didn't think Q3 was made for single player? IIRC, it was pinned around being one of the first games designed primarily for multi-player gaming, vs single-player which was common at the time.

 

[Santilli]

Quake 3 has a great leap in graphics vs. the earlier versions. Quake 4 was better graphics, but did have some lame maps, well in, IIRC.

 

[ddrueding]

I've played Civilization 5 for 920 hours, and finally unlocked 90% (158/176) of the accomplishments. If that was work at my normal rate, I could buy a new GT-R in cash. That is a depressing thought.

 

[Santilli]

Quake 3 also has some really poor early rounds as well. Just boring.

 

[Handruin]

I've played Civilization 5 for 920 hours, and finally unlocked 90% (158/176) of the accomplishments. If that was work at my normal rate, I could buy a new GT-R in cash. That is a depressing thought.

Wow...that's a lot of hours for a single game. I bought Civ 5 recently on a Steam sale for I think $10, but haven't played it yet.

Can you even get 920 hours of billable work at $100/hour? That would be some nice money.

 

[ddrueding]

Can you even get 920 hours of billable work at $100/hour? That would be some nice money.

No, I couldn't. I could get those kinds of hours @ $65, but I'd rather work much less for much more.

 

[CougTek]

Well, 920 hours at 65$ would give you close to 60K$. It should be enough to pay for your kitchen and your fancy heated floor.

 

[Stereodude]

I've played Civilization 5 for 920 hours

You've spent 23 40 hour weeks worth of time playing a game? Over how many months did you pull off this feat?

 

[ddrueding]

Since September 2010. Keep in mind that I have a game running in the background most of the time at work (and a number of times left it open for a full weekend), so it isn't really dedicated playing time.

 

[MaxBurn]

MechWarrior Online To Use Crysis 2 Game Engine

http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/718498/mechwarrior-online-to-use-crysis-2-game-engine/

I don't remember if that was a demanding engine or not but I heard it looks good.

 

[Handruin]

Yes, from what I remember that was a demanding engine on a PC. Looks like you can reserve a pilot name on their website if anyone thinks they'll be getting into this game next year.
http://mwomercs.com/

 

[MaxBurn]

Appears some dishonorable piece of garbage took my name.

 

[CougTek]

MechWarrior Online To Use Crysis 2 Game Engine

I hope they'll refine it because Crysis's engine is very demanding and often for no good reason. For instance, several of their New York maps still render the sea water below the ground even though you are quite far away from the ocean. That's very demanding for the system.

 

[ddrueding]

Just put 2 hours into Skyrim...it was pleasant.

 

[Handruin]

I would really like to get the game but I know if I do, I'll need to upgrade my video card or else it won't play smoothly. I'll probably pick it up the first half of next year after a system refresh.

 

[ddrueding]

On "Home1" it plays at 2560x1440 on Ultra quite smoothly. It does demand more CPU than any game I've seen before.

 

[Sol]

The Elder Scrolls games have always been insanely huge and open games but I think they really stepped up the writing and quest design with Skyrim. There are some pretty significant chunks of story telling that have absolutely nothing to do with the main plot.

Apparently Bethesda have promised fewer, larger, chunks of DLC, and with the inevitable bug fixes and mods to fix the dire PC controls, next year might be the perfect time to grab it.

 

[ddrueding]

One of the things I like is that they have turned up the max viewing distance, so you aren't living in a foggy world. You can move slowly and carefully through the world, spotting baddies and avoiding confrontation.

 

[Handruin]

On "Home1" it plays at 2560x1440 on Ultra quite smoothly. It does demand more CPU than any game I've seen before.

That's a nice system to be playing this on. I'm still sporting my 8800GT for graphics which at this point is fairly dated. Is now a bad time to buy into a new graphics card? Last I read, refresh cards are coming out, but based on the same chips.

 

[ddrueding]

I don't keep up with the card releases, just buy something a few ticks down from the top and call it good. If someone had news about new cards, I would be interested as well.

 

[Mercutio]

It does demand more CPU than any game I've seen before.

You clearly haven't ever tried Dwarf Fortress.

 

[ddrueding]

Indeed. I'm sure a few thousand simultaneous games would positively kill my rig.

 

[Mercutio]

Indeed. I'm sure a few thousand simultaneous games would positively kill my rig.

No, you'd just need the one.
Just because it doesn't use 3D graphics doesn't mean it isn't insanely complicated.

 

[LiamC]

AMD and Nvidia are due to refresh their respective lineups just before and just after Christmas. AMD will probably do a trickle down approach (high-end first) and I believe Nvidia are going for a mid-range part first--but not sure about this. The AMD mid-range/mainstream card will come a month or two after the high-end.

Given this is a new process node (28nm) for both players, expect tight supply/high prices initially.

Haven't heard if the new weapons are a quantum leap in performance or just "a little bit more" that has been prevalent of late.

 

[sechs]

You clearly haven't ever tried Dwarf Fortress.

This sounds like Progress Quest with work.

 

[Mercutio]

This sounds like Progress Quest with work.

It's amusing, especially if you actually manage to get a fortress to thrive for a while.

 

[Mercutio]

OK, see, this is the kind of crap I mean when I think about how crappy modern gaming is. EA has the power to lock people out of their own games because they used naughty words on EA's official forums.

 

[MaxBurn]

Well that right there is bull****.

 

[Handruin]

OK, see, this is the kind of crap I mean when I think about how crappy modern gaming is. EA has the power to lock people out of their own games because they used naughty words on EA's official forums.

I think if I remember reading it correctly, it wasn't even that person who used the naughty language, I think it was in a quote from someone else? None the less, it's absurd.

 

[LiamC]

So a person is banned and can't play single player? What do you think they will do? Har, har me hearties... Stuipd move.

 

[Santilli]

Hmmm. I've already taken the position of banning any EA games I don't already own from my computers.

Looks like they just managed to loose a customer for life.

No loss for me.

 

[Chewy509]

The one thing I've really begun to understand about a lot of the very large corporations, is that they no longer care about customer service, but rather grabbing/siphoning as much income from the consumer as possible in the shortest amount of time.

The number of retailers whose customer service policies now seem completely anti-consumer orientated is unbelievable. In some respects most are really pushing the consumer laws to the limits...

In there view, if they didn't need to deal with customers at all, they wouldn't bother, except they need to, as it's the customers giving them the $.

I can't say much for gaming these days, as I haven't actively purchased a game in nearly 4 years, but what I've read about DRM, account lockouts, etc., I'd rather browse the net looking for free and/or open source stuff first, even if it means I would have to compile the game myself, before giving some mega-corp like EA a cent of my income.

I guess this is another reason why the Indie scene is picking up again... (not taking into account that EA, etc are laying off staff left, right and center). People are sick of dealing with the mega-corp paying $50+ for a game, when they can get an Indie game for $10, or start looking at some of the free/opensource stuff coming out now...

 

[ddrueding]

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is a very good game. Some quests cause a very deja vu feeling, probably related to the previous games, but it is pretty, combat is fun, and the dragons are beautiful.

 

[Mercutio]

That game looks way too much like Fallout 3, a title that suffered horribly from consoleportitis and left out all the stuff that was fun about actual Fallout games.