My view on the gaming world

Please view this as my personal view on the subject, and not anyone elses.

I have been an active gamer since the early 1980s.

I have lived through the games era of Pac-man, Lemmings, Mario, Pong, Tetris and even Arcroniod.

In 1988, the gaming industry suffered a major crash. Many top retailers stopped selling anything that resmembled a game, and it was shunned by the gaming world.

If you look at the consoles we had in the past, NES, SNES, MEGADRIVE, AMIGA, COMODORE 64, ATARI, AMSTRAD, GAMEBOY, ARCIMEIDIES. You can see how the gaming world has evolved into somthing very speical.

Technology grows at a super-fast pace, and most of todays top software designers are still running to catch up. Now look at what we have today. PC, Wii, PS 3 XBOX 360 and Elite. Its incrediable, that in such a small space of time, 20 years or so, we have gone from pong, which was merley to paddels and a ball on a black screen, to mulit-player games that involve HD Graphic consoles that can produce some of the most stunning effects ever made.

Is the market moving to fast? Maybe. Lets look at it this way.

In 100 years from now, can you imagine what the games will be like? How much more "real life" are they going to to get? Is this going to take the fun out of a game?

A game is basically a program created for personal player enjoyment. And some are produced in a few months, others, like some of todays super games, take many years and thousnds of pounds to produce. Puzzle games come out every year, and still sell. Why? Because they are proffitable. Anyone who can pick up the latest puzzle game for a fiver is going to choose that than pick a super deluxe game for a pc that requires X amount of RAM and specs to run.

One of the biggest flaws, is the game companys force people to buy and update their machines and hardware to cope with the strenious but all the same amazing effects and abilitys of todays top games. I am not moaning, its an amazing feat.

All I would like to see, is a gradual slow down of the way things are on the market, so most of the younger generation can keep up.

What are your views?

You are talking about PCs and newer games demands for higher specs, yes? I see that as an unfortunate thing of how the PC gaming world works. That's why I prefer consoles, because they are static, a one-time investment.
What I don't like is today's costs. I would rather have longer games with less eye candy and games with less development time with the sacrifice of some eye candy.
In short, go back more to the old days. You can put in all eye candy you want, but it won't help you if a game takes 5 years to create and lasts only 20 hours and costs $60. It won't be worth the money.

I think newbies are very excited to try the new things from the gaming industry. Reality bites, games are cool. What I detest and hope doesn't go to far is the "realism" they try to put into games, like Metal Gear Solid 3 and probably 4. Some nice ideas don't work because they add tedium or a thick layer of micromanagement to the game.

Since I only game casually, I like the relative stability of the console market compared to the PC market. If you find out there's a really awesome game (like Portal) and you go purchase it expecting it to work on an older machine, it can be frustrating. So I like being able to wander in, look in the bargain bin, things like that. I often don't have a game in mind while shopping, so that might be some of my problem with gaming on the PC.

If you checked the 'deluxe' games lately, they toned down the drive for better hardware in the last few years. It still creeps forward, but not liek it used ot, where a 2 year old comp was basically worthless. Yes, those $5 games sell, to people who buy $5 games. Its a different niche than the people who buy $50 games.

I just bought Age of Conan. It runs fine on my machine which is only a 3.2 GHz Pentium 4. I think a lot of the time people expect too much from games. I'd rather have a game that can push the limits of hardware that isnt out yet, but can also have those turned down to run on a mediocre system. That way in a couple years I can run it at full settings. I do that with Guildwars. Turn everythign on full and get 30-45 fps.

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Originally Posted by abachler

If you checked the 'deluxe' games lately, they toned down the drive for better hardware in the last few years.

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I disagree, newer games requires much more from todays hardware, than older games required from the hardware of their time.

Call Of Duty 4 - UT3 - Crysis - Gears Of War - Bioshock

These are very heavy hitters!

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Originally Posted by Neo1

I disagree, newer games requires much more from todays hardware, than older games required from the hardware of their time.

Call Of Duty 4 - UT3 - Crysis - Gears Of War - Bioshock

These are very heavy hitters!

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I have no problem running those. Its not a matter of spending more, its about spending smart. Apply your upgrade dollars to the bottleneck, not the symptom. Most people start gettign choppy video and they knee jerk purchase a new video card or faster processor. While that may help somewhat, the problem is usually slow memory. Remember that you need your memory speed to be at least 1/8 your total processing speed. Core2 Duo at 2.4 GHz, you need a minimum of 600 MHz dual channel, running a quad core 2.66, spring for 1333 or it will slow you down. The higher you can keep the ratio the better System memory also bottlenecks the GPU, sicne the gpu has to wait for the processor to send it the data, and the procesor can only send the data as fast as it can retrieve it from system memory.

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I have no problem running those.

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You are sporting a 3,2 gHz Pentium 4 right? What is your videocard?

You are going to have a very hard time convincing me you can run Crysis on anything but low, that CPU is just above the minimum requirements.

But nonetheless, whether or not YOU can run those games are kind of irrelevant, as is the speed of the memory. My point still stands. Crysis has been out for 2/3 of a year, and yet, to play Crysis at medium settings @ 2560x1600, you need a QX9770 and 3x Geforce GTX280.

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Originally Posted by abachler

I just bought Age of Conan.

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I just got that on Saturday also. Had to turn down the settings but it runs well.


For PC games I'm fine if they provide the ability to tone down the graphics. I personally don't like building gaming rigs. I prefer to spend that money on something else.

To be perfectly honest I think the biggest problem with modern games isn't the graphics. It is the lose of storytelling and game play. I played some BBS games that were a lot better then modern games soley because they had invoking stories.

The last few games I've bought I've been disappointed in because they only provided a fairly short amount of game play. Most games don't have a lot of replayability without going the multiplayer route.

Most aren't even built for replayability and just toss everything into the multiplayer mode.

Gosh! I don't play any since everquest gone evermesh and despite that am already tired of mmorpgs and mmos and mmwhatevers. Now they even want you to have a single-multiplayer-something with that Spore thing. Damn marketing always getting in the way of creativity.

Let me see... the last game I actually had a blast with was Half-Life 2. With this new machine of mine I finally bought Doom III last weekend and keep my Doom collection up to date. I couldn't run it before. What a disappointment! The game scares me too much. I really can't play it. I get too nervous and jumpy and my heart pounds. I'm not kidding! So, yeah. Congratulations Id. You made it so scary I don't want to play it. So long for my favorite game of all time. Besides its too damn dark! I can't see a bloody thing without the flashlight. Too much darkness = not fun.

For around 3 years now I'm only trusting Indie games and a few establish, yet hardly known makers like Paradox Interactive. It's true I also lost a little bit of the touch for computer games. But I still find much enjoyment in titles like the Avernum Series, Eschalon, Darwinia, Penumbra, Battle for Wesnoth, or Hearts of Iron, Crusader Kings, Europa Universalis. What I don't find is any incentive to spend $50 in a marketing ploy.

I feel the biggest problem with games is not that they have the latest graphics but that underneath the graphics there really isn't much gameplay. I have noticed a shift in the market however towards games that take a very long time to develop but when they do come out reap huge profits for the companies. I think that instead of the continual release and flow of good games we will see a small and unsteady release of extremely good games which is fine by me. Most of the crap I see going to the console really doesn't break my heart because it's the same old fare that I was tired of 5 years ago.

As far as hardware concerns go I have not had any problems and I'm still running AGP. I have noticed that the major difference in the games is not the textures but more the number of triangles per mesh. Having looked at the Oblivion model data firsthand there are about 1500 to 2500 and up to 5500 triangles per mesh object. This will really push any video card but it's a cold hard fact that no technique or trick can fool the eye like more geometry can. In short the more geometry the better lighting, better effects, better vertex blending, etc, etc. So I see a lot of the models in games ramping up the triangle counts to insane numbers and yet my rig still performs admirably.

I cannot fathom why some of you have trouble running these games when you have far better systems than I do. My system was built 4 years ago and it's just a single core AMD XP 3200+ with 3 gig of RAM. But it does have Corsair memory running at 2,2,3,6, the CPU is overclocked to 2.4, and the video card is a BFG which is overclocked from the manuf. I have a little bit of trouble on Call of Duty 4 when lots of characters are on screen but normally have no issues. Oblivion taxes it in some towns and only when bloom is enabled. Speed isn't just about video card but it's about CPU, mobo (motherboard can be a huge difference depending on the manuf. and chipset used), memory timings, bus speeds, etc. Buy high quality components and you get what you pay for. Buy cheap no-name crap components and you get what you pay for.

I feel games need graphics AND gameplay. I'm assuming most dev houses now have teams devoted to both. And it is getting better. There are more and more games out there offering much more than your typical FPS. Games like 1701 A.D., Black and White 2, Sims 2 (if that's your thing), Oblivion, Need for Speed series, GTA series, etc, etc.
Notice these are not all the latest titles but they offer me many many hours of just plain fun. On the horizon are Spore (hopefully will be good), Fallout 2 (can't wait), IL2 Battle of Britain, Train Simulator 2, and many more. I feel the way to get a good gaming experience is to broaden the genres you play. Once you begin to enjoy other genres of games you open the doors for some really good games that you may not have thought about previously.

Finding a good game today is like finding a diamond in the rough. They are out there but you have to wade through all the crap to get to them. My recent new game is Sins of a Solar Empire and although it has it quirks and annoyances it is a kick arse game. They have had so many fans say they want a campaign (yep the into story was that good that you wanted more) that the newest patch is rumored to have a campaign in it. Ha...just when the game devs thought single player was dead.

Has anyone played Sins of a solar empire.

I also think that nowadays gameplay suffers because of the graphics and "real life"-liness. Hasn't it crossed anyone's mind that real life physics and rules might get boring? That there can be something more interesting than what we see every day with our own eyes? I find crazy games which have nothing to do with reality much more interesting.

Also, I enjoy playing GTA1, GTA2 (and sometimes Vice City), but San Andreas... is a bit of an overkill already. I like Sims 1, I feel it offers everything I'd ever want. I don't play AoE2 or 3, I play AoE1. I even managed to get a little addicted to Wolfenstein 3D. Diablo, Carmageddon 2, Warcraft 2, Elma - all very simple or old games. New games get me bored too quickly. That is because graphics and reality has gone too far.

I don't get it, they add things like HDR to make it more realistic?! HDR looks terrible IMO, along with some other corny lighting and glossy surfaces you get 'plastic world' that is supposed to be realistic how!? Oh yes, not to mention it just chews my resources.

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Has anyone played Sins of a solar empire.

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...My recent new game is Sins of a Solar Empire and although it has it quirks and annoyances it is a kick arse game. They have had so many fans say they want a campaign (yep the into story was that good that you wanted more) that the newest patch is rumored to have a campaign in it. Ha...just when the game devs thought single player was dead.

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Um...yeah....I have. It's a great game. Thankfully you can turn the annoying pirates off and build your forces to eventually annihilate the enemy. Better block off about 6 hours of your day though because the games even on the so-called 'small' maps take forever. Sometimes the computer just won't die. It's like every RTS out there where you can barely make it with tons of ships and yet the AI sneaks by with a couple of lowly ships and resources. I haven't been brave enough to go online and might not b/c I want to continue to enjoy the game. Sometimes the online experience makes me hate games.

It's a great game overall.

I found the unit design to be a bit shallow in Sins. I like a lot of control over my units, and Sins just didnt deliver.

Do you like something like EVE online more?

As for the unit design, yes. I found the grinding in EVE to be decidedly un-fun. I also didnt like the FPS nature of it. X3 is still pretty fun though.