New levels of retardedness

**Mario F.** · 03-21-2008

Originally Posted by maxorator

"One console in every household" - not in mine. Consoles don't have games I would play. And nothing will EVER make me play with something else than a keyboard and a mouse.

Fair enough. One can always argue that not every household has a personal computer, as a certain gentleman would have liked.

But I don't get it with the keyboard and mouse... I believe it's mute. A game interface changes according to the where it is supposed to be played on. You think a game for a console is designed to be played with a mouse and keyboard? Of course you don't. So what's your point?

And... you can get keyboards and mice for most consoles. So... yeah.

Originally Posted by maxorator

And the most annoying thing is that EVERY GAME IS ON A CD/DVD!?!?!? I mean... that is really lame. That is one reason why I hate commercial games on PC.

Again I'm confused. I would trust my backups to a CD/DVD before I would even think of storing anything on my hard drive. I have working CDs dating from the DOS times. Can't say the same of floppies or hard drives. Can you?

The absolutely best thing about consoles is that I can put Linux on it.

The absolutely best thing about consoles is that you can play games in it. Not always this is true of your PC back home.

If you are not a gamer, or are too religious about PCs you won't want a console. I'll buy that. As I'll buy "I don't like consoles and I don't want to explain why". What I don't buy is the direction this thread took in which to justify one preference over another you folks think you need to bash, hit and plunder.

In the end it only shows your blinding religious single-mindedness and your ignorance.

EDIT: And It has been a pleasure to have been witnessing on the course of these 5 pages how deliciously appropriate the thread title has become

**Elysia** · 03-21-2008

If it should be called a media center, then IMO, it should support the full spec. Not just some "half" spec. That's not a media center.

**whiteflags** · 03-21-2008

Well maxorator, there is probably somewhat of a technical reason for PC ports which would answer your questions, but mostly I don't think they're questions the developers or marketeers would would want easy answers to. I mean, for example: it's certainly a degree simpler to capture footage of a PC game, but not impossible on a console. I'm glad it's not, but it's not like they're going to push consumers to purchase something like that.

The simple solution to most of your problems though (at least if a console game lacks a port) would be emulation as long as you've legally purchased the games you simulate (to appease your conscience if nothing else). I wouldn't knock console entirely. Like the PC, some astounding games are on it.

Are there many open-source games for console?

If the era continues long enough, with the right variables at play, the open source culture will have an influence. Part of the difficulty though might be that consoles are constantly rebuilt and rebranded with new technology that isn't necessarily well-developed or opened up. Also consider that (many?) console games have graphics that are initially drawn by supercomputers and Joe, Inc. simply doesn't have that. Many console gamers have that sort of expectation. Consoles are really in an entirely different market and so many people can somehow afford to buy the latest and greatest.

Can I easily test my own games on consoles without wasting DVDs/CDs? Can I run multiple games at the same time?

Try rewriteable CDs and DVDs, they're awesome. As for running multiple games at the same time, no, you can't really do that on a console. But can you really play more than one game at a time?

TL;DR: I don't think anything you've asked is a really legitamate criticism of the console platform, but I detect some hardline opposition in your tone.

**maxorator** · 03-21-2008

Originally Posted by citizen

But can you really play more than one game at a time?

I can't play multiple FPSs at the same time, but there are other types of games too. But something I have done is playing an FPS (Warsow), OpenTTD and solving sudokus.

Originally Posted by Elysia

Chatting is PC territory, I would say.

I don't really care whose territory what is. I just expect quite expensive devices with that kind of architecture to be multifunctional.

Of course my statements are subjective and not always true. But this is what I think. These are my arguments and I don't see why it should make anyone upset that I said why I don't like consoles (maybe a bit too agressively though

).

**Elysia** · 03-21-2008

Though I would expect expensive consoles to do a lot, which is why they shouldn't be expensive in the first place. They should play games, nothing more.
Preferably with a keyboard to be able to text chat in games and a headset to voice chat.
A console might be good for game trailers and demos, too.
But that's where it stops.

The rest is really PC territory. Consoles were designed to play games, not be media centers. That's what the PC is. And will always be. The ultimate everything-in-one tool.

**maxorator** · 03-21-2008

Originally Posted by Elysia

Though I would expect expensive consoles to do a lot, which is why they shouldn't be expensive in the first place. They should play games, nothing more.
Preferably with a keyboard to be able to text chat in games and a headset to voice chat.
A console might be good for game trailers and demos, too.
But that's where it stops.

The rest is really PC territory. Consoles were designed to play games, not be media centers. That's what the PC is. And will always be. The ultimate everything-in-one tool.

I agree.

**whiteflags** · 03-21-2008

"The PC is the digital hub."

**JFonseka** · 03-21-2008

With technology, I wouldn't put anything as definite.

Considering the console networks now offer a lot, who knows what the future will hold. Especially now they are hooked up to the net. I'd say PC will hold dominance for a while, but some of that share will be taken up by the console market, it will be a long while before anything drastic happens anyways.

**Elysia** · 03-21-2008

Until they start supporting open source formats and start supporting the full range of compression format levels and not just some "half level," I'd say the PC is in no threat of the console.
The PC will always dominate in that regard.

**abachler** · 03-21-2008

There will always be things the PC can do that consoles can't, and because of that the PC will always be the better choice. The moment that consoles are capable of as much or more than a PC then they will cease to be consoles and be PC's, so in one way or another PC's will still reign supreme. The PC is just so much more flexible in terms of hardware and software that consoles are nothing more than an interesting niche market. When we finish the first terminator, it wont be built with a console

**JFonseka** · 03-21-2008

Originally Posted by Elysia

Until they start supporting open source formats and start supporting the full range of compression format levels and not just some "half level," I'd say the PC is in no threat of the console.
The PC will always dominate in that regard.

EDIT: sorry my grammar was horrible
How many users of computers in the world know what 'open source formats' let alone 'compression format levels' are? The more features that a particular console offer is what is interesting to the userbase, it is what determines the sales. Have a more interesting network, then you start adding to the userbase.

Research companies use the combined power of multiple PS3's to process their projects, people who are willing to contribute their PS3 power to research, more and more possibilities are rising.

Wasn't it Bill Gates that said '84k is all the memory anyone will ever need' - or something like that?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Network

2.9 million on the playstation network

That will no doubtedly rise over the years and so will the xbox and wii networks.

The PC has started its slow and steady decline already.

**indigo0086** · 03-21-2008

Originally Posted by Elysia

Until they start supporting open source formats and start supporting the full range of compression format levels and not just some "half level," I'd say the PC is in no threat of the console.
The PC will always dominate in that regard.

Consoles never were competing with PCs as a wole, only the portion that adheres to gaming, commercial gaming in specific. A lot of small time developers who do independent development at times end up creating commercial games. Whether or not the 360 supports a codec or whatever has no bearing on the fact that it is a device made for games. Media center functionality is probably less than half of what the PC can do, it probably has less independent game development as a PC would have, but it's still a gaming machine catering mostly to commercial developers and has a growing independent development scene.

I forgot what the argument was about anyway, it seems there's an argument every other day here anyway. Since the thread was de-railed I'm just addressing this.

**abachler** · 03-21-2008

Well, it started out as a gripe about DRM intruding on fair use and moved to PC vs Console because someone saidconsoles are less vulnerable to piracy. So it wasnt really derailed, it just evolved into something else, as any conversation does.

**JFonseka** · 03-21-2008

This is that territory and etc, aren't what console developers are thinking. They are thinking:

'that will be our territory'

Now that the playstation and nintendo are facing competition from microsoft, microsoft will no doubtedly start to implement many of their pc features onto the console and considering sony's technological contributions to the other fields they will soon start implementing some awesome stuff. The desktop computing area needs to improve in terms of hardware, all they want to do is design new styles, increase processing speed or make the monitor bigger.

Yawn.

**maxorator** · 03-21-2008

Originally Posted by JFonseka

Now that the playstation and nintendo are facing competition from microsoft, microsoft will no doubtedly start to implement many of their pc features onto the console and considering sony's technological contributions to the other fields they will soon start implementing some awesome stuff. The desktop computing area needs to improve in terms of hardware, all they want to do is design new styles, increase processing speed or make the monitor bigger.

That is one of the most important things about consoles...