Has PC always been ahead of console in all generation?

[Majinash]

As an avid PC gamer... I find it silly you could compare '98 PC games to OoT and FFVII and say the PC won out. The N64 and PS1 had some incredible and innovative games. If any generation of consoles did beat the PC, I'd say that one would be at the top of the list.

Except the water temple... screw that temple.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

short answer:

lol no

longer answer:

back in the day, consoles were quite a bit different in what pc's offered. there wasn't necessarily a direct comparison, as plug n play couldn't have been more simple while some (if not most) pc games could be one hell of a pain in the ass to get going on your computer. If anyone wants to complain about bugs or CTD's these days, they would explode at the horrific days of the early 90's on the computer.

also I have to laugh at your examples, I'm pretty much 80-90% a PC guy now, but all the PC games you picked I find to be absolute snoozefests, while all the console games were a ton of fun and I would pick them in a heartbeat over the crap you just glorified.

Thief is crap? It's very hard to find faults in the original Thief games outside their graphics.

I said I found it to be a snoozefest, not that the game itself was crap. I can recognize half life is an objectively good fps, doesn't change the fact that I find it to be one of the most boring fps's I've tried to go through. Same goes for thief, it just didn't tickle my fancy in the slightest, but I'm not calling the game crap, considering that it's leaps and bounds better than it's modern day version from what I've heard from people who've played through both of them.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

Oh I get it. You have no patience.

nice jab, glad to see opinions are respected by you.

I will agree with you tho, Half Life 1 is greatly overhypped. It wasn't even 'half' as good as its sequel, which improved everything. It was boring, the shooting was unsatisfying, and the game was poorly balanced, often giving instant damaging enemies or pointless easy shootouts.

Half Life 1 is just too slow, and unlike Thief, which is a stealth game and therefore all about slow pacing and gameplay, cant be forgiven. Regardless, Thief does stealth better then pretty much every game ever made.

I actually tried playing the second game as well, as I had heard it was much better, and there was no difference, I could barely make it through the canal system part to the black mesa part before I was bored out of my mind.

I've played plenty of slow pacing games and I've dabbled in many games with stealth, I just didn't care to push through a game I wasn't having fun with. Now I could sit here and explain in detail about all this shit but obviously like the OP you've made up your mind on anyone who doesn't share your exact opinion.

Spoiler

 

[octafish]

I remember when you could run Linux on an XBOX and get a very powerful (for the time) PC at a quarter what it would cost to build. The XBOX was a beast on release, it is only this current gen that has been disappointing hardware wise.

I've never owned a console because they are only for playing games. I've been editing photos with photoshop since PS 5 in '98 so I've had a powerful machine since then. Prior to that I still found having a PC more useful than a console, all the way back to my C64 and ZX days.

That's just me though, I do my own oil changes, repair electronics, and make furniture. I like to monkey with things, so PCs are perfect for me. I currently have four that I use on a regular basis.

 

[Strelok]

I'd say the fact that we aren't getting a sequel and the fact that the developers had to close down is a sign that it didn't do that well. It has a rabid fan base, but that doesn't mean that it was a financial success. Granted, some team members managed to form a new company that is working on a spiritual successor to S.T.A.L.K.E.R., but without some sort of miracle, the series is effectively dead, so I wouldn't say that it is "doing well enough for itself."

ROFL!!! Research... Do some... The owner of GSC, Sergei Grigorovich made the top 50 richest in the Ukraine in part because of S.T.A.L.K.E.R., though Cossacks alone brought in $100 million in retail sales.

http://www.agentix.org/en/r42/1913.html

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. sold 2 million copies as of 2008 and this didn't include digital copies, all three parts to the first game are on Steam and GoG now.

He was named the Ukraine's version of Forbes, Entrepreneur of the year 2010, and GSC won most innovative business ideas the same year.

http://predprinimatel.co.ua/en/news/predprinimatel-goda-sergejj-grigorovich-ernst-young

Lets not even get into book sales.

http://stalker.wikia.com/wiki/S.T.A.L.K.E.R._Book_Series

Or the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. TV series had Sergei stayed with it.

http://kinostalker.com/?lang=en

In one of his final interviews he made a statement about why he left gaming, he still holds the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. IP, and defends it legally when required.

Since then, Grigorovich has become something of a Howard Hughes in the Ukrainian games scene. He grants few interviews; in his last one, given to Ukraine's edition of Forbes earlier this year, he is quoted as saying he became tired of the industry, and was seeking something new to do in his life.

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-06-30-stalker-whos-the-rightful-heir

Anyway, there is still Vostok Games and Survarium as well as 4A Games and Metro 2033/Last Light. Bit Composer picked up the rights to Roadside Picnic (novel that inspired S.T.A.L.K.E.R.) and the Stalker (1979) movie so there is still hope for some form of Stalker game, just not a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game.

On Topic: Consoles have not always been below the PC, used to be the consoles would start out quite high above at least graphically in the N64 era, the gap got pretty tiny in the 360/PS3 era and blown out of the water XBone/PS4. I have always found something good to play on consoles, except this generation, what will likely be the final generation. Sad end to a long legacy.

Edit:
Actually it was only the 360 that pulled ahead of the PC, and it didn't last long.

Also not really fair comparing that atrocity, and crime against the gaming community Halo (insert number here) to the likes of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Crysis.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

It was the 7th generation that (graphically) consoles pulled ahead and renders your arguement void.

 

[AuronFtw]

Consoles peaked in the PS2 era, PCs peaked in the PS1 era. Your point?

PCs peak all the time, basically. From some of the most legendary, genre-defining shooters (quake, CS, even tf2 arguably) to RPGs (Baldur's Gate 2 and Planescape Torment remain completely uncontested as far as well-written characters, story and dialog goes), PCs have offered a never-ending stream of quality content. It comes and goes, as companies come and go, and shit that EA/ubisoft/etc pull often make it hard to stay positive, but on the whole PCs have been absolutely fantastic gaming devices for *well* over a decade.

Around the time Windows 2000 came out and was mostly stable (improved upon even more in XP), even the notorious CTDs became a legend of the past. You had to intentionally run games without proper drivers to get them to crash most of the time, and you'd rarely ever crash the whole OS. That aspect has been improving steadily ever since, as most drivers and system updates are acquired automatically. With minimal effort you can run games from even 10, 20 years ago. I installed Diablo 2 on a powerhouse machine and noticed it running shitty - 10 minutes of checking the net for fixes and I found a glide wrapper download (for free, obviously) that fixed the problem immediately. A game that came out before some current gamers were born was up and running at max performance in 10 minutes. In my opinion, that's a huge +1 for PCs being great gaming devices. Games didn't stop being made between generations - having unimpeded access to decades of content is one of the main reasons PCs didn't "peak" and then fall. They've stayed constant, with every legendary title still being playable (and often offered DRM-free and for cheap through sites like GOG or GMG) in addition to every great new game released. It's a smorgasbord of fantastic gaming; a true "library" of games and genres, spanning the years and still working great.

I do agree that the PS2 era was clearly console's peak, with the perfect combination of huge, quality libraries thanks in large part to great console design allowing easy third party developing (something PS3 fucked up hardcore) *and* backwards compatibility allowing the many fantastic PS1 games to be enjoyed without fucking around hooking up multiple consoles. The fully offline local multiplayer was icing on the cake, with titles like HALO, timesplitters, baldur's gate: dark alliance and star wars battlefront all offering hundreds of hours of friendly gaming with none of the headache of unlocking optional characters via 10 hours of solo play or being pestered with system updates or DLC packs. That shit was the bomb.

 

[bishopzz]

All of the games you showed are held I'm high regard by a lot of people, so it was hard to see the difference.

"Console shooter that is scripted, linear, regen health and nothing but corridor crawler" I found that statement kind of dumb, who decided games with those qualities were bad? I mean all of the Half life games would fit that description, except for the regen health thing. Are you sure BioShock uses regenerative health? I hope you didn't intentionally use a BioShock 2 screen shot, because most people wouldn't call it a top teir game. Most importantly it was released three years after Halo 3.

 

[Chaos Isaac]

I'd rather play Sonic over Doom any day. I mean, look at all that color.

Clearly even back then, Consoles had a graphical advantage and greater creativity.

(Don't take me too seriously)

 

[Maximum Bert]

Looks like an opinion piece especially the way you compare the games i.e look game x is better than game y (in your opinion) therefore the game x is on is the superior platform er ok if you say so.

I wouldnt call Doom in 3D it was 2D just 2D trickery to make it look 3D. 3D games came later also there were games that used effects to look 3D way before Doom like Monster Maze for instance on the Zx Spectrum so I guess that makes it superior to PC and consoles for quite a while since that was released in the early eighties PC and console were just playing catchup.

 

[MysticSlayer]

I'd say the fact that we aren't getting a sequel and the fact that the developers had to close down is a sign that it didn't do that well. It has a rabid fan base, but that doesn't mean that it was a financial success. Granted, some team members managed to form a new company that is working on a spiritual successor to S.T.A.L.K.E.R., but without some sort of miracle, the series is effectively dead, so I wouldn't say that it is "doing well enough for itself."

ROFL!!! Research... Do some...

Or, you know, I just didn't find that information when I did do my research. I'm a huge fan of S.T.A.L.K.E.R., and I, like plenty of fans, was scouring for an answer when it was officially announced that there would be no sequel. However, at the time, the only answer people could get was that the series wasn't financially successful enough despite sales numbers and the dedicated fan base.

 

[Laughing Man]

Sorry what is the purpose of this topic? I kind of think I know what you are asking but you fail to give any clarification on what you are comparing, are you comparing pure hardware power, line up of games, graphics quality.

It's not really a very difficult thing to answer.

This generation, the one we are on right now. At the point of the consoles launch this is the only generation in which you have been able to build a comparably powerful PC for a very near price point of one of the major current gen consoles, that's it no debate.

 

[DefunctTheory]

There's really only one objective way to compare consoles and PC, and that's in the graphical and processor power department. And generally speaking, PC spends more time on top then consoles in that regard, but it usually came at a price. As was mentioned by other's this generation was the first one where PCs could compete, per cost, to the power of consoles, at release date. previously, you had to wait a year and some change to do so, but then you had 4+ years of graphical superiority to lord over the console fans.

Every other comparison is basically opinion, including game comparison.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

This argument is incredibly disengenuous. Comparing carefully handpicked screenshots? Really? Exhibit A compares a 2.5D FPS with a 2D side-scroller. Exhibit B compares a couple of photo-realistic FPS games with a deliberately cartoonish JRPG and action-adventure games. Exhibit C compares... a bunch of perfectly serviceable cross-platform FPS games. What's your case again? Some of the pictures look prettier than the others? Are you even contemplating elements such as art direction, aesthetical design and gaming genre?

 

[stroopwafel]

I don?t think it?s that black and white, as in that consoles and PCs exist in complete separation. As a ?console gamer? I?ll be the first to admit that a game run on PC at the highest settings looks on average prettier and has a more stable/higher framerate than its console counterpart(at the cost of a higher price and more hassle). Not to mention that the lines between consoles and PCs have started to blur, with less clear distinction between the two. I?d say espescially in the 16- and 32-bit eras both platforms had their own libraries, and which one was ?best? was a case of complete personal preference. Now, with games being mostly multiplatform that distinction has fallen away.

However, I think people often underestimate the market appeal of consoles and how this translates into game development. It?s not all about specs but also what system is the most lucrative to develop for. Without the joined share of PCs and consoles most modern games would probably not even be developed, as a PC only market would be insufficient to recoup investment. So what you have is games developed specifically with consoles in mind and which are ported over to PCs and vice versa. It is because companies(developers, publishers, manufacturers etc.) have a vested interest in the joint install-base of consoles that they are willing to develop multi-million dollar games for it.

I mean, just to give an example many PC gamers love Dark Souls. Now, without consoles they would never have this game. Not only because it was originally developed as a console game but also b/c it ran on the same engine as Demon?s Souls, and this engine was originally(and exclusively) made by Sony Japan Studios for PS3. Now you can say ??with mods this PC version is superior to the console versions?? and that might be true but without consoles this game would have never seen the light of day on PCs in the first place.

Similarly as console gamers got to experience awesome games like FEAR and Half Life 2 which were originally developed as PC titles. So yeah, there might be less distinction now as PCs and consoles become mutually dependent but at the same time both platforms get to enjoy the best of both worlds. I think the architecture of new-gen consoles(espescially PS4) proves my point.

 

[DataSnake]

Actually, no. Back in the early 90s, everyone was amazed that John Carmack managed to figure out how to do smooth sidescrolling on PC. At that point, the NES had had smooth sidescrolling for years. The reason PC is ahead now is basically a Tortoise-and-the-Hare situation: one takes massive leaps forward with years-long rests in between, the other advances slowly but constantly. As in the old story, slow and steady wins the race.