I blame PCs for the PCification of console gaming
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then these forums are worthless. so you are forced to spell out every joke to everyone in order to not get suspended? what a load of bull. i don't even know why i'm here, this is a goddamn breach the freedom of speech.Hammeroj said:If I did that, I'd most certainly get a warning.theklng said:i cringe every time i see shit like this. you know, it would actually be pretty good if you just posted the image and nothing elseHammeroj said:*looks at the thread title*
-This looks interesting, let's watch.
*sees some bullet points on what exactly PC gaming has done wrong*
-Oooh, bullet points.
*proceeds to actually read it*
I'm not sure if you're serious or joking. Which are you?
1. Installing is optional... until you are talking about XBL games, then I'm sorry, but these games would never exist on a disk format.MrCherry said:
2. Yes, but remember how some were completely broken from the start and you could never complete them?
3. I'm pretty sure that your post wasn't humorous at all. Nothing was funny, unless you count making ridiculous claims.
Mr Cherry, I think this is aimed at me. When I wrote the post, I intended it to be satire, a play on the kind of arguments that I've seen on forums, or heard on youtube videos. Things like someone blaming a piece of scripting in BlOps single player not working in the PC version on consoles. Things that didn't quite make sense. So, as part of the joke, some of the things in my list deliberately don't make sense. I could only hope that some people got the joke, and some people did. Some people didn't, and I feel I have to earnestly explain myself. Never mind.Omnific One said:
Games are awesome. They are the most awesome hobby, however you play them. All these arguments about what is better, or what is 'ruining' what, seem pointless to me, so I wanted to make fun of them. If you are young, and still in school, and argue with your classmates about what is better, well, we've all done that, and look back at how pointless it was. Anyone who was at school in the late 90s, like me, would look back now and say that the PS1 and N64 and PC back then were all awesome, in their own ways. So it is today. Pay your money, take your choice, play games, have fun, and stop bitching that it's not as good as it could be. Because it will never be as good as it could be.
A yes. Well that's the flipside of a similar kind of problem.Chibz said:
One side is game designs being hampered by focusing on technical stuff, the other is technically impressive stuff being hampered by legacy support.
There's a reason why Crysis still hasn't been surpassed on the PC... We're only now getting PC's that can run it properly on the highest settings. XD
We seem to be stuck in a pit of compromises.
Amazing game design is being held back by requiring obsessive (mostly graphical) detail in games - or risk being relegated to the 'bargain bin'. (even for the 360 and PS3... Hell, even developing a game that uses the Wii's graphical capabilities properly is a big task...)
At the same time, PC's, with their impressive technical capabilities are being held back from demonstrating anything technically impressive by game consoles that are seriously outdated by comparison.
But... That's not really fair, because it's also being held back by PC's themselves.
A developer not too long ago said that back before 3d acceleration, in the days of doom and the first quake, a high end PC was about 10 times faster than a low-end one.
Now, the gap is more like 100 times... Can you imagine trying to get a game to work alright on a set of computers where one extreme is 100 times more powerful than the other?
something is going to suffer in the process.
Sometimes, I do miss the old days though.
Did you know that Chris Sawyer (Famous for Transport Tycoon & Rollercoaster Tycoon) created pretty much all of those 2d games, right up until Rollercoaster Tycoon 2, by himself?
One person did that. One.
(OK, that's a lie. Technically, he did all the coding, and a lot of the graphics, but had some out-sourced art, and outsourced music. Making 3 people in all.)
Transport tycoon back in the day was marketed and sold as if it was a mainstream title. It sold in pretty large numbers too.
Yet by today's logic, it'd essentially be considered an 'indy' title...
Yeah, technical advancement does come at a price...
Moviebob (in his "Game Overthinker" hat) may have had a point about moving back to cartridges for consoles for a time, seeing as how the price of flash media has dropped to the point where it could be a halfway viable format. Could conceivably reduce the whole install/loading issue.
Amusingly, the first "computer" I worked with frequently had a cartridge slot.
As far as patches, brown graphics, and pay-for-play models go... Basically, if we really care that much, we need to stop buying buggy, me-too, and/or mercenary games until the industry gets over itself.
Amusingly, the first "computer" I worked with frequently had a cartridge slot.
As far as patches, brown graphics, and pay-for-play models go... Basically, if we really care that much, we need to stop buying buggy, me-too, and/or mercenary games until the industry gets over itself.
How extremely passive aggressive of you!Radeonx said:
Anyways, this thread immediately filled with people unable to parse this line:
...and people who wish to do nothing but flame.Durananrananrananran said:
Her, for instance.Chibz said:I propose a forced separation. PC gamers are free to spend however much money they want on their...
And I get to enjoy gaming on my functional $150 (total price with taxes, TYVM) 360. Playing the exact same games. And if they try to say I'm "gaming wrong" I get to call them an arrogant SOB, and to drink... a very unpleasant thing to drink.
Edit: 1995. What a year.
This one as well (despite them trying to point out that we've only sunk into a dumb flamewar again, they couldn't resist lobbing some flaming poo on their way past).CrystalShadow said:
Escapistmagazine.com forums, what happened to you?
Well done calling him an idiot (and then telling him to be respectful, oh my!). YOU'RE the one that ignored his line (and video) about it being ironic and a satirical call for everyone to get along.Morgan Howe said:1. your an idiotDurananrananrananran said:
2. graphic options are needed because NOT EVERY COMPUTER IS THE SAME
3. everything is not brown on pc, quite the opposite, you can find more and varying games on pc then you can on any console combined
i'm an avid pc and console gamer, sure they both have perks and let downs, but YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT!!!
and if you'd had a brain you'd notice that there are already DOZENS of topics on this RANT. so please be respectful to the forums and don't duplicate topics
Another victim of Poe's Law. Stop taking everything at face value.
Well of course. Although apparently, you've sunk to calling any disparaging remark a flame... Not that I can take any of this seriously enough to give a serious response to, but in the end it amounts to the fact that both consoles and PC's are collectively emphasizing the worst aspects of the respective systems, and downplaying their strengths.lacktheknack said:
Used to be, cross-platform development between PC and consoles was relatively rare. Probably because the gap in performance was quite different to today.
In the past, consoles were better at some things, PC's better at others.
First it was raw processing power VS specialised graphical abilities. This eventually became specialised abilities VS more powerful but more generic abilities - Leading to consoles being able to pull off amazing 2d graphics PC's had a hard time with, but PC's being able to pull of the earliest half-way decent 3d graphics.
Unfortunately, with the advent of 3d consoles, and dedicated 3d hardware in PC's, the overall abilities of the two gradually converged to the point where the primary distinguishing feature is now the input device, and the difference in development choices between powerful, but frequently changing hardware in PC's.
VS more more predictable, but much more static (and thus rapidly outdated) hardware in consoles.
That, and the sudden increase in piracy concerns on the PC thanks to the highly open design, and increasingly easy access to the internet. (A pc can run all the tools needed to pirate a PC game, irrespective of it's security features. - to pirate a console game, you need to mess with the console, AND have a PC to do at least some of the work.)
But, despite that, the convergence in overall abilities means compared to consoles back in the past, where comparing a PC to a console was almost like comparing apples to Oranges, the modern situation is like comparing apples to slightly different apples.
It's this convergence that has been hurting both sides, even as it's made cross-platform games much more common.
Consoles are under pressure to compete graphically with PC's, for one thing. Something that used to be so implausible that nobody even considered it. (Not because console graphics were nessesarily inferior, but they tended to function rather differently, thus having radically different strengths.)
This means one of two things: Console games end up looking bad compared to PC games. Or PC games never live up to their potential, being hamstrung by games designed with console limitations in mind. (And if you think it's as simple as graphical effects, bear in mind that the level design of a well thought out game takes technical limitations into account.)
Consoles now have online systems as well, which predictably, has made developers lazy about debugging their games.
This would have been a disaster in older console generations. And in fact this is illustrated quite well by the bug in Metroid: Other M, which thanks to the Wii's inability to patch games required shipping out replacement game disks, AND asking customers to send in corrupted save files on an SD card.
That's pretty expensive. (Though not as expensive as a recall of a cartridge based game would have been.)
PC games have had patches just about forever though. But there at least, the reason seems quite understandable. PC hardware isn't standardised. And users have free reign to install just about any software they like on their PC, a lot of which can even be running in the background at any given moment. - Especially given the ability to multitask.
The hardware variations alone lead to hundreds of thousands of unpredictable variations. Add drivers and system software variations and you make that a hundred times worse. Add in installable software, and the situation becomes almost too chaotic to deal with.
Consoles shouldn't be having that kind of problem, yet somehow we're getting there. Probably because system updates now allow consoles to do this too. Sort of.
Anyway, I could go on and on listing this in unending detail...
But somehow I get the feeling the heart of this problem, which seems to be related to PC / console convergence, can be traced back to Microsoft.
I personally witnessed a game console crashing with a distinctly microsoft style BSOD. That was, in fact, a Sega Dreamcast, which, if you do your research, you'll find it ran windows CE...
The PS2 and Gamecube were both consoles in the traditional sense as far as I can tell. Yes, there was obvious convergence with PC's even there, in what their abilities were, but they seemed built around different parts and architectures.
Documents show the gamecube for instance was using TEV's (Texture Environment Units), which are an interesting design reminiscent of very simple hardware shaders, but working along quite different principles.
Around this time PC's got the first generation of Pixel & Vertex shaders.
And then of course, the Xbox showed up, and really screwed everything up in terms of convergence.
Because, the original Xbox wasn't just a device with similar intent to a gaming PC... It Was a PC. Every single component was recognisably a PC component. Right down to an intel Celeron processor, Nvidia graphics chip, and most of the usual peripherals.
These days, the PS3 pretty much uses PC graphics hardware. The 360 uses a prototype directX10 hardware design... Which only leaves the Wii, with a design lifted from the gamecube.
(But the rumours of Nintendo's next console, show... Surprise: PC graphics hardware.)
Truly, we have entered a period of such convergence that the end result seems to be the worst of both worlds. Irrespective of whether you prefer consoles or PC's.
If you can be bothered to read all that, i'll let you off for your flippant accusation. If not, clearly 'flaming' is the only thing anyone actually pays attention to anyway isn't it?
I read it all, and THAT is the Escapist I remember. Thanks!
If you read your original response to Chibz, it DOES come across as inflammatory and barbed. In greater detail, I get where you're coming from much better. No hard feelings.
If you read your original response to Chibz, it DOES come across as inflammatory and barbed. In greater detail, I get where you're coming from much better. No hard feelings.
Y'know what's PCificating the console market, and consolifying the PC market?
Mobile games.
Damn straight.
. . . and casual games as well.
. . . .
Y'know, I proprose a truce between us PC gamers, and y'all console gamers: instead of us focusing our angst at each other, and measuring each other's genitals in an ever-on-going pissing match - I say instead we should join forces and beat the mobile and casual market into absolute submission. We are the superior species, dammit! Why should we be allowing these heathens to encroach upon our territory?! We've been so muddled with each other, we've overlooked the infestation of cockroaches that've setup their Coleman-laden camp site, and have proceeded to enagage in activities we all already hate . . . y'know it, the spawn camping, sniping, tea-bagging, trash-talking, etc.
Unify, brothers! We have a calling, a crusade! We shall not stand idle no longer as senseless dribble continues to spread it's vile evil across our hallowed lands! We shall destroy these infidels, lay a curse upon them, vex them with the evil eye!! We shall exorcise the demons, cast out the devils! We shall beat our war drums and our v00d00 drums!! This is our SPARTA!!! Get out of here STALKERS!!!!
Who's with me?!!
Mobile games.
Damn straight.
. . . and casual games as well.
. . . .
Y'know, I proprose a truce between us PC gamers, and y'all console gamers: instead of us focusing our angst at each other, and measuring each other's genitals in an ever-on-going pissing match - I say instead we should join forces and beat the mobile and casual market into absolute submission. We are the superior species, dammit! Why should we be allowing these heathens to encroach upon our territory?! We've been so muddled with each other, we've overlooked the infestation of cockroaches that've setup their Coleman-laden camp site, and have proceeded to enagage in activities we all already hate . . . y'know it, the spawn camping, sniping, tea-bagging, trash-talking, etc.
Unify, brothers! We have a calling, a crusade! We shall not stand idle no longer as senseless dribble continues to spread it's vile evil across our hallowed lands! We shall destroy these infidels, lay a curse upon them, vex them with the evil eye!! We shall exorcise the demons, cast out the devils! We shall beat our war drums and our v00d00 drums!! This is our SPARTA!!! Get out of here STALKERS!!!!
Who's with me?!!