Why buy consoles?

[NoNameMcgee]

You can rent games from D2D.

Their rental catalogue options are small and the time you get with them is short (5 hours). I'm talking about a system where I can rent games to play them in full, and probably send them back and never play them again, unless they are exceptional in which case I would buy a copy to keep for the future. This is the system consoles can have, because you simply pay a monthly fee and you can rent out a game and keep it as long as you need it, before sending it back and getting another game in its place. The PC has nothing like this.

 

[maddawg IAJI]

Those upgrades cost money, it costs a lot more to keep your computer up to date then just one payment for the console. Ya, they break down and don't last as long as the PCs, but they are easy to set up, cheaper in the long run and simpler to play on and maintain.

 

[Sabiancym]

Fighting games like Street fighter keep me coming back to consoles, and classics

Fighting games are on PC. In fact there are probably more of them on PC.

Umm.. not quite. Sure you can play many old fighters on PC in semi-legal emulated form, but pretty much none of the recent fighting games that anyone actually plays are on the PC. Oh, and yes if you count indie developed flash based fighters that no one cares about you could say that there are technically "more" fighting games on the PC.

Virtua Fighter? No. Dead or Alive? No. Tekken? No. Mortal Kombat? No. Marvel VS Capcom 3? No. Street Fighter? Sort of. SSF4 had no PC version and a PC version of AE was only recently announced after being pretty much denied for a long time.

Melty Blood and BlazBlue are probably the only widely known fighting series that are well represented on the PC, but both exist on console as well.

I can sort of understand you wanting to defend the PC, but please try and not just make things up.

Please tell me what I "made up"?

 

[Sabiancym]

I've always been a PC gamer but I'm becoming increasingly interested in consoles. For two and only two reasons:

1. More choice of games.
2. Ability to rent and trade-in games.

That's it. If only the PC had more games being released I would never even consider owning a console, I love PC gaming. I don't think theres a huge lack of games on the PC as much as other people say (I agree with you that most AAA games get a PC release, particularly ones on the Xbox 360) but there is undoubtably more to choose from on the consoles.

The ability to rent games means I can simply join a rental plan and play what I want when I want, with a fixed monthly price, which is much more appealing to me, and I can just buy games that I truly think are worth the price (hint: theres not many). Which is pretty much exactly what I do now with piracy, because piracy is my equivelent of a "rental option" on the PC.

More choice of games on console is flat out un-true. There are way more games on PC. And I'm not just talking about indie games.

 

[Bravo 21]

quite simply, it is fun to be able to play in the same room as your friends, and carrying a PC around for LAN parties is just to heavy, and laptops well, i don't know, there's just something about them

 

[StriderShinryu]

Fighting games like Street fighter keep me coming back to consoles, and classics

Fighting games are on PC. In fact there are probably more of them on PC.

Umm.. not quite. Sure you can play many old fighters on PC in semi-legal emulated form, but pretty much none of the recent fighting games that anyone actually plays are on the PC. Oh, and yes if you count indie developed flash based fighters that no one cares about you could say that there are technically "more" fighting games on the PC.

Virtua Fighter? No. Dead or Alive? No. Tekken? No. Mortal Kombat? No. Marvel VS Capcom 3? No. Street Fighter? Sort of. SSF4 had no PC version and a PC version of AE was only recently announced after being pretty much denied for a long time.

Melty Blood and BlazBlue are probably the only widely known fighting series that are well represented on the PC, but both exist on console as well.

I can sort of understand you wanting to defend the PC, but please try and not just make things up.

Please tell me what I "made up"?

Perhaps the fact that a dedicated fighting game player would be happy with the selection of fighting games on offer for their PC?

 

[Sabiancym]

Fighting games like Street fighter keep me coming back to consoles, and classics

Fighting games are on PC. In fact there are probably more of them on PC.

Umm.. not quite. Sure you can play many old fighters on PC in semi-legal emulated form, but pretty much none of the recent fighting games that anyone actually plays are on the PC. Oh, and yes if you count indie developed flash based fighters that no one cares about you could say that there are technically "more" fighting games on the PC.

Virtua Fighter? No. Dead or Alive? No. Tekken? No. Mortal Kombat? No. Marvel VS Capcom 3? No. Street Fighter? Sort of. SSF4 had no PC version and a PC version of AE was only recently announced after being pretty much denied for a long time.

Melty Blood and BlazBlue are probably the only widely known fighting series that are well represented on the PC, but both exist on console as well.

I can sort of understand you wanting to defend the PC, but please try and not just make things up.

Please tell me what I "made up"?

Perhaps the fact that a dedicated fighting game player would be happy with the selection of fighting games on offer for their PC?

I never said that.

 

[Sabiancym]

This thread looks like it should have been called 'Why PC gamers think you shouldn't buy a console.'

Cheers!

Or

"List of falsities console gamers think are true about PCs"


Literally half of the reasons given here for not gaming on a PC are false.

 

[Sabiancym]

this is not flaming.

consoles dont realy have ANYTHING that makes them better than PC. everything you can do on a console you can do with a PC. onsole fanboys claim.

Ummm... there's one pretty major thing you can do on consoles that you can't do on PCs that you seem to be overlooking (though it's been mentioned in this thread MANY times): play games that are exclusive to the console. There are quite a few of them (and sorry, they're not just for the "kids"). It's kind of hard to take your post as not flaming when you don't pay attention to the one aspect that is important to gaming, that being the games.

Ok, but PCs have more exclusives, plus if everyone united under one platform we wouldn't have to worry about buying multiple consoles or PCs. Every game in the world could run on PCs. Not every game made could work on consoles.

If every console gamer switched to PC, the price of hardware would go down, and the quality of games would go up due to not being handcuffed by the old hardware and strict policies of Microsoft and Sony.

 

[Vibhor]

Some games are better on consoles. Also, CPU monitors will never be better than TVs. Consoles these days also have lots of built in things that are also better on TV (Netflix Instant Stream, for example). Some games are just better on consoles (like Third Person Shooters).

PC supports gamepad which automatically makes your 3rd person shooter point invalid and TV has color bleedout which can completely ruin the visuals.Seriously, TV better than a moniter?
Have you even seen the modern HD moniters?

Have you seen the size of modern TVs?

Size just highlights the shitty aliasing artifacts.
And if size really meant something then PS3 is automatically better than the Xbox 360 and my gigantic CPU is a god gift.
Also, huge moniters do exist.

Size doesn't always make things better, but what would you rather watch a movie on (using Netflix Instant Stream), a normal computer monitor (what most people have) or a large flat-screen (what most people have)? It seems to me like you guys have elevated your PC-Dalekness (because at least most elitists just look down on everyone else, not act like they should be EXTERMINATED) to hating on TVs. I can hardly look upon logic's mangled corpse.

Hurr durr PC elitist.
That is the best insult you can come up with?
Yeah I am a PC elitist/console fanboy hybrid.
And why the fuck would you buy a console to watch movies?
Have you lost points to make for an argument?
Also, laptop can be connected to a TV.

I'm not saying that's the only reason to buy it, I'm just saying that it's a reason. Also, that doesn't work with every laptop or TV.

Neither is every Television a high def one which would render your point moot too.

 

[NoNameMcgee]

I've always been a PC gamer but I'm becoming increasingly interested in consoles. For two and only two reasons:

1. More choice of games.
2. Ability to rent and trade-in games.

That's it. If only the PC had more games being released I would never even consider owning a console, I love PC gaming. I don't think theres a huge lack of games on the PC as much as other people say (I agree with you that most AAA games get a PC release, particularly ones on the Xbox 360) but there is undoubtably more to choose from on the consoles.

The ability to rent games means I can simply join a rental plan and play what I want when I want, with a fixed monthly price, which is much more appealing to me, and I can just buy games that I truly think are worth the price (hint: theres not many). Which is pretty much exactly what I do now with piracy, because piracy is my equivelent of a "rental option" on the PC.

More choice of games on console is flat out un-true. There are way more games on PC. And I'm not just talking about indie games.

You mean old games? I'm not interested in retro gaming, I think newer games are better. Free games? Rarely good. If you dont mean old games, indie games (which are mostly not very good either) or free games, perhaps you could elaborate?

Now that I think about it, the PC does get a lot of shovelware (even more than the Wii) but who cares about that?

The PC gets a lot of good games, but they are mostly ports from consoles. Dont get me wrong, if I had a console I would still probably be buying the PC ports instead, because I prefer gaming on the PC, but theres no doubt the consoles get more AAA releases than PCs do.

 

[the_green_dragon]

A mediocre trained monkey can change a graphics card. or even build a whole PC i learned it with 10yrs just by reading the manual. Motherboard here, harddrive in that slot, graphics in there, ram in there, put the cables together , Profit.

Great. Now add up the cost.

 

[Vigormortis]

BIG snip

I'm actually in agreement on a lot of those points. I wasn't saying every gamer should turn to PC gaming. In fact, there are a number of people I know that really should stick to console gaming as they have absolutely zero computer savvy. (and by that I mean they're the type that will be confused why their PC won't turn on, only later to find they forget to plug the thing in)

"Convenience" is the point I was trying to make. How many people actually want to go and search for each upgrade your rig can get and go buy each upgrade and actually install them to said rig. I'm already aware that consoles aren't exactly cheap, and buying the next gen console is probably gonna rack up a nice amount of spent money. Buuut a PC upgrades a lot quicker than new consoles come out. But that's just what I've seen. And I agree with it coming down to preference. And a lot of people "prefer" what's easier to work with. Which just so happens to be a console.

Just like with pulse2, I actually agree with you to some extent. For some, especially those that know bugger all about computers, console gaming is the most ideal form of gaming for them. The point I was trying to make is, much of the "good" things about consoles (the same things that people say they choose consoles for) can be achieved on PCs with a little know how. I.E. Split screen, controllers, playing on your TV, etc, etc And, that much of the "bad" things about PC gaming are common misconceptions.

 

[Sabiancym]

A mediocre trained monkey can change a graphics card. or even build a whole PC i learned it with 10yrs just by reading the manual. Motherboard here, harddrive in that slot, graphics in there, ram in there, put the cables together , Profit.

Great. Now add up the cost.

8800GT on Ebay - $60 http://cgi.ebay.com/EVGA-NVIDIA-GeForce-8800-GT-GDDR3-/320679416962?pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item4aa9fb9482#ht_500wt_922
E6750 on Ebay - $70 http://cgi.ebay.com/Intel-CORE-2-DUO-E6750-2-66GHz-4M-1333-SLA9V-/230570254882?pt=CPUs&hash=item35af0ee222#ht_1234wt_905
MSI G41M on Newegg $50 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130305
GSkill Rijaw 4GB RAM on newegg $50 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231277
LOGISYS 550W PSU on Newegg $25 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817170028
LITE-ON Black 18 DVD Drive $17 on Newegg http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106274
Microsoft Keyboard and Mouse on newegg $30 http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.623199
WD 500gb HD on Newegg $26


Total $328....and you could find it cheaper. This rig would play everything at levels the PS3 and Xbox can, probably even better.

So there goes your point.

 

[DanDeFool]

Mostly the exclusive titles. I bought a PS2 to play Devil May Cry. That was the game I had in mind when I bought that console. Luckily, I picked the winner of that console generation, and there were lots of great games on the PS2.

I bought an N64 to play Mario 64 and Zelda: OoT. That decision didn't pan out quite so well.

My rule of thumb for consoles is that there must be at least 1 reasonably well-reviewed game that I am interested in playing which is exclusive to the device for every $50 I will spend on it. This is why I own a Wii, and why I'm considering buying a banned X360 (since, apparently, those can go for $50 + shipping + peripherals and adapters).

 

[Sabiancym]

I've always been a PC gamer but I'm becoming increasingly interested in consoles. For two and only two reasons:

1. More choice of games.
2. Ability to rent and trade-in games.

That's it. If only the PC had more games being released I would never even consider owning a console, I love PC gaming. I don't think theres a huge lack of games on the PC as much as other people say (I agree with you that most AAA games get a PC release, particularly ones on the Xbox 360) but there is undoubtably more to choose from on the consoles.

The ability to rent games means I can simply join a rental plan and play what I want when I want, with a fixed monthly price, which is much more appealing to me, and I can just buy games that I truly think are worth the price (hint: theres not many). Which is pretty much exactly what I do now with piracy, because piracy is my equivelent of a "rental option" on the PC.

More choice of games on console is flat out un-true. There are way more games on PC. And I'm not just talking about indie games.

You mean old games? I'm not interested in retro gaming, I think newer games are better. Free games? Rarely good. If you dont mean old games, indie games (which are mostly not very good either) or free games, perhaps you could elaborate?

Now that I think about it, the PC does get a lot of shovelware (even more than the Wii) but who cares about that?

The PC gets a lot of good games, but they are mostly ports from consoles. Dont get me wrong, if I had a console I would still probably be buying the PC ports instead, because I prefer gaming on the PC, but theres no doubt the consoles get more AAA releases than PCs do.

MMOs, RTS, Flight sims, other sims, all the regular games that get released cross platform.

Count em up, the PC has way more. Hell, steam alone has more games than the entire Xbox and PS3 library.

And I'd be willing to bet that the PC gets as many if not more AAA releases.

 

[Bat Vader]

I never really cared about PC gaming until I was able to get an average gaming PC for about $375.00. I own a PS3 and an x-box 360 for the exclusive console games. If Heavy Rain, L.A. Noire, and Red Dead Redemption were on the PC I would have bought them for the PC instead.

A friend of mine is going to build a new gaming PC for me. The one I have now is basically out of date and won't be able to run games like Rage or TESV: Skyrim. I would build it myself but I am afraid I would somehow break it as I was building it.

 

[Vakz]

I happen to know Stukov irl, and can thus answer for a few of the questions.

i'd like to call you out on the "cheaper games" thing.

if you don't buy from retail, you pay with your credit card, right? credit cards have interest rates, so that 49.99 you spent on the shiny new 59.99 game? it really translates to something like 70 dollars with interest, plus, with console games, you get the "pre-owned" market, which you can get games there for downwards of 20 bucks.

Who said anything about credit cards? You can use regular bankcards to buy games online, with no interest rate, meaning 49,99 actually did cost just 49,99.

Also. no DRM to stop you from enjoying pre-owned or borrowed products.

I believe I read recently about some game companies locking certain features to the account on PSN, so that if you buy used, you won't be getting the "full experience".

No installation required (as long as you're not on PS3)

"as long as you're not on PS3.. you're gonna rule out a third of the console market? Besides, I own a 360, and the thing sounds like a jet engine if I don't install the games.

Multiplayer for most new games is better (since people make games for consoles first these days)

I'm allright with getting a buggier time just after release, if it means I can get dedicated servers with higher max players and admins getting rid of the foulmouthed 12-year olds.

Couch multiplayer (ah... the Goldeneye days...)

My chair is more comfortable than my couch. What's your point?

unless you buy a 3000 dollar one from alienware or something otherwise, you have to make it yourself. and honestly?

Seriously? 3000 dollars? What are you buying, a mac? For 3000 dollars, you get pretty much the most extreme overkill machine that is available right now, which is just stupid to get. You can get away with half that money, and still get a computer that will last several years, and that's even when I converted from Swedish Kronor, which stands very high compared to the US Dollar at the moment. If I had been looking at a US Store, it would probably be even cheaper than 1500.

 

[GeneWard]

I just like being to not worry about specs, but being a pc gamer on the side with a mediocre pc (Left for dead is about as much as my pc can handle, but runs fine)i much prefer the input of a keyboard and mouse in shooters.

 

[the_green_dragon]

A mediocre trained monkey can change a graphics card. or even build a whole PC i learned it with 10yrs just by reading the manual. Motherboard here, harddrive in that slot, graphics in there, ram in there, put the cables together , Profit.

Great. Now add up the cost.

8800GT on Ebay - $60 http://cgi.ebay.com/EVGA-NVIDIA-GeForce-8800-GT-GDDR3-/320679416962?pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item4aa9fb9482#ht_500wt_922
E6750 on Ebay - $70 http://cgi.ebay.com/Intel-CORE-2-DUO-E6750-2-66GHz-4M-1333-SLA9V-/230570254882?pt=CPUs&hash=item35af0ee222#ht_1234wt_905
MSI G41M on Newegg $50 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130305
GSkill Rijaw 4GB RAM on newegg $50 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231277
LOGISYS 550W PSU on Newegg $25 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817170028
LITE-ON Black 18 DVD Drive $17 on Newegg http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106274
Microsoft Keyboard and Mouse on newegg $30 http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.623199
WD 500gb HD on Newegg $26


Total $328....and you could find it cheaper. This rig would play everything at levels the PS3 and Xbox can, probably even better.

So there goes your point.

Wheres the LCD monitor?
I assume thats american dollars, how much is an xbox on ebay in America these days?
What about people who don't have credit cards to buy stuff off ebay or online?
EDIT: U forgot postage on those items