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Section 0 - About
0.1 - Why are you writing this?
0.2 - Who are you?
0.3 - Copyright
Section 1 - General
1.1 - PC Gaming is dead.
1.2 - I would rather sit on my couch
and play a console game than sit in front of a computer.
1.3 - PC games all suck. There are no
fighting, platform, or sports games available for the PC.
Section 2 - System
2.1 - PC games look bad because they
have to cater to low-end systems.
2.2 - The PC has a big bloated operating
system.
2.3 - PCs have an AGP bus which cripples
any benefit of having a fast video card.
2.4 - My console's specs are way better
than your PC's!!!
2.5 - The Xbox will be able to run Doom3 as good as a PC.
Section 3 - Software
3.1 - Drivers, drivers, drivers!
3.2 - Patches, patches, patches!
Section 4 - Video
4.1 - I don’t want to have to
buy a new video card every 6 months for play the latest PC games.
Section 5 - Sound
5.1 - Who wants to listen to games on
those little PC speakers?
Section 6 - Online
6.1 - PC gaming sucks online. 56k users
slow everything down.
Section 7 - Control
7.1 - Mouse and Keyboard controls
are awful.
0.1 -Why are you writing this?
Because I have grown tired of the PC being attacked by fanatical console owners. Everyone with $200 to blow on a console tends to think they just bought themselves something that outperforms a $1500 PC. I know it’s all about the games, but some people can really get on your nerves. The next time some console-crazed fanboy starts mindlessly babbling about fill-rates and triangles per scene, point them right here.
Just some average Joe, smuck, suspected fanboy, whatever. I have been gaming on the PC for the better part of a decade. I love it.
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This has been said for years. With every major console release, scores of console users proclaim the “death of the PC.” Each and every time the PC remains a solid gaming platform and pushes forward. PC gaming has outlived three generations of consoles and shows no signs of slowing down whatsoever.
1.2 - I would rather sit on my couch and play a console game than sit in front of a computer. I can’t have my friends play with my on my computer.
It’s all a tradeoff in the end. Sure with a console you can play on your couch, but you lose graphics detail and the higher resolutions the PC has to offer.
PCs do not lend themselves well to sports games where four people get together on a couch and “toss the ball around”. Still, the option to frag your buddy across the country in Unreal Tournament 2003 has it’s advantages.
1.3 - PC games all suck. There are no fighting, platform, or sports games available for the PC.
To each his own. Even though there are some fighting and sports games for the PC, these genres do not lend themselves well to the PC. There is a fair share of platform games available on the PC, but even I would admit that that are better played on a console.
With that said, the PC most certainly excels in First Person Shooters, Role Playing, and Real Time Strategy. Even Japanese-style role playing games are beginning to appear on the PC (Final Fantasy XI).
Again, it’s a matter of preference.
2.1 - PC games look bad because they have to cater
to low-end systems. They don’t take advantage
of recent hardware.
The beauty of PC gaming is the level of customization available. Almost every aspect of a game can be tweaked, from resolution right down to hardware-specific effects. Thanks to technology such as DirectX even more customization is possible. Nobody writes code which directly access hardware. If a developer wants shiny pixel shaded water in their game, it’s as simple as a query to see if the system’s hardware supports it. If so, shiny water it is. If not fall back on the not-so-pretty software-rendered water effects. Only the laziest of developers code to low-end systems and only to low-end systems. Games by those developers never really appeal to the hardcore PC gamer anyway.
2.2 - The PC has a big bloated operating system. It sucks up all the resources and makes games run slow.
This is a common misconception. Unless you are having the operating system crunch prime numbers while you are playing games, it is pretty much sitting idle wasting very few CPU cycles. With 512 Megabytes being the average amount of RAM in a PC gaming system these days, the OS simply sits quietly in RAM while the player is gaming away. Only in the extreme case where the system was very low on RAM and constant swapping occurred would a performance penalty occur.
2.3 - PCs have an AGP bus which cripples any benefit of having a fast video card.
Another misconception. While it certainly has it’s disadvantages compared to architectures lacking a slow bus, PC hardware more than makes up for this shortcoming. First off, current PC video cards sport 64 megabytes of RAM on average, with 128M becoming more and more common.
With all this RAM on the video card itself, the need to pull textures from system RAM to the video card becomes less and less an issue. Keep in mind that the (current) best console hardware-wise only sports 64M RAM total. When it needs to swap textures not in memory it need to go to the ultra-slow hard disk or even worse, the DVD. The worst case scenario for the PC is a hit to system RAM.
Due to the massive amount of system memory in the average PC, all textures can be loaded into system RAM at the start of a level, or streamed into RAM as the game progresses (Dungeon Siege). The option to choose textures based on the amount of memory your video card has is also becoming more and more common (Neverwinter Nights).
The memory bandwidth on a Geforce4 card is quite high, 8 – 10.4GB/s depending on the model. Still, as GPUs become more and more powerful, the need to transfer data over the system bus becomes less and less relevant. See:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1647
‘While memory bandwidth has been getting more plentiful, GPUs have been becoming more powerful. The next-generation of GPUs will offer much more programmability and flexibility, allowing developers to truly utilize their potential. Going along with this trend, the next-generation of 3D games won't be entirely memory bandwidth limited. The need for a GPU to run through tens of shading instructions to produce a single pixel will shift games from being overly dependent on memory bandwidth over to a balance between GPU power and memory bandwidth.”
2.4 - My console's specs are way better than your PC's!!! My console is more powerful than any PC.
No, you are wrong.
Gamer PC* |
Xbox |
NGC |
Playstation 2 |
|
| CPU | 2.2Ghz | 733Mhz | 485Mhz | 300Mhz |
| GPU | 275Mhz | 233Mhz | 202.5MHz | 150 MHz |
| RAM | 512M + 128M Video |
64M | 43M | 32MB |
| GPU Memory Bandwidth | 8.8 GB/Sec. | 6.4 GB/sec | 3.2 GB/sec | 3.2 GB/sec |
*Average gamer's PC with 2.2Ghz Pentium 4, 512M, and GeForce4 TI4400 128M.
TODO -- More meaningless tech trash.
2.5 - The Xbox will be able to run Doom3 as well as a PC.
BAWHAHAHAHA!.
3.1 - It’s impossible to play a PC game because I always have to get new drivers and it never works, my system always crashes.
I will have to admit, this is an area where PC gaming may lose some of it’s user base. Not everyone who wants to play games feels like mucking around with system settings, installing video drivers, downloading patches, etc. The idea of popping a CD in a console and playing is certainly appealing.
With all that said, there are those of us who do like messing with our systems. One of the biggest appeals of owning a gaming PC is that everything is customizable. If you are playing a lot of PC games, chances are you bought and installed your video card yourself. You installed the drivers and you are probably overclocking your system to some degree.
Now if you don’t mess with your system, there is no reason it should not simply work 100% of the time. If you keep a clean system with the original video drivers, your system should always run just fine.
A gaming PC is a lot like a car, either you are a grease monkey or someone who never opens the hood. In the end you either drive a hot-rod or a run of the mill sedan.
3.2 - PC games always need to be patched.
Patches are both good and bad. On the downside, it shows that a lot more testing goes into the release of console games compared to PC games. However, patching does offer the option to fix what is wrong with a game after it’s release. In the rare case a console game has a bug/flaw there really is no option to fix it. You just have to live with it. It’s not uncommon for console games to have bugs fixed quietly on re-pressings of the game. The lack versioning is the only thing keeping people from knowing about it.
On the upside, patching does allow “broken” PC games to be fixed. Also, not all patches are bug fixes. It’s not totally uncommon for patches to introduce new features or technology to a game (better graphics options, speed tweaks). While patching is a pain sometimes, most of us would rather have the option to patch than not.
4.1 - I don’t want to have to buy a new video card every 6 months for play the latest PC games.
You do not have to buy a new video card every 6 months to keep up with PC games. A $200 video card will last the high-end gamer two or more years. Just because every 6 months the latest and greatest video card debuts, does not mean you need to buy it just to play games. A two and a half year old GeForce2 Ultra is capable of handling most of today’s games at high resolutions.
PS -- My law. Never pay more than $200 for a video card!
5.1 - Who wants to listen to games on those little PC speakers?
PC sound has been top notch since the introduction of the original Sound Blaster. Today’s PC sound systems can rival the most expensive home theater setups. 5.1 audio, EAX, A3D are all available on the PC. The PC is capable of totally replacing standard audio equipment. Where other than the PC can you have a 120 gigabyte jukebox at your disposal?
Little speakers? Check out: http://www.hifi.com/store/category.cgi?category=mul_speakers
6.1 - PC gaming sucks online. 56k users slow everything down. My console is broadband only!
This is one of my favorites. You have to understand that the only person slowed down by a 56k modem is the person using the 56k modem. The term “Low Ping Bastard” (LPB) was invented by narrowband users who were getting destroyed by broadband users in online play. The way I see it is, if they want to suffer playing at a high ping, so be it. They have the option to do so, then let them. Also, broadband is not available everywhere at this time. Outside of FPS games, it’s safe to say that most online games are narrowband friendly.
PC gaming servers are as close as the guy in the next room. There are typically no servers backed by some giant corporation. Translation? PC gaming online is (9/10 times) FREE.
7.1 - Mouse and Keyboard controls are awful.
It's a matter of taste. If you have been using a controller all these years, sure, a keyboard and mouse may seem awkward, but the level of precision the kb/m combo gives you is amazing.
If you really want to use a controller there are dozens of gamepads and joysticks available for the PC. You can even hook your PS2 gamepad up to the PC if you really want to.