Yay for P.C Gaming

[Silent_Buddha]

Just lacks hoarder gene. Piles of old useless crap sometimes lose their appeal. But I don't know why one would want to flush Steam games.

So that I don't have to spend time hunting through my Steam library for a game I might want to play. If they allowed me to put games into a "will never play again" Library category that would work as well. As is, all games, installed, recent, and favorites aren't quite enough. As when I buy a game on sale I don't immediately install it. And I have some games that I bought in a Steam sale 3-4 years ago still waiting to be played because I sometimes completely forget I have them due to having a large list of games. And my list isn't even as large as some of the people in this forum.

The below just goes into old games in general that I have.

I just see no point in keeping something I don't plan to ever install and play again. Like my original Doom floppy disks. I only keep those out of nostalgia. I'll never install and play it although I like to think that someday I might install it with a cool mod. But if I'm honest with myself, I know that'll never happen. Hell I don't even have a floppy drive anymore.

The original Quake CD I have just for the Trent Reznor CD audio track. But other things like Ground Control (one of the best RTS games I've ever played) I'm thinking of just throwing away as I haven't installed it since the 90's and can't see myself bothering to install. I still have it just because it's one of my favorite RTS games of all time. Would love for someone to make a proper sequel to the series, however.

Regards,
SB

 

[Davros]

Ground Control II: Operation Exodus ???

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Ground Control II: Operation Exodus ???

Yes, I have that as well. I mean a sequel to the series (IE - both games) with a modern engine. There just aren't enough good RTS games with a storyline anymore.

Regards,
SB

 

[zed]

I've been reading about last of us recently looks great etc.
Now this massively more powerful hardware mother called the pc which I have, unlike the ps3 which I don't have. surely can deliver similar technical experiences after all its more than 10x more powerful than the ps3. where are the these games I can try out? Please pjbliverpool enlighten me

 

[pjbliverpool]

I've been reading about last of us recently looks great etc.
Now this massively more powerful hardware mother called the pc which I have, unlike the ps3 which I don't have. surely can deliver similar technical experiences after all its more than 10x more powerful than the ps3. where are the these games I can try out? Please pjbliverpool enlighten me

Are you suggesting that there are not any games on the PC that are technically equivalent or more to Last of Us on the PS3?

It's well known that no PC game takes full advantage of the superior PC hardware because the vast majority of games have to cater for a far lower common denominator. But even if someone were to claim that something like Crysis 3 (or 2) or Battlefield 3 on the PC were not as impressive as Last of Us (which would be absurd IMO but that's not the point) then that same person would have an exceedingly difficult time making the same claim of something like Watchdogs or Battlefield 4 which will be running fine on the same PC hardware that's been around for the last 3 of 4 years of the current consoles generation.

 

[orangpelupa]

Technical superiority on pc games are harder to experience/notice than ps3 games.

On ps3 exclusive, every technical wizardry have lots of highlights and we'll exposed to gamer.

On pc? Many technical superiority are just tacked on and not well exposed.

For example, the facial expressions of the last of us. It's one of the main selling point. Although it's actually not technically impressive, those facial expressions are just press rendered cutscene.

On the other hand, pc have better anti aliasing, filtering, AO method, tessellation, shadow filtering, transparency, etc.

But will you really feel it adds something substantial to the gaming experience?
Will the game expose those technical superiority?

I can't stand Any jaggies. It really distract me. But for many people, the AA on the last of us are good enough.

This "good enough" zone. Pc games often surpass that zone. Not many people will notice and feel the tech superiority.

 

[swaaye]

Improved facial animation greatly reduces the uncanny valley effect and people most definitely will notice that over something like a new shading effect buzzword that is all quirky and of arguable benefit/value.

I think the big picture is even games on the snobby PC user's super duper rig-of-the-year are not even remotely photorealistic and the unwashed masses look at it from this viewpoint. They don't sit around and get all obsessive compulsive about the little things. But aspects like uncanny valley that really hit your brain directly do naturally get attention.

 

[Billy Idol]

Is there a PC exclusive game out there that is technically impressive, that has high AAA production values and fine art?

Project Cars maybe? But unfortunately not my cup of tea...

 

[swaaye]

You'd probably need to look at MMOs and strategy games. Some have amazing artwork (like Guild Wars 2) but they aren't really above and beyond because they essentially target hardware like Intel HD.

Civ5 is certainly an achievement on various graphics aspects but it's not exactly going for pure eyecandy.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

I've been reading about last of us recently looks great etc.
Now this massively more powerful hardware mother called the pc which I have, unlike the ps3 which I don't have. surely can deliver similar technical experiences after all its more than 10x more powerful than the ps3. where are the these games I can try out? Please pjbliverpool enlighten me

Last of Us has good art direction, great level design, and a fantastic story that knows how to manipulate a player's emotions to good effect, but the graphics aren't all that spectacular. For one, the levels are extremely small, linear and constrained with limited views of the level at any given time. That applies even to the outdoor areas like the one leading up to the Hydro plant. The last level at least gives you an expansive view, but limits how you view it quite severly with very limited, linear, and small areas to explore.

It's very easy to make a good looking game with those constraints if you have good art direction. But even with that the limitations of current gen consoles show though. Texture variety is OK but texture resolution is still pretty bleh.

I'm guessing that by having such detailed character models, that may have required them to make such small levels.

Regards,
SB

 

[Billy Idol]

Last of Us has good art direction, great level design, and a fantastic story that knows how to manipulate a player's emotions to good effect, but the graphics aren't all that spectacular. For one, the levels are extremely small, linear and constrained with limited views of the level at any given time. That applies even to the outdoor areas like the one leading up to the Hydro plant. The last level at least gives you an expansive view, but limits how you view it quite severly with very limited, linear, and small areas to explore.

It's very easy to make a good looking game with those constraints if you have good art direction. But even with that the limitations of current gen consoles show though. Texture variety is OK but texture resolution is still pretty bleh.

I'm guessing that by having such detailed character models, that may have required them to make such small levels.

Regards,
SB

Did you play it yourself?

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Did you play it yourself?

Have some friends that have it. Watched them play some as well as watched an entire playthrough on Youtube. It's all, small area -> cutscene while next area loads -> small area -> next cutscene, etc.

It speaks wonders that I actually watched an entire playthrough, though. That's fairly rare, as either I'll get bored with the crappy game/story (Uncharted 2/Tomb Raider 2013/etc.) or if it looks good with regards to story and/or gameplay (Alan Wake/LA Noir/etc.) I'll stop watching and buy it.

The story for Last of Us was good enough to make me want to watch it through to the end, but combined with the gameplay it wasn't enough to make me want to buy it, especially as I would have had to buy a PS3 as well. BTW - I liked its gameplay better than Alan Wake, but there's a difference between spending ~10 USD for Alan Wake and 250-300 USD in order to play Last of Us.

Regards,
SB

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Last Of Us finally brought back gameplay into console games ! That game is a fantastic treat. Play it on Hard with Listen off or on Survivor. Its a rare gem.

PC hardware has never been and never will be utilised completely. The money invested never really pays off. On a console, with a fraction of the cost you do get much more 'graphics' per dollar spent.

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

PC hardware has never been and never will be utilised completely. The money invested never really pays off. On a console, with a fraction of the cost you do get much more 'graphics' per dollar spent.

But you never get to to enjoy the full experience of everything to the max.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

But you never get to to enjoy the full experience of everything to the max.

Yes , of course. But games never really go 'max' anyways. Most are made around console hardwares and let you get more AA and AF, thats all. Games like BF3 and Witcher 2 , whihc actually push the hardware, aren't many. Your costly hardware mostly goes unutilised, where as on consoles, every drop of performance is sucked out of it. There is a different kind of satisfaction in it , knowing your machine is going above and beyond what was possible. Wish I could say that about my quad core processor which sadly no game (except bf3)ever cares to uitlise.

 

[orangpelupa]

but everything on the max maybe not give noticable image quality boost or gameplay boost.
i even need to manually disable Chromatic Aberration and turn off all motion blur on Crysis 3 to stop my headache.

skyrim i can enable tree shadow and grass shadow. But it does not give noticable picture quality boost for me (yeah i see the shadow, but i can live without it).
BF3, as long as i put the texture to max and other to low, my eyes did not complain.

those are my experience, it can differ widely from one person to another.

 

[pjbliverpool]

but everything on the max maybe not give noticable image quality boost or gameplay boost.
i even need to manually disable Chromatic Aberration and turn off all motion blur on Crysis 3 to stop my headache.

skyrim i can enable tree shadow and grass shadow. But it does not give noticable picture quality boost for me (yeah i see the shadow, but i can live without it).
BF3, as long as i put the texture to max and other to low, my eyes did not complain.

those are my experience, it can differ widely from one person to another.

Try playing all those games in 3d. You WILL notice

 

[orangpelupa]

i cant play skyrim on 3D. it have shadow left/right eye bug.
i cant play Crysis 3 on 3D, the fps too low
i cant play BF3 on 3D, the crosstalk of left/right eye are too heavy.

last time i can play 3D game a bit long, i played Tomb Raider. It have wrong depth between lara's feet/arm when she crawls with low camera angle (often used on rush/collapsing hallway cutscene).
Her tress hair also doesnt work on 3D.
the crosstalk also become to heavy and make me dizzy. Max play time about 15 minutes.

 

[pjbliverpool]

i cant play skyrim on 3D. it have shadow left/right eye bug.

There's a fix for this and the game plays splendidly in 3D with it.

i cant play Crysis 3 on 3D, the fps too low

Lower settings/resolution? You say you can't see any difference between the PC and console versions anyway so dial all settings back to minimum and run at 720p. You'll apparently not see any difference and unless your PC is insanely slow, gain more than enough performance to run in 3D.

Plus, C3 should use the same 3d solution as C2 which actually had very minimal impact on frame rate unlike your average 3D vision game which halves it. Albeit the visual quality of the solution is inferior IMO.

i cant play BF3 on 3D, the crosstalk of left/right eye are too heavy.

Seriously? I played the whole game in 3D with minimal, but in some scenes noticeable cross talk. Try reducing contrast, charging glasses and if all else fails, getting a better monitor! I'd advise changing convergence settings but for some reason they appear disabled in BF3. I'll admit BF3 is one of the more suffering games in regards to cross talk (by which I mean the ghosting effect on either side of objects) but I wouldn't say it comes close to being a show stopper.

last time i can play 3D game a bit long, i played Tomb Raider. It have wrong depth between lara's feet/arm when she crawls with low camera angle (often used on rush/collapsing hallway cutscene).

Your 3d settings are set wrong in the menu then. I'm literally playing the game myself at the moment and I don't have this issue. However as the camera perspective does change during these scenes I can see how certain depth settings might cause the 3d to go wrong.

Her tress hair also doesnt work on 3D.

Yes it absolutely does.

the crosstalk also become to heavy and make me dizzy. Max play time about 15 minutes.

You can try changing the 3d settings through the games menu (unlike BF3). Beyond that I'd suggest the same things I mention above for BF3. I'm on my first play through of this game right now (at the point where you take the boat inland to the queens temple) and I've played the entire game so far with utterly zero cross talk.

 

[orangpelupa]

liverpool, you use 240hz monitor?
i use samsung HDTV and the crosstalk are horrible. The only thing that still bearable are 3D animated movies.

it just sux. the crosstalk cant be killed