Anyone else considering not joining the next generation?

[Dumac]

Back in the SNES days, consoles had specialized hardware designed for things like very fast blitting. A fast enough computer to match a console was very expensive, several grand at the time. If I'm remembering my timelines correctly, when the Genesis and SNES came out, EGA was still the dominant graphics format, and VGA was just starting to become common. So actually, consoles did have magic technology, comparatively. PCs at the time were business machines that were in the early stages of being adapted to gaming.

Nowadays that doesn't hold true, and with computer prices having falling greatly, a console is only better than the average cheapie computer with it's crappy onboard Intel video, a powerhouse PC will blow a console away.

Still, consoles have their advantages.

Early 90's. Super Nintendo and Sega Megadrive/Genesis were way better than my Commodore Amiga. The Amiga had useless ports of the likes of Streetfighter 2, could've never managed Sonic the Hedgehog or Super Mario World. Even as late as the original XBox, my PC couldn't have run a driving game as slick as Project Gotham Racing.

Sorry, but I remember playing tons of games back in the day that looked way better than anything on the SNES.

My real point here is the lack of variation between PC and console titles now. There just aren't so many games that are exclusive to consoles now. . . at least that I'm interested in. And multiplayer games are mostly online now. . . and I always had the most fun actually in the same room as my friends.

I know what you mean about lack of variation. Console vs PC games used to be a big split, but now they are mostly overlapping with a few fringe games on the side.

If you like local play, you should check out some of Nintendos stuff. NSMB, SSB, Nintendoland, Mario Party, Kirby Epic Yarn, upcoming yoshi-island game (I think), Pikmin 3 (I think)..a lot of fun local games to be played now and in the future.

Besides that, console exclusives are usually third-person action games like Bayoneeta, Ninja Gaiden, Unchartered, inFamous, etc. And even some of those are getting ported to PC (DmC, Prototype, Darksiders, etc)

 

[cmdrdredd]

How is bringing a game that has already been out for a year to the ps4 something special? D3 already sucks to I dont see how this can be a big selling point for them.

Cause it is the first blizzard game on any console in like 13 years??

 

[Sulaco]

Cause it is the first blizzard game on any console in like 13 years??

Which...is...not really a reason whatsoever, considering 95% of people who would be interested in it could already and would already have bought it and run it on fairly mediocre PCs, for less.

 

[BoberFett]

Sorry, but I remember playing tons of games back in the day that looked way better than anything on the SNES.

Ummmm, that's just a list of DOS games. Pay attention to the year. The Genesis was released in 1989. Look at what PC games were in 1989. You think Commander Keen was graphically superior to the Genesis?

 

[Dumac]

Ummmm, that's just a list of DOS games. Pay attention to the year. The Genesis was released in 1989. Look at what PC games were in 1989. You think Commander Keen was graphically superior to the Genesis?

The snes era was 1991-1996.
Genesis was apparently 1989-1995 (I never had one).

Why would you just include games from the launch year of 1989? What is important is how the whole era played out. Basically all the games on that list fall somewhere in the snes/gensis era.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Which...is...not really a reason whatsoever, considering 95% of people who would be interested in it could already and would already have bought it and run it on fairly mediocre PCs, for less.

Incorrect. There are tons of people who would never play a game on PC but might be interested to play diablo on their console, from a couch.

 

[American Gunner]

Incorrect. There are tons of people who would never play a game on PC but might be interested to play diablo on their console, from a couch.

I am one of those people. But I don't think it is exclusive to PS4 because they danced around the question about if it will appear on "other" next gen consoles, so it won't be as much of a selling point as some people think.

 

[Dumac]

Which...is...not really a reason whatsoever, considering 95% of people who would be interested in it could already and would already have bought it and run it on fairly mediocre PCs, for less.

D3 on consoles has a lot of different features, though.

Online play, local couch co-op, no AH, zooming out (yes this is an actual thing people wanted on PC, as trivial as it sounds), and some other stuff we don't know yet.

I am one of those people. But I don't think it is exclusive to PS4 because they danced around the question about if it will appear on "other" next gen consoles, so it won't be as much of a selling point as some people think.

It is all-but-confirmed to be multiplatform. It definitely isn't exclusive to the PS4.

 

[BoberFett]

The snes era was 1991-1996.
Genesis was apparently 1989-1995 (I never had one).

Why would you just include games from the launch year of 1989? What is important is how the whole era played out. Basically all the games on that list fall somewhere in the snes/gensis era.

At their release, the Genesis and SNES were more powerful than most PCs. And again, take into consideration that a computer capable of running the high end PC games with a decent VGA card probably cost $2000.

You stated that the games you played on the PC were better looking than ANYTHING on consoles. That's patently false.

 

[kalrith]

And again, take into consideration that a computer capable of running the high end PC games with a decent VGA card probably cost $2000.

In my situation it was more like $3,000. My dad bought a Tandy 386 sx16 for $3,000 in 1992. Then he bought a Compaq with a Pentium 100 for $3,000 in 1995. Both prices included the monitor. Since most people already owned a TV at the time, the console wouldn't have had an extra expense for the display.

 

[Dumac]

At their release, the Genesis and SNES were more powerful than most PCs. And again, take into consideration that a computer capable of running the high end PC games with a decent VGA card probably cost $2000.

I don't care about a snapshot status of their release. It doesn't matter if the SNES and Genesis were more powerful than most PCs for 10% of their life cycle. You still have top-tier PCs and the rest of the life-cycle to consider. DOS games didn't go into maturity until a little later than that anyway. Also price is irrelevant, so don't bother bringing it up. I never said computers were cheaper. The point is that saying:

Early 90's. Super Nintendo and Sega Megadrive/Genesis were way better than my Commodore Amiga. The Amiga had useless ports of the likes of Streetfighter 2, could've never managed Sonic the Hedgehog or Super Mario World. Even as late as the original XBox, my PC couldn't have run a driving game as slick as Project Gotham Racing.

is false. As that photo proves, PC games were plentiful and pretty great looking during the early 90s. And this isn't even touching N64/PS1 or PS2/Xbox era.

You stated that the games you played on the PC were better looking than ANYTHING on consoles. That's patently false.[/QUOTE]

No its not. A lot of the games on that list look way better than anything on SNES.

 

[purbeast0]

i can't believe you guys are arguing about whether consoles 20 years ago were more powerful than pc's 20 years ago...

 

[smackababy]

Technically, weren't consoles just a pc with an embedded system similar to an arcade machine? You just switch out the logic board that had the game on it.

 

[Dumac]

i can't believe you guys are arguing about whether consoles 20 years ago were more powerful than pc's 20 years ago...

This is important stuff.

 

[alcoholbob]

PC prices have fallen immensely. I remember buying a POS Company 486 33MHz with 4MB of RAM with no memory or HD upgrades and that cost me $3,000 back in the day. If I added HD and RAM upgrades it probably would've hit 4k easily. And some stuff still ran slow.

Today you can build a system with a 3960x with a GTX Titan for a comparatively cheaper cost. Also if you adjusted for inflation, the real cost of a new PC back in the early 90s would probably be $10,000 today.