A PC release on DVD ?

[Grandpa]

And don't forget that DVD drives can read CDs faster than a CD reader.

[kefka]

There's a good chance Kotor2 will have a DVD release, at least in Europe. The number of PC DVD games is growing rapidly.

 

I've just bought The Chronicles of Riddick on PC and that comes on a single DVD here, while in the US it uses 5 CDs!

 

It's actually a pleasure to install games now.

[DSLuke]

Yes a PC can read DVD discs much faster than the CDs and also you don't have to change disk every 5 minutes.

 

DVD

[EnderAndrew]

I don't have a DVD-Rom, because - No games get released on DVD.

 

As soon as they are - of course I'd buy one.

 

(Still had to vote "Don't have a DVD drive, though)

 

If TSL was released on DVD, I'd certainly think about upgrading.

A few more games, and it would become a must have.

 

It's strange that games that 'require' a certain standard of graphics card, get released all the time, but no one has yet said; "OK - we're releasing this game on DVD only, time to upgrade, suckers".

 

The switch from Floppies to CDs was much quicker than the switch from CDs to DVD.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

There are several major releases you can buy on DVD like Everquest 2, City of Heroes, Far Cry, Doom 3, etc.

 

And the only reason we don't see more people release games on DVD are people thinking like you.

 

DVD's are flat-out better, and are dirt cheap. I just bought a dual-layer, 16 speed DVD Burner for $65 with free shipping. DVD-ROM drives are just as cheap as CD-ROM drives.

 

DVD technology has been out over 7 years.

 

There is no real excuse. It's time for publishers to push the envelope a little here and push DVD only releases.

[The Coordinator]

And don't forget that DVD drives can read CDs faster than a CD reader.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

Not necessarily.

Maximum read speed for many dvd drives is48x.

For cd drives it

[Mr. Brightside]

Three years, very old! :D

[Darth F@nboy]

I would absolutly buy it on DVD.

We all the time gets mesages "You can't play this game, you don't have good enough grapich card os something".

Why can't we get " You can't play this, you don't have a DVD rom"?

It is the same thing!

It is harder to instal a grapich card than a dvd player, and it is cheper to buy a god dvd than a god grapich, so why the heck not?

[The Coordinator]

It is harder to instal a grapich card than a dvd player, and it is cheper to buy a god dvd than a god grapich, so why the heck not?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

yes :D

 

dvd: need to plug in/connect 2 cables. need no drivers.

g-card: needs 1-2(new cards use lots of power) and drivers.

 

definetly hard work when compared to push the buttons of your cosole/tv.

but hey, you ll learn something about hardware

 

Oh, for the consoleros only: even in your console sleeps a crippled pc! (w00t)

[Darth Ni]

Thats the thing with NVidia cards : when you put them into your rig, you only realize how big they are. They take up 2 entire slots and increase the temperature inside the case by a considerable amount even ifyou get a graphics card mounted fan. I still like Nvidia over ATI though and I am Canadian...

 

Nvidia cards may appear inferior but they kill ATI

ATI Radeon X800XT Platinum Edition (NOT X850)

vs.

eVGA GeForce 6800 Ultra Extreme Edition

 

The Nvidia card won 18 tests, the ATI card won 11 tests and 6 tests were a draw. The Nvidia cards also murder ATI at higher resolutions where the ATI starts to lag sometimes...

[EnderAndrew]

It is harder to instal a grapich card than a dvd player, and it is cheper to buy a god dvd than a god grapich, so why the heck not?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

yes :D

 

dvd: need to plug in/connect 2 cables. need no drivers.

g-card: needs 1-2(new cards use lots of power) and drivers.

 

definetly hard work when compared to push the buttons of your cosole/tv.

but hey, you ll learn something about hardware

 

Oh, for the consoleros only: even in your console sleeps a crippled pc! (w00t)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

It bother me how people are dismissive of people who play consoles.

 

The work I've done to my XBox is by far more complex and difficult than any PC I've ever built.

 

I own a PC and 6 different consoles. If there is a good game on PC, I play it. If there is a good game on a console, I play it. People who cut themselves off from good gaming experiences because of system bias are only hurting themselves.

[Naso]

Consoles only have a couple of buttons. Therefore, console games involve pressing said couple of buttons repeatedly. These repeated presses of buttons have their own term: combos. Console games, due to the lack of controls, tend to have very simple interfaces, allowing correspondingly simple interactions. This makes console games simplistic and highly repetitive, and, therefore, they are primarily marketed to small children and the sit around the apartment drinking beer and eating pizza to lazy to do anything but watch football demographic of 20-something guys who don't want to leave the couch in between sporting events.

[EnderAndrew]

I think you're confused here.

 

Most PC games I've played in the last 5-10 years have gotten increasingly simpler, while console games have gotten increasingly more complex.

 

Console games rated M have been selling far more copies than any games aimed at kids.

 

The Nintendo Gamecube is the console aimed most at a younger audience, and it hardly sells at all.

 

Kids don't pay $300 for a new console, and then spend $50 per game.

 

The most recent stats I've seen on a console gamer pegs him/her at the average age of 27.

 

I'm an avid PC gamer and all, but most PC games can be played almost completely with a mouse and the directional keys (or WASD). Most console games lately have more and more complex controls.

 

Edit: I'm just curious. Do you have any idea how many buttons there are on an XBox, and how many button combos you can press?

[Naso]

Yes yes, I've seen the xbox. PC games have gotten simpler because the new generation of consoles have cut into the market share, there have been more and more parallel developments, such as kotor, etc. Do you really expect companies to turn their backs on the console paradigm, which is proving extremely profitable?

[EnderAndrew]

I've seen several developers come forward and speak out, saying that they don't "consolize" their programs.

 

Morrowind got ported exactly to the XBox. It's just like it's PC counterpart, and that's a fairly complex game. I've never seen a tactical RPG on the PC, yet they are quite complex.

 

EA Sport's titles made up over 20% of the console title market. How many 9 year olds play Madden 2005? I've never seen a single one.

 

But the national Madden Bowl competition is filled with a bunch of 30 year olds.

 

The fact remains that most PC releases can be played almost entirely with a mouse, while XBox controls for most game are far more complex than what I see on PC releases.

 

If you don't have an XBox, and don't play XBox titles, I think you may mistaken a bit on what console titles are like.

 

KOTOR was a built upon an engine originally designed for the PC. And then it was designed for the XBox, and surpassed the original PC title in it's story depth and role-playing.

 

Yet everyone swears that people want to design simple, dumbed down games because they have to be marketed for consoles, and only kids play consoles.

 

I have younger cousins, neices and newphews. They all play gameboy, while all of my adult friends own XBoxes and Playstation 2's.

 

The XBox marketed and sold a Mech Combat game that required a $200 add-on, which was this mamoth set of controls that effectively acted as the ****pit of a Mech.

 

Yep, aimed right at 9 year olds.

 

I can't recall the last PC title I've seen marketed with near as complex of controls.

 

I'm not anti-PC. I love my PC, and build a new one every year. I just don't understand how everyone is so judgemental of the XBox as being some kid's toy.

 

The top selling console titles right now are Halo 2, Grand Theft Auto: SA, Metal Gear Solid 3, etc. Those games come with a M rating, and are marketed to adults.

[Naso]

Do you know how many kids play those things? I work at a summer program and so many 6th graders play GTA you wouldn't believe...

 

Madden et all? Previous comment on football, and maybe a small one on slowed development

 

I know about the mech thing. Sims are dying on pc's, it's true. Morrowind though? That interface was consolified, as was kotor's. There is a lot of porting, because the xbox was designed as a mini-pc and that has been influencing game design for a long time now in many ways.

 

I didn't say that the be all and end all of interface was number of keys, and the mouse eliminates that. Consoles don't have mice, and approximating it with the little joysticks doesn't work all that well in my experience....

 

Wow, I love the way it edited c*ockpit. That's freakin' hilarious... unless of course you said something else

[EnderAndrew]

Nope, they block c*ckpit. I played Morrowind on both the PC and the XBox. I preferred the PC version, because I wanted to get the expansions.

 

With the XBox version, I could more quickly access what I wanted with a few button presses. On the PC, I generally had to pull up various menus, and use the mouse. I found navigation to actually be slower.

 

Morrowind was everything it was promised to be. It's flaws are more based in the game being too large rather than being stripped down. Tons of side quests, tons of towns, tons of NPCs, etc. etc.

 

The game does nothing to keep steering you along the main plot. The NPCs are dry. But these flaws have nothing to do with the XBox port. I just don't care for the conversation system they developed for Morrowind. KOTOR's interface is just as simple as NWN's interface. And again, I contend that KOTOR is a much more enjoyable, and much deeper game than NWN. NWN was written for the PC, and KOTOR for the console by the same company. That makes it hard to argue that Bioware simplified or stripped down the game for the console.

 

And while some kids may play GTA, the game is designed with adults in mind. It features sex shops, relationships, and ultra-violence. Rockstar games could keep shipping out the same game, but each new installment has more complexity, and more to do.

 

GTA:SA introduced RPG elements with stats and skills that need to progress, including respect and individual relationships in the game.

 

Side missions include:

Races

Specific vehicle missions

games inside games (old arcade style games)

Taxi Missions

Pimp Missions

Ambulance Missions

Fire Missions

Vigalante Missions

Pilot School

Bike School

Boat School

Remote Control Missions

Tagging Missions

Finding hidden horeshoes

Finding hidden oysters

Dating

Photo missions

Rampages

Unique jumps and stunts

 

etc. etc.

 

If I am to compare the latest PC RPG (Troika's Vampire: Bloodlines with first person combat) to GTA: SA, I'd have to say that GTA (as a pure console title) has just as many RPG elements, and is 10 times as complex. It's a sad statement, but just as true.

 

The only thing that GTA: SA lacks to classify it as an RPG hybrid is character creation.

 

Did I mention in GTA that you can customize tattoos, hair style, clothing and accessories?

[Naso]

I agree about morrowind's problems, but little things, like not being able to enter text for merchant sales, stuff like that.

 

I haven't played GTA. I tried a little of #3 and didn't like it, but that the subject matter looks stupid to me. I'm all for violence in games, but it seemed pretty crass and pointless to me. If it's truly as complicated as you say, then that's pretty bloody impressive, but would by far be the exception, not the rule. RPG's dont' always need complexity though. KotOR was great, and quite simple. Things like strategy games, however, rarely get on consoles, partly due to demographics, partly due to complexity.

[EnderAndrew]

I haven't seen Alpha Centurai on a console, but I haven't seen La Pucelle Tactics, Gladius, Final Fantasy Tactics, Orge Tactics and the like on the PC either.

[Naso]

I meant more along the lines of Rome Total War, or Homeworld, or stuff like Alpha Centauri.

[EnderAndrew]

Those games are not condusive to the control scheme on an XBox. I'll grant you that.

 

But that doesn't mean that XBox games have to be simple, stupid, or stripped down.

[Naso]

In all fairness, I haven't played tactics games and such, but I did look at screenshots and it looks like a slightly beefed up version of what you get in say a final fantasy game, which I haven't played too much of, but basically amounts to showdowns of a few on a few in which you have a turn to select from 4 or 5 actions, right?

[EnderAndrew]

With tactics you usually have a squad of around 6, against another small squad. But each individual character has very unique skills. You take each character, and develop what jobs they study, and can mix skills from various jobs.

 

I love larger tactical games like Civ, and Alpha Centauri. But games like Final Fantasy Tactics offer an equal level of tactical enjoyment. But instead of large battlefiends, you deal with small units.

[mkreku]

If it's truly as complicated as you say, then that's pretty bloody impressive, but would by far be the exception, not the rule.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's actually more impressive than how he described it.

He forgot to mention:

 

Cycling skill (complete with cycling races)

Triathlon (once you have high enough stamina and cycling skill you can go to one of the gyms and compete in a triathlon that takes you all over the state!)

Finding graffiti and photo views.

Mutltiplayer rampage.

Billiards! (in bars you can actually play a working game of billiards)

Basketball (you can play basketball if you find a court)

Shooting contests (most larger Ammu-nations have shooting contests you can participate in)

Parachuting (you can jump from planes and slowly glide to the ground..)

Pimp My Ride (you can pimp your own car with nitro, hydrualics, different wheels, colours etc.)

Casino (Black Jack, One-Armed Bandits, Wheel of Fortune etc. and you even have a gambling skill to develop)

Delivery missions (find hidden shops you can do missions for and earn lots of money from)

Radio-controlled models (fly model airplanes, helicopters, drive cars etc.)

Gyms (where you can fight for new skills or just train your strength/stamina)

Export/Import missions (you steal a variety of cars and you can export them for money, and then import other cars)

Gang Wars (command and conquer new gang territories, fight other gangs, defend your own territories)

 

There's more but I'm out of time

[Darth F@nboy]

Arn't you going a bit of-topic here?

[iamthelorax]

EnderWiggin, among PC games only RTS's and crappy shooters require few buttons. With RTS and RPG's, the mouse is worth more than its weight in buttons, and comparing button counts on PC and console is misleading (the mouse can effectively use movement and 1 button to replace 10 other buttons, as in KotOR). That said, keyboard shortcuts are faster, and once I finally started using them (on my 5th time through KotOR) they were indeed a lot faster than mousing. On the other hand, the K2 XBox screenshots (don't know about K1) make it obvious that there is a scroll menu for actions, which implies that the control system has been simplified for XBox, at the expense of time efficiency. If the K2 PC control system is the same, it would probably be my biggest complaint about the game. Even amongst PC shooters, look at Splinter Cell: PT, which requires AT LEAST 20 BUTTONS.