are pc games more than console?

PenguinJim

Steam is rarely the cheapest place for Steam games!

They had a few great sale events from 2009-2011, and again since Summer 2013, but for about two years from 2011 they were consistently beaten by places like Amazon and Gamersgate on both everyday prices and sales, and offered no extra incentive to buy directly from them.

I wonder if we'll get an Easter event soon?

mttylad

Not to forget that if you buy a game for an xbox360 today and another game for an xbox360 in a years time (if they are still around then) you will be able to play the 2nd game.

However on the PC, in 12 months the required spec will have increased meaning upgrades.

PenguinJim

No, that's simply not true.

Nilrem

mttylad wrote: »

Not to forget that if you buy a game for an xbox360 today and another game for an xbox360 in a years time (if they are still around then) you will be able to play the 2nd game.

However on the PC, in 12 months the required spec will have increased meaning upgrades.

Not really, the minimum spec doesn't increase that much over the space of a year, especially with the consoles around (the PC versions of games are often held back in their lower performance mode by the need to keep them able to work on a Console).

When I built my Q6600 about 5 years ago it was mid range, it played all new games up until the time I replaced it about 6 months ago at at least minimum spec of better (I think the only thing I changed was video card about 3 years in when the original one died - a £120 upgrade).

For example the new Dark Souls 2 game (not even out yet) requires a Core 2 duo 3.17ghz cpu as the minimum cpu (my 6600 was a core2quad at 3ghz so would be fine), and a 5870 card a card that is 3 generations (so 4 years) old, and 2gb of system ram.

Even the recommended spec is not much better being an I3, a 68x series video card and 4gb of ram - which is about a 2-3 years old spec (I was running 4gb of ram 5 years ago).

Unless you buy a really cheap PC, you shouldn't need to upgrade much at all on a regular basis.

Not to mention most PC parts come with a 3-5 year warranty by default, so if they die you can normally get them replaced fairly easily, unlike the consoles (and one of the most common parts of both consoles and PC's to die, the optical drive, is a £30 five minute job a monkey could replace in PC's).

Johnmcl7

mttylad wrote: »

Not to forget that if you buy a game for an xbox360 today and another game for an xbox360 in a years time (if they are still around then) you will be able to play the 2nd game.

However on the PC, in 12 months the required spec will have increased meaning upgrades.

As other have posted above, that time has now past so PC's last far longer than they used to and even with fairly cheap upgrades they can still play games at decent quality. Even performance from recent onboard graphics card is surprisingly decent.

John

Percy1983

On the PC upgrade front I can dispel the myth but explain where it comes form to further prove its untrue.

I will go back to the release of the 360 as I know a PC which was built to beat it and continued to do so until recently (was upgraded).

In short when we built it the PC it ran games at very high/top settings at 1366x768. while the 360 versions where running at the equivalent of high settings at 1280x720.

So towards the end of the generation, said PC was running most games at medium/high setting in PC and in some cases dropping down to 1280x720 too.

Meanwhile the 360 versions where running at the equivalent of medium/low in PC terms which some games running sub HD ie 1024x600.

Now this was my brothers PC on a limited budget, in the meantime I had a bigger budget and had been upgrading along the way and was pushing 1080p at very high setting.

So the short of it is, if you want to run PC games at max settings yes you need to upgrade, but if you want to run a PC better than the a console (fixed target) then if it does at first it will forever more. (unless you fill it with virus's and malware)

Cycrow

My pc hasn't been upgraded for about 4 years now
its a i7 930 with GTX480. (so several generations old now)

and it still runs all games without a problem with alot being able to run with full graphics settings as well at 1920x1200

The only thing that really needs the latest hardware is when you run the latest games with all the graphics effects on, but you can simply turn these off and the game will still be decent and look better than the console version

Sanday

I had written a lengthy reply about how Steam is the way forward etc but then my connection timed out.

So I'm just gonna say that PC gaming is cheaper than console gaming!

Considering you can built your own pc now for the cost of a console and make it better!

Sparhawke

Generally speaking a lot of console games get traded in that pushes down the prices, something that never happens on PC games, this is why some tend to be far cheaper but you have to hunt around.

Percy1983

Sparhawke wrote: »

Generally speaking a lot of console games get traded in that pushes down the prices, something that never happens on PC games, this is why some tend to be far cheaper but you have to hunt around.

With disc copies of games there is generally more made on the consoles and as you say more used as well as more stock to shift later down the line.

On the flip sides you can get PC games so cheap as publishers do decide to drop the bottom out of prices , ie another 100k sold at £4.99 is better than no more sales and due to very low overheads prices really can plummet hence why you see games in steam sales and humble bundles which are cheaper than used discs on the consoles.