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[Optimus Lime]

Some of the problems being described in here are really, really bizarre. Hunting .DLL files? Really? In 2017? Manually editing config files? 'Trial and error' of in-game settings - in an age of Geforce Experience?

I have been PC gaming since the 1980s until the present day, and this stuff hasn't been common for over a decade.

 

[zoobzone]

Because games don't work the way you want without manual tinkering.

Marvel vs Capcom Infinite - the image becomes stretched if you used 21:9 monitor unless you turn off display scaling in nvidia control panel.
Forza 7 Demo - still no idea how to run this game in 21:9.
Diablo 3 - if you want to run it 21:9, choose 2560x1440 and run the game in Window mode, it'll become 3440x1440

Its nothing to hard to deal with, but annoying nonetheless.

oh and one more thing, its disgusting how most PC ports treat all game controllers as Xbox layout, I hate having to figure out which button is which on my PS4 stick.

 

[Angry Fork]

Some of the problems being described in here are really, really bizarre. Hunting .DLL files? really? In 2017? Manually editing config files? 'Trial and error' of in-game settings - in an age of Geforce Experience?

I have been PC gaming since the 1980s until the present day, and this stuff hasn't been common for over a decade.

Just off the top of my head: DLL stuff happened with Deadly Premonition and Dark Souls. LA Noire had a problem with Visual C++ redistributable that required a particular year and if you had one already installed, then installed the new one over it it created problems where you had to basically uninstall all of it and then get the new one. Bioshock 1 settings wouldn't save and required setting config files to read only. Anything really old like System Shock 2 is a nightmare on modern PC's and near impossible without community mods.

Like I said, i don't mind figuring stuff out personally but most people who have been playing on PC for a long time recognize problems like that. I get it we love PC gaming because visuals + performance is better than console, games are cheaper, etc. but to act like some of this still doesn't exist is disingenuous. Sound and control problems are particularly prevalent on laptops where there are more chances for conflicts. And I think casual PC gamers who don't know/understand tech problems or have the patience for them are more likely to have laptops.

Newer games are far less likely to have problems but it's not unheard of, especially if your parts aren't as new. The average person who isn't that computer literate doesn't want to deal with ANY of these kinds of issues, and it's not laziness it's "I just worked 8-10 hours, I don't want to work more just to get a game working" and that's a 100% rational thing to say. Consoles are popular because 99% of the time it's like playing a movie, you put the disc in and play. The problems you typically get are ones out of your control (glitches, online is down, etc; ignoring red ring of death stuff).

 

[Narroo]

Let's see: Sonic Mania. What could go wrong?

The animated intro and outros run at 1/2 speed, at best. Hours of trouble shooting later, all I can determine is that there's some sort of bug with the game. I tried contacting Sega support and they gave up.


This is hardly the first time I've had an issue with a game; Mirror's Edge skipping it's cutscenes, some games like Sonic Generations wouldn't start, Grim Fandango only rendered a quarter of the screen, Swords and Sworcery rendered at first like an Atari Game; I've had plenty of games randomly not work out of the box.

Also, as an aside, if you don't buy the nicest PC on the market, you have to fiddle with quality settings to get everything to run optimally. Hey, did you know that Windows Aero forces Anti-alising on full-screen boarderless window games? Some games give a good amount of input lag if you don't disable Aero. Lot's of stuff like that.

 

[Optimus Lime]

Just off the top of my head: DLL stuff happened with Deadly Premonition and Dark Souls. LA Noire had a problem with Visual C++ redistributable that required a particular year and if you had one already installed, then installed the new one over it it created problems where you had to basically uninstall all of it and then get the new one. Bioshock 1 settings wouldn't save and required setting config files to read only. Anything really old like System Shock 2 is a nightmare on modern PC's and near impossible without community mods.

Again, considering the staggering number of PC games released, these are incredibly isolated incidents from many, many years ago. They are not representative of the state of PC gaming.

but to act like some of this still doesn't exist is disingenuous

I agree. Which is why I'm not suggesting that there isn't an added layer of complexity sitting on top of PC gaming, which is an enthusiast space. I'm suggesting that the problems associated with PC gaming are being blown out of proportion by posters in this thread, just as PC gamers claiming that 'it is no harder than building with LEGOs!' are being equally disingenuous and ridiculous.

The average person who isn't that computer literate doesn't want to deal with ANY of these kinds of issues, and it's not laziness it's "I just worked 8-10 hours, I don't want to work more just to get a game working" and that's a 100% rational thing to say. Consoles are popular because 99% of the time it's like playing a movie, you put the disc in and play. The problems you typically get are ones out of your control (glitches, online is down, etc).

That's right. A console is a consumer appliance for a generalist audience who has no real interest in technology, or enthusiast gaming. You'll get no argument from me there.

 

[univbee]

Grim Fandango only rendered a quarter of the screen

Was this with the newer Remastered release, or the original disc version from way back when? I know the disc version was fraught with all kinds of issues on newer machines. There was a puzzle which was impossible if your PC was too powerful, which seems to be a recurring thing with adventure games, they frequently seem to tie something important to a process without a speed cap.

 

[autoduelist]

I have a widescreen laptop and gaming on it takes an ton of fiddling I don't have time for. Almost no game just works, massive resolution issues. I have no interest in a desktop as I need a laptop for other reasons.

 

[Mohasus]

Because games don't work the way you want without manual tinkering.

Marvel vs Capcom Infinite - the image becomes stretched if you used 21:9 monitor unless you turn off display scaling in nvidia control panel.
Forza 7 Demo - still no idea how to run this game in 21:9.
Diablo 3 - if you want to run it 21:9, choose 2560x1440 and run the game in Window mode, it'll become 3440x1440

Its nothing to hard to deal with, but annoying nonetheless.

oh and one more thing, its disgusting how most PC ports treat all game controllers as Xbox layout, I hate having to figure out which button is which on my PS4 stick.

All these problems were caused by using non-standard devices on PC*. These wouldn't even be a possibility on consoles.
I learned my lesson when I bought a 1440p display.

*Yeah, I know this sounds weird because PC is all about options and yadda yadda, but 16:9, 1080p, 60Hz and Xbox controllers are the specs most games are made for.

 

[Neith]

Some of the problems being described in here are really, really bizarre. Hunting .DLL files? Really? In 2017? Manually editing config files? 'Trial and error' of in-game settings - in an age of Geforce Experience?

I have been PC gaming since the 1980s until the present day, and this stuff hasn't been common for over a decade.

Yeah, it's crazy talk. I mean, I don't use any portion of Experience, and I use Inspector, but I still find everything pretty easy to comprehend.

Editing config files is literally for hardcore graphics users. I do it all the time, or used to rather as fewer games have these options, but it's really not rocket science and there are guides.

 

[J_ToSaveTheDay]

Console:

- relatively flat pricing

- game performance can be measured definitively across each title and set in stone by the developer without user needing to adjust -- even if they are performance limited compared to what the PC spectrum is able to provide

- "upgrades" are rarely needed to keep up with the ecosystem (and if they are needed at some point, they're cost-competitive to PC component upgrades)

- OS updates are maintained and delivered in a relatively unified fashion, console manufacturer issues OS updates and game developers can issue updates for games individually

PC:

- pricing varies dramatically depending on the performance the user wants

- performance varies (potentially quite greatly) based on components assembled; relative performance expectations require at least some semblance of understanding of contemporary game engines and game settings. I think people who are in the know on this stuff take for granted things like knowing that MSAA requires more system resources to utilize than FXAA, etc... and having someone (developers) just predetermine all of these variable settings ahead to reach a set performance goal is generally far more convenient, though not always optimal if you do know these settings and their effects on the end user experience and you develop preferences based on it

- routine maintenance of PC through various forms of updates (updates for games, updates for game clients like Steam, updates for Windows, updates for specific PC components like GPU, keyboard, mouse, etc...)

- lack of understanding of certain settings or game engine functions can lead to pretty easy misunderstanding of why games are ultimately running the way they do, and PC's user-customized experience can make this an extremely overwhelming prospect when you've bought into the hype cycle of a game's marketing, review cycle, or positive word of mouth but your excitement to get to the game is being stifled by puzzling technical issues that you lacked the understanding to foresee or address. Someone on a message board telling you that your new PC has approximately 5x more processing power than your console of choice but not knowing how various PC-only settings weigh in on that processing power can lead to some very puzzling and sometimes frustrating expectations v reality outcomes

- the lack of understanding bit above has you going to forums seeing people with various specs, sometimes ones that are theoretically close to yours, reporting non-issues; you also get exposed to people having much better specs in the same reports and maybe start to lament not waiting longer and budgetting for a better CPU or GPU or both because of the bevy of positive responses that report no issues while you struggle to comprehend, sifting through message after message, etc; you do this for years and years and realize that new CPUs and GPUs come out every 1 or 2 years and they seem to get incrementally more expensive so you always feel like you're behind, and that feeling just gets exasperated by your inability to comprehend where things went wrong once or twice in completely different games for completely different reasons, etc

PC is probably like 90% hassle-free, but that 10% has a tendency to snowball for anyone that came from that console experience.

 

[jph139]

I've been dipping my toes in PC gaming (mostly via my laptop) for years and, despite always wanting to take that plunge, it IS too difficult. Looking to buy parts is like trying to read another language. Gauging what parts affect what features and what features result in which performance. Trying to evaluate the relative value-for-cost within your budget. Understanding how this all relates to the actual games you want to play. And then at the end of it the actual physical challenge of trying to assemble the thing.

Once you pass that initial hurdle and learn to process I'm sure it's significantly easier. But that's a BIG hurdle.

Like, I've more or less given up and am mostly looking into getting a prebuilt one at this point. It's going to be more expensive for worse performance but I don't really care - I just want to buy something, plug it in, and play shit on my TV.

 

[Mass Effect]

Because... well, it can be sometimes. For the most part, modern games are fine, but even then there are some issues. Sometimes you get shoddy ports (looking at you, WB), sometimes you run into strange errors because of your setup and have to find a workaround (Red Faction: Guerrilla).

And this isn't even getting general ease of use. IF you're only gaming on Steam, you can pretty much have it to where it's relatively as simple as gaming on consoles. Most modern games support controllers these days. And even if they don't, you can brute force them now through Steam. You can have graphical settings done for you through tools like GeForce Experience.

It gets a bit more complicated though once you start including other services like Battlenet, Origin, GoG. It's not hard by any means, just inconvenient.

And then you have older games... Fucking annoying sometimes. I've definitely had a few cases where it took me a while to get games working properly.

I don't really see a problem bringing older games up, the topic of PC gaming being considered too difficult is not limited to just modern games, and in terms of playing older games it is vastly more difficult than finding the right plug for your TV.

I'll use Fable 3 as a different example, with that being the last mainline entry it remains a game people still want to play. If you've got a 360 or Xbox One it's simple, buy it digitally or put a disc in, it'll play instantly and flawlessly every time - co-op works, DLC is buyable, jobs done.

For PC? Well, it was delisted off Steam and the GFWL store is dead so digital is out of the question. So then you're on to getting a physical copy, except GFWL games had a one time use serial number so you need to track down a sealed boxed copy - good luck. Let's say you get around that and find a copy you can use, got Windows 10? Cool, it uses Securom so that probably won't work. If you do get it installed though, well GFWL is dead so your problems can range from either needing to use an unofficial tool to remove GFWL entirely to error codes that have no solution. And on top of this co-op is inaccessible and DLC cannot be purchased any more.

Obviously all of that isn't going to apply to the latest and greatest like PUBG or Destiny 2 or whatever, they are one facet of PC gaming that will no doubt be discussed at great length by many others, such that I don't really feel any need to drop my 2 cents in regarding them.

Ooorrr... you could just buy Fable 3 from Amazon, which will give you a Steam code, instead of going through all that nonsense.

I do agree with you that older games can be problematic to play on PC, especially if you want to use a controller. For example: Star Wars Starfigher. The game actually does support xinput controllers, but setting up the button configuration can be a pain in the ass.

Not to mention the various other issues you can run across with older games, bu

 

[Yarbskoo]

Also, as an aside, if you don't buy the nicest PC on the market, you have to fiddle with quality settings to get everything to run optimally.

You're not wrong, but the alternative is a system in which the majority of games run sub-optimally and no amount of tweaking will fix them.

 

[fluffydelusions]

Only time in years I've ever had to tinker with anything is getting older games to run. I believe vampire the masquerade requires some fiddling about to get it working which is the most recent example off the top of my head. But the fixes are always right in steam forums so it's not hard to find. Everything else pretty much just works when I click play.

 

[Freshmaker]

Some of the problems being described in here are really, really bizarre. Hunting .DLL files? Really? In 2017? Manually editing config files? 'Trial and error' of in-game settings - in an age of Geforce Experience?

I have been PC gaming since the 1980s until the present day, and this stuff hasn't been common for over a decade.

Geforce Experience can be really strange.

It still insists that I should turn off all effects and post processing on Witcher 3 with a 1070. To run it at 1440p.

 

[Norse]

Read the forza demo thread of gaf and you'll see people editing config files to get it running smoothly on some pcs.

Another thing is the fiddling with the pc to get a game running its best can be as enjoyable as the game itself. If your console has a hiccup in a game you just accept it. Not so on your pc. Time to tinker.

 

[killatopak]

it's not really difficult. The problem is being compared to consoles which are significantly more accessible.

 

[ToKre]

in an age of Geforce Experience?

Geforce Experience , is the only thing ruining my PC gaming "life" i guess

i've been a PC only for 3 years now but i can't find an answer to this thing crashing everytime i update it deletes my GPU drivers sometimes without replacing them and after downloading the driver i can't install it.

so i just stopped updating my gtx 1080 its been 5 months since the last time i updated my drivers and that one was a mess as usual.

 

[Lashley]

Laziness.

Don't have a PC anymore and don't miss it. My time spent actually play games has doubled.

Will get one again though.

So...You do miss it 😏

 

[Compsiox]

I've spent hours fixing shit, it's definitely worth it for me because I love everything that a PC offers. With that being said, I understand why no one would ever want to bother with that frustrating as fuck shit.

 

[Fishook]

I have a pretty much hassle free PC gaming for the last 10 years or so, but I don't clutter my pc with shit, and I am not that bothered that I use benchmarking tools in every game I play.

If you don't know what you are doing and start downloading of mods and shit you are bound to have problems, I learned years ago I make sure I buy decent hardware and keep it up to date. Its not a cheap option and I wouldn't recommend consoles for most people.

Its a nothing compared to when to PC gaming when I first started 20 years ago, and gaming on a budget.

 

[Koren]

For me, gaming on PC is either
- dealing with things that doesn't work on Steam Linux (I guess it works more consistently if you have exactly the Ubuntu version they want, but well...)
- dealing with Windows just for games, and that's a hassle (and a money waste)

So yes, for me, it's some work... I guess people that already use the last Windows have a more streamlined experience, though.

 

[Narroo]

Was this with the newer Remastered release, or the original disc version from way back when? I know the disc version was fraught with all kinds of issues on newer machines. There was a puzzle which was impossible if your PC was too powerful, which seems to be a recurring thing with adventure games, they frequently seem to tie something important to a process without a speed cap.

Remaster, actually. Tried contacting double fine and they never got back to me.

 

[DarkestHour]

I have zero issues and have had zero issues that weren't shitty developer related in the past 10 years. Install Windows, don't fuck with it, install GPU driver, download games, play.

The problem is people fuck with their computer and then read bullshit "fixes" by internet know it all which make the issue worse.

 

[Regolego]

Im mainly a console player and whenever I play Steam-games (on Mac), I tend to get into trouble - such as achievements not popping up when starting games directly without starting Steam.
If i switched to PC I guess the lack of control-layout for dual shock would be such a big problem I had to get a xbox controller (no big deal though)

Still I prefer to play certain games on PC and certain games on consoles - so let's keep both!

 

[Lashley]

I have zero issues and have had zero issues that weren't shitty developer related in the past 10 years. Install Windows, don't fuck with it, install GPU driver, download games, play.

The problem is people fuck with their computer and then read bullshit "fixes" by internet know it all which make the issue worse.

 

[Narroo]

You're not wrong, but the alternative is a system in which the majority of games run sub-optimally and no amount of tweaking will fix them.

What do you mean by sub-optimally? Yes, games may have worse Graphics on console and be capped at 30 FPS. But that's not sub-optimal, that's how the games were designed.

To exaggerate a bit, you wouldn't call the original release of Okami on the PS2 'sub-optimal' compared to the PS3/PS4 HD ports, would you?

It's well known that PC's can be more powerful than their contemporary console counterparts. PC versions usually allow quality settings that make the game look nicer as part of the entire attraction of a PC version of a game. That's half the point of PC games nowadays. That doesn't make the console versions 'sub-optimal,' it means you spent $1,200 on a PC.

With that in mind, I'd wager that most PC users do not have the best PC's available and most likely don't have optimal experiences on the PC because they have to compromise on their graphic settings.

 

[Aureon]

I'm a pc enthusiast, programmer and game developer.
I'll freely admit setting up a wireless controller to work properly and without excessive input delay is a major PITA.

 

[biggersmaller]

For me, going back to an old 386 my family had in the 90s - tinkering with a PC was part of the fun for all aspects of computing, especially games. I found great satisfaction in getting every bit of power out of a machine.

However, my last rig was an i7 930 / 5850 and I've been a strict console gamer since the PS4 launch. The reason is I have a family and I just wanted to literally turn a machine on and game with the little amount of gaming time I have available.

What I don't understand is how defensive PC gamers get about this. Embrace the hobby as it is. You all know damn well you cannot simply go onto Steam and select a game with the certitude it will run in the same way a console user can. Especially if you're running hardware a little out of date.

 

[Gravy Boat]

Threads like this are part of the reason I spend more time on consoles. I don't understand most of the jargon that's used in there, what all those things are supposed to do. Just sounds annoying to deal with little issues like this as they come up.

 

[Soulblighter31]

What do you mean by sub-optimally? Yes, games may have worse Graphics on console and be capped at 30 FPS. But that's not sub-optimal, that's how the games were designed.

To exaggerate a bit, you wouldn't call the original release of Okami on the PS2 'sub-optimal' compared to the PS3/PS4 HD ports, would you?

It's well known that PC's can be more powerful than their contemporary console counterparts. PC versions usually allow quality settings that make the game look nicer as part of the entire attraction of a PC version of a game. That's half the point of PC games nowadays. That doesn't make the console versions 'sub-optimal,' it means you spent $1,200 on a PC.

With that in mind, I'd wager that most PC users do not have the best PC's available and most likely don't have optimal experiences on the PC because they have to compromise on their graphic settings.

Designed for 30 frames? Thats always inferior without exception. Advantage of PC gaming isnt graphics, certainly not half the apeal. Mouse and keyboard control in games is the biggest one, the feel of high framerate in every game is another major one and the games library, with thousands of games and entire genres spanning 40 years only available on PC.

Even if users have to lower graphical settings to hit high framerates, thats a win over the console experience. The game plays and feels better, the image detail is the least important part.

 

[dynamitejim]

In my experience there's always been some problem with the PCs I've had that have really frustrated me. My current PC (Win 10, 6700K, RX470) is getting BSODs quite often and I know trying to diagnose what's wrong and fix it is going to take hours and hour and hours and hours....And I don't really feel like dealing with that right now. Which sucks because there's a bunch of games in my Steam backlog I want to play.

So instead, I've just been playing Samus Returns and the other GBA/DS/SNES Metroidvanias on my 3DS. I just turn the damn thing on and it works. (Ok, I had to put CFW on it to run the GBA games, but even that is incredibly simple these days.)

 

[Lashley]

Threads like this are part of the reason I spend more time on consoles. I don't understand most of the jargon that's used in there, what all those things are supposed to do. Just sounds annoying to deal with little issues like this as they come up.

tbh I was clueless for a month or so then I picked it all up, it seems intimidating but it's really easy to get used to

 

[Olli128]

You shouldn't use the duplicate display mode. It's nothing but trouble on some hardware/software configurations, and will cause most of the issues you've been dealing with aside from the gamepad-related ones. Set it up so that when you're using your TV, your monitor is disabled, and vice-versa. Extend is okay too if you absolutely need the second screen while playing games, but you might run into a couple issues such as some games starting on the wrong display, and/or audio being sent to the wrong device depending on whether you're using HDMI cables with a monitor that has integrated speakers/headphone jacks.

Wouldn't that mean having to change display setting every single time I want to play a game though? Would be nice if there was a way that when I change to my PC HDMI on the TV the PC could detect it and automatically do this + change audio channels rather than having to manually change it every single time.

 

[Zepp Twofist]

Reading through this thread it seems like 90% of tinkering happens when trying to do things that are impossible to do on other platforms.

 

[CyclopsRock]

The major benefits of consoles are that they're all identical. If a game has a problem on PS4, it'll have a problem with your PS4 and vice versa. It's definitely possibly to have the smooth and plain-sailing experience of the OP, but similarly - because there are such a huge number of variables in PC gaming - it's also possible to have a really bad experience and often you won't know that's gonna happen until it does.

 

[Deleted member 325805]

I'd rather spend 10 minutes extra setting up a game and play it at 60-144fps than pop it in instantly and have to play it at 30fps.

 

[Zephyx]

In my opinion, culture-wise and the tinkering of configuration aside, (I live in SE Asia), people have a stigma on using PCs for purposes other than work. They face a PC or a laptop for 8 hours at work and they don't want to face that again when they get home. They rather play games with their phones or a console since playing on a PC may remind them of a negative experience on their job. It's changing with younger people nowadays but most people here would still rather use other devices for their entertainment.

 

[Yui's Empire]

I've been a PC gamer pretty much my whole life. Eventually, I got tired of interior ports (not graphics, functionality), late releases, and tons of things I was interested in skipping PC altogether. Also, nowadays PC games are lower on price but a good PC to make games run properly can not compete with 250$ consoles, and that is important when you gotta spend wisely. Not to mention I had a lot of unluck at times with hardware malfunctioning, not to mention crap like the shaders not being supported on the Geforce 4 MX back in the day and so on. I eventually became tired of all of it, never been big with mods apart from a few on Unreal Tournament and Doom, so I moved to console. The convenience for me is amazing, and while things improved on PC too, I'll never forget buying a 360 and just... gaming. No driver hunting, no tweaking, no external services for online gaming or voice chat, no bullshit. Just gaming with stuff like Halo 3 that isn't even on PC to begin with. I know fully well the advantages of PC gaming but tbh I can't be arsed anymore. I wanna play.

 

[DalikSkywing]

Designed for 30 fps games? That is the most stupid thing I have ever read on this board.

 

[Deleted member 325805]

I've been a PC gamer pretty much my whole life. Eventually, I got tired of interior ports (not graphics, functionality), late releases, and tons of things I was interested in skipping PC altogether. Also, nowadays PC games are lower on price but a good PC to make games run properly can not compete with 250$ consoles, and that is important when you gotta spend wisely. Not to mention I had a lot of unluck at times with hardware malfunctioning, not to mention crap like the shaders not being supported on the Geforce 4 MX back in the day and so on. I eventually became tired of all of it, never been big with mods apart from a few on Unreal Tournament and Doom, so I moved to console. The convenience for me is amazing, and while things improved on PC too, I'll never forget buying a 360 and just... gaming. No driver hunting, no tweaking, no external services for online gaming or voice chat, no bullshit. Just gaming with stuff like Halo 3 that isn't even on PC to begin with. I know fully well the advantages of PC gaming but tbh I can't be arsed anymore. I wanna play.

It sounds like you haven't been a PC gamer for a very long time.

 

[blankempathy]

I'd rather spend 10 minutes extra setting up a game and play it at 60-144fps than pop it in instantly and have to play it at 30fps.

Some people will never understand this. Ever since I bought a 144hz monitor I've fallen in love with shooter games again. I feel like I have so much more control that it has improved my experience immensely. I can't exactly blame people though. It's something that has to be experienced in person.

 

[gelf]

PC is my preferred platform these days mainly because I like having more control options and I like the long term backwards compatibility of the system. I totally get why others see it as a hassle though, I do encounter more issues that need some searching for a fix. I never bought a console game that flat out refused to even start.

You don't have to tinker in most games but sooner or later you'll probably have to, especially if you can't afford to brute force past some performance issues by keeping your system cutting edge.

 

[Lister]

I've been a PC gamer pretty much my whole life. Eventually, I got tired of interior ports (not graphics, functionality), late releases, and tons of things I was interested in skipping PC altogether. Also, nowadays PC games are lower on price but a good PC to make games run properly can not compete with 250$ consoles, and that is important when you gotta spend wisely. Not to mention I had a lot of unluck at times with hardware malfunctioning, not to mention crap like the shaders not being supported on the Geforce 4 MX back in the day and so on. I eventually became tired of all of it, never been big with mods apart from a few on Unreal Tournament and Doom, so I moved to console. The convenience for me is amazing, and while things improved on PC too, I'll never forget buying a 360 and just... gaming. No driver hunting, no tweaking, no external services for online gaming or voice chat, no bullshit. Just gaming with stuff like Halo 3 that isn't even on PC to begin with. I know fully well the advantages of PC gaming but tbh I can't be arsed anymore. I wanna play.

Your experience with PC gaming is well over a decade out of date.

It's like me saying I'll never console game cause I hate blowing into cartridges to make them work.

 

[rodrigolfp]

Some of the problems being described in here are really, really bizarre. Hunting .DLL files? Really? In 2017? Manually editing config files? 'Trial and error' of in-game settings - in an age of Geforce Experience?

I have been PC gaming since the 1980s until the present day, and this stuff hasn't been common for over a decade.

resume for people with this problems:

 

[Deleted member 325805]

Some people will never understand this. Ever since I bought a 144hz monitor I've fallen in love with shooter games again. I feel like I have so much more control that it has improved my experience immensely. I can't exactly blame people though. It's something that has to be experienced in person.

Going from 60 (PC) to 30 (PS4) was always really noticeable for me, games just felt so choppy and unresponsive on console but I recently bought a 144Hz monitor and it has made the situation even worse. I played the new Uncharted the other day and it was jarring as hell, whereas Uncharted 4 felt pretty good when I played that before switching to 144Hz.

 

[TheRagnCajun]

Sometimes PC games don't work properly or not at all. I'm looking at you wolfenstein new order. It still happens. I've been pc gaming for 15 years and it still happens. I used to bother with searching forums to get help with getting the game running. Now I have no time or patience. I'll just steam refund it and forget about it.

 

[LordRaptor]

Console:

- relatively flat pricing

- game performance can be measured definitively across each title and set in stone by the developer without user needing to adjust -- even if they are performance limited compared to what the PC spectrum is able to provide

- "upgrades" are rarely needed to keep up with the ecosystem (and if they are needed at some point, they're cost-competitive to PC component upgrades)

- OS updates are maintained and delivered in a relatively unified fashion, console manufacturer issues OS updates and game developers can issue updates for games individually

Really?

This is really what the console market looks like in 2017?

2 radically different base SKUs for the Playstation and Xbox branded devices, with a myriad of different SKUs within those base SKUs of different HDD sizes, and given mandatory installs a near necessity to upgrade beyond a 500Gb HDD for early adopters, and that upgrade process being manually opening your device up and buying more expensive and more error prone 2.5" laptop drives over cheaper and more robust 3.5" drives, as well as all of the background research required as to whether you get a standard platter, an SSD or a hybrid?

Come on now.

 

[Clear]

The more options you have, the more things you can do, the more that can possibly go wrong. Its just the way it is with software/systems.

What makes PC great is also its weakness in this regard.

Thing is there's no real way around it as the more things are built to simplify operation and be more foolproof and user-friendly, the more inscrutable they are when something weird happens.

 

[c0Zm1c]

There's definitely more work involved with PC gaming than console but it's not necessarily a bad thing. After all, without 'tinkering' user fixes/improvements and mods wouldn't be possible, or at least less viable. I'd rather we had that than not.

Some of the problems being described in here are really, really bizarre. Hunting .DLL files? Really? In 2017? Manually editing config files? 'Trial and error' of in-game settings - in an age of Geforce Experience?

I have been PC gaming since the 1980s until the present day, and this stuff hasn't been common for over a decade.

I don't use Geforce Experience because, ironically, it gave me a bad experience. Manually editing config files will hopefully always be a thing, it's what allowed me to use inverted Y axis in Mad Max until the developers added the option, for example. Geforce Experience isn't going to help in those situations.