Madus_Maximus

This is the reason mentally unstable 14 and 16 year olds shouldn't be allowed to get to such a stage in the first place with anything remotely "addictive". If you do something like this then you have something majorly wrong with you to begin with, it's not games that cause it. They may trigger it, but the cause is rooted much deeper within their minds. How many millions of people play violent games but DON'T murder their parents?

Enjoy your 3 new maps (and 2 old) for $15! It's been pretty much universally slammed as half assed and well over priced and nothing but a cash in. I wonder if they're charging so much so IW get some money from it seeing as Activision still haven't given them any profits from game sales yet? OA = win though! I really prefer BC2 to MW2, MP is better, SP is better and DICE seem comitted to releasing new maps for free (unless EA say they can't). Even if it's just to have a dig at IW/Acitivision it's all good for players in the end.

HAHA that headline generator is SPOT ON! The Daily Fail is a truely disgusting excuse for a "newspaper". It's one of those publications that makes the idea of free-press worth a second thought. Most people here in the UK just see it for what it is. The term "Daily Mail reader" is often used to offend someone who has very black and white views on things like racism and so on. They're usually rather ignorant and out of touch with reality (sounds like politicians, but that's another subject lol). It's always the end of the world according to the Mail! How it still exists is beyond me. As a side note, they're also regular contributers to rather epic Photoshop failures. Although why on earth a "reporter of the news" has any reason to doctor photographs is beyond me. Another feather in their fail hat I guess.

I'm not really bothered with games being on console, it's just when they do an obvious port to PC and don't bother to address PC "issues" in the process. Not being able to go prone or lean left/right are two of the more obvious casualties in most FPS games that get ported over. How difficult is it to add these things? At least the lean, and that won't require you to have to redesign parts of the environments like going prone my potentially do. The interface being overly cluttered and condenced with lots of sub-menu's is also an annoyance with console ports. You also seem to get auto-aiming in some games too, to a degree. Fallout 3 is a good example. Check where your shots go even if you're not actually aiming there. They hit the target centre mass even when you're not always aiming there. This is more obvious with rapid firing weapons like the laser gattling or something, but it's there and sometimes annoying as it's more common when they're behind some cover and you're aiming where they're exposed, whilst it hits centre mass that's BEHIND the cover! Overall I'm happy with this. It's a welcome change from the poorly made over hyped fluff we've had over the last few years. It's not quite as good in MP as BF2 was, but that's down to the console changes (prone/lean as mentioned above). The larger maps and destructive objects really add an element of "oh crap!" though, you have to think of your cover more lol. The sound goes without saying. I hope BIS can implement something similar with OA (I'm sure I saw something about them redesigning the sound engine, or maybe I missread or it was miss-translated).

Mass Effect 1 is still full of game killer bugs sadly. Not just ones that crash the game, but lock up your entire system, forcing you to physically power down your machine and reboot it. They promised to have a patch out to fix it over a year ago, still no dice. They just seem to have gone for the sequel instead. It may be the case of publishers more so than the developers, but they still released a broken game. PC games sadly get a lower priority on multi-platform releases these days as it's a niche market with a lower ROI. Looking at some of the big publishers latest moves in the PC market with their DRM it seems like they're purposely trying to kill it off by using the "piracy" excuse. I hope BIS doesn't follow this route with their games. I was going to get this tomorrow but like an idiot forgot it was Easter, so I'll have to wait for Tuesday now thanks to bank holiday Monday too lol. That is assuming my local GAME even sells PC stuff any more. Their selection shrinks by the week.

I find SLI = trouble for most games, if not crashes and so on, performance at least. ArmA 2 will just be more noticable with it's performance loss due to it already being a pretty damn demanding game with it's huge scale. Looking on forums for other games you see people with multiple GPU's also having performance problems usually caused by the games not really being optimised for all that overhead. Technically you have 4 "cards" in SLI with 2 x 295's as a 295 is already set to SLI by default due to being 2 x 260 cores on a single board. Anything not really optimised for SLI is made worse by having two or more of those things as it just adds more overhead. Try physically removing one, see what it's like, that'll be the only way you'll be sure if that's the problem. Another problem is sometimes the i7's. Most games aren't made for so many threads so again, overheard comes into it. Same goes for RAM as they're coded in 32bit rather than 64 (some have 64bit executables though, like Crysis, which allows it to unlock all that extra power). Ironically the people who seem to get the best performance from this and other demanding PC games tend to have a good dual core CPU and a good single core GPU with 4 or so GB of RAM. It's down to the software not being optimised for that extra power, so it just gets clogged up trying to access it.

That's my point. Most other games they don't bother doing a proper job for the PC version, they just rush it so it "works", but quite often it doesn't work as well as it should and is buggy. Look at GTA4 and Mass Effect 1, massively buggy ports because they didn't seem to care! It's nice to see a dev team put some effort into what they release. I'll have to pick this up from retail seeing as the digital version went walk-abouts for UK folk!

This may be a long shot, but it MIGHT work! What if you installed an older version of Windows in a Virtual Machine, like Suns Virtual Box, then in the settings limit the available hardware power to it so it acts like an older machine with specs more like those of the time RS was doing the rounds. I'm not sure how 3D accelleration will work but it's not that demanding so it should (in theory) run fine. Faling that, old PC time! lol

The 360 and PS3 are multi-core machines too, so they'll also make use of multi-threaded code on those platforms. If nothing else it's just a WELL ported game if that's truely the case. The original engine was written for PC then ported to console, so maybe that's why it still has all these features you don't normally see in console to PC ports (although I'm thinking more along the lines of they actually care. Most developers see the PC as a secondary market that doesn't matter to them all that much so they don't put in the effort they should).

The shotguns are pretty useless I find apart from like said above, breaching doors and thin walls. The range is a little too low unless it's a really close quarters situation. But then, that's what shotfuns are designed for lol.

Most people are like that full stop, if they use Macs or not. The vast majorirty of people don't know HOW a computer works or what's in it, they only care that it works and that's about it. To use anecdotes I know more Windows users who are clueless than Mac users who are clueless. Oh, and Macs DO run Windows faster. They use optimsed drivers for that specific hardware in the machine rather than more generic ones that have to play nice with other generic parts beyond what the driver is actually written for. Software optimisation is far more important than sheer hardware power. Just look at how Windows XP and 7 run faster on the EXACT same machine than Vista, all down to software. ---------- Post added at 06:09 AM ---------- Previous post was at 06:04 AM ---------- With your comment on the case I'm making the assumption you've NEVER seen a Mac Pro in person that's been opened. Lift latch on back, panel comes off. Tada, done. Also, you couldn't make 2 PC's with the same specs for that price. They're server parts, it's a workstation not a desktop. It's not made for gaming it's made for massive sustained number crunching. Putting the loads they're designed for onto a regular desktop (even an UBER i7 machine) will kill it. Desktops aren't made for sustained high throughput over periods of days and months, sometimes even years of never been turned off beyond the odd restart for software updates, just like a server. It's a tool for a different job, it's not a gaming rig, but they're more than capable of running games.

I was going to get this on ye olde Steam but it mysteriously vanished when I got around to looking. I'm assuming it has something to do with the metro bombings in Moscow, considering it's set in those very tunnels... or is it another one of those awesome licencing things where we don't get it in the UK much like stuff on iTunes? It's pretty hard to find PC games at retail these days too and getting there is a pain too as they're shut when I finish work. Damn thee powers that be at Steam! DAMN THEE!

I'm not quite so sure about that. It was the last of the good R6 games (a "true" R6 game) but I'd say Rogue Spear was a superior game. The rediculous bugs ruined the experience for me in Raven Shield and their god aweful "patching" lol. Beyond the bugs though (and the insta-aim/shoot/youdie AI that was alerted by a fart you've not yet done) it was a good game. Those bugs just tended to get in the way of the implementation in places.

Look at the vast majority of PC's sold these days. They're almost exlusively low powered laptops with shockingly poor GPU's and aniemic CPU's. Macs on the other hand tend to be better at the low end than most mid range PC's, unless you get a gaming rig (which is a niche market no matter what we like to think). Shove Windows on pretty much any Intel based Mac and they'll be able to run most games released in their respective release period. They're kind of like the middle ground between PC's and consoles in that they have fixed hardware configs, like consoles, but there's still several configs available and they get progressively better far more often than consoles, like PC.

Give it another couple of years and that'll be the case pretty much everywhere. It'll all be digital downloads or where you have to order it from places like Amazon if you want the physical copy. Even the HUGE HMV's and so on here in the UK (they're a massive retailer of games/music/films) have like 1 shelf dedicated to PC games, most of them are old titles in the budget bin (like "Best Seller" series etc) or the latest multi-format tripe poorly ported over. Even in GAME (they sell erm... games lol) only have half a shelf for PC games now, same situation as above. Checking Steam shows a bad picture too looking at the latest releases, there's next to no PC only games released any more. Most that are tend to be indie stuff (which is often pretty damn good concept wise but can be a little unpolished due to lack of funds). PC gaming is beocming an even bigger niche. Maybe the move to the Mac platform for Steam and their porting of their current titles, and native release of new ones will bring the market out of the crapper as Macs tend to be far more capable hardware wise (think of the % of Macs running Intel CPU's capable of running games vs's the % of PC's capable of it). On the game itself. I'm not too sure why they keep some of the console limitations (if you can call them that) in the PC version. It's not like you can play against console players so any advantages you'd get using the mouse/keyboard or extra functionality isn't really an issue. Things like the lack of prone and leaning really tick me off and the somewhat pathetic time enemies remain. It's annoying in single player too when you load a checkpoint (another thing I hate about console oriented games, unless they've been done well) all the bodies have vanished and you can't nick their weapons.

10 hours is a life time these days in game terms, especially for a linear story with no sort of free-roam. Things have gone backwards in every respect but visuals for the vast majority of games over the last 10 years. This sounds like it may be a welcome change, it'll rely entirely on it's single player aspect as it doesn't have MP to rest on. How many games can you think of that have sub-par SP, yet it's only given a life line because of the also sub-par MP, people just like to play together! It's like an easy get out clause for devs these days. Look at BioShock 2, if you played the first you'll understand why MP isn't needed (or a sequel for that matter).

I'll correct it for you ;) That was until APPLE invented the abstract OpenCL API. There you go! I'm sure you knew, just others won't and are unaware of a lot of the things Apple actually do in the open source community. They've open sourced a big chunk of Grand Central Dispatch too which is used to control multiple CPU cores/threads rather than having to write the code every time for new apps.

The Cell itself isn't really the problem, it's more the case they use 7 CPU cores which are split up to do different tasks. Tying the code together is the ballache. Paralell programming is hard enough as it is before you add the complexity of handing specific tasks off to different cores. SONY need to come up with an API similar to Grand Central Dispatch that Apple made for the Mac to handle all the multi-core stuff and the developers just piggy back onto that system. SONY messed up early on by not having a full SDK with the compilers ready which just made things even more of a pain for developers. I think he's mistaking "simplistic" for "it's not needed so it isn't there". Many people seem to make that mistake. How many of the extra lights and buttons do you use on your PC? On Macs you have a power button and the inputs like USB and so on. You don't need anything else. It's industrial design at it's most pure. The idea is to have nothing distracting you from what's on the screen, unlike some of these PC cases with flashing lights and stuff all over the place. Also, how is making it easy to use a complex bit of kit bad? Should we go back to machine code in command lines because using a GUI is too simplistic? Don't mistake a well designed interface with being "overly simplistic".

Since the move to Intel there are plenty of Macs that are capable of playing games. The more recent ones will handle most things on the market with little issue so it's about time someone took note of that and exploited it. The major factor behind the lack of games in the past has mostly been the DirectX API. Microsoft managed to get most studios locked in with it rather than OpenGL which could do all the same things but require less hardware to do it, and with the advantage of running on all platforms. When we start seeing more Mac games it wouldn't surprise me if we started to see them relesed for Linux too using the same install disc. More PS3 games may start showing up too as that also uses OpenGL (and it runs on Windows too so they could use the same disc for all 3 main OS's).

ch_123, I think we should just give up. We're surrounded by ignorant people who'll hate everything Apple make simple becuse Apple make it. It's also ironic how the main arguments about why Apple are so evil is because they can't build their own machines and it's all about the hardware and so on. I've not seen many arguments that big up the awesomness of Windows, just the hardware they run on. People don't seem to understand that the main reason people like Macs over Windows machines is the SOFTWARE! The OS is just nicer to use (in my opinion), it's more stable and more logically laid out in terms of UI and so on. The vast majority of 3rd party apps also follow the same UI design/concept rather than having their own as is often the case with Windows. Windows has more software, but I'd argue that Macs have more higher quality software, at least in my experience.

That would seem to tally with the rumours I've been hearing about Acitivision handing over development to another studio for the "Main" releases.

ArmA 2 is pretty much the only PC only game (apart from WoW and The Sims 3) even being sold at any of the Game store's I've been in lately. The PC section is rediculously small these days and most of them are multi-platform releases. The same goes for Gamestation and HMV. There's a massive HMV in Manchester (well there's like 3 of them lol) and they have the basement dedicated to nothing but gaming with a Lan set up and everything, they have like 20 PC games on the whole floor, most of which are multiplatform releases or old "classic" titles from the hay day.

If it's as atmospheric as S.T.A.L.K.E.R. then it'll be worth a buy. Those guys know how to make games that make you jump lol. They made brilliant use of the shaders in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and seeing as this is being made by some of the folks who made that and the engine, this should be interesting if nothing else. At least there's no pretense about what it is. It's a linear story driven game with little freedom to go and do what you want. They've said that from the start so we know what to expect.

Looking at those requirements it looks like they've coded it for 64bit. Finally! Now games will start to actually use all that power in those rediculously overpowered (for current games) gaming rigs. That latest trailer was great until the end with that voice over by the GameStop guy. Really ruined the whole thing. It's also interesting how they can get it to run nicely on 360 then give us those requirements for the PC version lol. Does that mean they've not bothered to optimise it for Windows or the 360 version is going to be hella ugly compared?

I smell DLC!