New computer, new danger

[Poo Bear]

I had my old AthlonXP/GFFX5500 for about 5 years before it blew up. Being a penniless indie developer I had to scrape by on an Intel Celeron 2.6GHz machine with a ATI X600 for a good few months. The end result is that all I've been playing for about the last 2 years are indie games.

As Intel and nVidia have just dropped their prices i've splashed out on some upgrades:

1. a Pentium4 650 - runs at 3.4GHz and has a 2MB cache ~$50
2. a gig of ram capable of running at the whopping new FSB speed of 800MHz ~$50
3. an nIvida Geforce7600GT ~$60

Yes, I know those are hardly mind blowing specs to most people these days, but I think it's amazing for the money.

So now, in theory, I can embrace mainstream gaming with all its shader model 3 whizz bangery. Sadly, mainstream gaming prices mean I have to be very careful in my selection.

1. battlefield 2042
2. world of warcraft BC (I have played the original already but it chugged somewhat, I haven't seen burning crusade, does it add anything for the noob?)
3. oblivion
4. fear
5. prey
6. Command & Conquer 3
7. supreme commander
8. guild wars
9. stalker
10. warhammer 40k: dawn of war
11. gothic 3

<above list not in any order>

I need to make a complete list and prune off anything that won't run acceptably (oblivion perhaps). Once I have the perfect list we can switch it into a poll.

So please comment on any of these you've played, if you think they'll run OK or not, why they are any good or not, if I've missed something wonderful off the list.

[Weeble]

Burning Crusade has new low-level zones focused around the new races, and obviously the new races themselves. I've not played any of the new low-level content, though. There seems to be little mid-level content, and mostly high-level content. If you do have a high-level character, the expansion has lots of new content. Outland is very nicely made. Of course, if you have a high-level character you pretty much have to buy the expansion. All your guild-mates will have it and you won't have anyone to play with anymore until you do.

[Konedima]

I'll address these individually (as for performance, I have an Athlon 3000+, 1gb DDR1 RAM, 7600gt, so anything I can run, you most likely can - better.):

1. battlefield 2142: I've never liked the BF series. Long live Tribes! Don't know how well it will run.
2. world of warcraft BC (I have played the original already but it chugged somewhat, I haven't seen burning crusade, does it add anything for the noob?): I don't know about BC, but regular old WoW is good, I just can't afford pay for it. Should run fairly well.
3. oblivion: Get this. If nothing else, get this. Runs fine for me with everything cranked up at 1024x768.
4. fear: Looks pretty, demo plays good and runs well.
5. prey: See above.
6. Command & Conquer 3: Haven't played it.
7. supreme commander: The king of all things RTS. Oblivion comes first, this comes second. Should run alright on smaller maps but get too many units and will chug.
8. guild wars: See C&C3
9. stalker: See C&C3
10. warhammer 40k: dawn of war: An RTS done right. Not as good as Supreme Commander (and nowhere near the scale thanks to the unit cap), but it does everything right and should be on your RTS list.
11. gothic 3See C&C3

[simonb]

1. battlefield 2042 - Havnt Played it looks ok but id rather wait for Enemy Territory 2.
2. world of warcraft - Dont bother unles you have insane amounts of time to waste on a pointless timesink.
3. oblivion - Great game.
4. fear - Havnt Played
5. prey - Havnt Played
6. Command & Conquer 3 - Great game, playing it at the moment.
7. supreme commander - Havnt Played it because it ran like a crippled snail on my PC.
8. guild wars - Havnt played it but its probably the same as World of Warcraft except a worse game.
9. stalker - Havnt Played
10. warhammer 40k: dawn of war - An OK RTS game, nothing special. Get C&C3 instead.
11. gothic 3 - Havnt Played

Conclusion - Get C&C3 and Oblivion

[Crussh]

You can get to experience outland without being lvl 58, its just that you have to stay clear of the monsters since they will slaughter you if your lower than 58 If you are gonna start a new character play in horde on the executus realm so that me and my friends can help you

Edit: Screw wow dont get it dont even think about it, it will kill your brain, eat your money and slash your free time to shreds, ive just decided to quit and most likely never EVER play it again...seriusly its killing people

[Sorrow]

1. My most hated FPS series
2. all my 70s mate think it's awesome, haven't played since it came out.
3. Oblivion is fun...but i can easily live without it.
4. Fear, for some reason this just didn't hit the spot for me.
5, 6 ,7. haven't played.
8. i think Guild Wars is great, haven't played since the early days though.
9. haven't played.

by the way, the Moonpod site loads up so fast with Firefox and this built in spell check is awesome .

[Inane]

Prey is short, as far as games go, and there's not much to lengthen the time. Multiplayer is comparable to a bowl of the most delicious salmon, marinaded in pig ****. It brings sweet new concepts (Level formed around a miniature planet with proper gravity? Awesome) but overall the gameplay for MP is lacking. It's just... Missing something.
Edit: A good example would be Red Faction's multiplayer. Nothing particularly wrong with it, but after 5 minutes you just want to get back to singleplayer.

Singleplayer is good, excellent even, if you can properly appreciate the "gimmicks", but it really is incredibly short.



Oblivion... Eh, I didn't really like it. I like dialogue, definitely, and I like females who don't suffer "Manface Syndrome", and most of all, I like a challenge that requires thinking to get out of. Oblivion is lacking in all three. I played as a thief/mage, and while I would do crazy things to get the x3 backstab damage in, after that though it simply became a process of "Cast buff, throw fireballs, hack and slash."

My aforementioned problems with the dialogue would be that A) Everyone says the same thing. "Heard any good rumors?" "That dude on the docks is all on the docks." "Heard any good rumors?" "That dude on the docks is all on the docks." "Heard any good rumors?" "That dude on the docks is all on the docks."
There's truly, probably about a 100th of the conversation as in the predecessors to the game.
Also, whenever you ask someone with a unique voice, ala beggars (who sound like... Beggars) a common question (Like... "Heard any good rumors?"), they'll answer in the common tone for their entire race/gender. So that beggar who's talking like he's dying of a severe case of bronchitis is now speaking like a royal **** yacht club member.

[Poo Bear]

Ok, i've removed BF2042 due to the negative comments and Gothic as nobody has heard of it and reviews aren't great.

Sounds like Supreme Commander might run acceptably, but I'll leave it on for now and try and get hold of a demo to check it out.

I've been offered second hand cast off's of a few new entries from friends:

Half Life 2 - played a demo on release but the old PC couldn't handle it
X3 - same deal, old PC had ZERO chance of running it, looks complicated?
Guild Wars - looks like I can give it a free shot, is it worth the time sink?


p.s. Prey being short is probably a plus in my book, short and sweet sounds good. I don't have that much free time and I love actually finishing a game.

[simonb]

Definately play Half Life 2. One of the best games ever made in my opinion. Also it is rather short.

[icarus]

Well I DO have a powerful computer and I AM tight on cash so I DID buy F.E.A.R. I also have HL2 (waiting for ep2!) and am planing to buy STALKER.

[SethP]

If you're interested in the supreme commander demo, the official links are below:

[Sergenth]

Half-Life 2 all the way + Episode 1.

The only "commercial" games I'm looking forward to on PC are Half Life 2: Episode 2 and Portal which supposedly comes with it. I need Portal as much as I need Odin Sphere for PS2 later this month.

[icarus]

[simonb]

SPORE

[Sorrow]

Id say guildwars is worth while for the casual player, atleast it was when i played.

Guildwars Endgame was the thing that put me off in the end, well that and the pvp