Actually PC gaming can be more affordable (or about the same, depending on which console) than console gaming. Consider that most people need a PC at home anyway, so they can just buy one with slightly higher specs in order to play most games released for a few years.

Consider as well that PC games are cheaper than PS3/360 console games.

Dude you dont have to have any experience bulding a PC to try building one, it's easy as hell to build a PC and unless you suck balls at saving money you don't need a full time job to save up for a rig.

$800 is plenty for a good rig, sure you can get much better but $800 more then gets the job done.

Good call on the NeoGeo, maybe you should invest in one since building a PC seems to be too difficult for you. Stick with the handheld consoles and let your mom and dad invest your money.

 The difference between PC and Neo geo is that everyone needs to have a PC in their home. It has nothing to do with playing games...its a life neccesity.  So the decision comes down to...do I want to spend extra 300 bucks to invest in a good video card, better processor and extra ram to run latest and greatest games or do I just go for the barebones minimum and do my gaming somewhere else.

I recently took the plunge and spent 250 bucks to add to my 400 dollar PC that I bought earlier this year. Fairly happy thus far...but not too sure this beats console gaming as it is now.

I'd say their system had better specs than mine and I could run Crysis with the XP limits removed with a smaller resolution (not terribly small and either 2x or no AA) and have it run decently. 20-30fps with a lot of stuff going on and 30-40ish at best. Obviously it's not consistantly smooth, but I still played through it at those settings.

Unless it's in the link, I'm not seeing what the conditions for testing were. Trying to max Crysis is plain suicide, but that doesn't mean it wouldn't look good if you lowered the resolution and knocked off the AA a little bit.

The PC my mom uses to surf the net.

• AMD Sempron 1.6ghz (Lulz single core)
• 512 mb ram
• Geforce 5200 GPU
• 80GB HDD
• 22" Phillips LCD monitor
• Windows XP

That monitor costs more than the computer!

She'll keep that for a couple more years and upgrade it to the cheapest computer she can find. Most people follow that exact same path, the only reason she hasn't upgraded is because I keep the machine clean.

Your standard computer is now COMPLETELY different to the computer you'd play games on.

That is not a recent computer in any way.

For 200 € (including 20% tax) you can get a pre-built 2.2 GHz Sempron with 2 GB RAM and an on-board graphics card. That's the cheapest computer I can find right now at some online stores. Obviously a good enough computer for web browsing and office applications.

If you spend 200-250 more €, you can instead get a Core Duo with 4 GB RAM and a 8600 GS OEM card (perhaps even a better one, this was a really quick search). With that setup, I bet you'll be able to play many new games for years to come. Obviously not at the highest settings, which give better graphics than consoles can make anyway.

Simplified instructions:

1. Get $800
2. Build a PC
3. ????????
4. Profit!!

Those are quite expensive case, RAM and power supply if you ask me.

The point is that the differences between your standard web/email/office machine and your required gaming machine to play the latest games are becoming a gulf. Whereas before you didn't have to spend much more than your standard computer to play games because you needed to upgrade more often. For that reason upgrading your PC to play games can be considered roughly equivelent to buying a console because that power simply isn't needed elsewhere by most people. Theres the other factor which is the popularity of Notebook computers which have to be factored into this as well.

@Squilliam: In that case we're in agreement. My point was only that PC gaming is not necessarily more expensive than console gaming as ZenfoldorVGI implied.