greenmedic88 said:
That was the other thing that sticks out in mind about PC gaming, specifically when it comes to self built PCs; you spend a lot of time tweaking settings, updating and modifying, even after the process of mapping out hardware specs, pricing all hardware to get the best parts under the same budget, assembling everything neatly with clean wire management and airflow, overclocking CPU in BIOS, stress testing OC settings for system stability, overclocking GPU, stress testing settings for game stability, etc. and I still spent a lot of time tweaking settings in each game to get the best performance to visuals balance. It was almost like every game I played with a decent engine became a benchmark program for my system. I had fun with that, but I spent a lot less time actually playing through games as a result. That doesn't happen on a console. |
You only have to do that if you want to, though. That is the advantage of PC gaming, you have a choice of how much time you spend to 'perfect' your system, but honestly it takes a month or so to get it just right for a future of 4-5 years of gaming (and other things) on it (assuming you are not an enthusiast who needs every latest CPU and GPU X 4 per annual release.) I personally like that I didn't have to wait for From Software (or Square Enix) to release a patch to fix the abhorent framerate and low-resolutions (720p) of Dark Souls ( or FFXIII) or that I can modify Skyrim/Oblivion/Morrowind to look essentially identical (if not now, in the near future i.e Morrowind, Skyoblivion.)
To give you an estimate of my personal experience with my new PC (built in October, previous desktop build was in 2009.) It took me 2 hours to build and get it running with proper wire management. It took me half an hour to install the operating system and transfer my games from my other computer. It took me 20 minutes to overclock my cpu, since my motherboard has auto-overclocking features (I could've gotten better voltages/temps at higher framerates if overclocked manually, but I chose not to.) Then I installed Skyrim, installed mods, and tinkered with that for a few days. And then I played the game for 40 more hours (on top of a 500 hour history.) Skyrim, in particular, is a PC game in which one will tinker the most (another being GTA IV.) For games like Alien: Isolation and The Evil Within, I just installed and played just as easily as if I installed and played them on a console. And if something didn't work with them, I was guaranteed a fix within a week by the community, without having to wait for their respective developers to come up with something.
