Modern gaming fatigue

[zzip]

18 hours ago, Keatah said:

People often say that's a conspiracy. Some kinda collusion going on to get you to spend money. Bullshit. It's just a collision of various disparate segments we loosely call the "industry". Each element pushes the other. Nvidia makes a new graphics chip. The software guys exploit it to the best of their ability. Neither is working under the table to cause the rat race cycle. Jensen Huang and Austin Meyer aren't plotting to drain your bank account.

I can tell you that Apple at least aggressively obsoletes their old hardware to get people to buy new stuff.  It works like this:  They release a new device which has a new iOS revisions.  All developers have to upgrade their Xcode to support the new iOS.   The new Xcode has a new minimum iOS version it will support.  Your apps can only support what Xcode allows it when you release an update.  Many older devices can't get the new iOS version, and therefore therefore their device starts losing the ability to use the newest apps.  So maybe an iPad that's only five years old is now almost useless, or that iPod you thought would last forever is giving you errors constantly now.

[MrMaddog]

On 8/23/2022 at 4:48 PM, Keatah said:

First encounter with contemporary DLC, outside of the Apple II sphere, would have been Doom. The game was complete on several levels, no pun intended. Most of us got the shareware version, 1 episode sporting 9 levels. The game played long enough feel complete for the price of free (or 10$ on retail distro disks in a box). You could also change the difficulty for some replay value. This first shareware edition played long enough to make it worth the time and money - didn't feel cheated or teased at any time.

 

Then you could get the full version with more episodes and levels. I had no reservations buying it because I wanted to see more of the 3D world. Go on additional missions. In time there would be Doom II and Ultimate Doom. All purchased straight away because I wasn't goaded, frustrated, or teased. I mean the game just didn't stop like in mid-level. It would provide lengthy satisfying play through an entire episode.

 

And then there were the user-created add-ons which was like free bonus material. Got most of that via dial-up Terminal-to-BBS. Then the internet happened with AOL. Gosh I miss that service!

 

All of the above was paralleled with the Duke Nuke'em 3D and Quake franchises. Though I didn't take a liking to Quake III: Arena's on-line feature. Servers were polluted with scriptakiddies.

 

What I wished for was more content for DESCENT. And more open-air regions for it. Same with Unreal and franchise. Unfortunately that wasn't to be since "on-line" gaming was becoming the thing.

 

It was about this time I was getting frustrated with getting the right hardware to get a good framerate on Unreal and Tournament - always felt on the apex of a house of cards. Any change to my rig would make it all crash. And building one to maintain compatibility with all software that came before was beginning to be a little annoying. DOS, Direct3D 8/9, Glide 2.x/3.x, OpenGL, PowerVR SGL, S3 MeTaL, and not forgetting software-only rendering. Not every game worked well across the board - one wanted this API, the other that API. Another wanted a certain version. Another wanted a specific card. Ugh!! A more recalcitrant version of CONFIG.SYS & AUTOEXEC.BAT was playing out. Just in a GUI that made it more inconvenient to drill-down. A prelude to modern gaming for years to come until very recently with Windows 10.

 

 

Shame you had that experience with Unreal & Unreal Tournament, I was able to play those games on my Pentium II w/ only 32 Mb RAM using software rendering.  I did eventually buy a NVDIA GeForce 2 card but by that time Direct3D drivers became the norm.  Pity I missed out on the "fun" of dealing with 3Dfx stuff...

 

Most of the time I spent with UT was with add on mods just like with Doom & Quake, in fact I only played certain mods online where there's a community of more mature players than the usual idiot kids who spam the default gametypes. 

 

Ironically it was Epic that introduced the concept of DLCs back when they were called expansion packs and they were free along with the game patches.  But they also introduced game patching for Xbox consoles, UT Championship, and started charging for Gears of War map packs because Microsoft made them.  And hence the slipper slide of gaming down the microtransaction slope...

 

My online days are completely over now and I only play around with Doom mods with an occasional Boomer Shooter (ugh, couldn't they call them Gen X Shooters instead?) off Steam.  I actually have more fun playing with a demake version of Quake Champions on GZDoom than playing the actual game online with it's constant big file updates.

 

And I agree about this being the end of the "eternal upgrade" trend of PC gaming since most people are already happy with the likes of Steam Decks instead of constantly changing up graphic cards which are mainly sold to crypto-scalpers instead of gamers.  Once I'm in the black again, I'm only going to upgrade my existing PC to the max memory and a mid-range GTX card that can handle games made after 2015.  If I ever have the need to play anything requiring ray tracing then GeForce Now will fill that void.

 

[zzip]

23 minutes ago, MrMaddog said:

My online days are completely over now and I only play around with Doom mods with an occasional Boomer Shooter (ugh, couldn't they call them Gen X Shooters instead?)

They've forgotten us GenXers exist.  Everyone is a Boomer, Millenial or Zoomer (Gen Z)

[+GoldLeader]

Modern gaming fatigue?

 

See also my Status Update.

 

 

Yes, I consider PS3 "Modern"...

[Rhomaios]

7 hours ago, GoldLeader said:

Modern gaming fatigue?

 

See also my Status Update.

 

 

Yes, I consider PS3 "Modern"...

A PS2 also plays PS1 and PS2 games and never needs firmware updates or connects to some online portal. Time to come back to the simpler times!

[Rhomaios]

8 hours ago, zzip said:

They've forgotten us GenXers exist.  Everyone is a Boomer, Millenial or Zoomer (Gen Z)

Millennials are old enough that they're often considered boomers now, too.

[Keatah]

I was really big into wanting the latest and greatest 3D hardware and fast CPU speeds. So there was some bias there. I was of the mindset "gotta be in hardware 3D". It was a dangerous mindset that sapped a lot of fun and cost a lot of money. Again, likely seeded by pulp magazines making one feel bad about not having top-of-the-line best of the best.

 

4 hours ago, MrMaddog said:

Shame you had that experience with Unreal & Unreal Tournament, I was able to play those games on my Pentium II w/ only 32 Mb RAM using software rendering.  I did eventually buy a NVDIA GeForce 2 card but by that time Direct3D drivers became the norm.  Pity I missed out on the "fun" of dealing with 3Dfx stuff...

Having a 3DFx machine meant tweaking settings and patching games as much as playing them.

 

All wasn't lost. It very well may have been me trying to get a rig that spanned a big timeline like early DOS through the then present Windows 98 & XP. I wanted my rig to handle ALL the 3D standards come hell or high water. Because developers weren't yet standardized on anything. Rendition, S3, 3DFx, MiniGL, Glide, Nec, RRedline, Speedy3D, and more. We had GlideWrappers and even parts that sat on the PCI bus and rendered there and sent it back to the CPU. No video output whatsoever.

 

In my sub-microscopic world of mom's basement, Unnreal and Tournament likely were at the "wrong place at the wrong time". I did end up enjoying the game once I got away from the 3DFx and PowerVR bullshit. Once I got a chip that handled OpenGL/D3D and 2D/3D. Pretty sure that was the TNT2/Ultra. The chip that solidly firmly convinced me Nvidia was on the right track.

 

The fretting over hardware stopped once I was into the TNT2. I was able to take more simplified linear upgrade path. No swapping vendors or chipset brands anymore. All I had to do was look to the next iteration for a performance gain. As a matter of course & evolution I would segue into the Geforce 2, 3, and 4. Without headpounding specsmanship. Without lateral comparisons to other stuff.

 

I appreciated it that Nvidia didn't do nearly as much IP acquisitions and mergings and buyouts. 3DFx excepted. I was slaphappy as pig in shit when they fizzled out and got scooped up. The Banshee bullshit, the 3500 stupidness, the RUSH non-sense. I had so wanted a RUSH board. 2D + 3D in one card! Whoooot! But the Alliance ProMotion chip suckedthedickus pretty bad. And it was still passthrough, just on-board. I wised up and said no.

 

From a non-benchmark point of view, TNT2 was superior to 3DFx because of its feature set. 2D/3D in one, 32MB video memory, VIVO, and other subtle niceties of a full-featured card of the time. Supported the now-becoming-standard APIs. I wouldn't have to experiment around with matching games to 3D standards or hope that a game supported a specialty card, like a Matrox Millenium or whatever else. No. The games would have to fall in line. And they did.

 

From a benchmark POV, the TNT2 was on-par or slightly slower than a 3DFx Voodoo² board. And it couldn't match 2 V² boards in SLI. And magazines and online fanbois would go to great lengths to remind you of it. Well. I would eventually grow up and move away from all that benchmark buddy-buddy-bullshit stuff. Eventually would stop paying attention to anything "overclocking".

 

Today I am proud to say I enjoy a 1080GTX I got for a great price nearly 4 years ago. And before that, it was that Geforce 4! So I got my money's worth. And left the baggie-chasing of graphics card behind for good!

 

4 hours ago, MrMaddog said:

Most of the time I spent with UT was with add on mods just like with Doom & Quake, in fact I only played certain mods online where there's a community of more mature players than the usual idiot kids who spam the default gametypes. 

Yes. I didn't too many mods on Unreal. I was kinda busy with other stuff. So I missed out on that. Perhaps I'll get into it as a retro thing.

 

4 hours ago, MrMaddog said:

Ironically it was Epic that introduced the concept of DLCs back when they were called expansion packs and they were free along with the game patches.  But they also introduced game patching for Xbox consoles, UT Championship, and started charging for Gears of War map packs because Microsoft made them.  And hence the slipper slide of gaming down the microtransaction slope...

Yes. I didn't mind a few expansion packs being sold at retail. I liked the Duke3D material and ate it up. Really, UT was close to my final push in 3D gaming of that era. Games felt like they were getting too big. Remember, I growed-up with Pong, Tank, Hockey, Shooting Gallery, and Speedway/Race. The dedicated consoles. So the VCS was magical with its carts when it came out. Channel-F wasn't available much in my area, and I wasn't THAT much into videogames just yet. Right on the cusp.

 

GZDoom for the win! And of course, big file updates ARE a major turn-off. But I find them intriguing if done infrequently. Maybe once or twice per year. I like to see what the game houses have been working on all that time. I really liked the transition from Doom to Doom II. It was a timely release. A buttery smooth shift on a 10-speed automatic.

 

The progression of X-Plane 5 to 12beta has been a nice thing over the past 20 years too. That's 7 payouts of $60-$90 to stay current. A fair value. And it's important that each version works without a server and can be 100% saved locally for years to come, because the simulation has changed in what it offers. Minus some stuff here, plus other stuff there. There's more to say on sims but ya'll get the idea.

 

4 hours ago, MrMaddog said:

And I agree about this being the end of the "eternal upgrade" trend of PC gaming since most people are already happy with the likes of Steam Decks instead of constantly changing up graphic cards which are mainly sold to crypto-scalpers instead of gamers.

Yes again. I hear that there's a glut of GPUs on the market in recent times. Both new and old. Nvidia has a bit of a problem (detailed in youtube vids keyword search GPU PRICE). They need to clear inventory (I wonder why??), and the 40xx series is right around the corner. And hard gamers won't want the excess 30xx's this close to 40xx. And the fab contracts from TSMC have to be fulfilled, so Nvidia has to buy the chips.

 

And I also think gamers got a little miffed at the high prices of scalping last year. I sure as hell had. I don't even know WTF the 30xx specs are I'm so out of it. But if I can get a full-tilt 3090 for less than 1/3rd the $2300 scalped price I may pick one up. Used! Not going to "donate" anything to help Nvidia reduce inventory or move product.

 

Part of Nvidia's problem are these miffed gamers. I'm a sore one on that issue. I got a used 1080 GTX for a great price and it's pretty much enough "card". Been happy with it. The last 5-year pricing has been too high on 20xx and 30xx. So I never followed the scene. And I didn't encourage buddies either. Nor have I gone out of my way to build machines for myself or others with the latest in cards. 

 

Nvidia abandoned us gamers and I have no loyalty to them (or any company really) to do my part. No. I'll simply wait till the price is right.

 

The industry calls it demand destruction. Or demand reduction. Make a product too expensive or too hard to acquire and people look elsewhere or do something entirely different. And they might not come back. Had the cards been affordable and available I might have already gone through the 10-series, 20-series, and 30-series, waiting anxiously for a 40xx. Might have gotten back into the scene with the raytracing push. But I've shifted how I game and a 40xx isn't necessary now. And there's so much retro and near-retro material out there to last me several lifetime's worth. All the studios sweating out AAA titles aren't getting my attention.

 

Still proud to say (like a recovering druggie) I went from having 20-25 graphics boards bought every few months in the dot-com era, ending with a GeForce4, to 1080 GTX. Next up? Who knows!

 

 

4 hours ago, MrMaddog said:

Once I'm in the black again, I'm only going to upgrade my existing PC to the max memory and a mid-range GTX card that can handle games made after 2015.  If I ever have the need to play anything requiring ray tracing then GeForce Now will fill that void.

I may get a 40-series or 50-series for flight sims. It depends on the scalpers. I have no problems waiting them out.

[Keatah]

On 8/24/2022 at 10:29 AM, zzip said:

Many older devices can't get the new iOS version, and therefore therefore their device starts losing the ability to use the newest apps.

I got my iPhone in 2018. It's just fine. I am ready to take advantage of any new camera tech they've developed since. So I won't mind an upgrade. 5 years is pretty good for a mobile device IMHO.

 

I recently experienced this with XP and browsers. Had to find an XP compatible one with backported features. Thankfully I did. And can continue using a 2004-era lappy as my daily driver. It's been one of the most cost efficient tech purchases outside the Apple II+ and //e. If I spent $1300 on it, and have used it for 18 years, it comes to be about 20 cents per day. Not too shabby!

 

They say most PCs using SandyBridge and later are usable for 10 solid years. Still pretty good. Especially compared against the 386/486 through Pentium-4 times, where upgrades seemed to happen every 6-months or every year. And if pulp magazines had their way, you'd upgrade once every season. Have I ever complained about those publications before!?!?!

 

On 8/24/2022 at 10:29 AM, zzip said:

So maybe an iPad that's only five years old is now almost useless, or that iPod you thought would last forever is giving you errors constantly now.

I put iTunes 9 into a VirtualBox XP machine, specifically so I don't have to do streaming and fight the bletchy interfaces of newer iTunes. So that I can use my old iPods.. But I'm an outlier here no doubt.

 

The only tech I (and the family) burn through are business machines and NUCs. Upgrade them all the time. Write them off. Donate them. Sell them afterwards. Conduct sucking-up activities through give-aways.. Pretty much everything else has a long service life. We do what it takes to make it so.

[zzip]

7 hours ago, Keatah said:

I was really big into wanting the latest and greatest 3D hardware and fast CPU speeds. So there was some bias there. I was of the mindset "gotta be in hardware 3D". It was a dangerous mindset that sapped a lot of fun and cost a lot of money. Again, likely seeded by pulp magazines making one feel bad about not having top-of-the-line best of the best.

7 hours ago, Keatah said:

Having a 3DFx machine meant tweaking settings and patching games as much as playing them.

 

All wasn't lost. It very well may have been me trying to get a rig that spanned a big timeline like early DOS through the then present Windows 98 & XP. I wanted my rig to handle ALL the 3D standards come hell or high water. Because developers weren't yet standardized on anything. Rendition, S3, 3DFx, MiniGL, Glide, Nec, RRedline, Speedy3D, and more. We had GlideWrappers and even parts that sat on the PCI bus and rendered there and sent it back to the CPU. No video output whatsoever.

I pretty much skipped the late-90s 3D hardware scene,   was getting married needed to get things like a house there wasn't money in the budget for things like 3D.   Sounds like a dodged a bullet.  But when I did get a 3D capable card in the early 2000s, things were still kind of a mess.   It annoyed me that some of my favorite games that were 2D or isometric would release their next version in 3D just because.   This created all kinds of performance issues, and the beautiful graphics of the previous releases were replaced with kinda ugly 3D blobs or rough polygonal graphics.   I suppose it had to start somewhere but it just seemed many games rushed to 3D before it was ready. 

 

7 hours ago, Keatah said:

Might have gotten back into the scene with the raytracing push. But I've shifted how I game and a 40xx isn't necessary now. And there's so much retro and near-retro material out there to last me several lifetime's worth. All the studios sweating out AAA titles aren't getting my attention.

There's a ton of games on Steam that run fine with basic 3D cards.   I find I prefer to more relaxing games on PC and AAA shooty shooty games on console.   So I don't see a need to upgrade my GPU anytime soon.   Like I said earlier in the thread,  haven't seen much that has put the PS5 through its paces yet, so I doubt these 20xx, 30xx, card owners are really getting their money's worth yet.

 

7 hours ago, Keatah said:

They say most PCs using SandyBridge and later are usable for 10 solid years. Still pretty good. Especially compared against the 386/486 through Pentium-4 times, where upgrades seemed to happen every 6-months or every year. And if pulp magazines had their way, you'd upgrade once every season. Have I ever complained about those publications before!?!?!

Windows 11 tried blocking old hardward, but sounds like they backed off?   So it's harder to get away with purposely obsoleting old hardware.   Since Apple controls the hardware and software side they can get away with being more aggressive.

[Steven Pendleton]

On 8/26/2022 at 4:20 AM, GoldLeader said:

Modern gaming fatigue?

 

See also my Status Update.

 

 

Yes, I consider PS3 "Modern"...

I forgot status updates still exist... I'm probably not the only one who forgot about them, I imagine.

[+GoldLeader]

5 hours ago, Steven Pendleton said:

I forgot status updates still exist... I'm probably not the only one who forgot about them, I imagine.

 

Yup! 

 

You have to select them under My Activity Streams (2nd choice)...

[adamchevy]

On 8/26/2022 at 7:48 AM, zzip said:

I pretty much skipped the late-90s 3D hardware scene,   was getting married needed to get things like a house there wasn't money in the budget for things like 3D.   Sounds like a dodged a bullet.  But when I did get a 3D capable card in the early 2000s, things were still kind of a mess.   It annoyed me that some of my favorite games that were 2D or isometric would release their next version in 3D just because.   This created all kinds of performance issues, and the beautiful graphics of the previous releases were replaced with kinda ugly 3D blobs or rough polygonal graphics.   I suppose it had to start somewhere but it just seemed many games rushed to 3D before it was ready. 

I was way into the 3D PC cutting edge graphics from 1997-2000.  I was amazed at games that came in the late 90s and early 2000s.  I played alot of Doom 2, Quake 2 and Quake 3 arena, and finally Counterstrike and Team Fortress.  The Lan parties that we played 20-30 player local Lan games were amazing.  I think 3D really made strides in 99 and 2000.  In 2000 Baldurs Gate 2 came out and it was a visual treat.  

On 8/26/2022 at 7:48 AM, zzip said:

 

There's a ton of games on Steam that run fine with basic 3D cards.   I find I prefer to more relaxing games on PC and AAA shooty shooty games on console.   So I don't see a need to upgrade my GPU anytime soon.   Like I said earlier in the thread,  haven't seen much that has put the PS5 through its paces yet, so I doubt these 20xx, 30xx, card owners are really getting their money's worth yet.

I agree with no need to upgrade at this point.  I think Unreal Engine 5 will change everything when it becomes mainstream amongst developers.

[Keatah]

On 8/26/2022 at 8:48 AM, zzip said:

I pretty much skipped the late-90s 3D hardware scene,   was getting married needed to get things like a house there wasn't money in the budget for things like 3D.   Sounds like a dodged a bullet.

Dodged a timesuck is what you did. Trying to live up to, and achieve, what the "enthusiast's collective" was doing becomes frustrating and hollow after a while. If that's the only mistake I made in my PC gamer's career then I'm doing fine. Stellar even!

 

On 8/26/2022 at 8:48 AM, zzip said:

But when I did get a 3D capable card in the early 2000s, things were still kind of a mess.

Not exactly sure when 3D started to stabilize. May have been around Maxwell/Kepler, the 9xx series. That's 2014'ish..

 

On 8/26/2022 at 8:48 AM, zzip said:

It annoyed me that some of my favorite games that were 2D or isometric would release their next version in 3D just because.   This created all kinds of performance issues, and the beautiful graphics of the previous releases were replaced with kinda ugly 3D blobs or rough polygonal graphics.   I suppose it had to start somewhere but it just seemed many games rushed to 3D before it was ready.

I didn't see it that way. The 2D's 3D counterparts were entirely new games to me. And they seemed like a natural progression. I do agree about the overall ugliness of early 3D-hardware enhanced games though. But the industry was still throwing shit at the wall to see what'd stick.

 

My first PC gaming was focused around some puzzle games, NanoTank, SimCity, Stellar7, Comanche, Outpost, Star Wars X-Wing, Tubular Worlds, Hi-Octane, Zone Raiders, Whacky Wheels, Tempest 2000.. And the technical astronomy and science applications.

 

Software 3D or Doom's so-called 2.5D kicked it into high gear for me. Duke3D, Hexen, Heretic, Quake, Descent came next. THEN the "real" 3D, like GLQuake, G-Police, Forsaken. and other contemporaries.

 

I got a little fatigued with PC 3D after Unreal Tournament GOTY edition. Maybe around the times of BioShock or System Shock. After the GeForce 4 epoch and definitely by 2009 it was over for me.

 

On 8/26/2022 at 8:48 AM, zzip said:

Like I said earlier in the thread,  haven't seen much that has put the PS5 through its paces yet, so I doubt these 20xx, 30xx, card owners are really getting their money's worth yet.

Still on my GTX1080, and seeing little need to go beyond that for my gaming and emu rig. Eventually I'll move into a 30xx, but will never pay more than 1/2 MSRP.

[zzip]

On 11/13/2022 at 6:17 AM, Keatah said:

Not exactly sure when 3D started to stabilize. May have been around Maxwell/Kepler, the 9xx series. That's 2014'ish..

Yeah it was a mess all during the early 2000s,  in fact I gave up on even thinking about running high-end PC games for awhile because they were always a struggle.   In fact it was when we finally got a PS4 it was a revelation "wow, I can just put a the game in the PS4 and it just works with beautiful 3D graphics?  No more wasted weekends trying to bring my PC up to snuff?   That was around 2014

On 11/13/2022 at 6:17 AM, Keatah said:

I didn't see it that way. The 2D's 3D counterparts were entirely new games to me. And they seemed like a natural progression. I do agree about the overall ugliness of early 3D-hardware enhanced games though. But the industry was still throwing shit at the wall to see what'd stick.

I'd argue a game like Monkey Island doesn't benefit from 3D.   They went from beautiful, stylized 2D art in Curse Of Monkey Island to a generic-looking 3D world in Escape from Monkey Island.   The price for that was suddenly your PC would struggle to run a LucasArts point and click adventure, when these were games that ran on fairly low-spec machines before that.   I guess it's not surprising this was the last adventure LucasArts released.   The fanbase for this type of game aren't necessarily going to be the type of people to run out and buy the latest PC upgrades.

 

 

[Tanooki]

I know it has been awhile on this since posting, and well, nothing really has changed with modern.  I got Valis Collection in the mail and Sonic Mania I found at a flea market cheap, neither I've made time for, and I have no excuse or explanation why exactly.  I really have no idea what the issue is, don't hate, dislike or have no legit reason not to use the Switch.  I've just been dabbling more with Gamecube/GBA and earlier stuff, and a couple daily do(non thieving optional for honest) gatcha mobile titles too.

 

Blew at least 6-7 hours this weekend going through a family members gaming collection they want to sell off, it's in a tub here, and it turned into more and more time, had to do various servicing/repair of a few systems, and it's largely done.  So that did net me a couple (so far) free GC games I wanted that's a nice savings (Robotech, Mario Strikers.)  I'm more feeling the care to do that than again...switch, which saddens (and confuses) me.