Gaming: Consoles X PCs

Blog entry posted by TiagoDu, Feb 22, 2012.

I play on Consoles since my childhood, but when PCs got into my life, it really flipped out. I play them both now, but i feel something special about PCs that i can't define.

I've found that both PCs and Consoles have their Pros, so i'm making a comparision between them.

Consoles Pros:

Simple to use: Anyone can turn on a Console and play a game. No need of installers, patches, massive set-ups. Just jump on and play.

Console-Exclusive Games: Some games are exclusive to consoles, not having PCs versions.

Console-Exclusive Accessoires: Kinect, Playstation "Wiimote Ripoff" Move, Wiimote, Wii Balance Board, Etc...

Mobility: Most consoles can be put on backpacks and can be transported easily. Note that Notebooks also qualify for this, but not all Notebooks are made to be gaming machines.

PCs Pros:

MultiTask System: A PC can be a gaming machine, but it's still a PC. This means you can search the intarwebz, download applications/games, send e-mails, do homework, listen to music, watch videos, view photos and a lot of other things. Some modern Consoles can play music/videos/photos, browse the web and send e-mails but not in the extent computers can.

Free Games: There's a lot of quality Free Games floating on the web, and you can download them all, or even play on the browser.

PC-Exclusive Games: Most of the games that make heavy use of the mouse (Strategy/Point'n'Click Adventure/Simulators/Some Puzzle Games) don't work well outside the PCs, so they are made PC-Exclusive.

Longevity: When a new console-generation comes, the gamer has to buy the new console to play new games. In PCs, the only thing you need to play new games are a new Video Card and some more RAM, not needing to buy a new one each generation. Eventually, you'll have to buy a new PC, but not every generation, for sure.

Backwards Compatibility: Old Consoles Games can only be played on the consoles they were made for, and not every console has backwards compatibility. In PCs, you can play from Commander Keen to Sonic Generations without loss of compatibility (You may need DOSBox to play DOS games, and some old Windows games may need special procedures to run on newer Windows, but nothing that can't be dealt with.)

Play Old Consoles Games(?): Well, this is it. Why will you buy consoles and console games, when you can download an emulator adn ROMs?
Well, it has Cons, though. Not all consoles have emulators, some emulators are not perfect and most Newer Consoles (PS1/PS2/GC/Wii) need a powerful machine to run properly. Besides, if you don't own the console/game you're playing, this is classified as piracy (Not that i'm against, i even have some NES/SNES ROMs on my PC:p).

So this is it. If you never owned a Console nor a PC, i would suggest you getting a PC first, then choose a Console you found intresting and worth paying for, then upgrading your PC to be a gaming machine.
However, the line between PC and Consoles is narrowing more each day. Consoles can do more things that PCs do and PCs can do more things a Console can do. For this, i don't care. If i can keep playing Quake on my PC, i'm fine with anything that comes.
TiagoDu

About the Author

A man who likes Games, and that's enough for regular people.
  1. Mario-Fan
    @SimplyMatt lolwut. Didn't you get Super Mario Galaxy 2? ... Okay, so that's more than a year ago, but seriously.
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  2. SimplyMatt
    Haven't played on a console in... oh my, a year (not really a gamer in these times). Like the post anywho, well written and made me think of some reasons why I don't play on consoles at all anymore.
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  3. TiagoDu
    @Ceed, well, Virtual Boy give headaches and we had to take a break each 15 minutes, and that's why it wasn't successful. Also, in PCs, there are some googles that enable you to look around while moving your head, but i've seen nothing like a pistol that aims dependent on your head rotation, but that would be cetainly cool. I never had a ROB so i can't say much apart from what i know from SSBB :P. @Renex An emustation and a multimedia station!
    roman6a likes this.
  4. ReNeX
    We can even grab a Wii and turn it into an emustation. It can run anything up to Wii. Hahaha
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  5. Ceed
    Also ROB was rad, he was basically a game controller that parts of him you moved to move the character in the game, I think that's way cooler than a computer player.
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  6. Ceed
    No I just mean like why didn't any of these things get pushed further, gaming visors/helmets would be cool, 3D isn't quite the same, 3D shows an environment in a different appearance applying the illusion of depth but imagine a game where instead of using an analogue stick to look around you move your head, using something like the superscope or other point devices that would work even when your not looking in the direction your using it.
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  7. TiagoDu
    @Ceed Virtual Boy is not needed anymore. 3D TV is advancing more than ever: Now they don't need even 3D Glasses. And Look at 3DS! ROB? Maybe a robot that really plays with us. Gets the controller and actually play the game! SuperScope is only a standard Gun accessory, like many others. And...Mind-Controlled Games? Well, we already have whole body-controlled games, and some applications controlled by cerebral impulses. Technology is progressing at an expoential rate. Why not?
    roman6a likes this.
  8. Ceed
    Come to think of it why didn't the nintendo superscope, ROB, and virtual boy kick off any kind of revolution in gaming design, I really would like to see a suped up version of the virtual boy. Maybe it did kick something off but it was a very slow kick.
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  9. Ceed
    Yeah haha, the move was definitely a ploy to attract the audience attracted to the wii for its new mechanics. That's for sure. Sony and microsoft didnt seem to think there was any money to be made there until the wii proved otherwise which is awesome because that means were getting away from the normal approach for video games, hopefully we'll go to mental recog games at some point.
    roman6a and TiagoDu like this.
  10. TiagoDu
    @Ceed Well, i bet Sony wouldn't make Move if nintendo didn't make Wiimote.
    roman6a likes this.