Personal Computer Game News

[yourbeliefs]

Halo 6 will be coming to PC as well.

Not exactly. I'm assuming you're referring to the quotes from this interview/article:

http://www.pcgamer.com/halo-6-will-release-on-windows-10/

To me, that's NOT confirmation that yes, Halo 6 will be on PC. It certainly alludes to it by saying Microsoft first party games will be on PC, but until I see something from Microsoft that says that "Yes, Halo 6 will release on PC" I'm not assuming anything. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see Halo 6 on PC, but I'm of the mindset of "I'll believe it when I see it." And let's not forget that Phil has been known to have his mouth write checks that his staff can't cash. Lord knows the Xbox One Backwards Compatibility, while a cool feature, isn't nearly as robust and full of games that Phil originally sold it would be.

I know I'm nit-picking here, but honestly, Halo is in a class of its own. I know 2 previous games were on PC but those were basically simple ports that were commissioned. Halo 6 on PC would be a major undertaking, both programmatically and marketing-wise. Yes it opens up the franchise for more gamers but also does hurt the marketability of the One if people realize they don't need the One to play the newest Halo game. It's a very tight rope to walk, and from a business perspective it really could go either way.

 

[king3pj]

Not exactly. I'm assuming you're referring to the quotes from this interview/article:

http://www.pcgamer.com/halo-6-will-release-on-windows-10/

To me, that's NOT confirmation that yes, Halo 6 will be on PC. It certainly alludes to it by saying Microsoft first party games will be on PC, but until I see something from Microsoft that says that "Yes, Halo 6 will release on PC" I'm not assuming anything. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see Halo 6 on PC, but I'm of the mindset of "I'll believe it when I see it." And let's not forget that Phil has been known to have his mouth write checks that his staff can't cash. Lord knows the Xbox One Backwards Compatibility, while a cool feature, isn't nearly as robust and full of games that Phil originally sold it would be.

I know I'm nit-picking here, but honestly, Halo is in a class of its own. I know 2 previous games were on PC but those were basically simple ports that were commissioned. Halo 6 on PC would be a major undertaking, both programmatically and marketing-wise. Yes it opens up the franchise for more gamers but also does hurt the marketability of the One if people realize they don't need the One to play the newest Halo game. It's a very tight rope to walk, and from a business perspective it really could go either way.

I think it's much more likely that Halo 6 will be on PC than not. Every single first party game they talked about at E3 this year is part of Play Anywhere.

You are right that there are plenty of people who will decide that they don't need to buy an Xbox if they can get Halo on PC, although most die hard Halo fans probably already bought one to play Halo 5. That being said, I'm not sure they care if Xbox console sales go down if that means game sales go up. The console sales themselves have never been where Sony and Microsoft make their money in the video game business. Game sales are where that happens.

I'm sure Microsoft would be happy to abandon consoles completely if they thought they could get their Xbox customers to switch to PC and buy games from the Windows 10 store instead of Steam. They would still get their 30% cut of every game sold without having to spend millions on R&D and manufacturing costs. It would be significantly more profitable for them.

Unfortunately for them Steam and the other digital storefronts have already got the PC games area covered and the Windows 10 store is struggling to make a dent in that market share. Bringing their Xbox exclusives to PC exclusively on the Windows 10 store (at least at launch) is clearly them trying to shift PC gamers over to their storefront and start to carve out some of that market share for themselves.

Edit: I also think the reason that Halo 5 Forge exists on PC was to give the developers a chance to work with Halo on PC before bringing a major release to that platform. This is the same reason Forza 6 Apex was made as a free to play game before Forza Horizon 3.

 

[yourbeliefs]

More crap that gamers have to deal with.

If you don't pre-order CIV 6, you don't get to play as the Aztecs for 90 days. So basically they're punishing you for waiting until launch to purchase.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Looks like the Shadow Warrior 2 PC release is trying to do right by PC gamers.

http://steamcommunity.com/app/324800/discussions/0/343785574529270965/

 

[king3pj]

More crap that gamers have to deal with.

If you don't pre-order CIV 6, you don't get to play as the Aztecs for 90 days. So basically they're punishing you for waiting until launch to purchase.

I'm not a fan of holding content to turn it into a pre-order bonus but obviously tons of games do this. At least we seem to be past the days where most games have different bonuses depending on which store you buy from so you can never get it all. Even that still happens on some games though.In this case there are 22 civilizations in the game so having to wait 90 days to be able to play as an additional one isn't a big deal to me.

I was planning on waiting until the first major expansion comes out before buying this game because the expansions changed Civ V in huge ways. Part of me wants to just use some of my Amazon credit and buy it now with the Prime discount though.

 

[yourbeliefs]

For some reason, the PC version of Mafia 3 is locked at 30 FPS. 2K has stated though that this is not permanent. Still, sucks for those that wanted to play it Day 1 the way it was meant to be played.

http://www.pcgamer.com/mafia-3-appears-to-be-locked-to-30fps-on-pc/

Update: 2K has released an official statement on the matter.

https://mafiagame.com/en/news/view/en-mafia-3-a-message-to-our-pc-players/

 

[yourbeliefs]

Dungeon Keeper is free via Origin.
https://www.origin.com/usa/en-us/store/dungeon-keeper/dungeon-keeper/standard-edition

 

[yourbeliefs]

The developers of Gears of War 4 have put together a very comprehensive performance guide for PC Users to get the most out of their game.

https://gearsofwar.com/en-us/developerblog/8/gearsofwar4perfguide

 

[king3pj]

The developers of Gears of War 4 have put together a very comprehensive performance guide for PC Users to get the most out of their game.

https://gearsofwar.com/en-us/developerblog/8/gearsofwar4perfguide

That was actually a pretty interesting read. Also, I'm not sure I've seen a developer benchmark their own game and publish the results before. Usually you have to wait a few days for other websites to get their hands on the game and run benchmarks. I also like that they used my exact CPU for their benchmark tests, although theirs is at a stock 3.5GHz while mine is overclocked to 4.0GHz.

If you don't care to read the whole guide and would rather just see how your card will perform here are the benchmarks for 1080p and 1440p.

It looks like my 1070 should average 71.8 FPS at 1440p with ultra settings. As long as I'm above 60 I'm happy. If these benchmarks prove to be accurate it looks like they did a good job with the PC port of Gears 4.

Nvidia's performance guide is also worth looking at if you care about this stuff. They put these in depth guides out for some major releases telling you exactly what each setting does and how much of a performance impact that setting has. They also include pictures showing you the visual difference each setting makes.

http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/guides/gears-of-war-4-graphics-and-performance-guide

 

[yourbeliefs]

Well if I end up liking Gears 4 enough to buy it on PC it's good to know that my current card should run okay on it. As long as I can get 60 FPS I'll be happy. It does annoy me a bit that you'll be playing the game at 60 FPS while I'll be right next to you in the game playing at 30 on my One.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Not only is Mafia 3 on PC suffering from a 30 FPS lock (which got people so mad that 2K is rushing to get it unlocked this weekend) but apparently the resolution isn't working right either, and that everything is being upscaled from 720p. And of course, the other numerous bugs that are inherent with the first release of an open world game nowadays.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/mafia-3-hangar-13/

 

[yourbeliefs]

I have no willpower

Edit: I hope I don't live to regret this. The game has unlocked already for Ultimate Edition players and the Gears Of War Subreddit is flooded with complaints about the game. It takes a LONG time to connect to games, and random disconnects are very common. I'm hoping the devs will use this time to fix things up before the "big" launch on Tuesday. We better not have another MCC situation on our hands.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Counterstrike: GO has added Sprays back into the game. Some caveats though: You have to buy them, and they're limited use. Also, some players have found some disturbing features about them, primarily that they have transparency issues.

http://kotaku.com/valves-decision-to-charge-for-limited-use-sprays-in-cou-1787529229

 

[yourbeliefs]

Star Citizen's Single Player campaign isn't going to make its target release of 2016.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/star...r-campaign-will-miss-2016-launch-date/0173645

 

[mdram]

Star Citizen's Single Player campaign isn't going to make its target release of 2016.

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/star...r-campaign-will-miss-2016-launch-date/0173645

REALLY? imagine that, another deadline missed
best internet scam ever!

 

[yourbeliefs]

Digital Foundry has released some analysis of Gears 4 performance. Even on the One the game looks and runs great. As far as PC goes, it looks like The Coalition wanted to remove the stink of previous UWP games and released, as DF called it "One of the best optimized PC games ever." Good to know, as my 960 is going to need some good optimizations to run well. I hope I won't have to be doing tons of tweaking to get good performance with decent visuals.

 

[king3pj]

Digital Foundry has released some analysis of Gears 4 performance. Even on the One the game looks and runs great. As far as PC goes, it looks like The Coalition wanted to remove the stink of previous UWP games and released, as DF called it "One of the best optimized PC games ever." Good to know, as my 960 is going to need some good optimizations to run well. I hope I won't have to be doing tons of tweaking to get good performance with decent visuals.

Looks great. I'm also very happy with the PC version of Forza Horizon 3. If these two games are an example of what we can expect from Xbox titles on PC going forward I will have no problem with buying their exclusives digitally through the Windows 10 store to take advantage for the Play Anywhere program. Even if those games come to Steam later I would rather have the Windows Store version so I own them on both Xbox and PC.

 

[yourbeliefs]

Shadow Warrior 2 will allow "cross play" co-op, meaning that if you have the Steam version or the GoG (DRM Free) version you'll be able to play with each other.



I didn't realize that this game had campaign co-op. Maybe if we hit a lull and after a steep discount king3pj and some other PC players can try this out (It allows for 4 player co-op.)

 

[yourbeliefs]

Reviews of Shadow Warrior 2 are out. Looks like overall it's pretty good.

 

[king3pj]

I've been meaning to get around to it but I still haven't played the first one. I don't see that happening any time soon.