X06: (XBox 360 Versions) Half-Life 2 and Portal Impressions + holy shit the price....

[Shift]

If EA doesn't come out with an equivilent HL2,Ep1,Ep2,Portal,TF2 for a standard and thus lower PC retail price: I will eat my own arse.

Ahh! Another graduate from Nintendo buisness 101: "how to sell ports of your titles 10 years down the line with minimal enhancement and a full asking price". It should not be full asking price. It's an old game, and to price it fully would be to undermine sales with a PC version that is still widely available, and going for £30 less.

Somehow I really dont think you get my point. There will be people who have stuck with consoles all the time, have a 360, and have never played the immense HL2+EP1. But they will get both of those games, plus EP2 (which means they dont have to wait for months to see the next part of the story like with did :hmph: ) and they get Portal and TF2 with it. They will get the entire start of the story, and half the episodes, and Portal and TF2, for the price of one game, it will be pure gaming bliss for those who haven't played HL2 etc yet.

Plus I would just like to add, I also used to hate FPSs on the consoles, they were lousy to control, rubbish graphics, crap framerate and generally just a shit game, the only two fps titles I really, really enjoyed in the past on a console was Perfect Dark and Goldeneye on the N64. But the 360 control is VERY easy to use, especially for FPSs, plus the games that we play will be mostly the games that the PC gamers will play, so same game. Plus you pay a lot less for it, you dont have to upgrade and you can buy a game in knowledge that it will definately always run at full pelt with very nice graphics. Its a win win situation in my opinion.

 

[kupocake]

Somehow I really dont think you get my point.

MY point is that your arguement is pointless, since the exact same thing may apply to people who pick up forthcoming, equivilent Half-Life 2 packs on the PC. For considerably cheaper.

But the 360 control is VERY easy to use, especially for FPSs, plus the games that we play will be mostly the games that the PC gamers will play, so same game.

The guy driving the airboat in the X06 video needs a bit of practice though

 

[stemot]

the 360 control is VERY easy to use, especially for FPSs.

That still don`t give the perfect control that a mouse and keyboard do, hence the need for a certain amount of autoaim in every console FPS made.

 

[ShadowJustice]

I'd really consider buying the xbox 360. But it really bugs me not being able to play first person shooters the way they are meant to be played - with a mouse and a keyboard.


I played hl1 decay (coop) for the ps2 with the joypad and it wasn't too bad, but I really hate not being able to play games the way I like.

Also, on my configuration I play Hl2 episode one with temporal antialiasing 6x and anisotropic filtering 16x ... something that's not going to happen on the xbox 360.

 

[Cole]

Ahh! Another graduate from Nintendo buisness 101: "how to sell ports of your titles 10 years down the line with minimal enhancement and a full asking price". It should not be full asking price. It's an old game, and to price it fully would be to undermine sales with a PC version that is still widely available, and going for £30 less

Because Zelda games are nearly the same since the original debut! Same with those Mario games.

 

[Shift]

That still don`t give the perfect control that a mouse and keyboard do, hence the need for a certain amount of autoaim in every console FPS made.

Every person I know who went from PC to 360 has said that the controller is just as easy to use as the mouse

 

[Asknoone]

The 360 controller is fantastic.

 

[kupocake]

Because Zelda games are nearly the same since the original debut! Same with those Mario games.

No, newer titles have built upon the old, but Nintendo continually brings the old titles back for new platforms. See the Super Mario Advance Series - hell, three of those four games were on a single cartridge a decade ago!

 

[Warbie]

Come on guys - HL2 will be fine on a pad. It isn't a twitch shooter, it's pretty easy, and there's no need for the quick precision a mouse offers (this isn't Quake 3). A joypad will be fine.

 

[kupocake]

A joypad will be fine.

It could well be brilliant for the Driving Sections. Though like I said earlier, the gy in the video needs some practice

 

[Noobulon]

Come on guys - HL2 will be fine on a pad. It isn't a twitch shooter, it's pretty easy, and there's no need for the quick precision a mouse offers (this isn't Quake 3). A joypad will be fine.

I usually think a pad is fine, but I have got a few concerns about Portal.
Although it ain't a twitch shooter, the videos show sections which require lightning-quick portal placement and precise aiming.

I hope they won't tone down the acrobatics in the PC version, in order to make it all doable with thumbsticks...

 

[Jintor]

Come on guys - HL2 will be fine on a pad. It isn't a twitch shooter, it's pretty easy, and there's no need for the quick precision a mouse offers (this isn't Quake 3). A joypad will be fine.

I don't care how easy it is on a pad! It's a PC game, and I refuse to share!

 

[SpotEnemyBoats]

Every person I know who went from PC to 360 has said that the controller is just as easy to use as the mouse

I tried playing Call of Duty 2 for the Xbox 360 in EB games & it was bitch to control the crosshair, I get frustrated easily.

But CoD2 for the PC controls was just a walk in the park as far as moving the crosshair around shooting stuff & moving your soldier around.


I just have very little patience with that sort of thing.

 

[UseAbuse]

I don't care how easy it is on a pad! It's a PC game, and I refuse to share!

*snatches PC game from Jintor* It's mine, it's mine, all mine!!

 

[stemot]

I tried playing Call of Duty 2 for the Xbox 360 in EB games & it was bitch to control the crosshair, I get frustrated easily.

But CoD2 for the PC controls was just a walk in the park as far as moving the crosshair around shooting stuff & moving your soldier around.


I just have very little patience with that sort of thing.

That`s what I`m talking about, there is no way you can have the same control with a pad, as you can with keyboard and mouse set up, I`m just not having that, and your description of COD360 is exactly my experience with console shooters.

To difficult to put your aim in pixel perfect place.

I`m not saying it won`t be a good 360 game, I`m just saying that for maximum gameplay, you can`t beat the mouse and keys.

 

[Shift]

That`s what I`m talking about, there is no way you can have the same control with a pad, as you can with keyboard and mouse set up, I`m just not having that, and your description of COD360 is exactly my experience with console shooters.

To difficult to put your aim in pixel perfect place.

I`m not saying it won`t be a good 360 game, I`m just saying that for maximum gameplay, you can`t beat the mouse and keys.

Yes you can, you can put the aim in pixel-perfect position. Ill admit, when I first had a go og CoD2 on my mates 360, it took me a while to adjust to it. But once I had adjusted it, I swear, I could aim just as perfectly as I could with the mouse, why do you think the 360 are now releasing RTSs? Battle for Middle Earth got a very good rating I was told, and it wouldn't have got a very good rating had it been irritating to control. The 360 controller is the most well designed controller to date.

 

[stemot]

Well, I`ll stick to using my mouse , works perfectly for me, besides, I can play MODS on the PC version as well.

One thing that does make me wonder, this is all the HL2 games Valve are planning to make (with all episodes after EP3 being outsourced), so why release it all in one package, but miss off the last part.

Wouldn`t they be best waiting until they had finished all the Eps first?
Does this mean, that when EP3 is released, they are gonna charge the full price for the one title, because if they do that on console, it`s possible they`ll do it on PC too.

 

[knut]

Honestly, I can't see how anyone can get stuck between controlling with a mouse or controlling with a controller (analog, etc) I mean, it's not mind-numbling hard to use them, is it? Granted, they both took me a while to get use to, but doesn't everything? Working in biro for art with shadings and the like took me a while to get use to, but I say a while and I mean 2 lessons at max.

But fair enough, it's horses for courses... or something.

In my opinion, I like both, but I feel aiming with a mouse to be way too unrealalistic. Well, they both are in their own sense, but with a mouse I felt the character looked odd turning his weapon, a weapon being like a heavy machine gun, way too fast in all these different directions. But hey, whatever.

 

[stemot]

In my opinion, I like both, but I feel aiming with a mouse to be way too unrealalistic. Well, they both are in their own sense, but with a mouse I felt the character looked odd turning his weapon, a weapon being like a heavy machine gun, way too fast in all these different directions. But hey, whatever.

Weight`s not really an issue when he`s using the HEV suit though

 

[SpotEnemyBoats]

I don't see myself buying the next gen consoles, Im pretty happy with my pc.


PC FOR LIFE!!!!

 

[Shift]

I don't see myself buying the next gen consoles, Im pretty happy with my pc.


PC FOR LIFE!!!!

Well make sure you have 2k saved up for next year, because you WILL need it to upgrade with all the ridiculous things thy are adding to computers now.

Ill add also, that with a statement, that yes, with mouse it does feel a tad unrealistic, but with the 360 controller and the rumble feature etc, you get more of a feel in the game, I have always liked the mouse over controllers, but for the 360 controller I am afraid I am gonna have to make the exception, they have a made a spot-on controller.

 

[SpotEnemyBoats]

Well make sure you have 2k saved up for next year, because you WILL need it to upgrade with all the ridiculous things thy are adding to computers now.

Even so, but if buying a console every 3 or 4 years is pricey. Infact a PC is much cheaper to maintain if you have a budget.


Don't forget about vista, DX10...Gabe said that He feels the PC is still has the upper hand, DX10 so in future Hl's and episodes he will suport that. So XBox360 will not get those features after ep2.

I've been a PC gamer for a good % of my life here on earth & PC's grow very quickly in a short period of time & before you know it the PC will have out weighed the 360....Count on it .

Im a die hard PC guy, & very stubborn.

 

[Shift]

Even so, but if buying a console every 3 or 4 years is pricey. Infact a PC is much cheaper to maintain if you have a budget.


Don't forget about vista, DX10...Gabe said that He feels the PC is still has the upper hand, DX10 so in future Hl's and episodes he will suport that. So XBox360 will not get those features after ep2.

I've been a PC gamer for a good % of my life here on earth & PC's grow very quickly in a short period of time & before you know it the PC will have out weighed the 360....Count on it .

Im a die hard PC guy, & very stubborn.

Yeah we will be stuck at DX9 but it doesn't mean we wont get the games that the pc get, we will just get them and they will look less of what they look on the PC. A PC used to be cheaper to maintain, but certainly not now, it would be now incredibly cheaper to buy the consoles than upgrade will all the crap the PCs are coming out with now. Quite frankly, I think someone would have to be a fool to spend the immense amount of money demanded to upgrade PCs just to play computer games well, I mean 2k? I could buy a car for that! The PC industries are ripping the PC users off big time I only just recently realized that, so unless you have a shit load of money, then you are making a mistake in going for the PCs.

 

[Dr. Zoidberg]

Who cares what they cost? If your cheap and can put up with the shit consoles give you (Pay for MP and maps, no mouse keyboard, limited preformance, no mods) then you do that. If you want the best preformance that is possible with video graphics and want a mouse and keyboard then go with the pc.

Oh by the way, if I were to upgrade so I could play a DX10 game, it would only cost 400-500 for a new video card (Mind you it always cost top $ for brand new hardware). If I wanted to upgrade to the new quad core chips (Which I dont need to play video games) I could buy a new mother board for 200, by some DDR 2 for 100, and by a new chip for 300-500. That total does not equal 2000.

 

[Shift]

Urrr, the consoles aren't shit in any way shape or form and, £230 for a shit console? Dont think so.

And you wont just need a new video card by the way, you will need a new quad-core processor when they come out, and you will need vista when that comes out, to run the game well. With just the video card, say bye bye to fps. That will come to around £1500-£2000 I think.

 

[SpotEnemyBoats]

Urrr, the consoles aren't shit in any way shape or form and, £230 for a shit console? Dont think so.

And you wont just need a new video card by the way, you will need a new quad-core processor when they come out, and you will need vista when that comes out, to run the game well. With just the video card, say bye bye to fps. That will come to around £1500-£2000 I think.

errm, It does'nt cost 2k, I think in future games it wont cost 2k to get.

IMO a dual core processor like AMD 64 +4200 processor will do just fine(you don't need a 3 core processor& most programs don't utilize the two core's), a GeForce 7600GT(It got great reviews) which is around 120-150 & it runs Half-Life 2 like butter 80 FPS, Vista, 2GiG ram, & a new MoBo its is'nt that expensive.


I usually buy part by part at Newegg.com they're cheep there.



PC's are underrated.

 

[stemot]

Yeah, the 2 grand estimation for a new PC is ridiculous.

I`m looking to get a new PC with a dual core AMD64, and a decent graphics card around chrimbo, and if I buy one of a dedicated seller on e-bay, I`m looking at around £500-600, which will be more than enough to run Vista etc, I`ll just upgrade the Graphics card at the time when DX10 has more specialist games to warrent the buy.

 

[Cuthbert]

And I must add, you don't have to buy the new stuff when it's released. If you just wait 6 months or so, prices of pc upgrades decrease. So you'll buy DirectX10 equipment paying reasonable money after 2 years, that XBOX owners can't. There are many advantages of Pcs over consoles. Only advantege consoles have is that you play games at a standard quality so you don't have to worry about "how good will this game work on my console?". And no matter how good the XBOX360 controller is RTSs and FPSs are meant to be played with a keyboard and a mouse.

 

[586FAC75]

I concur, I've just been window shopping on the web and to upgrade my PC to shitting-on-a-xbox360-from-a-great-heightness would only cost £316

 

[Cuthbert]

I concur, I've just been window shopping on the web and to upgrade my PC to shitting-on-a-xbox360-from-a-great-heightness would only cost £316

Not that I don't believe you but I just plan upgrading in near future, so can you tell me which cards and processor you bought? I really have no idea what should i get to make a great shitting performance like that.

 

[function9]

A few weeks ago I was at my sister's. Her husband is a big xbox junky and I tried playing H*lo. I tried every configuration I could for the controls, I don't know how people can play like that. I'm too used to a mouse+kb.

 

[Shift]

And I must add, you don't have to buy the new stuff when it's released. If you just wait 6 months or so, prices of pc upgrades decrease. So you'll buy DirectX10 equipment paying reasonable money after 2 years, that XBOX owners can't. There are many advantages of Pcs over consoles. Only advantege consoles have is that you play games at a standard quality so you don't have to worry about "how good will this game work on my console?". And no matter how good the XBOX360 controller is RTSs and FPSs are meant to be played with a keyboard and a mouse.

It aint standard quality at all, I have seen some of the games that are coming out for the 360 next year and they look incredible, using graphics of the likes I haven't even seen yet, it may be DX9, but DX9 can still come out with some immense graphics, I mean you have seen how awsome EP2 and Portal look, not to mention a lot of other games that have been announced. Oh and yeah, I may have overdone the price tags of this new equipment but the main point I was getting at is that overall, the equipment is very expensive I personally would not want to blow all my hard earned money away on all the upgrades when I could just spend £230 for a 360 and thats that. This is my personal opinion on the matter so stop slating it, I am just not so much into computer games that I would wanna spend a lot of money monthly just to upgrade my PC, if I was loaded, then yeah, but Im not, so its consoles for me. Oh and stop slating the consoles too, you are most certainly a fool to say that the 360 is crap, its is no where near crap, and the sales it has made is proof of that.

 

[586FAC75]

Not that I don't believe you but I just plan upgrading in near future, so can you tell me which cards and processor you bought? I really have no idea what should i get to make a great shitting performance like that.

Kebab Vindaloo should get it going

Haven't bought them as yet, but will do when I can scrape the dough together; nVidia GeForce 7600 GT 256mb graphics card and AMD Athlon 64 7600+.

Okay, maybe slightly exaggerating on the height the shite may fall...But it's still £300 and-a-bit quid I'd rather spend than on an Xbox 360...I'm just not a console person.

 

[SpotEnemyBoats]

Lets look at this way, Every time you buy a new console & what not it becomes overlwelmingly expensive...every 3-5 years you get a new console, First vanilla xbox starting price $200, Xbox 360 $300 depending if you want the premium version of it, the PS3 $700 I think.

After all the years you spend buying new console every 3 years, not too mention the games are overpriced, $60 even the crappiest game. Plus no game updates patches (which fix critical problems & glitches), Mods which will never be on the console mods keep the game alive for several years.

Also imo the 360 is'nt all that great its ram is 512mb lol, & 20GiG ahem.


Eventually the Pc will have completly outmatched the 360 in due time. Dx10 will only be available for the Pc, vista and new hardware.

the 360 in the eyars will have the same graphics as it did lets say a year from now, while the pc have completly evolved.


EDIT: Oh wait did'nt the 360 have a cooling problem? the 360 would over heat, what happened to that?

 

[Warbie]

I concur, I've just been window shopping on the web and to upgrade my PC to shitting-on-a-xbox360-from-a-great-heightness would only cost £316

What complete and utter crap

You could spend double that and still have a pc which lacks the power of a 360.

 

[Chirs]

FPS are so hard to play on xbox 360 pads. can you use USB keyboard and mouse on the 360?

 

[Warbie]

Lets look at this way, Every time you buy a new console & what not it becomes overlwelmingly expensive...every 3-5 years you get a new console, First vanilla xbox starting price $200, Xbox 360 $300 depending if you want the premium version of it, the PS3 $700 I think.

To keep up with pc gaming, to play with decent settings at a good frame rate, you have to upgrade every two or three years (often more frequently), each time spending more than the price of a new console. I'd say it's cheaper to buy each console of any given generation than to keep up with the hardware the latest pc games demand.

And before someone says, 'well i'm still gaming on a P3', that's fair enough, but it completely negates the 'pc games will look better in a year' argument.

Plus no game updates patches (which fix critical problems & glitches), Mods which will never be on the console mods keep the game alive for several years.

You're right about mods - not that that bothers me, there are so many good games around these days that I don't have time for mods. Updates and patches can also now be delivered to consoles (see Xbox Live). Unlike the pc, this is rarely needed. Console games aren't nearly as 'glitchy' and don't suffer from the 'critical problems' that quite often plague pc releases.

Also imo the 360 is'nt all that great its ram is 512mb lol, & 20GiG ahem.

Keep trying to convince yourself

Eventually the Pc will have completly outmatched the 360 in due time. Dx10 will only be available for the Pc, vista and new hardware.

Sure, but at a price. Technology also doesn't equal better games.

the 360 in the eyars will have the same graphics as it did lets say a year from now, while the pc have completly evolved.

Each time it 'evolves' you need to open your wallet again. And what does that get you - 90% of the time exactly the same games from the limited no. of genre that you were playing before.

Games on the 360/PS3 will also look considerably better in a year or two - just as with every console, developers learn to get more out of the hardware over time. First generation games always look quite poor compared to the 2nd and 3rd. If anything, I noticed more of an improvement between the first and last games on the N64 and PSX than with the new gfx card for my pc.

EDIT: Oh wait did'nt the 360 have a cooling problem? the 360 would over heat, what happened to that?

They can run a little warm, as can any hardware. Mine has never crashed, and certainly not as often as your average pc.

I'm not saying consoles are better btw, I just felt the need to replay to your :rolling: post.

FPS are so hard to play on xbox 360 pads. can you use USB keyboard and mouse on the 360?

Nope. MS made the decision not to allow the use of a mouse for gaming on the 360 and are sticking with it.

It really isn't so bad using a pad. Infact, some fps (usually slower paced ones) work better than with a mouse and keybaord.

 

[pomegranate]

Who cares what they cost? If your cheap and can put up with the shit consoles give you (Pay for MP and maps, no mouse keyboard, limited preformance, no mods) then you do that. If you want the best preformance that is possible with video graphics and want a mouse and keyboard then go with the pc.

Alternatively, Get. A. Life. Then you won't be so bothered about having the very very very best graphics.... 'cos, you know, it doesn't really matter.

 

[bigburpco]

I don't see myself buying the next gen consoles, Im pretty happy with my pc.


PC FOR LIFE!!!!

I can still imagine wielding some sword or lightsaber with the Wii though.

 

[DEATHMASTER]

I understand where KB is coming from with the PC love, but there's no reason to simply bash consoles.