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[HeWhoWalks]

Tell me you are a Playstation fanboy without telling me you are a PlayStation fanboy

"People are too invested in this shit".


Anyway, in a bad place? Not in my world. ONLY thing wrong with PC is lack of games that are made solely for it (which I get, but it would still be nice). Otherwise, it remains my go-to platform for practically everything!

 

[Spiral1407]

Yes, entry level hardware performs like ass and costs what mid-range did in the 2010s. The reliance on upscalers/frame gen to get decent performance is also disappointing.

And don't give me that inflation bs. Consoles managed to remain at a relatively similar price for decades so there's no excuse.

PS1: $299
PS2: $299
PS3 (No Wifi): $499
PS4: $399
PS4 Pro: $399
PS5 (Digital): $399

Now let's look at PC GPUs. The 1070 launched at $379 and the shitty 4060 is actually more expensive than that at $399. Now what does the 5070 cost, you might ask? $549, take it or leave it...

$399 got you a whole ass console since 2008 (and even more than that if you consider the 360s pricing). $399 in the modern PC space gets you one shitty component that sometimes gets beaten by its predecessor.

 

[Justin9mm]

"natively" means literally nothing in 2025. You think the PS5 Pro does fuck-all "natively"?

You're right! But he still has a point. Unless you want high end. Better value and performance out of a console for mid range.

 

[Dorago]

There are no big budget games made for PC only anymore.

Half Life Alyx doesn't count.

Therefore PC graphics are stagnant meaning game graphics are stagnant.

You aren't getting innovation building games fro souped up AMD laptop APUs.

Also the Nvidia focus on "new techniques" that haven't improved performance is a hindrance too.

You have AMD native games ported to bizarre Nvidia chips running on 1,000,000 different hardware configs.

If someone came out with a new superior hardware/OS standard this problem would solve itself quickly.

It would be like IBM compatible becoming the standard in the mid 1980s crushing the zoo of 8 and 16 bit custom architectures.

We need the <blank> computer with <blank> standard hardware running this very efficient and performant OS called <blank>.

Would that be so hard?

 

[Schmendrick]

Yes, entry level hardware performs like ass and costs what mid-range did in the 2010s. The reliance on upscalers/frame gen to get decent performance is also disappointing.

And don't give me that inflation bs. Consoles managed to remain at a relatively similar price for decades so there's no excuse.

PS1: $299
PS2: $299
PS3 (No Wifi): $499
PS4: $399
PS4 Pro: $399
PS5 (Digital): $399

Now let's look at PC GPUs. The 1070 launched at $379 and the shitty 4060 is actually more expensive than that at $399. Now what does the 5070 cost, you might ask? $549, take it or leave it...

$399 got you a whole ass console since 2008 (and even more than that if you consider the 360s pricing). $399 in the modern PC space gets you one shitty component that sometimes gets beaten by its predecessor.

uh huh, and we`re forgetting the 699$ PS5 Pro that`s weaker than the 549$ 5070 and is in general a laughable uplift from the base console given its price....who`d have thought that market prices affect all players in a given market, right?

The PS5 came out at the beginning of the whole semiconducter misery we`re in now, the pro and the stable base prices 4+ years in are just a first taste of what this means for console pricing. If you think the next gen is gonna be much cheaper than roughly comparable PC components and the platform holders will just eat the giant increase in manufacturing cost I´ve got a bridge to sell you.
Argumenting with a pricing history that`s literally from another era at this point is ridiculous. Moore`s Law is largely dead and with it the classic scaling that made gen on gen power increases comparably cheap and "old" nodes degrade in pricing fast.

 

[Guilty_AI]

There are no big budget games made for PC only anymore.

Half Life Alyx doesn't count.

Therefore PC graphics are stagnant meaning game graphics are stagnant.

You aren't getting innovation building games fro souped up AMD laptop APUs.

Also the Nvidia focus on "new techniques" that haven't improved performance is a hindrance too.

You have AMD native games ported to bizarre Nvidia chips running on 1,000,000 different hardware configs.

If someone came out with a new superior hardware/OS standard this problem would solve itself quickly.

It would be like IBM compatible becoming the standard in the mid 1980s crushing the zoo of 8 and 16 bit custom architectures.

We need the <blank> computer with <blank> standard hardware running this very efficient and performant OS called <blank>.

Would that be so hard?

Yes it would be hard because it'd be absolutely unnecessary and useless. This isn't the 80/90s, computers don't need to squeeze out the last bit of hardware functionality to run basic applications anymore, devs don't need to rack their brains to give their game basic features like "3D" or "sligthly more open levels".

To make a top-of-the-line game today, the biggest hurdle is managerial and logistical, not the hardware.

 

[SmokedMeat]

Nah. We get just about everything that gets released with Nintendo being the only exception.

In terms of builds you build to what your budget is. You can always upgrade as you go.

 

[delirium trigger]

Yes, entry level hardware performs like ass and costs what mid-range did in the 2010s. The reliance on upscalers/frame gen to get decent performance is also disappointing.

Entry level hardware doesn't perform like ass at all. You can build a 4060 pc for like 800 bucks and turn raytracing and pathtracing on in cyberpunk. You can even turn the traffic up due to a better cpu than the consoles.

My parents got us a compaq desktop with an nvidia card in like 1998 for 699 or 799 and that was pretty standard over 25 years ago, lol.

 

[nkarafo]

Yes.

Game optimization is at a new low. All these new techniques like upscaling and frame gen only make the situation worse because devs use them as a safety net for shitty code.

Unreal Engine 5 is one of the worst game engines ever made and one of the most widespread.

Shader compilation stutters is a new issue that didn't exist before, at least not at this level.

GPU prices are a joke. Mid range cards now cost as much as enthusiast cards would a few gens ago.

 

[delirium trigger]

Scratch that, it was an hp pavilion in 2001, had windows xp on it. I had a dell with a voodoo graphics card and windows 98 before that. Pc desktops are actually fairly similarly priced to what they were 20+ years ago which is kind of crazy.

 

[Spiral1407]

uh huh, and we`re forgetting the 699$ PS5 Pro that`s weaker than the 549$ 5070 and is in general a laughable uplift from the base console given its price....who`d have thought that market prices affect all players in a given market, right?

The PS5 came out at the beginning of the whole semiconducter misery we`re in now, the pro and the stable base prices 4+ years in are just a first taste of what this means for console pricing. If you think the next gen is gonna be much cheaper than roughly comparable PC components and the platform holders will just eat the giant increase in manufacturing cost I´ve got a bridge to sell you.
Argumenting with a pricing history that`s literally from another era at this point is ridiculous. Moore`s Law is largely dead and with it the classic scaling that made gen on gen power increases comparably cheap and "old" nodes degrade in pricing fast.

You're misunderstanding my argument. I'm not doing a general PC vs console debate. The point of that comparison was to show how console pricing was generally unaffected by inflation unlike with PC hardware. PS5 Pro is an outlier, sure, but you're forgetting that:

1. We've had decades of generally unchanged pricing before PS5 Pro. That pricing remained the same during a recession and a global pandemic.
2. Sony aren't going to price their base system at around $700, that would be suicide.
3. They've already been eating those manufacturing costs for decades and they're currently more successful than they've ever been.

I think the PS5 Pro pricing is more down to Sony becoming increasingly more arrogant (like during the PS3 gen) than anything else.

Entry level hardware doesn't perform like ass at all. You can build a 4060 pc for like 800 bucks and turn raytracing and pathtracing on in cyberpunk. You can even turn the traffic up due to a better cpu than the consoles.

My parents got us a compaq desktop with an nvidia card in like 1998 for 699 or 799 and that was pretty standard over 25 years ago, lol.

If it has to hallucinate frames to beat its predecessor, then I'd consider that to be ass. And $800 is entry level now, huh? Kinda proving my point...

 

[SlimySnake]

I would say yes. Especially compared to previous gens. I remember building a PC back in 2003 just for Half Life 2 and it played like a champ a year later when it finally came out. I dont quite recall how expensive the whole thing cost, but it wasnt much.

By 2011, GPUs like the GTX570 cost $350 and I was able to run everything on the PS360 at 1080p 60 fps maxed out on my PC with just a $100 cpu.

In 2019, i bought a prebuilt Pc with a 2080 for just $1,400. And again, maxed out everything on the PS4 and was easily able to run everything at native 4k 60 fps or 4k dlss at 60 fps.

Come 2022, and i had to shell out almost $900 for my 3080 which does run games at 2x the PS5 but with the CPU and RAM and motherboard upgrades, the whole thing ended up costing me near $2,000. All of a sudden 2x more performance now costs 4x more dollars.

Compared to the Pro, its still a decent purchase, but I dont see a reason to spend another $2k on a 4090 or 5090 which is the only thing that will give me a meaningful 2x boost. Things are just way too expensive now.

 

[MMaRsu]

yes. if that Monster Hunter World beta is an indication.
PC .. monsters are made of paper mache
PS5 everything runs fine.
im running a 4070 on my pc.

Why is that an indication

Lmao

Its a horrible unoptimized beta.

 

[MMaRsu]

You also dont need the newest gpu's to play games



Yes its mediocre but for under 100€ you have a gpu.

Yes you can play Kcd2 on it

 

[Jigsaah]

I feel like I'm being priced out of the high end PC market. 2 grand for the best GPU available is insanity. I did the 950 some odd dollars for the 3080. Did the 1600 bucks for the 4090. I think that's my limit. For what I'm getting as far as an upgrade...2000 is too much.

As long as you don't feel like you need the best of the best, PC Gaming is in fantastic shape right now. I'll just put money aside slowly for the next upgrade so its not so much of a sticker shock.

 

[Schmendrick]

You're misunderstanding my argument. I'm not doing a general PC vs console debate.

No I don't. I'm pointing out that historical data, and you are btw forgetting the PS3 era, is worthless with the changes on the semiconductor market.
You are not getting X times the hardware power for roughly the same price every new console gen anymore. After almost 60 years of Moore's Law in full effect that's now over ..... >> 60 years <<

The ps5 pro and the new GPU generations aren't just corporate greed (not only) but to a big part harsh physical limitations that make any further node shrinking ridiculously expensive which also leads to old nodes only very slowly getting affordable.
The way console gens worked so far is no longer feasible because you either have to price them way outside of the classical console budget due to the limitations of density progress on the dies ( there is no subsidizing that kind of cost increase ) or you have to rely on crutches like AI upscaling and FG.
This last Nvidia gen is an outlook on where the journey is going for everyone in the GPU business... And consoles do not have the luxury of being able to bruteforce things regardless of price like a 5090 does. That we're at a point where further progress in 3d graphics needs almost exponential growth in power doesn't exactly help the situation.

Unless there is a revolution in semiconductor tech in the next 1-2 years classical hardware generations are about to drastically change, and arguably not for the better.

 

[MMaRsu]

I feel like I'm being priced out of the high end PC market. 2 grand for the best GPU available is insanity. I did the 950 some odd dollars for the 3080. Did the 1600 bucks for the 4090. I think that's my limit. For what I'm getting as far as an upgrade...2000 is too much.

As long as you don't feel like you need the best of the best, PC Gaming is in fantastic shape right now. I'll just put money aside slowly for the next upgrade so its not so much of a sticker shock.

I don't really understand why you don't skip a generation. A 4090 is a beast of a card and I see zero reason to upgrade, even if it was a thousand bucks.

 

[Jigsaah]

I don't really understand why you don't skip a generation. A 4090 is a beast of a card and I see zero reason to upgrade, even if it was a thousand bucks.

Oh I am now. Not getting the 5090....just doesn't make sense. The 4090 was insane when it came out though compared to the previous gen. Before I had the 3080, I was on the 1070ti...so the 4090 was the exception.

 

[Renoir]

Why is that an indication

Lmao

Its a horrible unoptimized beta.

im saying that because we came so far.. theses consoles are practically PCs, its just weird to me that its this monumental undertaking to make a game run on a pc. I remember the Ps3 hardware was this rubicks cube that everyone took years to decipher to make good games on. But NOW???.. are the devs still puzzeld with theses NVidia cards that are ultra common now?

 

[draliko]

The problem is GPU generations are so ahead of consoles that isn't really worth it since just a couple of games really use them, leaving path tracing off the table, when you're at 60fps+ and high (ultra nearly always is a waste of resources) graphics it's good enough since everything is programmed console first and then "upgraded" for pc... We could get a GPU mid console gen and coast for 8 years if we want, the ps6 will not be close to to a 4080 let alone newer stuff, there's power limit on a console and money to lose for the manufacture, they will not go crazy anymore (remember the PS3 hole)... We don't really have to shell out 2k for a GPU, that's the nice thing, you could if you want, otherwise there are plenty alternatives that still let you play what you want when you want.

 

[bad guy]

It's really about value for money. If I'm going to spend that much on a computer, it needs to offer better value for money. At this point last gen, if you spent $720, you'd get better value for money than a console.

It's really about playing games you like. If I'm going to spend money on a console and it can't play the games I like, then it's the worst value for money ever.

 

[UnrealEck]

People keep comparing the price of a console to the price of a PC and it's retarded.

Does a base Cayman cost the same as a GT4 RS? No. Why? Gee let me think.

 

[MikeM]

uh huh, and we`re forgetting the 699$ PS5 Pro that`s weaker than the 549$ 5070 and is in general a laughable uplift from the base console given its price....who`d have thought that market prices affect all players in a given market, right?

The PS5 came out at the beginning of the whole semiconducter misery we`re in now, the pro and the stable base prices 4+ years in are just a first taste of what this means for console pricing. If you think the next gen is gonna be much cheaper than roughly comparable PC components and the platform holders will just eat the giant increase in manufacturing cost I´ve got a bridge to sell you.
Argumenting with a pricing history that`s literally from another era at this point is ridiculous. Moore`s Law is largely dead and with it the classic scaling that made gen on gen power increases comparably cheap and "old" nodes degrade in pricing fast.

Why do people compare full console systems to the cost of a single PC component?

The Pro was designed for better RT and AI upscaling and it does that job very well.

 

[Arachnid]

As far as hardware availability, maybe. I was trying to get a 3800x3d a few days ago but couldn't find it anywhere other than scalpers weirdly.

EDIT: And the 7800X3D. I built my rig too late I guess.

 

[Astray]

The problem is GPU generations are so ahead of consoles that isn't really worth it since just a couple of games really use them

They're not far ahead they just have more expensive variants with bigger dies.

GPU performance uplifts have slowed massively in the last few years due to the death of Moore's Law's. This has affected both consoles and PCs.

 

[UnrealEck]

They're not far ahead they just have more expensive variants with bigger dies.

Are you saying nVidia's graphics cards are not far ahead of what's in a PS5 Pro?

 

[Doctor Hades]

The worse thing, by far, with PC gaming is that too many publishers are releasing buggy and/or poorly optimised games. I buy a lot of PC games and I swear that about 8 out of 10 of them launch with issues that then means I have to wait weeks, even months, for fixes. This has got much worse in the last 3-4 years and I don't think we can blame COVID for all of it.

Shader compilation stutter is the worse offender and that usually comes hand in hand with Unreal Engine 4, an old engine that is still depressingly popular with developers and which has these issues that most of them either choose not to fix or just don't care about enough to bother. I am astounded at how many major releases are pushed out with this issue on PC. Of course, it is a non-issue on consoles due to the them having fixed hardware which means the pre-compiled shaders can be distributed with the game itself and updated via patches, something not possible on PC. This additional work that is required to get the games working on PC seems to be too much for many developers.

For example, the recent Final Fantasy VII Rebirth launched on PC and the developers even added a pre-shader compilation during the initial boot but it only creates about 70% of them meaning that the other 30% are generated as you play resulting in stuttering for a few hours. And then just when you have the game running smoothly, you find that the stutters are back because you updated your graphics drivers for a new game you just bought. You would think that Square-Enix would be concerned at one of their much-loved and renowned franchises having performance issues but it seems they just don't care. EA Sports WRC, another UE4 game, was a stuttering mess on PC that tooks months to fix.

Despite Digital Foundry highlighting issues with games such as Star Wars Jedi: Survivor (which is still an embarrassing stuttering mess on PC with RT enabled) and many, many other games, it seems like most publishers just choose to ignore them. That said, I think EA are easily the worst publisher at the moment for pushing out half broken games unless they have "FIFA/FC" or "Sims" in their names in which case they receive decent post-launch support.

PC gaming is awesome when everything works, offering a better than console experience, but it also sadly sucks when it doesn't. And, unfortunately, it seems that the well-optimised gems like Kingdom Come: Deliverance II and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle are the exception rather than rule.

 

[UnrealEck]

PC gaming is awesome when everything works, offering a better than console experience, but it also sadly sucks when it doesn't. And, unfortunately, it seems that the well-optimised gems like Kingdom Come: Deliverance II and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle are the exception rather than rule.

Even when a game is not performing as well as it can on my PC, it still gives me a better experience than on a console.
Buggy and poorly optimised games are not something only happening on Windows.

 

[Doctor Hades]

Even when a game is not performing as well as it can on my PC, it still gives me a better experience than on a console.
Buggy and poorly optimised games are not something only happening on Windows.

The biggest issue plaguing many PC games is stuttering and while you can brute force your way through some of this with a high-end 16+ core CPU (and also by never updating your graphics driver which resets the shader cache!), you can't completely eliminate it if a game releases with this issue.

Console games can have traversal stutter but they do not suffer from the dreaded shader compilation stutter meaning that they can offer a noticeably smoother experience, albeit with reduced visual fidelity compared with PC. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Dead Space Remake, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth... those are all games that run better on consoles than PC.

The need to compile shaders for DX12 games on PC is, in my experience, a weakness of the platform and requires a lot of effort by developers to fix. Alas, many developers just don't bother or they do the absolute minimum to partly reduce it, e.g. like Square-Enix did with the PC port of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth which at least compiles some of the shaders at the start but still misses a lot. Even the recent Avowed, which is mostly a decent PC port, still has some stuttering which I'm guessing isn't present in the Xbox Series X|S versions.

 

[Astray]

Are you saying nVidia's graphics cards are not far ahead of what's in a PS5 Pro?

They are ahead because of their (current) superiority to AMD. But the difference imo is marginal between DLSS and PSSR (look how many zooms it takes DF to find problems in comparisons, they even have to resort to finding issues in "static images" which is bull because games are almost always delivering graphics in motion). The end user gives zero fucks about this level of difference. FSR can be visibly worse though (watching my brother in law play Wukong on his base PS5 was fucking painful!).

The real issue is everybody is stymied because node shrinks and improvements in actual arch are now becoming very difficult to achieve. That's why you see Nvidia and AMD and all of them in the fake frames race now.

The biggest issue plaguing many PC games is stuttering and while you can brute force your way through some of this with a high-end 16+ core CPU (and also by never updating your graphics driver which resets the shader cache!), you can't completely eliminate it if a game releases with this issue.

Console games can have traversal stutter but they do not suffer from the dreaded shader compilation stutter meaning that they can offer a noticeably smoother experience, albeit with reduced visual fidelity compared with PC. Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Dead Space Remake, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth... those are all games that run better on consoles than PC.

The need to compile shaders for DX12 games on PC is, in my experience, a weakness of the platform and requires a lot of effort by developers to fix. Alas, many developers just don't bother or they do the absolute minimum to partly reduce it, e.g. like Square-Enix did with the PC port of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth which at least compiles some of the shaders at the start but still misses a lot. Even the recent Avowed, which is mostly a decent PC port, still has some stuttering which I'm guessing isn't present in the Xbox Series X|S versions.

The biggest issue on PC is every gaming PC is built out of disparate software and hardware providers who will never be incentivized to fully agree on anything.

Just take what should be a relatively simple task of finding one RGB control standard for PC parts and you'll see what I mean.

It's also why consistent QA is almost impossible on the platform for any dev, you simply can't optimize for every quirk in every build and every installation no matter how much money you throw at the problem. I have seen problems in some easy-to-run games with no solution because the problem is so rare that no one ever asked about it!

Even Steam basically gave up on software QA and now essentially tells you that it's your problem to solve, they have elected to give easy refunds within two hours rather than enforce any kind of certification process or even guidelines for you to filter out games that exceed your minimum specs.

Well, refunds solve my money issue, but Valve can't give me back my time spent downloading and testing the game to begin with.

 

[PurePlatinum]

"PC Gaming" is a blanket term that I think covers at least two different very distinct markets.

1. The vast majority of "PC Gamers" are just people with laptops or pre-built desktops, who are playing Minecraft, Fortnite, Apex...the usual suspects. I would guess this accounts for almost 85%-90% of the PC audience.
2. People who are building PCs to play the latest AAA slop. This market is far far smaller than we think. Go look at how poorly PS Studios games do on PC (outside of Helldivers). Why is GTA6 not releasing day and date?

For the former, I think PC gaming is in a great place. You can get a lot of solid hardware at an affordable price and play those kinds of games for a long time. The later category is just full of bad unoptimized ports of console-first games, and I don't see it getting better.

 

[Zacfoldor]

Gabe is all that stands between PC gaming and MS turning it into an Xbox forever.

You just better hope Gabe don't retire. The man is getting on up there. Anyone else will sell out in a heartbeat.

Because Gabe is the only defender of PC gaming and keeping it from being the next Xbox, and because Sony and Nintendo have companies and boards protecting them from the same fate, I would say that PC gaming is more tenuous the older Gabe gets and far more tenuous than Nintendo consoles.

Are you okay with Microsoft buying Steam? If that sounds great to you, then you will probably get your wish in a couple decades. PC gaming has a bright future as a Microsoft Xbox.

 

[MMaRsu]

Gabe is all that stands between PC gaming and MS turning it into an Xbox forever.

You just better hope Gabe don't retire. The man is getting on up there. Anyone else will sell out in a heartbeat.

Because Gabe is the only defender of PC gaming and keeping it from being the next Xbox, and because Sony and Nintendo have companies and boards protecting them from the same fate, I would say that PC gaming is more tenuous the older Gabe gets and far more tenuous than Nintendo consoles.

Are you okay with Microsoft buying Steam? If that sounds great to you, then you will probably get your wish in a couple decades. PC gaming has a bright future as a Microsoft Xbox.

 

[GymWolf]

Nvidia retroactively made all the old gpu more performant with the autobot model and if you have a powerfull pc you can play ue5 games without most of the problems that console players have and i don't have to act like i hate the engine with the best graphic on the market just because i don't have the hardware to properly run it, so personally i'm in a good spot now.

Now we only need windows 11 to not suck but that's an high task.

 

[Schmendrick]

Why do people compare full console systems to the cost of a single PC component?

Why do people not actually read a conversation before giving in to the urge to add to it?

The Pro was designed for better RT and AI upscaling and it does that job very well.

riiiiight.....