Topic: PC gaming sure is gaining Steam these days. (The PC gaming thread)

[pokepal148]

And I guess those folks on Mac and Linux can tag along as here well. Otherwise Insanolord might get lonely in the Mac Gaming thread.

This laptop I'm using is surprisingly competent at gaming considering it's 10 years old now. I've been playing a bunch of stuff on it and I even picked up a SteelSeries controller for it. But I'm planning to keep this laptop going for at least a year or two and we'll go from there.

My Steam Friend Code (Jesus Christ, is there no escape from Friend Codes?) is 115591001 for anyone interested.

[NWR_insanolord]

Even after the last major Mac OS update killed compatibility with probably most of my Steam library I still have way too many games on there, and I'll probably never touch any of them..

[pokepal148]

Well I mean when Apple heard that people were playing games on their macs, they had to step in and put a stop to that.

[NWR_insanolord]

That update was nothing in terms of killing game compatibility compared to what's coming next.

[Stratos]

So I've been planning to upgrade my PC for the past two years but been dragging my feet.

This is what I have at the moment, would be open to feedback.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/8v6sTC

Shooting to spend about $1200. Must support 4 monitors. I don't need top-tier, but playing all games at 60fps and 1080p or maybe 4k would be nice. I'm mostly happy with the current parts/price, but am a bit hung up by the case. I want a CD/DVD/BD optics drive, and it would be mice to have a slot on the outside for SD Card media because I have been working more with cameras and would like something built in for those because the USB converters I have are super slow.

Would also like plenty of modern USB ports (3.1 and/or 3.2 USBc types). Should I not be hung up on these little things for a case and just make sure its got room for the optics drive? Part of the motivation is to clean off my desk area and having a lot of extra cables/adapters/external hookups just leads to a more cluttered desk for me.

[pokepal148]

I downloaded the epic games launcher so I can mooch on the free games. That was a mistake. Free games are nice but Epic's storefront on the launcher is absolutely miserable and the launcher is a mess in terms of UI and performance.

If only Epic was in charge of the Number 1 most successful game in the industry right now. Maybe than they could invest that money into making a competent game store/launcher thingy.

[pokepal148]

Well speak of the devil. Epic is claiming that Apple is threatening to pull support for Unreal Engine on the Mac and iOS platforms.

Looks like Insanolord's Mac gaming ambitions might have taken another hit.

[NWR_insanolord]

I’m pretty sure none of the handful of games I play on my Mac use Unreal.

[Stratos]

I was tempted to start a new thread but this seems like a fair enough place to put this.

I'm building a new PC and am looking for feedback on my build. I was going to really go out on a graphics card but some folks have been talking me down since I tend to stick to older games.

I do want to play a few modern titles as well though (Ark, Horizon Zero Dawn, Jedi Fallen Order, Star Wars Squadrons), but I'm not shooting for 4k graphics so I'm hoping to trim down costs a bit.

I'm playing chicken with the prices since new NVIDIA and AMD graphics cards are releasing in the coming month. I might go up to a $400 card and get something like a 5700x or a 2060 Super.

Anyone here want to throw in their 2-cents on my purchase?

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor  ($209.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: MSI B550-A PRO ATX AM4 Motherboard  ($139.99 @ B&H)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL16 Memory  ($138.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: HP EX920 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($129.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER 6 GB OC Video Card  ($239.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Corsair 275R Airflow ATX Mid Tower Case  ($79.98 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply  ($99.99 @ B&H)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro OEM 64-bit  ($139.88 @ Other World Computing)
Custom: NOLYTH External Bluray Drive 5-in-1 External Blu Ray Drive USB3.0 Bluray Drive Player Burner for Laptop/MacBook/Windows10/PC with SD TF Card Reader/2 USB3.0 Hub/BD-ROM/R/RE  ($118.88 @ Amazon)
Total: $1297.68
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-09-16 00:42 EDT-0400

[pokepal148]

I have to admit, the GOG galaxy launcher thingy has really won me over. It's UI is leagues above what Steam has to offer and the way it can sync with your libraries on other platforms and bring them all together is a godsend.

[Stratos]

Its a little too good at syncing with other systems. It claims I own Xbox games I've played on my Dad's system that I do not own. It even lets me "load" the game to play, but just routes me to the Microsoft store.

[pokepal148]

I finally ordered a new laptop. I settled on the Lenovo Legion 5 Pro which crammed a 16 inch screen into the chassis of a 15 inch laptop and is getting marked down like crazy because the 2022 model is coming out soon.

The one drag is that it only has a 516gb SSD so I'll be fridge cleaning for a bit until I get a bigger one for it. My current laptop for context has essentially 3tb of storage but I only really use the 1tb SSD for the laptop itself while the 2tb HDD is mainly used to back up my SD cards from things like the Wii U, 3DS, and my phone.

[Adrock]

I didn’t know where to ask this: is anyone getting a Steam Deck? It’s probably the only way I’m ever going to play PC games. I’m also not sure I care enough to spend $400.

[Mop it up]

Not me. 3DS is still plenty to cover my limited handheld needs, and it feels like Xbox gets almost everything PC does.

[NWR_insanolord]

I didn’t know where to ask this: is anyone getting a Steam Deck? It’s probably the only way I’m ever going to play PC games. I’m also not sure I care enough to spend $400.

I'm tempted, but kind of on the fence. At some point I should go through what's compatible and see how much of it is stuff I'd want to play. Most of my Steam library is strategy and sim stuff that I wouldn't want to play in that form factor, and a lot of the rest of it is indie stuff that's already on Switch. To be perfectly honest, the recent announcement that they got Dolphin running on it is probably the biggest selling point for me right now. I'll still probably hold off to hear more impressions, or maybe wait for the next revision.

[pokepal148]

I tried to get a full on laptop but the one I got had a faulty keyboard so I had to send it back.

[pokepal148]

There. I have finally joined the modern computer bandwagon. The most striking thing about this laptop is how many things it just does on its own like automatically connecting to Bluetooth devices that I had to do weird workarounds with to get going on the old one.

[Benton Slane]

I think, In 2020, there were an estimated 1.75 billion PC gamers worldwide, up from 1.5 billion PC gaming users in the previous year. Despite slowing revenue growth, PC gaming remains very popular and digital storefronts like Steam or the Epic Games Store making PC gaming titles accessible for gamers worldwide.

We're going to start seeing more of 'gaming as a service' type subscriptions like Xbox Gamepass and of course, cloud gaming which will mean from a hardware perspective that people won't need anything super powerful like a beefy CPU or GPU.