Dilemma: To buy or to build?

[Kaymish]

build your own save a small fortune your friends are telling the truth
i spent $3.3k NZD on mine but its total overkill still a year or so down the track and the far less powerful by almost a half alienware PC was at $7K plus i got ripped off by the sales person for some of the parts

 

[ALuckyChance]

Please, for the love of God, build your own. It's rather simple to make one these days, and if you're smart you can make an incredibly affordable PC that can play most games with high graphics settings.

 

[EvilGamer89]

First off is the Op even reading this anymore?

Second, build your own, way cheaper.

Third, as for places to get parts check ebay, newegg.com, and my favorite tigerdirect.com. You have to go between a lot of sites to find the best deal but I usually go between newegg and tigerdirect. I generally dislike ebay cuz it's full of scammers.

 

[Wintermoot]

building a PC takes allot of time and know-how but you can fully customize its spec,s but you can end up paying MORE than a Aline ware (asumin that with 800$ you would have a office comp)
on the other hand Alien ware is the best you can buy (at this moment)

 

[ALuckyChance]

Great going with the 'No True Scotsman' fallacy there.

No that's just the definition of "video" game.

There used to be text adventure games (still are, on some sites); does that still make them video games?

When did I say that? I remember saying

"That being thet you don't need absolute top-of-the-line computers to play modern games. Sure, it's nicer that way, but not required....

I simply renounce graphics as the be-all-end-all facet of gaming. If graphics is all a game has, then it's a fairly poor game in my opinion. If it has good gameplay, interesting story AND good graphics, then I'm likely to go to the store and buy it. Having good graphics is nice, but hardly necessary for a good gaming experience."

I'n not saying anything about graphics not being necessary there, now am I? I'm just saying that having good graphics is not required for a good gaming experience, and that good graphics do not automatically make for a good game.

See: Tetris. Limbo. Braid. Portal. The Witcher. Civilization-series. Sword Of The Stars. Sins Of A Solar Empire.

If you want good stories, go read some book. If you want good game play, there are a tons of board game out there. If you want good graphic, look outside. But video game is the only thing that binds all three together. Good graphic is just as important as game play and story in video games. Good story alone don't make a video game good, it just makes a good story. Good gameplay makes it a good "game", but it doesn't make it a good "video" game.

Ever played Deus Ex, or Morrowind, or Mount&Blade? Video games don't need good graphics to be a good game.

Also, the definition of a video game is:

A type of game existing as and controlled by software, usually run by a video game console or a computer, and played on a video terminal or television screen. Controlled by a paddle, joystick, joypad, mouse, keyboard, or a combination of any of these input devices.
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/video_game

All a video game needs in the graphics department is something to look at, whether it be text, pixels, or high-definition HDR 42000-poly models. If a video game needed great graphics, no game from the 1980's to 1990's would've ever have been made.

 

[solider23876]

I feel like SakSak is going insane trying to prove a point that I thought would be obvious to the gaming community. Maybe it's because I play my games on an old Toshiba laptop with the infamous Intel 945GM chipset, but I have come to appreciate gameplay over graphics. I don't think that graphics are anywhere near as important as gameplay, story, or sound. I believe that the three latter factors make the game. Visuals are a means to display what is happening ingame. Of course graphics are necessary. SakSak doesn't mean that they aren't necessary. A game run in 800x600 will still be the same game if I run it in 1920x1080, is it not? A good game should be able to stand on its foundation of gameplay and story without necessarily being so detailed that you can read the nutritional facts on cans. As long as I can tell where I am and be able to differentiate a human from a tree and an enemy from an ally, then the graphics are doing their job for me.

Now, this doesn't mean that I don't appreciate good graphics. Just because a game has exceptional graphics doesn't mean that it's automatically a game that I won't enjoy. However, if the controls are clunky, the AI is questionably programmed, the story is paper-thin, the actual gameplay isn't fun, and the graphics are intelligible, then I simply will not enjoy the game. And even if the graphics were phenomenal, then I still would not enjoy it. Why? Because the game aspect of it sucked. Its graphics were fantastic, but the game was terrible.

Yes, great graphics allow the average person to immerse themselves more easily, but what exactly are they immersing themselves into? A story. Visuals tell the story in a more direct way. No room for misinterpretation (unless the visuals are so poor that you can't tell what's happening) because the creators are depicting their story the way they see it. However, what I've just described is not a video game. It's called a movie. Graphics, gameplay, and a story should work in conjunction to classify a work of art as a video game.

Graphics + story = Movie/Visual novel
Gameplay + story = D&D, text-adventures
Graphics + gameplay = Board game, probably many more examples that I can't think of

I've gotten quite off-topic from what I originally meant to post. I can see why this debate branched off into so many different points.

Brain fart, so if I remember what I meant to say, then I'll post back. XD

 

[Subzerowings]

I'm thinking of having one built too.
I have a budget of about 5500 euros, so I hope I can get one that plays Fallout 3 and Oblivion on max settings.

Depending on your resolution and whether you can actually see the difference between 2xAA and 16xQSAA(not many people can), you might be able to get a PC which does that for ?550.

I'm curious on how you managed to spend so much money since I can build a top of the line PC for less then half that which runs everything but the worst console ports perfectly.

Belgium is really freakin' expensive.
We're notorious for paying a shitload of taxes.

 

[Azure Sky]

I do hope you realize you are badmouthing one of the best games that was released that year?
But that is not the point.
But attempting to sidestep a perfectly good example because it wasn't your cup of tea isn't very becoming.

Now, as for all the games you mentioned, they are how old? 5 years? 10? more? Please do not bring archaic examples into a conversation about modern gaming. =3

Says the man who brought up shadows of the collossus. Im just saying that if graphics made a game then all those old games would nologer be considered good anymore. But like you mentioned shadows of the collossus is still a loved game. The very example you used proves you wrong.

Graphics and make a good game better. But they cant make up for bad gameplay/story.

I said it before, and I will say it again.

Now, as for all the games you mentioned, they are how old? 5 years? 10? more? Please do not bring archaic examples into a conversation about modern gaming. =3

This is a discussion on the performance of newer games designed to be played under ideal parameters and not a discussion on how older games are still very much playable with the now dated graphics they are designed to run at.
Unless you enjoy the idea of playing a game such as... CoD4 when it looks like CoD1/2.

Graphics and make a good game better. But they cant make up for bad gameplay/story.

Don't take the discussion off topic.

 

[Luke5515]

If you know a little bit about computers you could probably build one without much difficulty. There are computers that are a lot cheaper than an Alienware if you just want to buy one. But building is just getting all the parts and plugging slot A into receiver B.

 

[Sharkosauros]

if you know what ur doing, building is the best option , u can end up saving up, but. if u dont know then well.. either u will make ur pc crash every 5 mins, or u will end up wasting more money then buying a new comp that eventually woud turn out to be better then the you builted,