AV Podcast : Games : 2nd Mar 2007

**Stuart Wright** · 03-03-2007, 7:33 PM

AV Podcast : Games : 2nd Mar 2007
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50.1Mb, 52 minutes and 36 seconds

00:44 Gaming News
18:36 Review of Crackdown for the 360
26:40 PCs vs Consoles Discussion. Which is better for gaming?

CAS FAN · 04-03-2007, 10:44 AM

I may not be the biggest fan of Sony at the moment but the anti Sony mentality in this podcast was cringeworthy and I had to switch off after the first 5 mins or so. Shame as i'm sure some of the articles later on in the podcast sounded pretty interesting.

**Phil Hinton** · 04-03-2007, 11:04 AM

I think that's rather strong. There is no Sony Bashing mentality to any of the presenters here, in fact all they are doing are reporting what are facts and if that makes Sony look bad, then isn't that Sony being stupid and not the presenters of the podcast.

The guys are pretty un biased but they do like to poke fun at people and as Sony are busy making themselves a laughing stock with recent press releases and again ripping off the euro market you can't blame the guys for having a few sly digs at them.

I'm sure most people see Sony as fair game at the moment due to their continuing attitudes towards consumers in most areas of the business. If that makes you uncomfortable then we apologise and in future will issue a warning before we use humour in the podcasts.

CAS FAN · 04-03-2007, 11:31 AM

Maybe and I guess that Sony have rightly taken a fair bit of stick, but to I felt that the piece at the start was going a bit too far. There are some positives to PS2 emulation (such as upscaling to 720p/1080i) and Sony have announced that around 1000 games (around 50% of pal games released) are to be supported from launch. That said, I guess that info was probably not available at the time of doing the podcast, which will have affected how the presenters discussed the situation at the time. I also felt that the saving of £10 a game with PS3 games was a big factor as at the end of the day console gamers spend much more on games than hardware. 10 games with a £10 saving is £100 saved and considering that i've owned over 50 360 games since launch then that's alot of money.

Either way though Phil, i'm not wanting to cause any trouble and those were just my views from listening to it. I've nothing against Seth at all, I find his input to the forums to be fantastic and he seems a great bloke. My comments were meant as positive criticism but I agree they were perhaps a bit strong as listening back I guess that Ian was highlighting the pro Sony points and Seth was just balancing out with the negatives.

Uruloke · 04-03-2007, 12:44 PM

You're right, the news about the 1000 games being backwards compatible came after we had recorded the podcast.

davidm · 06-03-2007, 11:10 PM

Great podcast guys

I would just like to thank you for making me look a complete idiot on the train yesterday while listening to 'Smashie and Nicey' doing the top 10. I couldn't help but chuckle away to myself and receive some very strange looks from my fellow passengers.

Keep up the good work

Tantalus · 07-03-2007, 10:08 AM

Nice to see PC gaming getting more of a focus on your Games podcasts. Up until now I was of the mind to suggest you rename it to "Games Console" podcast(!) but good to see the revised focus.

One thing of interest you didn't focus on with regards PC gaming was CPU. You focussed primarily on graphics cards when, with the advent of multi-core CPU - huge changes are looming in the capabilites of multi-tasking.

Valve, developer of many online games are already looking at this with a view to splitting up various parts of the game execution to different cores. AI to one say, sound to another, rendering to another and so on.

While consoles are giving the newer graphics cards a good run for their money, the advent of multi - quad core and more processors will begin to create a much greater divide between consoles and PCs.

Another issue of course is online - collaborative play. PC gamers are able to use other tools such as TEAMSPEAK, MSN, XFIRE and other communications methods which consoles just can't compete with.

Seth Gecko · 07-03-2007, 11:16 AM

Hey Tantulus (My #1 fan it seems - seen Misery?

)

The point of that roundtable was there was a forum thread regarding it. We also have a very strict running time so not to bore too many people (although we could do an insomniacs version)

There was so much more to discuss - multiple cores, physics cards, (DX 10 we covered in an earlier one), sound technology (it's progressed from the old Sound Blaster days!!), online gaming differences. To do it all justice probably would have tripled the time.

BUT!!!! Don't worry, these things will get discussed in further casts (such as physics in games and the advent of the card technology), so don't worry, there's more coming!!!

Of course console fans will be catered for as well - we hope to have a look at the PS3 properly for example (can't say anymore yet - but stay tuned!)

Tantalus · 07-03-2007, 11:27 AM

... only when you don't mumble...

====

Fair points but was the forum thread really answered? I understand the chap in question wanted to know should he upgrade - but perhaps the more important question was - taking the XBOX 360 as an example or maybe PS3 - which you can consider next time - what specification of PC provides equivalent performance?

For example, does a Quad Core + 8800GTX card + 2GB memory running Call of Duty provide a better gaming experience than an XBOX variant? Of course PC enthusiasts won't benefit from DX10 for a few months yet when the new games come out. Some would argue that a Wii - regardless of specification - is more fun (!). But between an XBOX and a PC - what is the framerate - what comparative statistics can be used?

Seth Gecko · 07-03-2007, 11:32 AM

That's an interesting point. But as COD3 isn't on PC, the compare has to be on COD2, a dated game for example. Can't use Gears of War, which is Unreal 3 engine, as we could use Unreal Tourney 2007 but it's not out yet (but we can argue the engine is used in a similar envionment).

And that goes on for another point - is graphics and sound everything? Take World Of Warcraft - a lowly 7600 graphics card can handle that and the game has 8 million subscribers (more than the population of Switzerland!)

No need to answer here - we're recording tomorrow night. How about we refer to multi-cores, physics cards and similar experiences in that roundtable (sort of a Part 2) ?

Seth Gecko · 07-03-2007, 11:33 AM

P.S. I don't mumble. I'm quietly spoken (and usually exhausted as I've been up for about 15 hours when we record!).

Tantalus · 07-03-2007, 11:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seth Gecko

How about we refer to multi-cores, physics cards and similar experiences in that roundtable (sort of a Part 2) ?

Habanero · 07-03-2007, 11:59 AM

I too thought the "Smashie and Nicey" top ten was a podcast classic!

However I thought that the PS3 news sounded a bit biased. I fear that any future PS3 games review is likely to conclude "it's crap".

Seth Gecko · 07-03-2007, 12:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Habanero

However I thought that the PS3 news sounded a bit biased. I fear that any future PS3 games review is likely to conclude "it's crap".

Actually we're not biased, although it sounds it. From our perspective we hope the PS3 as a console is going to be superb and offer many quality games, we feel that Sony have dropped the ball repeatedly and as such have taken a bit of stick from us for it. But if Nintendo or Microsoft had done it, then we'd have done the same.

As said, something is in the works for the PS3 as I type and you'll hear more on the podcast soon (and yes, as a gamer, I'm looking forward to it)!!