I have noticed a curious pattern in many of the newest (and not even so
new) games: They will often list as "minimum requirements" specs which are
much higher than what would be sufficient to run the game. Especially this
seems to be the case with the CPU.

  As I understand it, "minimum system requirements" should mean "if you
want this game to run and be playable at a decent frame rate, you should
have at least this kind of system". However, you can often play the game
at decent framerates with a much poorer system, at least if you turn down
the graphical quality.

  For example, I recently bought the game "The Last Remnant", and it lists
as minimum CPU requirement an Intel Core 2 Duo or an AMD Athlon X2.

  Note that both of those processors are 64-bit and with two cores. So
the "minimum system requirements" is telling me that I *need* at least a
two-core 64-bit processor to run the game.

  However, the game runs just fine with my single-core 32-bit Pentium4.
I have even maxed up all graphical settings and I'm getting pretty good
framerates (something like 20 FPS and up). Of course this is mostly thanks
to my GPU, but at least the CPU isn't getting badly in the way.

  The minimum system requirements list, in fact, doesn't make at all clear
whether the game will work with a 32-bit processor at all. But it does.

  Incidentally, the game "Assassin's Creed" lists the same two CPUs as
a minimum requirement, yet also runs on my P4. (Although this one is so
much heavier that I have to run it in low-to-medium settings if I want
to get any decent framerates. Especially higher-quality shadows clog the
system quite badly, especially at the bigger cities which have hundreds
of buildings. In the biggest cities I have to turn shadows completely off.
But it runs, nevertheless.)

  Perhaps the idea is simply "yes, it will run on an older CPU, but in
that case you will need a much faster GPU to compensate", and what they
are listing is some kind of "average minimum" hardware settings to get
the game running ok. However, it would still be nice if they were a bit
more specific, especially about whether the game is 32-bit or not. And
maybe give a few example "minimum" hardware assemblies which will run
the game.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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What bugs me is when they list things like "Needs a GPU with pixel shader 2 
and texture mapper 3".  How the heck am I supposed to know that? Give me a 
sample level for free download so I can see if it works. :-)

On another note, how long does an xbox 360 game take to really load? 
Bioshock takes like 90 seconds to go from starting the game to asking 
whether I want to load the level or start a new game. That seems kind of 
long, especially since I've copied it to the hard drive. I suspect they're 
making me sit through animated logos every time just because they can, 
without actually doing anything in the background.  I noticed GTA is the 
same way.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   There's no CD like OCD, there's no CD I knoooow!

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Regardless of the degree of veracity of anything that has been written
in this thread, I'm not sure that such a thread is very relevant here.






only joking of course. I sorta agree with you in the case where this 
citations comes from. There is just this problem of this group being 
p.o-t, so anything posted here is not very relevant here.

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andrel <a_l### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> Regardless of the degree of veracity of anything that has been written
> in this thread, I'm not sure that such a thread is very relevant here.

> only joking of course. I sorta agree with you in the case where this 
> citations comes from. There is just this problem of this group being 
> p.o-t, so anything posted here is not very relevant here.

  I don't understand what you mean. Approximately 100% of people who
read this group are computer users. There's a rather big probability
that a significant part of them play computer games, so the subject
is interesting to them. The subject is also non-controversial. It's not
like I'm questioning someone faith or life philosophy.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 6-6-2009 23:32, Warp wrote:
> andrel <a_l### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
>> Regardless of the degree of veracity of anything that has been written
>> in this thread, I'm not sure that such a thread is very relevant here.
> 
>> only joking of course. I sorta agree with you in the case where this 
>> citations comes from. There is just this problem of this group being 
>> p.o-t, so anything posted here is not very relevant here.
> 
>   I don't understand what you mean.

That is not entirely true.

> Approximately 100% of people who
> read this group are computer users. 
So? A fair amount have views on religion too, close to but not entirely 
100% I would guess. Possibly about the same percentage as those playing 
games.
> There's a rather big probability
> that a significant part of them play computer games, so the subject
> is interesting to them. 
Well, I  don't, but that is not the point.
> The subject is also non-controversial. It's not
> like I'm questioning someone faith or life philosophy.

Not sure if it is non-controversial because it is about games. Some 
people have very definite feelings about some games and how much 
hardware you need to play them correctly. Besides, if something is 
totally non-controversial there is no point in posting it here nor 
anywhere else.

Finally, I am sure you read the 'only joking of course' part of my post 
too. So this reply is rather silly. Then again, it is probably not 
directed at me (see my post in that other thread), so let the innocent 
bystanders judge. ;)

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On 6 Jun 2009 17:32:12 -0400, Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:

>  I don't understand what you mean.

Double Dutch humour ;)

-- 

Regards
     Stephen

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Warp wrote:
>   I have noticed a curious pattern in many of the newest (and not even so
> new) games: They will often list as "minimum requirements" specs which are
> much higher than what would be sufficient to run the game. Especially this
> seems to be the case with the CPU.

In the earlier days the minimum requirements tended to be specified so
that the game/program would start, but wouldn't be anyhow usable.

I'd think that it's a question of responsibility. If the game-maker
tells you that this game will run on this (minimum) configuration and it
doesn't, they're responsible for it and have to return the money. It
might even be the slowest possible configuration they've actually tested.

-Aero

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Warp wrote:
>   Perhaps the idea is simply "yes, it will run on an older CPU, but in
> that case you will need a much faster GPU to compensate", and what they
> are listing is some kind of "average minimum" hardware settings to get
> the game running ok. However, it would still be nice if they were a bit
> more specific, especially about whether the game is 32-bit or not. And
> maybe give a few example "minimum" hardware assemblies which will run
> the game.

	My guess is that they're listing the minimum specs that they
_guarantee_. In other words, they didn't bother testing it with anything
lower.

	It's really the only explanation I can come up with - otherwise they're
needlessly limiting their market (unless they're in bed with the
hardware manufacturers).

-- 
Don't take life so seriously.  It won't last.


                    /\  /\               /\  /
                   /  \/  \ u e e n     /  \/  a w a z
                       >>>>>>mue### [at] nawazorg<<<<<<
                                   anl

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news:4a2acc3f@news.povray.org...
>  I have noticed a curious pattern in many of the newest (and not even so
> new) games: They will often list as "minimum requirements" specs which are
> much higher than what would be sufficient to run the game. Especially this
> seems to be the case with the CPU.

I don't know about game makers, but I do list "higher than necessary minimum 
requirements specs" to customers because lots of Windows machines are filled 
with CPU-hogging, RAM-eating crapware (installed by the
computer maker or by the user) that completely nullify the actual minimum 
requirements. Machines that are well cared for would be fine with those 
specs, but that's not the case for the general population. After seeing some 
of my stuff crawl on other people's machines (where it should have run 
smoothly), raising the requirements a little bit was definitely a good 
practice, and I'm not even talking about games or CPU-intensive software, 
just simple office applications.

G.

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Mueen Nawaz wrote:

> 	My guess is that they're listing the minimum specs that they
> _guarantee_. In other words, they didn't bother testing it with anything
> lower.

I would imagine this is what it is too.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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