JonCole

Thanks, guys.

No less than an hour ago I bought a Corsair PSU from Newegg, they have a couple of solid deals going after rebate - Corsair CX430M 430W Modular PSU - $44.99 -> $24.99 after $20 rebate Corsair CX500M 500W Modular PSU - $54.99 -> $34.99 after $20 rebate Nothing too wild but if you're going pretty solidly budget like I am, $20 can make a difference. Good luck and feel free to ask any questions you may have. That PCI-E thing compares to a SATA II vs SATA III vs SATA 3.0Gbps vs SATA 6.0Gbps crisis I had last time I build a computer, so I know that feeling of dumb terminology getting the better of you.

That logical increments seems like a pretty rad site, never heard of it before. It definitely gives a solid guide for someone who doesn't know much about building a PC. For actual pricing at the moment you'll be buying your parts, I'd recommend PC Part Picker. It has some good comparative pricing tools in there as well as good side-by-side comparison of important specs, so you can figure if you should buy whatever component of whatever brand from whatever retailer. I saved $20 here and there finding out that Newegg had a rebate on a PSU that Amazon didn't have, and vice versa - http://pcpartpicker.com/ Also, one other point I'd like to make is that you should try to get the 2GB version of the 650Ti Boost (or 7850, if price sways you toward AMD). That extra VRAM could really make the difference in running some next-gen games that take advantage of bigger VRAM pools on next-gen consoles.

Well, let's not lose the thread on Eidos - Square-Enix has already announced that a Tomb Raider sequel is actively in development for next-gen, so that's very likely still going to happen. They've also announced Deus Ex Universe, which is taking some of the headspace that birthed the iOS Deus Ex game and expanding the next round of Deus Ex games into a multi-platform effort from the start. Their investment in Deus Ex only seems more active when you consider the Director's Cut release this year. So, while focus may shift to online games, it seems that the biggest of the AAA titles are still intact unless everything changed on a dime after seeing these financials. In all likelihood, I'd imagine there'd instead be more doubling down on iOS versions of these franchises and potentially some kind of online adaptation of Deus Ex (at least seems more likely than Tomb Raider).

I heard that Giant Bomb's spoilercast on Beyond was pretty good, for those finished with it. It's Patrick Klepek, Dave Navarro, Kirk Hamilton (Kotaku) and Justin McElroy (Polygon) - http://www.giantbomb.com/videos/let-s-spoil-beyond-two-souls/2300-8157/

The other interesting aspect about Ghosts in particular is that due to the critical mass of it, I simply can't imagine that most of the audience will migrate to next-gen. Sure, there will be a contingent who feels that effectively spending $560 on a Call of Duty game makes sense, but I think the most dedicated audience just bought it day one for 360 and will wait until a next-gen only game to upgrade. The only palpable differences seem to be things like AI bot count, unlike BF4 that actually has higher player counts and bigger maps in next-gen. I imagine that by that token, making XBONE/PS4 Ghosts was not an incredible priority for Activision/Infinity Ward, especially since they don't make an effort to push tech like DICE does.

I heard that when you use sights with a lot of zoom like ACOG and Target Finder, next-gen actually uses a real depth of field effect while last-gen uses an even or slightly gradient blur effect. I'm sure it's not a profound difference, but it could be quite noticeable if you're a fan of those attachments and it affects performance.

I imagine that I could even just go ahead and pay for the PS4 upgrade via PSN whenever and add it to my "download list". The actual transfer of stats and whatnot happens within the game, so I can do that at my leisure (if I understand correctly).

So, I'm feeling some last minute doubts about my PS4 preorder and I want to kind of bounce my thoughts on others so here I am! I have absolutely no doubt that the PS4 is the next-gen console for me, but I'm just not sure it's a compelling enough proposition for me to need it right now. Once I get over the high of having new hardware, these things reflect what's on my mind: I'm not interested (enough?) in next-gen games at the moment, I was only planning on playing Battlefield 4, Resogun, and Contrast on PS4 through the end of the year and even into Q1 2014. I own BF4 on PS3, because I was hoping to try out the next-gen upgrade path. As a result, I have no incredible need to upgrade on a timely basis; in fact, stats and premium will transfer whenever I do make the transition, so I needn't worry about progress on PS3 being lost. Resogun and Contrast were on my radar due to being on PS+, but by the same token they won't go anywhere as long as I keep up my PS+ sub. The retail games I'm interested in checking out after BF4 are Infamous: Second Son, Destiny and Watch Dogs, all of which come out Q2 2014 or later. I've paid off about $300 of the preorder and the other $100 is somewhat hard to come by right now. I could use the $300 to finish building my HTPC, which I could use to play PC games on my big screen. Is there any obvious reason for me to keep going with this? I didn't really realize it at the time, but delaying Watch Dogs really seems to have been the last straw at any kind of immediacy for next-gen in my mind. As it is, I have a deep backlog of high quality games to play on PC, 360, PS3, 3DS, and hell... even Wii. I can't imagine that adding Assassin's Creed 4 and whatever smaller stuff between now and Q2 will be that painful. Thoughts?

From what I understand, Dark Arisen is a re-release of Dragon's Dogma with expansion content and some revision of mechanics on top of the original game. The most immediate comparison is Witcher's Enhanced Editions, though I'm not personally sure that Dark Arisen is as large or comprehensive.

Reevaluated some things and have a revised HTPC build in the works. It's kind of a bastardized version of a real HTPC, since it has some gaming prowess, but the processor and GPU should both have pretty low idle and the GPU shouldn't really spin up to a high-power use state unless I'm doing some gaming. PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks CPU: Intel Pentium G3220 3.0GHz Dual-Core Processor (Purchased For $56.99) Motherboard: MSI H81M-P33 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (Purchased For $27.99) Memory: Kingston HyperX Blu 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1333 Memory ($72.99 @ Amazon) Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 1TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($69.67 @ Amazon) Video Card: Asus Radeon HD 7850 2GB Video Card (Purchased For $114.59) Case: Antec GX700 ATX Mid Tower Case (Purchased For $60.46) Power Supply: Corsair CX 430W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V Power Supply ($49.99 @ Amazon) Total: $452.68 (Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.) (Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-11-02 11:52 EDT-0400) The thing I've learned is that if you're willing to be a little patient and buy things as they go on sale, you can get a pretty cheap, pretty solid PC. Just don't wait too long, as you might miss your window to RMA in the event of a DOA component. That processor I already purchased normally retails for $79, but I caught it at $57. The mobo typically goes at twice the price and the GPU is about $70 off normal price, by the same token. I'm hoping the other components will go on sale or similar components will be cheap in the next couple weeks and I might slide this build under $400 (granted I already have a Windows license, so in reality it'd be right on the $500 price point).

We probably just call it "American wonderboard" in the US.

I played the demo on console and the game on PC, but I still think the controls are unwieldy in either case and not even close to Gears of War as you described. Gears of War is a competitive game and thus has a level of polish and precision to its controls that simply isn't comparable to DS. Anyways, I didn't mean to say that Dead Space has tank controls (and I didn't actually say that), I was more alluding to the fact that this game falls somewhere in between a spectrum from tank controls to third-person shooting controls, much like RE4/RE5. I appreciate precision and this game doesn't have it, there are plenty of times where I used a melee attack that I would have guessed hit the enemy by the animation but I actually miss them and they pull off a one-shot kill or extremely damaging blow. I also didn't like the way you run in the game, can't put my finger on what exactly was wrong because it's been long enough since I played it but I thought I should say it. I put out the disclaimer that I'm not a fan of horror games, so again read my comments with that filter. The only RE games I liked were the lightgun games and RE4, but even then I didn't think they were anything to write home about. And I'd like to restate that I simply didn't like the non-pausing inventory and by no means am saying it's an invalid design choice. I will agree that it enforced consciousness of surroundings, and I liked it as a stylistic choice if nothing else because it blended well with the aesthetics and functions of other technology in the game. Nonetheless, I still do find Dead Space fairly compelling in terms of being thrilling, the inventory/upgrade system, and the narrative (can't speak for where it goes in later games). I just can't find it a more compelling choice than some of the other games that were mentioned in this thread. Of course, it's moot considering the sale is over. What choice(s) did you end up making, Rxnadu?

Nintendo is super-good at censorship: https://twitter.com/NoMagRyan/status/396248784641863680

I think there's so little stock on items like that because on the whole, Club Nintendo really doesn't offer anything incredibly compelling, but having extremely limited, quite nice items keeps people on the hook. I definitely thought they'd wait longer before having any kind of Digital DS downloads, but I suppose this is the most limited fashion they could have done it in. It's kind of like those ambassador program games that blow every other eShop game out of the water, but are only available to a very specific group of people so there's no expectation of more on the horizon.

Considering I'm not a big fan of horror (jump scares get me, atmosphere gets me, unexplained noises get me, etc), it shouldn't be a surprise that I'm not a big fan of some of these games but I need to throw my hat into the "Don't buy Dead Space" pile. While I actually did get pretty far in that game given my background with horror, I was still stopped dead in my tracks by an unkillable enemy. It rang very Resident Evil to me in both that momentum killing mechanic as well as the action/shooter controls with a degree of clunkiness. I don't really like tank controls, and I don't buy into the idea that having unwieldy controls adds to tension of horror moments because it really just makes me frustrated with the mechanics more than anything. Also, I don't particularly like that the world is moving while you're navigating your inventory, though I can see the argument for that adding to tension without necessarily being clunky.

Maybe in the year 2020 Nintendo will realize that given a blank canvas, people are going to draw dicks.

Wow, finally a rock solid PS+ month for NA: http://blog.us.playstation.com/2013/10/31/playstation-plus-november-preview/ Of course Resogun and Contrast for PS4, then we also get ibb & obb, Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen, and Binary Domain for PS3, and finally Soul Sacrifice and Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath for PSV. Every single one of those games were games I was planning on buying at the right price, so I'm very stoked for November.

Actually, now that you say that I really do find that many of the episodes I don't like are of that nature. That said, I meant more that the personalities of Troi and Data make these episodes where everything is super inward-facing and really highlights their idiosyncrasies. It takes a really long time for a Troi episode to get beyond the simple background of "what is it like to be a woman in space" or "what is it like to read minds, wouldn't it be crazyyyyyy". It's probably partly a result of DS9 coming after TNG, so they took some chances earlier on and let people's quirks unfold through relationships and interesting scenarios rather than introspective "what is it like to have a parasite in your body that controls your mind" or "what if you're a fairly non-empathetic doctor" questions being foundations for episodes.

I've been slowly burning through Star Trek with my girlfriend, we watched all of TNG and switched off seasons when DS9 was running concurrently. We decided it'd be cool to watch Voyager episodes along with DS9 episodes in order of airing, so I'm about halfway through S3 of DS9 and two episodes into Voyager IIRC. I'm really enjoying watching DS9 for the first time and rewatching Voyager (watched Voyager in syndication, never watched DS9), I think they did a particularly good job in DS9 of not having any characters whose specific episodes I don't enjoy. A small feat, really, considering my generally positive feelings about TNG while completely detesting most Troi and many Data episodes.

I basically buy every bomb I can get my hands on and destroy every one of those blocks asap. I can't deal with the potential randomness of that particular enemy, because all it takes is a bad fall, getting juggled by an enemy, getting thrown, timing a jump incorrectly, falling too slow, jumping too high, or whatever to get totally annihilated by one of those damned blocks.

I've considered this, but the case I have really is complete garbage so replacing it was a top priority anyways. I'd like the final product of this to be an HTPC that I use as a OTA PVR and light gaming device, only problem is my budget is practically nil. Eventually I'll be replacing every part, but it really has to be one thing at a time so I figured a sound-dampening, high quality case would be a good first step to mitigate some of those shitty parts I can't afford to replace for months. My long term plan is to replace the case, then the PSU, then the hard drive, and finally upgrade the motherboard/CPU/RAM. Even when I'm done, it'll be a pretty cheap machine that has a very specific purpose.

On the topic of cases, anyone have experience with noise reducing cases? I built a PC with some spare parts I had lying around and I'd like to use it as a HTPC-type thing, only thing is it's loud as sin. I'm trying to make this a budget-friendly build, since as I said I made it from spare parts and can't afford outlay for a whole new machine. I'm really looking to spend less than $100, ideally around $50, for a case that dampens the horrible loudness of these older parts. I'm looking at the Fractal Design R4 and the Azza Silentium 920B, both of which scrape the top-end of my budget. Any cheaper suggestions/thoughts?

Ah, yeah sorry about that: 1 TB WD Blue 7200RPM Internal Drive - $64.99 + 6.99 shipping If you need wiggle room downwards, the components to consider going budget on are: processor - a Core i5-4430 would be fine, still quad-core just downclocked chipset - you might find savings if you went to Ivy Bridge components, Core i5/i7 in the 3000 series and appropriately matching motherboards hard drive - obviously you could get a lower capacity HDD than 1TB, minimal savings however PSU - 80 Plus Gold + modular is nice but non-modular and 80 Plus Bronze can give some savings; if you do wiggle here, stick to quality brands like Seasonic, Corsair, and Antec (the latter two are supplied by the former, actually) because the efficiency pays off in the long run and cheaper brands/models tend to be louder and run hotter I still wouldn't say you should cheap out on the PSU, and you definitely shouldn't cheap out by getting less than 8GB RAM or a video card with less than 4GB of VRAM unless your budget absolutely makes it impossible to afford them. If you want to spend more, I'd do it on the processor, PSU, and perhaps a solid-state drive. A Core i7 is generally overkill for 1080p gaming, but it'd get you more futureproof-ish longevity than a more expensive video card. I'm not super hot on SSDs, personally, because they're just too expensive for the relatively limited benefits they grant. I'd much rather spend that money on more capacity or maybe some nice new accessories like a 1440p display or a mechanical keyboard, but that's just my preference and I know some people love SSDs.

I'm sure it makes sense, but 6 alphanumeric in two three-part groups is really confusing to someone with no familiarity. American zip codes are just five numerals.