Console ports or how to annoy PC gamers

Crni Vuk

Crni Vuk

M4A3 Oldfag oTO
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I am not sure if I really should make some thread here but since its the game section and I love complaining/ranting why not.

I am curious why or what makes it so hard to "port" a game from the console to the PC - seriously now. Why is it so damn fucking difficult to make it feel "alright".

Right now I am playing Star Wars - The Force Unleashed on PC (as it was pretty cheap) and I dont mind if the visuals are "less" then what might be possible - And letz forget for a moment the claim in 2008 by them that a "PC port" is impossible as it would only work with machines that cost 4000$ or something yeah I bet ... .But it is not like I am some graphic whore anyway the game doesnt look that bad to say that and the graphic really is pretty decent (why in hell it takes 25! gygabite of space on the computer as it comes with 2 DVDs and 30min of instalation while on the X-box it just has 7 Gygabite on a single disk is something I cant understand ...).

So to say that the visuals dont bother me that much. But what REALLY is absolutofucking annoying is the fucked up controls of the game ... I mean while playing its not thaaaat bad, playing it feels like god of war (in some places) and you can get used to it the game doesnt require more then buttonsmashing anyway ***(what happend to the good old Star Wars games with the real great sword fighting *le sigh* like Jedi Knight and such :( ) but the menue doesnt even feature a cursor ! And to navigate you have to presh (in the german version) "Ü" - "*".

I can only say WTF(!). Really. If a console port lacks some visuals, thats ok for me. I can see here that the PC and the console are not exactly the same system and reworking the visuals for it means almost like making a whole new game (eventually no clue), but for the love of jebus is it that hard to give some decent controls ? Something that is already a standart for the last 20 years in gaming ? A DAMN MOUSE CURSOS IN THE MENUE ! Are we back to the stone age of gaming or something D: !

Alright. Rant over.


***(what happend to the good old Star Wars games with the real great sword fighting *le sigh* like Jedi Knight and such :( )

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DlhxtWmFuRk[/youtube]

I am curious if there is also some kind of lightbread knife or something ... you know for the survival jedi

*Edit
Of course everyone is free to include his totally own personal rant. Just do it. Gamers of this world UNITE !.
 
Whatever you do don't buy Strangers Wrath for PC.. It's by far the worst 'port' ever conceived by men. (AFAIK)

You can't change your resolution.
It runs like crap on systems that can run the most demanding ''current gen'' games. (15 FPS!!)
You can't change the controls, you can't play the game properly by using the standard control scheme .
It crashes
It has visual artifacts

...


It's horrible.
 
Strangers Wrath really is teh shit. I was super happy to see it finally on pc... just to realize that I just wasted a bunch of euros for a crappy pc port. The menu is shit, the controls are shit and like Painless DocM wrote above, you can't even change the resolution nor change any other graphic settings (except chosing between general low / medium / high settings).

Same with Bionic Commando. It's not a that bad port, but what in hell... why didn't they exchanged the controller button icons with keyboard icons.. guess it would have made just too much sense.
 
On a more positive note the 'devs' promised to release a patch very soon. I hope it makes the game at least playable as I have been waiting to play this for a very very long time. (I didn't own an Xbox)
 
PainlessDocM said:
On a more positive note the 'devs' promised to release a patch very soon. I hope it makes the game at least playable as I have been waiting to play this for a very very long time. (I didn't own an Xbox)
Click to expand...

Me too. I'm also waiting for it to show up on GoG.com as part of the Oddbox that they're offering on Steam. I haven't played any of the Oddworld games, but each of them is one I want to play.

Sincerely,
The Vault Dweller
 
The first two games work excellent, only the 3D ports suck very much.

In the near future they will release "Strangers Wrath HD" on PS3, they promised to patch the current pc port to the same level. (Improved graphics etc.)

I'm still pretty optimistic for the future of this game, but in it's current state it's like playing an early beta version.
 
ok....


resident evil 4 on PC, ported from console.

1) it was made after 2000
2) it has no mouse support.
3) its a FPS with free-look.

put that together.... free-look using keyboard on a FPS.
 
reminds me to Metal Gear Solid Sons of Liberty. While the menue and interface was "ok" ... they really havnt spend much time with the controls. Playing it with the keyboard was a nightmare ... as someone got the great idea to map the keys in totally strange locations and I never figured out how to change it, so meaning to hit something you would have to hit a key on the other side of the keyboard while the controls have been in a completely other direction ... which makes using combos pretty awesome ... though after using a controler it wasnt still that much better as it didnt suported all buttons ... that I managed to still beat the game ... well the story was just to cool.
 
sea said:
By far the worst port I've played is Dead Space for PC. While it doesn't have the same issues with performance as some ports (it actually runs very well on older hardware and looks good too), the controls are almost literally unusable if you don't own a gamepad. There is so much delay and acceleration on the mouse that it goes from being the precision instrument you'd expect in a shooter, to something less responsive than using god-damned arrow keys to aim. It turns what is a pretty good Resident Evil 4-style horror shooter into a chore. All that, and apparently the game even had a dedicated PC team that worked on it for close to a year. Really? It sure doesn't show.
Click to expand...

You are talking about V.Sync bug everyone knows at this point. All you have to do to fix this is force V. Sync from control panel and leave the ingame setting off. Game is perfectly playable with keyboard and mouse and I wouldn't have it any other way. It really is a good port despite this little annoyance.
 
Indeed, DeadSpace port is very very good. Can't even tell that it's a port, actually. And definitely nothing as bad as the RE4 port, but WesDude described it pretty well already.
 
Crni Vuk said:
reminds me to Metal Gear Solid Sons of Liberty. While the menue and interface was "ok" ... they really havnt spend much time with the controls. Playing it with the keyboard was a nightmare ... as someone got the great idea to map the keys in totally strange locations and I never figured out how to change it, so meaning to hit something you would have to hit a key on the other side of the keyboard while the controls have been in a completely other direction ... which makes using combos pretty awesome ... though after using a controler it wasnt still that much better as it didnt suported all buttons ... that I managed to still beat the game ... well the story was just to cool.
Click to expand...


All MGS games have PS3 DUALSHOCK USB capability for PC. Makes life amazing.
 
yeah well thats all super nice and such really. Just that it doesnt help anything if the controler I use(ed) wasnt really recognized by the game ;)

And playing with the keyboard was pretty annoying as like said someone decided to throw the buttons all over the keyboard ...
 
Use google, It will save your life.

I don't know about the legality, but apparently the PS3 controller being used on PCs pisses Microsoft off.
 
Crni Vuk said:
reminds me to Metal Gear Solid Sons of Liberty. While the menue and interface was "ok" ... they really havnt spend much time with the controls. Playing it with the keyboard was a nightmare ... as someone got the great idea to map the keys in totally strange locations and I never figured out how to change it, so meaning to hit something you would have to hit a key on the other side of the keyboard while the controls have been in a completely other direction ... which makes using combos pretty awesome ... though after using a controler it wasnt still that much better as it didnt suported all buttons ... that I managed to still beat the game ... well the story was just to cool.
Click to expand...

You can change controls partly in the settings tool outside of the game. I managed it to play the game pretty good with keyboard, especially because I played the first game only with keyboard too. It worked very good in MGS2 too, until the parts with the sword kicked in. At this stage you have to use the keyboard to control the player and in the same time use the mouse to control the sword. Obviously, this didn't worked pretty well, as I lack one additional arm for this... Never managed it to beat the final boss even on normal difficult settings, because I was out of healing stuff short before he was down.
 
Lexx said:
. It worked very good in MGS2 too, until the parts with the sword kicked in. At this stage you have to use the keyboard to control the player and in the same time use the mouse to control the sword. Obviously, this didn't worked pretty well, as I lack one additional arm for this... Never managed it to beat the final boss even on normal difficult settings, because I was out of healing stuff short before he was down.
Click to expand...
Please dont remember me to that part ... you know I spend HOURS to finish the training where you could simply not progress before you did a very special strike ... I still dont know how I managed it. But well ... I managed to win against Solidus though it was definetly a hard fight. Not just cause of the controls ...

Using the keyboard worked (somehow ... as long you just had to shoot and run) and I cant say it is bad to play it without the mouse when you had to aim as it makes aiming more difficult and rewarding (if you ask me) but just as you said by your self ... once the sword fighting kicks in ... it becomes a real pain in the ass.


On the other side I swear I am close to colapsing and throwing that piece of shit Force Unleashed in to the corner and vaporizing the DVD. I hvae no clue if it is the same in the console version but who got the fucking idea to disconect the camera from the player in boss fights so its not centered around the player anymore to go with some Review from gameguru : "The game trancends into an awkward mode when it translates into boss battles and a bunch of fixed camera angles, ala Revenge of the Sith were boss battles had confusing camera angles so as to make the combat simpler but instead ruin the games experience to mere button smasher"

Seriously now dont they get some testers or something ? Do the people not play their own games or what ? Fucking camera. I have no clue how many times it killed me in those boss battles : /

))<>(( said:
Use google, It will save your life.

I don't know about the legality, but apparently the PS3 controller being used on PCs pisses Microsoft off.
Click to expand...
And buy a new controler ? Fuck no. The one I used back then wasnt cheap either (Logitech and wireless). But I never got the hang out of it how to activate all buttons ...
 
The benefits of already owning a PS3.

Yes, I am fucking crazy, having the whole MGS series on PS3 AND PC.

No, I don't give a shit.

Yes, It's worth it when laptops are travel friendly.
 
MGS 2: Sons of Liberty is the pc version of it, there wasn't anything else. Sons of Liberty is the normal MGS2 with the virtual reality missions includet, if I remember correct.
 
Son's of Liberty is the game without the extra content and it was ps2 only. Substance had the VR missions and was ported to xbox and pc.
 
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