PC Game Suggestions

I have a new Toshiba laptop (linky) and I'm looking for game suggestions for it. I haven't played a PC game since I got my PS2 and my last two computers were woefully inadequate for anything more demanding than Minesweeper. I'm looking for good games in general (I'm open to different genres) that don't contain the word "Warcraft" in the title and don't need $3000 worth of hardware to run on the very lowest settings.

Specs:
CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo 2.00GHz T5800 (website's wrong, it's a Centrino 2 instead of a Centrino "1")
RAM: 4GB PC6400 DDR2 SDRAM
Graphics Card: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3470
OS: Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit SP1

I plan on upgrading the graphics card at some point and installing Windows 7.

Try codemasters "Dirt" its basicly the newest version of a game they used to make called Colin mcrae rally. I have a version of colin mcrae rally 2.0 and its pretty fun.

Unreal Tournament!

Okay, how new school or old school do you want to get? How many games are you looking for? Any favored genres?

And you don't need $3k of rig to run the latest games. I'm doing that on $300 of equipment.

Here's what I suggest in roughly their order of awesomeness. Many of these are not the Latest-and-Greatest, but are that good:

• Half-Life Orange Box. Preferably get HL1, just to acquaint yourself with the start of this fantastic series.
• Fallout 3. Heck, get 1 and 2 while you're at it.
• Toca Race Driver 3 - (Best Racing Game I've Played)
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - (Frighteningly Immersive)
• Peggle - (Simple Yet Addictive Fun)
• Crysis - (Gorgeous)
• F.E.A.R. - (Mind berkeley Scary)
• Left 4 Dead
• Unreal Tournament

In reply to Salanis:

My favorite genres for PC are racing, FPS, combat flight sim, and war/strategy games. I wanted to get Orange Box and DIRT, but I didn't have a computer or console new enough to play them. I think I have TOCA 3 already for my PS2- great game, BTW.

These are all good starting points. Thanks.

'Live for Speed' is an awesome racing sim that runs on next to nothing. Takes some getting used to, but the demo is free, so it's worth a try.

Anything Valve source engine should run just spiffy on that laptop.

Windows 7 isin't really optimized for gaming yet, so you'll take a pretty significant performance hit with some graphics features.

ArtOfRuin wrote: My favorite genres for PC are racing, FPS, combat flight sim, and war/strategy games. I wanted to get Orange Box and DIRT, but I didn't have a computer or console new enough to play them. I think I have TOCA 3 already for my PS2- great game, BTW.

Groovy. I tend to like shooters as well. Most of those are shooters.

I highly recommend STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl. Great shooter, but it's a bit RPG like, in the sense that you need to manage your equipment and it's non-linear. It should be hella cheap now. It can be pretty buggy, but it's fantastically immersive. Takes place in a wasteland surrounding Chernobyl, and really makes you feel like you are man alone in Hell.

I was hooked when I started yelling and cursing because the military surrounded the compound I was in, and I needed to punch a hole through the perimeter and run like hell in order to get out.

Grand Prix Legends (F1 Racing in 1967)

GT Legends (Door-slammers through the years)

Nascar Legends (Dodge Daytona's at Riverside? Check.)

Rally Trophy (Flogging an original Mini or Escort Cosworth in the dirt, need I say more?)

GTR (Modern racing, buy it with GT Legends for cheap)

Counter Strike (Get Half-Life OrangeBox and get everything, Left 4 Dead is a new game but is a FPS version of a Zombie Movie with Co-Op)

Battlefield 1942/Vietnam (Vehicles)

Serious Sam I/II (Play Co-Op with friends and enjoy the attitude and hords o'monsters)

No One Lives Forever 1/2 (Play a campy 60's spy in a campy '60's spy movie/book, plus she's hot and the multiplayer is almost too much fun. Harpoon gun your friends? Check. Slap fight to the death? Check.)

For the racing games, a decent steering wheel will make you much more successful. I used to have one of these:

http://www.softwareandstuff.com/acc_ultracer.html

and it was pretty good for casual race car sims and it is just a standard 6-button joystick, no drivers needed. Pretty neat, but you need to have an analog game port to get it to work properly. If you want to get more serious there are a bunch of decent wheels and pedals available.

Luke wrote: 'Live for Speed' is an awesome racing sim that runs on next to nothing. Takes some getting used to, but the demo is free, so it's worth a try.

YES! Beat me to it. Easily the greatest racing game I've ever played.

For FPS, Battle Field 2. Little bit older, but still the most amazing FPS ever. Helicopters, Fighter jets, Bombers, Tanks and Sand rails plus all different classes from medics for healing to support to resupply. Some of the biggest levels I have ever seen in a multiplayer game and up to 64 players. Even squads to limit voice communication to small groups and commanders who can deliver artillery strikes, spot threats via satellite and deliver orders to the squads.

CoD4 single player is pretty damn good, but the multiplayer is a bit standard rambo shooter.

For a flight sim there is no better then IL2 1946. It is a compilation of all the IL2 games and is THE BEST ww2 flight sim out there. Tons of planes, a huge amount of skins available so you can do arial combat from ~1930 to approx 1960 (indochina or israel) It is also moddable if you go to All Aircraft Arcade. If you mod it, you can make all the planes flyable, add more realistic effects and sounds, and add new flyable planes. My game is seriously modded and I spend a huge amount of time playing it. They even have the silver plate B-29 which has an accurate model of the fat man and little boy nukes that you can use. Very satisfying to watch and useful for alternate history missions.

Get it you won't be dissappointed!!

Chris Rummel

I would suggest that anyone who enjoys FPS gaming should check out Urban Terror (UrT).

Stolen right from their website:

Urban Terror™ is a free multiplayer first person shooter, that (thanks to ioquake3) does not require Quake III Arena. It is available for Windows, Linux and Macintosh. The current version is 4.1.

Urban Terror can be described as a Hollywood tactical shooter; somewhat realism based, but the motto is "fun over realism". This results in a very unique, enjoyable and addictive game.

No registration required: Download, install, play!

Urban terror 4.1 Official video

Disclaimer: I'm in no way affiliated with said game. I just like it a lot.

-Dan

LOTRO, Because it isn't Warcrack. And it has a better engine than WoW.

Baldur's Gate! Best. Game. Ever.

Leisure Suit Larry

Bumboclot wrote: I would suggest that anyone who enjoys FPS gaming should check out Urban Terror (UrT). Stolen right from their website: Urban Terror™ is a free multiplayer first person shooter, that (thanks to ioquake3) does not require Quake III Arena. It is available for Windows, Linux and Macintosh. The current version is 4.1. Urban Terror can be described as a Hollywood tactical shooter; somewhat realism based, but the motto is "fun over realism". This results in a very unique, enjoyable and addictive game. No registration required: Download, install, play! Urban terror 4.1 Official video Disclaimer: I'm in no way affiliated with said game. I just like it a lot. -Dan

yeah this game is addictive too.. Very addictive..

I like the pistol (+ nades or shotgun, optional) only servers. They are a very good way to improve accuracy.

The art of walljumping is quite interesting too.

EDIT: Link not safe for work. Has some NSFW content at the end. Click

You cant upgrade video cards on laptops, they don't make very good video game machines either. All the components are really slow so you have some resemblance of battery life. Its really not worth bothering, just get some more games for your PS2 if you want to play games.

In reply to SupraWes:

I know my laptop isn't a gaming machine, though I am suprised you can't install an upgraded video card (I can't seem to find any). Battery life sucks on it anyways (2 1/2 hours at most) so I tend to leave it plugged in.

Maybe at some point I'll get a dedicated gaming rig, but this laptop lets me rejoin the 21st century. My old laptop was constantly crashing on me and died 8 months ago, and until I got my new laptop I've been making do with an old Pentium III/~300mb RAM tower I used in my A+ certification class!

It's really easy to build a grassroots gaming rig. My current one ran me $240 and runs very well. Build one just like you would a car: by scrounging cast-off parts. Craigslist is invaluable.

Saying, "ZOMG! A gaming rig will cost you $3000, minimum!" Is like saying, "Oh, my god! A race-car? A new Z06 is going to cost you $75,000, minimum!"

Lots of people have to have the latest-and-greatest computer components. These people turn around and sell their 6-month old parts for Cheap!$!

It's an old game, but one of my favourites..

Mafia

ArtOfRuin wrote: I am suprised you can't install an upgraded video card (I can't seem to find any).

In the quest for thin & light on anything smaller than a 17" form factor you'll find that even discrete chipset video cards are integrated into the motherboard. You usually get 2 choices for motherboards, integrated intel, or "upgraded" AMD/Nvidia depending on the model.

tecmo superbowl

I've never been one for video games, but I like the pinball game that's built into Windows XP (plus it's free.) I'm not sure if Vista has it or not.

In reply to MCarp22:

The "discrete" part is what tripped me up. We never practiced on laptops in my A+ classes, so I'm not as familiar with laptop hardware as I am with desktop/tower hardware. If I can dig up my IBM that died, I'm going to do an autopsy on it- it'll be good practice and help me shake some of the rust off, since I don't use any of my A+ skills at my current job.