How you got into PC gaming (from consoles)?

[PlayModeOn]

Hello,

 

It has been 12-14 months since I moved from consoles (PS3) to PC and I want to share my experience and how I got into PC gaming.

 

My first-hand experience of PC gaming was actually at Internet Cafe shops. At the time keyboard and mouse was very foreign to me since I have been gaming on a controller. My first PC game (that I played at the internet cafe) is Counter strike (not sure which) and Call of Duty 4. I loved the mouse but I hated the keyboard, at the time I keep pressing the wrong button and especially the console/chat key (~ tilde key) which is super annoying in the middle of a gunfight. I also find pressing the shift, ctrl or alt button very difficult because at first they felt awkward and stressful because I had small hands back then and the goddamm Windows key!. I grew up to believe that the PS3 is the most powerful gaming machine ever built so I was ignorant and always believe PCs are inferior to PlayStation 3s.

 

I continue to play at the Internet Cafe every week but I still never took PC seriously until I meet.... Battlefield 3. We all know how BF3 was hyped up because of its fantastic trailers showcasing the graphical fidelity of the Frostbite engine. Now It was said these trailers were shown from a PC so that was interesting to me since at the time the graphics looks very amazing and since then I never knew that only PC could deliver these graphics. So that is when I paid more attention to PC.

 

Predictably I purchased BF3 for the PS3 knowing that it will be only 30FPS, low settings and at 704p resolution? While I enjoyed the game I felt that I didn't bought the same product as shown in the trailers.

My local electronic retail shop called JB Hi-Fi had Alienware booth showcasing Battlefield 4 and Crysis 2 on their laptops and desktops. I was amazed of the sharpness and clarity of 1080p resolution (in a small laptop screen!) and smooth 60FPS animations. I didn't care about how good it looks but how 1080p and 60FPS makes a great difference. In fact I played BF3 at the Alienware booth at LOW settings, 1080p and 120FPS and I grown addicted to it. (You can enable FPS counter using BF3's built-in console).

 

And this is also when I learned how to read PC specs since it is shown as a sticker on the Alienware machine. I still remember it, it was an i5 with Nvidia GTX 550 Ti for $1000 (yes alienware has always been a rip off)

 

From there I couldn't go back to 30FPS console games anymore. There are a few that play at 60FPS such as Call of Duty and Gran Turismo 5 on PS3 so I only stick to those games because of the glorious 60FPS!

 

Fast forward a couple of years when they announced the next-gen consoles, this is when SONY and Microsoft dropped the ball for me. I read the specs on these machines - I was not impress. This is the moment when I decided to quit console gaming entirely. PS4 here in Australia cost $600 so I saved up $700 for a new PC. A $700 PC is already 2.5 times more powerful than a $600 PS4, so I am glad I choose PC.

 

I built my first PC on Novemeber 2013. It has been 13-14 months now so I want to celebrate my first anniversary of PC gaming!

 

 

That is my story, do you have a similar or different story to tell too?

 

@Faceman @Fate Now I just wished I didn't bought a FX-8350 in the first place....

[stconquest]

If it could play games, I would play.  Got NES at 8 years old, got a computer at 13-14.  Been Pc gaming since.  Last console I owned was the SNES.

[RevoltTrain]

My first PC gaming experience wasn't actually until 2012, a good friend of mine got his first PC, it was a prebuilt from a local shop, he managed to brick his original GPU (MSI 9800 GTX+) and got an XFX 7770, the first game I played on his PC was GTA IV Modded, and it was glorious and I absolutely loved it. But I didn't build my PC until Halloween of last year. Why you might ask, I turned 16 last year, I got my first job last year, so I had no way to buy parts before then. And I built a fairly decent machine for my first machine (Specs in signature) (I am upgrading my GPU to a R9 290 fairly soon) I've converted many of my friends to the MasterRace, and I'm glad I have, they've all enjoyed it so far, and I've made many friends and hosted many, many LAN parties. I have loved the entire experience and would not go back to purely console ever again (I might buy a used XBone just for Forza though)

 

BTW, I love my 8350, why don't you like yours?

[IMPERIUS]

I bought myself a ps4 but wanted a pc but I would have to buy the whole system+ monitor, mouse, keyboard etc because my parents wouldn't want me to give the money to buy a new pc so I'm stuch with a dual core cpu@ 2.7ghz...After about half a year from the buying of the ps4 my parents finally gave me money to get a new pc since even they saw this pc is reeeeelly old and it was really time for an upgrade. So now I'm currently waiting for some parts to arrive and then I'm going to build it. But I did play some older games with this old pc

[jayctech]

I was never much of a gamer full stop. For several years my most played game was RuneScape which was on the PC anyway (and to this day MMORPG's are still my preferred genre) and my console was the Wii. Do I have any issue with that? No. I like platformers and games of that nature and to this day fps don't really interest me. In fact, nor do games that focus too much on being "realistic". Getting a gaming PC was entirely random and tbh I have no regrets. I only game around 20% of the time but I make near daily use of my computer so I don't feel it's a waste.

[XrayCy]

my last console was ps2 i got into pc games because i could convince my parents that i needed a pc for school work but not convince them that i needed a  new gaming console 

[pALdesu]

Started playing games on PC in the 90's played nes/snes before that.

[Tycho]

back in 2006 I wanted to play runescape, which is only possible on pc. from there I got into (what now are disgusting) f2p mmorpg's and later on steam. Now if I game 2h a week I consider that to be much.

[DigitalHermit]

Red Alert 2 happened...

[Tickletehpickle]

Console Games are too expensive for me

[RevyOcelot]

I started gaming playing flash games on my dad's old PC as a kid, if you can call that gaming. If not then I suppose it's when I got a Wii. However it's I got a laptop of my own for school when I started to play online multilayer games. At my school the policies were lax and there were no limitations on games we could install. Apparently now even websites like Youtube are blocked on that custom Windows OS we used. We played mainly Tribes 1 with Annihilation mod, Tribes 2, Runescape (Clan wars in our shitty little clan) and Halo CE at school during some lunch breaks etc. My friends introduced me to Steam and from there on I began to play TF2 and Alien Swarm, later I would buy Portal 2 on discount after my friend gifted me Portal. However these laptops weren't very suited for gaming at all, I would be playing Alien Swarm at around 5 fps in some segments or less, don't ask me how I did it. Seeing the ridiculous prices of Alienware's prebuilts, I believed PC gaming was just too expensive and out of my reach That's what drove me to beg for a PS3 which I finally received two years after getting the laptop. It was a bit late compared to my friends in getting a console but now I finally had something I could play the latest games on. It came with Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood and I went on to buy Uncharted 3 and Black Ops II. I find it very hard to imagine paying that much to buy games now. So I was happily playing on console although I would still be playing TF2 on and off on Steam.

 

So what made me go back to PC? A game called Dota 2 or maybe my awful 0.3 K/D in CoD because I cannot play FPS with a controller. One day on Steam probably going on TF2 to idle something caught my eye. A chance to participate in the Dota 2 beta. I can't remember why I clicked on it but I was taken to a hardware survey where they asked me about prior game knowledge. I hastily filled in some false information and little did I know my journey back into PC gaming had begun. A few months later, I received notice that I had been accepted into the Dota 2 beta! I started up the game, played a bot match and had no idea what I was doing during the Christmas event of 2012 and left the game alone for a few months after that. So then came 2013, when I decide to pick up Dota 2 again. I played a few bot games and thought I had gotten the hang of it. A friend had already been paying Dota 2 and I decided to play with him; I was terrible and left that match in shame. Despite that, I returned the week understanding I was bad at the game. I needed practice and so I kept playing bot games for the next four months. Dota 2 began eating up more and more time and the PS3 was being used less and less. (I also played a few other games such as RIFT but they took up less time)

 

Now keep in mind I was still using the laptop from three years ago, I was playing with often sub 20 FPS. I had to get a new computer someday. So I began researching at the end of 2013 and that's how I found Linus Tech Tips. I watched video after video on building PCs and after three weeks and consulting with a friend, I had planned out my build. I'd say I chose the right parts aside from the overkill 750W PSU for a mid tier system. The store I bought from ran out of the specific 650W PSU I had planned on getting and looking back I could have gone with 550W and be fine. Despite having to share the PC with my dad, now I am enjoying 60FPS, still paying GST, having too many games, and throwing money at Gaben. The only thing I use the PS3 for now is the controller.

[zappian]

I wanted to play dota2.

[-TesseracT-]

Wanted to play the Tony Hawk games but didn't have my ps2 anymore. Tried it on my PC and discovered the amazing world of PC gaming.

[GarnetDevil]

I used to play League in some shitty craptop with no more than 20 FPS in lowest setting, so I decided to build a beefy PC for it

[bydus]

I've been playing on ps3 and 360 for a while and it was fine. Loved uncharted series for ps3 and free online play but I wouldn't play much. I've been testing some games on my 13.3 laptop which has a dedicated gpu and was surprised how much better games looked. So I started experimenting, hooked up 360 controller, tested vsync, some tweaks to reduce input lag etc etc. By then I realized damn, I can play like on console hooked up to my tv at 1080p max settings 60fps. Once I played some games at 60fps with controller on my couch I could not go back to 30fps gaming. Then I realized "next gen" or current gen consoles are very under-powered and was angry about undelivered promise of 60fps cosnole gaming. Sold my ps4 saved some money and build myself a powerful gaming rig inside node 304 case with 970 gtx and i5-4690k. Never looked back, simply amazing. I can play any games from the past maxed out at 2k or 4k(older titles) , so games I havent tried like Mass effect series or dead space I look like ps4 titles when using DSR (dynamic super resolution at 1440p or 4k) . Shame some games are terrible ports like AC:U but I don't care that much as I have an endless selection of titles I won't have time to play . PC gaming is awesome and I'm glad I sold my consoles.

[NeatSquidYT]

Being a console gamer, and an avid YouTube watcher, I heard everyone talking about PC gaming. The first PC game I bought was Garrys Mod, but I remember playing The Sims years upon years ago on PC, like I was VERY young. December 25th I got a PC that could actually play games, and have since bought Counter Strike: Complete and GTA: Complete on Steam. I still love console though, and still regularly play it. There's a console experience that I love, put in the game and play.

[AHaskin14]

Got a free Dell with a Core 2 Quad Q6600 and a Radeon HD 3450 and all I wanted to play was Company of Heroes and It couldnt so I got a GT 640 for it. Now the thing had some power so I began pirating a lot of games such as tomb raider, metro ll, and far cry 3. Realizing how much I enjoyed the experience over my ps3 I began buying games and built my computer a year ago.

[Zweihander]

I was introducted to Quake 1.

 

Back in the Heat.net days... Been hooked ever since.

[tnlich]

First system ever if you want to call it that was the Commodore 64 and Wolfenstein.

[FSBAlston]

Console gaming since Atari 2600 with Combat.

PC gaming since DOS (I kid you not), although I wasn't serious about PC until Quake 2 hooked me (first gfx card I installed was a voodoo 3, just for that game)

I have been through every console up to last gen (except x360). Don't plan to get ps4 or x1 because I consider these consoles' architectures to be too similar to pc and the exclusives aren't worth it.

[Cad6500]

My first gaming experience was back when my parents owned an internet cafe, used to play CS there a lot, then we had to move to a new city because of the bombings that happened close to the internet cafe. When we got here (city I live in now), they bought me and my siblings an original xbox, loved it especially halo and halo 2. When the xbox 360 came out, we got it but it RRODed, after a few years we found a place that could fix it, so we had it fixed but it just kept RROD-ing after a few weeks then died. After that I got into PCs and PC gaming. Me and my friends used to play DOTA and CoD at internet cafes around town. Now I pretty much only play F2P games (don't have money to buy games, and steam isn't an option because it would take a long time to DL 1 game) like LoL and War thunder... Additionally me and siblings got PSPs and we played on those a lot.