Planet Coaster Or New GPU

[sam12josh]

Should I buy the new game Planet Coaster, which I find incredibly beautiful and which I want more than most things I've ever seen. However the Alpha is £50 which is a lot of money for me, I only have £330 in savings for computer parts and games and earn very little. I was planning on buying a new GPU, like a GTX 970 for 1080p gaming. What would you do in this case, game or GPU?

[Godlygamer23]

Thread moved to New Builds and Planning.

[MoonlightSylv]

3 minutes ago, sam12josh said:

Should I buy the new game Planet Coaster, which I find incredibly beautiful and which I want more than most things I've ever seen. However the Alpha is £50 which is a lot of money for me, I only have £330 in savings for computer parts and games and earn very little. I was planning on buying a new GPU, like a GTX 970 for 1080p gaming. What would you do in this case, game or GPU?

What GPU do you have now?

[sam12josh]

Well...... it's an R9 270X. It's not very good and can only just get the job done. I do like it but I barely get 60fps at 1080p on medium/low settings.

[KearneyMC]

Why buy a new game when you could upgrade your PC allowing you to enjoy more games

 

[sam12josh]

If a buy a new GPU I won't have much money left and certainly not enough to buy an new AAA games. Especially Planet Coaster. Although I see your point, PC hardware is more important than games. On the other hand I can't get 40hrs of game time out of a new PC part.

[TheRandomness]

1 minute ago, sam12josh said:

If a buy a new GPU I won't have much money left and certainly not enough to buy an new AAA games. Especially Planet Coaster. Although I see your point, PC hardware is more important than games. On the other hand I can't get 40hrs of game time out of a new PC part.

R9 390 > 970 (390 also costs less: £259 for the Sapphire nitro, the best one (https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/sapphire-video-card-100382ntoc2l))

[sam12josh]

OK if I get the R9 390 would a 550W PSU support it, that is why I wanted to get the GTX 970 instead, plus it has lower thermal output and uses NVIDIA software which I prefer to use over AMD's.

[Energycore]

550W should be plenty for the R9 390 unless your CPU is a heavily overclocked LGA 2011 model like the 5820K.

 

But since we're a couple months away from the new generation of graphics cards, in your place i'd buy the game now and get the newer generation card in July-ish that should be as powerful as a 970/390 but should also cost anywhere from 20 to 50% less.

[sam12josh]

OK, with about £350 will I be able to afford a new GPU based on current rumours and release prices of the GTX 970/980? Your plan does sound great though.

[Energycore]

IIRC the 970 released at 350$ US and its price very slowly drifted down to 300. Since you can buy a 970 for £250 right now I'd expect the newer generation card in the same tier to begin at £300 in the UK. On the other hand, you should also be able to find a card that performs as well as a 970 for somewhere between £180 and £220 on release. And frankly you don't need anything more powerful than a 970/390 for 1080p 60FPS gaming.

 

Keep in mind these are wild speculation so the details may be way off by the time we see the cards, but what's for sure is that by waiting you will get yourself a better value than by buying in right now. And the 260X should meet the requirements for Planet Coaster no problem.

 

Just make sure you have a beefy enough CPU since if this is like any theme park simulator out there it's going to use more CPU power than your average shooter/RPG. It's hard to say how your computer will perform in the game since it's so early in development but I'd hazard a guess that any i3/i5/i7 from sandy bridge on should be fine. A weaker CPU might lag on humongous parks.

[sam12josh]

Well my CPU, an i5 6600k should do fine then and I thank you for your advice and will probably buy the game now and get a new GPU later, be it a 970 or new generation card I don't know but I do thank you.

[Energycore]

Yes, your CPU won't have a problem handling whatever the game can throw at it. Cheers!