Pc parts picker says my computer would be $2835. I paid $1950 just over a year ago at microcenter. That’s with a slightly “lower” video card since the one I bought isn’t even available anymore.
So this must be why I kept all my old consoles.
Low power gaming is better than ever. AAA graphics games are uncommon and unremarkable. It doesn’t take great hardware to play like 99% of great games of the 2020s. Same with pretty much everything before 2020. Steam Deck is a non high end laptop
So this thread made me look and the cost to build my PC today would be around double what I paid at the time.
It’s the same thing with pretty much everything I think. I’m a car guy and the hobby is dead. Now you can put a fancy paint job or wheels on a car but that’s it. Few people want to dig into the complexity of modern automotive systems.
My wife sews. It used to be cheaper to make your own clothing. More recently, pricing for fabrics and other materials went so high it became an expensive hobby. And now that Joann’s has gone out of business she literally can’t get fabric “reasonably” anymore.
Humans ruin everything.
It’s not like this is a pc only problem, it’s only a matter of time before it hits consoles too. If high costs persist I could see a return of arcades and pc gaming cafes.
Not just consoles, but phones, tablets, smartwatches, smart televisions, anything “smart” really including things like home automation devices, automobiles of all varieties, e-bikes, network routers and other networking equipment.
This has to get solved somehow or it’s really going to cripple a ton of industries.
But why would you, the corrupt cartel/cabal of relevant oligarchs, want to solve this?
You’re just describing whole sectors of products that can be financed via loans, rented out, made part of some tiered subscription program, something like that.
You will own nothing, and you will be a broke, compliant, debt-slave.
Hypercapitalism -> Technofeudalism.
Enshittify everything.
The problem is that it will impact other businesses as well. If this was just going to impact consumers, that would be one thing, but businesses need fleets of vehicles, fleets of phones, laptops, and network equipment. Suddenly not being able to get those things at all because of a RAM crunch is absolutely a disaster in the making. As much as it seems fun to pretend that all the oligarchs are in it together, they’re just as bloodthirsty for each other as they are for us.
I mean, the RAM manufacturers literally have been prosecuted for cartel-like collusion, multiple times, over many years.
I’m not just saying that as a framing device, they literally are a cartel.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DRAM_price_fixing_scandal
But more generally… yeah, I mean, that could mess up other industries, and also yes, the oligarchs in a cartel do still have power struggles.
We, us, our lives, the economy in general… thats all just the battlefield, the collateral damage, of their power struggles.
I guess you could say this could pretty much be our real world version of some kind of ‘first corporate war’ from various cyberpunk canons.
Yep, these people have way too much power, and… I guess it remains to be seen if any governmemt will actually do something about that, but I’m prettu sure they basically won’t.
It won’t persist. It’s just AI hype and massive upscaling of data centres.
Yeah but it could be a few years. That’s a long time to wait.
Unpopular opinion: it feels weird to call pc gaming a hobby. It’s like calling watching TV or masturbating a hobby. It occupies time to be sure, but it seems a lot more like a way to blow extra time than to invest it, and I played WoW for 13 years.
A hobby is just something someone does in their free time for pleasure, so yeah, watching TV would certainly qualify. I suppose masturbating could too but I would argue that falls closer to a physiological desire rather than a hobby. Hobbies can be just about anything - bird watching, walking, caring for a pet, reading, playing sudoku, etc. Playing video games has been shown to be good for mental acuity and hand eye coordination, so I would argue it’s even good for you! Hobbies don’t need to be an investment of time at all, they just need to bring you pleasure. We as humans need relaxation and decompression time, and that’s exactly what a hobby is. Sure some hobbies produce things or results of some kind, but they don’t have to.
I don’t think by your own definition you can exclude masturbation. It’s free time for pleasure. It’s non obligatory.
It also makes looking out the window a hobby… which makes me think this definition is overly broad.
My guess is that the “next generation” of PC gamers will be getting the next generation of consoles instead. Hopefully that doesn’t also mean that we stop getting PC ports of the good console titles.
This problem affects all technology, not just PCs. Phones, consoles, tablets, anything that uses DRAM at all. All consumer hardware is at risk.
Not with Steam doing this well
PC gaming has a specs problem when a mid range gaming PC from only a few years ago can’t play the latest games. In 2010 I bought a very basic gaming laptop and it could literally run any game at the time. Old games are just as fun anyway. I’ll play the newer games when it’s more affordable to.
My solution? SBC gaming! A customizeable console with a ton of cool games in the palm of your hand! Don’t like the os? Swap the SD card and boot another! Vertical orientation, horizontal, with or without analog sticks, so many models to choose from! Weird factor forms! Half baked software! Fuck up your emulator configuration and spend the rest of the afternoon unfucking it! Realize you spent more time tinkering with the device than playing games on it! A time sink for all ages and genders!
You joke, but this, unironically.
I am a bit tongue-in-cheek here but I genuinely enjoy SBC gaming. It has re-kindled the spark that I had for videogames.
I remember begging my parents, at the age of 12, for the cash to put together my first gaming-capable PC.
When I was a teenager in the nineties in France, it was a big deal that there was some PCs under 10000 francs (~1500€). PC parts pricing has been rough for years.
Was there really a time when a decent budget gaming PC could be built so cheap compared to middle class income? I’m not saying it’s not getting worse, but I’m wondering if the past is not idealized.
I built a basic box 2-3 years ago. Everything except the Graphics Card, Monitor, Keyboard, and Mouse cost me $480. I must have pulled the trigger at exactly the right time, because I got a used 3050 for $300, and a monitor for $50. I already had the keyboard and mouse I use. That means I managed to just barely squeak in under $1100. If you compared that to 1990 prices I think I would have managed to make a much worse machine in 1999 for around $1500 then, or about $3000 today.
you can always play xonotic tho
