Playing games on the PC sucks...

[Kratos Aurion]

Before you start an outrage on this topic, hear me out: some PC games are great games, i'm not judging the quality of these games. It's just that they're so inconsistent in terms of performance from PC to PC...

I offered a brand new laptop for my brother this christmas, because the one he had was already breaking down. I chose this one in specific because I knew it was more than enough to run "Sonic Generations", and it was also cheap enough so I could afford it. But then we tried the game, and it had so many slowdowns. I tried to fix it, but nothing worked. Here's my brother's new laptop's specs:

Notebook Acer Aspire AS5742G 488G75 Mnkk LX RDP02 012 - LX RDP02 012 - Aspire - Acer - da Acer (not all is in english, but I think you won't have trouble understanding it)

And here's the system reccommendations for "Sonic Generations":

OS: Microsoft Windows 7
CPU: Intel Core i5 @ 2.66 GHz / AMD Phenom II X4 @ 3.0 GHz
RAM: 3GB RAM
RAM: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 (1GB) / ATI Radeon HD 5850 (1GB)

What the f***? My brother's new PC is more than enough to run it flawlesly! His graphic card is twice as powerfull (2G instead of 1), The processor is the one they reccomend using, he has 5G more of RAM than reccommended and he has Windows 7. How can this not work? It doesn't make any sense!

My laptop, which I bought this year in february I think, is not as strong but it can run Sonic Generations almost flawlesly...this just makes no sense to me at all!
Here are my laptop's specs:

ASUSTeK Computer Inc. - Notebooks- ASUS N53Jq

MY 6G of RAM has to compete against his 8G, my 1G graphic card has to compete against his 2G, we both have the same OS too. My processor is a little better, but it can't be the processor because he has the one they reccommend using!

And you thought that made no sense? A friend of mine is playing "Sonic Generations" on his much weaker laptop than ours. His processor is much weaker than the one on the minimun requirements, his graphic card is a nvidia 512MG and the rest is pretty much the minimum required. I can't give you the exact specs of it, because I can't remember his Acer model...

It's not just because of this that playing games on a PC sucks. Tons of this stuff happened to me in the past. Both Civilizations IV and V have more lags than a beta test, no matter in which computer I installed it (both good enough to run them or much stronger). I eventually got IV to work, not flawlesly but playable, but never got V to fully work on me. I also tried Crysis (hands down, best FPS on the PC in my opinion) and it had lags on every single computer I putted it on. Even PC's that are more than twice as strong (is that right? xD) as the specs of the game. Much more stuff happened to me, but I think you get the point...

People who can run their PC games flawlesly on a PC have no idea how lucky they are. From my experience, it's pretty much random and not depended on the systems requirements. Will someone please explain this to me? Maybe i'm doing something wrong, or I missed something or there's something I just can't understand...

Sorry for the looooong topic, guys. I needed to vent a little xD

 

[TechJargonOnly]

Your brother's laptop is not on par with those recommendations. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 is far superior to the Nvidia GeForce GT540. The GT540(M) is a laptop GPU, and the GTX 460 is a desktop GPU, which is a decent card as well, and probably many times more powerful than the laptop's graphics.

I'm sorry, but your system does not meet those requirements. It's not the PC's fault, PCs are powerful, flexible, amazing machines. They are great for gaming, but you need to know what their limits are when they're fresh from the box, and usually require upgrades to reach their full potential.

 

[pparks1]

What the f***? My brother's new PC is more than enough to run it flawlesly! His graphic card is twice as powerfull (2G instead of 1),

The power of a graphics card is not determined by how much RAM it has. People make this mistake a lot.

People who can run their PC games flawlesly on a PC have no idea how lucky they are. From my experience, it's pretty much random and not depended on the systems requirements. Will someone please explain this to me? Maybe i'm doing something wrong, or I missed something or there's something I just can't understand..

The primary issue with PC Gaming is that there are just so many variables. For many of us who have had fewer problems, we are often the types who build the computer manually. The advantages are that we can be specific about motherboards, power supplies, tweaking of hardware within our BIOS, etc. When you get a prebuilt machine, many of these things are not configurable. Instead, you pick the CPU, video card, etc...and just more or less deal with the rest of the hardware that you get. Also, for many who build themselves, they end up spending more because they insist on higher quality components. I believe that these fundamental components (mobos, chipsets, power supplies) can make a marked difference in performance.

Also, many computers can be built with so much complexity that it makes it more complicated. For example, when BF3 came out, people who were running CrossFire or SLI'd video cards seemed to have far more graphical issues with the game at release than those people who were just driving a single monitor with a single video card. I had friends who simply removed a secondary card for awhile until they got the issues worked out. So, in fact, their extra "uber" powerful PC actually caused them to experience slower performance than somebody with a more average PC.

Sorry for the looooong topic, guys. I needed to vent a little xD

Totally understandable. I think we have all been there.

 

[Wishmaster]

For what its worth, Sonic Generations (the game itself) is actually very PC friendly and runs very well on the PC.

I think the big issue here is the onboard graphics. Which technically is not a graphics card at all, but a graphics 'chip" integrated into the motherboard.
I would be willing to bet, with everything else the same, and a dedicated mid range GPU, it would run flawlessly as would quite a few other games.

Sadly, thats not going to be a option with a laptop. The one it has is really suited best for Video Playback, Picture viewing, and Web Browsing. Not so much for games.

 

[pparks1]

Sadly, thats not going to be a option with a laptop. The one it has is really suited best for Video Playback, Picture viewing, and Web Browsing. Not so much for games.

This is reason I never recommend a laptop for gaming. Get a low-end laptop for portability and mobile computing, get a midrange desktop for gaming. Chances are you will spend less on both then you would on a laptop which really provides a solid gaming experience.

 

[badger906]

if you want gaming on a budget, an xbox or playstation is advised, if you want a true gaming experience, get some deep pockets and go to town its my hooby blowing money on tech lol

 

[Kratos Aurion]

It can't be because of the graphics card's power, because as I said my laptop has a weaker one and it runs the game quite well. His PC on the other hand lags like crazy!

Can I try anything to correct this issue, or is it that the computer sucks hard?

Thanks for the replies, guys