The devs would only prefer you play Oblivion on 360 if you cannot afford to buy a new, teched out gaming rig. The fact of the matter is, a lot of people won't be willing to shell out $1000+ for one game when they can spend $300+ game cost. And I wouldn't say its far more advanced than most top of line computers, since its technology is pretty much the same with what computers have now.</font>[/QUOTE]<font color = mediumspringgreen>But I thought I heard that Bethesda was trying hard to make sure you didn't need bleeding edge technology to have an excellent gameplay experience.

Regardless, time and technology march on. I agree with Secret Master's statement that the Xbox 360 is not THAT far ahead of PCs. And graphics cards that were considered bleeding edge consumer technology at the START of ES4 Alpha testing should (unfortunately) be affordable by the time the game releases. I think a $200 investment in graphics hardware would be all that would be needed to upgrade a Pentium- or Athlon-based gaming computer that is 4 years old or younger.

I am hoping (and expecting) that my ATI 9800Pro will handle the load. If not, I think that most who are awaiting Oblivion are likewise screwed. In that case, I'll be playing my newfound Morrowind for another 6 months, until the ES4 hysteria cools a bit and hardware (and SW?) prices drop.</font> </font>[/QUOTE]Your graphics card will more than handle the load. Its a mid-range card. You'll get plenty of graphic goodness. Steve Meister, lead programmer for Bethesda, has a 9800pro to test Oblivion on his comp.

And yes, Bethesda is designing the game with the intent of that you don't need an uber computer to play the game. But when I said that, I was talking about in reference to playing the game at maximum capacity. The devs have stated that they want everyone to experience the game in "all its glory". That means every setting maxed out for an amazing performance. The game itself has great compatability with older gaming rigs, but chances are they can't have every setting maxed out with an insane resolution.

My system specs are
AMD Athlon XP 2600+
2.09ghz
1gb RAM
Radeon 9700

This alone I think, will run the game at medium settings, some maybe set to low. I can play games like Call of Duty II and Doom III just fine. My graphics card is a bit weak, but it will get the job done.

<font color = mediumspringgreen>Mid-range!?!? [/i]~sigh~[/i] Time and technology march on, indeed.</font>

[ 12-13-2005, 02:51 PM: Message edited by: NobleNick ]

I saw a 9800Pro on Ebay for about £60 yesterday. I was gonna buy it, but I think I'm gonna get a 6600 instead.

Also another way to look at things. One of the animators for Oblivion, along with a few others, have said that the comp they used to play Bloodmoon on is the same one that they use to test/run Oblivion.

Also, couple this with the fact that Bethesda now has nearly 3 months devoted purely to optimizing (the game is already finished) and it is more than likely that things will run amazing for all of us.

If you mean 'Fast' when you say 'advanced'... a few months ago that would have been true, now it's only 'about as fast' as a top of the line 'off the shelf' computer.

In 3 months it will be noticeably slower than a top of the line computer.

In 6 months it will be totally off the bottom of the chart.

In a year it will be pathetic, like the XBox and PS2 have been for years. ;)

The downside for PC users is that game quality stalls at the current fastest console... so while we will enjoy some nice state of the art games for the next 6 months to a year or so, after that we'll have another 4 years of looking forward to games built to play on another slow old console (except it'll be the 360 this time).

I imagine top game developers have some pretty hot sysems, and I also imagine they play on both platforms to get a feel for how their game handles on both.

As far as 'advanced'... well thats a different beast. Consoles are single purpose systems, not particularly 'advanced' compared to computers IMO.

I haven't decided if I will buy a XBox 360 yet. While my laptop will probably run Oblivion, it's still a laptop, not a state-of-the-art gaming machine.

An XBox 360 is the only really interresting choice of the next-gen consoles.

Quote:

Originally posted by SecretMaster: Your graphics card will more than handle the load. Its a mid-range card.

<font color = mediumspringgreen>Mid-range!?!? [/i]~sigh~[/i] Time and technology march on, indeed.</font> </font>[/QUOTE]well... actually, if it's the 128 mb version, it's actually in the group of "low-range" cards, in bethsoft's estimation. :(

i'm considering getting the 360 myself, because my whole machine is now in the low-range group. and with 360 i'd still get the full game experience AND mods.

V***V

Hopefully, the XBox 360 will be backwards compitable with the Morrowind GOTY on the original XBox. If so, I will be able to finish it as my laptop don't run it well.

Playing Oblivion on laptops??? Hmm, that depends for me. I just prefer a nice PC for a gaming rig, a better environment.

The only thing I'd worry about is that laptops tend to get very hot with their processors (at least pentium chips). And a game like Oblivion might be running your comp like crazy, so I don't know how hot it get. But then again, I've never actually owned a laptop. So I don't know if they could overrheat easily.

I dunno, technology wise I think the PS3 looks the most interesting, Bluetooth controllers, Blu-ray DVD... some very cool tech in there for the money. (especially if they can get the price in the $400 range)