How to get into PC gaming

I just recently spent $600 on a PC and so far it runs nearly every game at Max settings 30-60 fps, including Crisis (4x AA) and The Witcher 2 on Ultra (2x AA). Also like Matt said, basically any profession in the digital arts/ gaming field requires a PC. I built my career on my PCs over the past few years, there aren't many people who can say they built a career on a console. There are so many things to learn on PCs. If there is any way you can make the investment, it is completely worth it.

@copedude This is the exact thing Matt is talking about. I think the greatest thing keeping people from trying games on the PC is just plain ignorance. A good PC will last you for years. I built mine over 2 years ago for under $1000. I haven't bought a thing for it since. It can play The Witcher 2 on Ultra. I plan on buying a new video card at the end of the year for BF3. Not because I HAVE to, because I WANT to and have the money. I could play BF3 on my setup right now and it would still blow the console version away, but I only play my games maxed out so I want to upgrade. People love to say that PC gaming costs more money. Well, doesn't everything that is better cost more money? In reality though, it's not much more than you think. Games are so much cheaper on PC. I just bought Dragon Age Origins: Ultimate, Darksiders, and Just Cause 2 for $22 combined. That's less than the original cost of the DA DLC ALONE. I almost grabbed Dead Space 2 for $15, but I will hold out until it's $10 in the Halloween sale. If I didn't already have both Mass Effect games, I could have gotten the ME 1 and ME 2 bundle for $12. Not only are these games much cheaper than their console cousins, they run, look, and play better. Matt- The only thing I would have changed in your article was the section about which games are best on PC. You could have just said every game available on PC. The only possible edge a console gamer could claim would be that a controller is better for certain games, like a Batman or Tomb Raider. To that I would say plug an Xbox controller into your PC and get the best of both worlds. If people want to stay on consoles, it doesn't bother me. You can lead a horse to water...

step #1: be an intensely reclusive dork. i kid, i kid. the pc's only real draw is exclusive games. graphics are for snobs (they're nice, great even, but not that big of a deal), and i spent about $1,800 on a nice pc (custom) STRICTLY to play medieval total war 2. that's great, but right now it needs a new hdd, operating system, more ram, etc. and frankly playing the witcher 2 (which i'll play anyways on my 360), warcraft, starcraft, and whatever is not NEARLY worth what it will take to upgrade my pc. i'll then just defer to copedude's comment to sum it up. don't get discouraged though matt, keep fighting the good fight.

PCs don't become obsolete in a month. That PC I bought for $600 was technically a bit old and "obsolete" and yet it ran every game out there amazingly well, and it did this for YEARS.

Team Fortress 2 is another great choice. A huge range of PCs can run it, it's fun even after several thousand hours, it's got an incredible Pixar-quality art style and charm, there's a crazy amount of weapons to find and maps to play on, and it's now FREE. Doesn't get much better than that.

For one, the people who claim PC's are "obsolete" in a month are the people who have never had a gaming PC. I have a two-year old graphics card, and I can run The Witcher 2 with everything turned up except Uber-Sampling. Yeah, the price is an issue, but just wait until it's time to buy a new PC for reasons other than gaming. Then you're looking at a premium of about $400-500 for the gaming portion of the PC, which is more or less the price of a console at release.

That actually isn't as TLDR as it looked in the box I typed it in.

I'm getting more into PC gaming, but the two big genres that are better on PC (RTS and MMO) are also my two least favorite genres, not to mention that I still like playing with a controller more than with a mouse and keyboard (mouse is fine, but the keyboard has so many useless buttons that devs feel need to have so many useless features tacked onto them. I do not need ten different keys to change through ten different stations of the in game radio). Anyways, I still am loving the STALKER series to death right now (PC only), not to mention TF2 is so much better on PC (actually, all Valve games are). Throw in Steam and I've grown to at least accept PC gaming much more than before, even if my 360 gets most of my time. Sorry about the TL;DR-ness of this, you aren't missing anything by not reading it.

I've been trying to convince friends to get into PC gaming for years. Their excuse is always "your graphics card costs as much as my console!" You don't need the latest and greatest hardware to play PC games - even the more demanding one's. You can run newer games off of a system that's 2 years old. Just don't turn up all of the graphics (AA, AF) and you'll be fine.

I've used Blackviper for years and it is easily the quickest, cheapest way of not only speeding up your PC but also making it more stable. Even if you don't want to play games it is worth doing anyway

On the second page you said "lets say you have $600" Personally I'd rather spend that money on 8 or 9 games then having to buy something that will be obsolete in a month and will need even more money to buy games for it