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PC Gaming Suggestions for Console-like Fun?
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Apr 24, 2008 08:57 AM
from the twister-seems-more-fun dept.
from the twister-seems-more-fun dept.
jayminer writes "We are a relatively newly married young couple who enjoy spending our spare time at home. We don't own a console but have a gaming laptop with DVI output to play games on our TV. My wife is also a CS major so she's computer literate enough. She does not like strategy games, MMORG or any other role-playing game. Apart from "Find the Sausage" jokes, we need quality gaming advice, preferably games which we can play with a single laptop connected to a single large screen, with two gamepads, a console-like experience. What are your suggestions?"
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Obvious answer... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Obvious answer... (Score:5, Insightful)
Ive sat here and tossed around all the game I can remember playing over the years, and the ones worth the time all equate one pc with one player.
Consoles are the king of multi user gaming hands down. Like suggested above, nab an old console. PS 1 or Nintendo 64 or such should be had for under 75 USD with several games.
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Re:Obvious answer... (Score:5, Interesting)
Super Mario Bros 3, Pong, Frogger, PacMan. Plus they make excellent drinking games (One shot for every fruit you didn't get on a PacMan level.) The best thing is an xBox can store ALL of these games and more.
Or you could even get some classic looking controllers and play these on the laptop.
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Re:Obvious answer... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Remember my.mp3.com? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Obvious answer... (Score:5, Informative)
For arcade games, you can use MAME
http://mamedev.org/ [mamedev.org]
Once you've got MAME, you need a set of current ROM files for it. You can find ROMs on BitTorrent or on any P2P application.
As MAME evolves, the ROM sets get replaced with new and better extractions, so you'll want a piece of software to manage them.
ClrMAMEPro is a tool that will use the data files from the latest version of MAME, and scan a big huge mess of old ROM files, extracting whatever is useful from them into a nice, neat set that works with the current version
http://www.clrmame.com/ [clrmame.com]
To get yourself set up, download any new or old MAME ROMs you can find, then use ClrMAMEPro to make a proper and current set out of them and burn it to backup.
There are also emulators floating around out there for Playstation, Nintendo 64, NES and Super NES. I've gotten good performance out of Project 64, an emulator for Nintendo 64. MarioCart plays quite well.
When you're choosing GamePads, you should look for something wireless that has as many buttons as you can possibly find. You want to be able to map the controller you choose to every possible controller from history, so you're going to need something that is flexible.
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re: MythTV and MAME (Score:4, Insightful)
The nice thing about this is, it gives you a good excuse to dedicate an entire PC to your TV set, since it works as a very capable DVR, gives you a set-top web browser, and other goodies.
The downside? At least from all the knoppmyth distros I've used, I've always had some hassle getting MAME working well with it. (EG. You can purchase wireless gamepad type controllers from Logitech that use USB dongles and are detected just fine in Linux. But you'll have to do some creative stuff with the xmame config file so you have all their buttons assigned in a sensible manner. If you don't assign one to simulate dropping coins in, for example, you'll never be able to get a new game to start from your controller.)
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Atari 2600 (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Obvious answer... (Score:5, Insightful)
Only if you're talking "Current gen". A Used Gamecube is $30 at Gamestop, and a Used X-box is $60. There are a Ton of good Co-op games for cheap (NHL HITZ is an all time favorite). Hell instead of buying the extra controller, buy 2 Gamecubes and an extra memory card in case you both want to game solo at some point.
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Stepmania (Score:5, Interesting)
Or get a Wii. Tons of simple flash games through the browser. Fun and simple.
Emulators (Score:5, Insightful)
Get some old-school console emulators and play some of the great classics.
I'm sure that what constitutes a "classic" will vary here on /., but I prefer some of the older Super NES games... Tetris Attack is awesome.
You didn't hear that from me, though...
Re:Emulators (Score:4, Insightful)
Just get SNES9X and download some games. I used to play that with my GF:
- Mario Kart (SNES version is one of the best ones)
- Lemmings (2 player snes version quite good)
- TMNT (2 player cooperative)
- Top Gear (one of the few two player coop. racing games where even if one is good enough, both of you will be able to go through the game [and you can cooperate by trying to block the first place cars to make one of you win
- Super Contra (a bit more "man" oriented, but fun coop too).
- Rock and Roll racing (another nice racing game).
- Battletoads in Battlemaniacs (two player kind of coop... a bit difficult [but quite fun if you enable infinite lives cheat])
- Bomberman (My girlfriend loves these ones. It is OK multiplayer)
- Joe and Mac (really funny caveman characters, multiplayer coop)
- Super Mario All Stars (I can never be left out! including Super Mario Bros 3, i have played it with my girlfriend from the beginning to the end)
- Ninja Gaiden Trilogy (not really multiplayer, maybe not really very good, but it is my favourite game of all time [Ninja Gaiden II for the NES] so I had to include it here =oP)
Those are all I can think of now. The reason I choose SNES is because such games are not as complex as todays' games; therefore you can just sit start it and begin playing without two hours of tutorial (I am looking at you Wii Zelda ).
Also, I think the SNES had the best kind of cooperative multiplayer games... these days it is very difficult to find such games in any console. The only cooperative games are FPS like "halo" but they are a turn off for most girls or other "casual" players.
And, the reason I don't choose Wii (even though I have one, which is in its box since I moved home 2 months ago) is because I hate mini-games, and all the multiplayer games from Nintendo are mini games (wiiware, mario party, rayman raymin rabbits, monkeyball banana... etc).
Oh! and the last one I would suggest is Worms. That is a really good game in which I have spent hours with my girlfriend and other friends (even a friend who never had used a computer had no problem playing the N64 emulated game =oO)
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Re:Legal ROMs? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Legal ROMs? (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Legal ROMs? (Score:4, Informative)
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"Hey everybody, look at me!" (Score:5, Funny)
Speaking as a married husband with a kid... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Speaking as a married husband with a kid... (Score:5, Insightful)
Speaking as a geek married with four kids, I say any time spent enjoying each other's company is good. You also make the assumption that they have the desire and means to get out and explore the world... I know we didn't early in our marriage.
Not saying that exploring the world is bad, but I think if they really enjoy gaming together, it's better than a lot of other alternatives. :)
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Suggestions... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you absolutely must play on the PC, well, I'd suggest you simply look for direct console ports or cross-platform titles. "Natural" PC games designed only for the PC are aimed towards a different audience and play rather differently. It's going to be especially hard to find multiplayer PC games that are playable on a single system with gamepad support -- most people who want that style simply go for consoles instead.
Now, some specifics... are console-style action-RPGs also forbidden? Some good multiplayer games fall into this category, like Marvel: Ultimate Alliance [wikipedia.org] and X-Men Legends II [wikipedia.org].
The venerable Worms series [wikipedia.org] (specifically, Worms Armageddon [wikipedia.org]) is also great two-player fun.
Guitar Hero 3 [wikipedia.org] is great fun on the consoles, but it has high system requirements on the PC and I'm not sure if it supports split-screen play.
Serious Sam [wikipedia.org] lets you play split-screen on one system, but I don't know how easy it'd be to use gamepads with a FPS designed for PCs (meaning, it probably lacks the auto-aim found in console FPSes).
The Gametap [gametap.com] service lets you play a lot of old-school games for a flat monthly fee, and many of them are designed for 2-player console-like gaming (they're ported from the consoles or arcades, after all).
Wikipedia also has a list of more single-system games [wikipedia.org] (sort the table by "screen view").
That's all I can think of.
you're doing it wrong (Score:5, Funny)
continuum/ subspace (Score:4, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SubSpace_(computer_game) [wikipedia.org]
its like the original asteroids, without the asteroids, and instead a maze of a bunch of other ships (random people from around the world)
i think a lot of slashdotters messed with it 10 years ago, and forgot about it
however, i recently rediscovered it (its free now) and was surprised to find a lot of zones still heavily populated. each zone has a different variation on the basic ship types and their abilities. you can waste 5 minutes or half an hour on it, to great effect
nothing like meeting a guy in a tank from finland, dodging his mine, blowing him away, while a guy from china materializes out of cloak and shoots you in the back. its cheap and easy mmorpg fun without the massive time commitment something like WoW demands
Buy a Console (Score:4, Insightful)
For Co-op play, console is King. There are a myriad of two player titles out there to cater for all tastes, and co-op is something that even gets included in some one [youtube.com] player [youtube.com] titles, owing to its popularity.
PCs are not designed for what you're looking for. Consoles are, and they are cheaper, faster, easier and offer a better selection of titles. Just buy the damn Wii.
Never mind games (Score:5, Funny)
Sexual deviance, man! That's what you need to try; your "find the sausage" game sounds like a good start. You're married, it's ok to do that now!
Re:Buy a console (Score:5, Insightful)
Reviews of modern games are often clouded by hype and irrelevant trends. Many nerds will retrospectively look at their video game library and wax poetic about the ones that are still fun (and they'll do it on their blog thanks to ego^w web 2.0). You can get these games used for $3-$10. A seven-year-old game can still be fun.
And if you haven't played it, it's new to you.
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Re:a relatively newly married young couple? (Score:5, Funny)
This is Slashdot, so I'm going to guess "all of it".
What did I win?
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