S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Because we haven't bashed this game enough

Shurikane · Dim Panties As String Joined: 24 Sep 2002

Just making it past the first combat encounter made me realize a few things about this game:

-Despite running at 800x600 and absolute minimal settings, I can barely average a 20 FPS in open air and 12 FPS in "detailed" situations. Plus the split-second screen tears that appear a couple of times every minute.

-Enemies are psychic. I can approach someone while crouched and moving very slowly. Despite my noise meter reading ZERO, the enemy manages to notice me, turns around and shoots me dead.

-Enemies are able to survive EIGHT bullet wounds to the chest at point-blank range.

-Enemies are able to survive a STAB IN THE FACE.

-Enemies are able to survive a shotgun at point-blank range.

-Emptying your clip on an enemy will cause him to flinch for about a second, then he'll fully recover and shoot you.

-You need about 2.5 seconds to reload a handgun. Enemies need 1 second.

-The AI is so absolutely horrific that your teammate will attempt to fire his shotgun at someone who is A HUNDRED FEET AWAY.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Thank you for helping Torrent sites stay in business!

Shurikane · Dim Panties As String Joined: 24 Sep 2002

Update: Stalker PHYSICALLY DAMAGED MY GRAPHICS CARD.

Both my Windows installations give a STOP error on startup. The DirectX files are completely fucked over. There are dotted black vertical lines at regular intervals on the screen and it's only possible to run windows in Safe Mode.

I'll have to go shopping this weekend... Either I buy a nVidia 7950 GX2, or I try to figure out the products of ATI. Suggestions?

Buda · Maille smith extrodanair Gender: Joined: 30 Sep 2004

Im a fan of nVidia, thats what my card is, and from what I know, which is admitadly not very much, you tend to get more bang for your buck with them.

Silver Adept · Otaku Lord Age: 42 Gender: Joined: 20 May 2003

I've had good results with both types of card - I do note, for whatever reason, the nVidia cards I've owned tend to have fan problems, which eventually results in their demise, but otherwise, it doesn't really seem to matter that much.

GAAZ · MOD Black Sheep Commander Gender: Joined: 14 Oct 2002

I now have an Nvidia card just because ATI's are a bit pricey.

Though I do prefer them more.

But research SLi and Crossfire cause I've been hearing a lot of problems with SLi and not too much about crossfire so I'm not sure if people aren't buying them or if they aren't complaining about them.

Ultrawolf · Mr. Roarke Gender: Joined: 04 Jul 2003

I've always bought Nvidia cards but I've always stuck with BFG or XFX because of their lifetime (double lifetime in the case of XFX) warranties. Even if they burn out or have fan problems or whatever I can still cash in on the warranties with those companies. Never had a problem with them but that's just me personally.

I agree with Buda's assessment of more bang for the buck, don't get me wrong ATI has historically had the more powerful GPUs but I've always been able to pinch pennies with Nvidia cards and getting almost equal performance. I know very little about crossfire and SLI other than you need much more power and a motherboard that supports that kind of structure.

Shurikane · Dim Panties As String Joined: 24 Sep 2002

After due deliberation at work, I chose the Sapphire Radeon X1950 Pro 256MB PCI-Express.

nVidia cards had me in the following pinch: I could either get the beefiest 7xxx series, which is too little too late, or get an 8xxx series, which is too much too soon. >_>

ATI provided a nice alternative. I also found the article that made comparisons between ATI and nVidia boards to better help me identify the approximate power of the ATI cards, which I do not know well. For your information, it was on Tom's Hardware monthly best video cards article.