Bonus 30 Days of Gaming Challenge: Day 33 - Biggest Frustration as a Gamer

"I can't do that, Dave," said my laptop, for the hundredth time this week...

Well it has been quite a while since I did any of these, although now I do have a few more written down to do in the future, but it is time for a further continuation of the 30 Days of Gaming Challenge which got this blog started in the first place.  I was going to write on the Most Disappointing Game, but my answer for it started to fall into too large a category.  So, I decided to keep the answer but change the title.

By far the biggest frustration for me in my times of playing video games, specifically PC games, is the bane that is System Requirements.  I cannot count the number of times I have seen a game come and go which looks utterly amazing, picked it up in the shop, looked at the back of the box, and put it down again and walked away.  The requirements for games are increasing dramatically, and it is very difficult to keep up.  In university, I have had the same laptop for 4 years now, and it's great at many things.  Graphics is not one of them.  It has been having increasing difficulty even running the basic games of chess that came installed with Windows!  I have a CD with the Samsung New PC Studio on it so I can transfer music onto my phone.  Not even that will run, though to be fair they added an excessive amount of graphics to a simple piece of software.

To be fair, this has probably meant that I have gotten more work done.  If I had been able to play Starcraft 2 when it came out, who knows how I would have coped...  Nevertheless, it is a sad trend that there is very little new content out there for people with older systems.  I know PCs are getting cheaper and some of the prices seem very reasonable, but many people simply cannot afford several hundred pounds.  And those gamers get left behind.  Minecraft won't even run on this thing, which truly baffles me.  Minecraft...

How can THIS not work?

Ok, my laptop is exceptionally bad graphically, and I have updated the card as far as it will go.  It's an ATI Radeon XPRESS 200M Series if you're interested.  I also get that laptops aren't designed to be gaming consoles like the PC.  Perhaps there are not that many people out there who enjoy playing games but are stuck with a low-spec computer.  However, for me, it is an endless frustration when the simplest of games refuses to run.  On top of that, knowing that any game that comes out is going to be well out of my league (again, Minecraft.........) is a bit of an issue from someone trying to write about video games in a blog.  Still, one day it will change when a new computer is purchased.  Until then, Civilization 2 is the game for me.