Stupid Dice, EA & NVIDIA!

I have bought one game in my whole life and that game was Battlefield 1942. Call me lame here, but as Dice (Digital Illusions) is a Swedish company, I wanted to support them. Besides, I was hooked on flying BF’s (well ok, Desert Combat’s) helicopters. Now a couple of years later, I was eagerly awaiting the sequel, if you can call BF2 a sequel. But what happens? I can’t even play the stupid f&#%¤!* DEMO!

Apparently, my GFX (graphic card) is way too old. But it’s not like it’s a Voodo3 or anything, nah, it’s a GeForce 4 Ti 4400 (not the monster in the series but still pretty decent). EA, Dice, and NVIDIA are “preparing” for the “next generation” GFX’s and have purposely excluded earlier GFX’s, including the popular GeForce 4 series. The game simply can’t be run. However older GFX’s from ATI works fine.

Nobody who pays own bills (or isn’t a millionaire or spoiled brat) wants to waste/spend hard earned cash. That’s it, plain and simple. GFX’s cost money, usually quite a lot and if you want to acquire the absolute best, you are going to get broke. Hopefully this strategic blunder backfires so big that these companies go bankrupt. Naturally, this won‘t happen but one can always hope. Seriously speaking here, if a lot of people switch to ATI in favor of NVIDIA, the company could be in real trouble.
Before BF2, I seriously wanted to upgrade to a newer NVIDIA GFX. As long as I had computers I always had GFX’s from NVIDIA. But now, when the scam is exposed, ATI is definitely the first choice and preference. See the market is bigger than Dice, BF2, NVIDIA, and even EA (Electronic Rats).

Let’s face it: apart from the (small) segment of hardcore gamers, most people have moderate systems. Is it really rational to exclude all those who are not Gamers, because these companies are “preparing for the next generation” GFX’s? A new GFX is usually not a very cheap investment. Most consumers want value for money hardware (software as well). As high-quality GFX is quite expensive, most people save money and buy higher-performing GFX that will last for a while, instead of regularly upgrading cheaper low-performing GFX’s.

Greedy developers and publishers (Dice & EA) and other companies (NVIDIA) should neither try to influence nor force consumers into upgrading. However, they should develop quality products (games) that do not exclude those with older hardware. For instance, both HL2 and DOOM3 run smooth on moderate systems. Just think about it, do you really want to upgrade GFX every time a new game is released? Of course not, it is a personal choice. BF2 is probably a success in terms of sales. But it could be a much greater success if it was available for all those without a state-of-the-art system.

When I think of BF2, Dice, EA and NVIDIA these days, an old saying comes to mind: “Don’t bite the hand that feeds you”. It’s easy to conclude that these rotten companies chopped the whole f@/!¤#& arm off.