Vista for video games: compatibility and features

[Image: Vista Logo]I’m listening to the PC Gamer Podcast and hearing the little jabs at Vista that are almost inevitable when you decide to charge gamers another couple hundred dollars to upgrade to a new operating system. I’ve heard a lot of jabs about Vista in the past few months, and I’ve had my own problems with the OS, but overall I’m pretty happy with it.

My Vista machine exists only for gaming. I’ve got a MacBookPro that I use for work, email, blogging, video editing, photoshop…literally everything else. On my desktop: Vista and games.

And I like it.

I use Steam the most, which is great because it’s worked flawlessly with my computer since I booted it up. Vista also has a self-populating “Games” folder, which grabs a little picture of the game box and some brief info on the game, such as the game’s recommended performance rating—

Oh yeah, performance ratings. What a cool idea.

That’s one of my favorite features, because it makes sense on so many levels. Computers have always suffered from needless complications. Gamers, especially console gamers (read: the mass market consumer), don’t like having to figure out what the difference between AMD and Intel is, which one they have, and whether or not they should open the nonreturnable box in their hands.

What’s the solution? Rank you computer with a number system. Rank the games with the same number system. Numbers match? Game work. So simple, even cavemen can get offended.

Also, and for a gamer most importantly, almost all of my games have worked. I have a few more to install (if I ever find those damn CDs) like DeusEx, or I’m not even sure I’m going to try TIE Fighter - but so far all the Steam games work, C&C Generals works, Civ IV works after a minor patch from their site. The only game that hasn’t worked yet is Dawn of War (!!) - but the last time I checked for patches was about a month ago.

I know there aren’t any DX10 games out yet, and I know that Vista takes a chunk of memory to run (although it’s a lot more efficient with it than XP - you’ll practically never have to reboot), but there will be DX10 games, and as to memory—use ReadyBoost. Yes, it actually works.

The bottom line is: I’m happy with Vista. In fact I like it better than XP.