Before, I had-

512 ram
128 meg geforce 5200

Bought some upgrades, now I have-

1.5 gigs ram
256 meg DDR3 geforce 7600

Both on a P4 2.8 mhz computer.

Last game I bought was Civ4, it was fine until lots of cities towards the ends of game. I had to skip over pretty much the majority of games that has come out in the past 18 months or so because my previous set up could not handle nearly anything decently. With Christmas coming up, and some poker winnings in my pocket... I am looking for a game that has come out within the past 18 months that I should be going after with my new setup.

I already have Bioshock for the 360, so won't get that. My current thoughts are-

Oblivion
Titan Quest
Medieval- Total War
Orange Box (should I get for PC or 360, and if PC can I run it?)

Any other recommendations from anyone? I like strategy games for the most part on my computer, some shooters. I just want to make sure that it will run smoothly and look good with my new setup. Thanks in advance for suggestions and recommendations!

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I have roughly the same setup as that, just an AMD XP 3200. Same gfx and ram though.

Oblivion runs "well". You get decent fps while most things turned up.

Orange Box is great, TF2 has no lag whatsoever, although I do get some quick freezes in Portals/HL2 after loading.

Haven't played the others.

As for suggestions, I just got World in Conflict and will test that out on mine and let you know how it goes.

I think Givin is still looking for people for his re-roll guild; if you've not ever played WoW, now would be a good time to start.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

I would recomend Oblivion on the 360, not the PC. The 360 runs it better than any of the PCs out there, except mabe the top of the line, 8-10k rigs. You lose the ability to use un-official mods, but the game runs silky smooth and oh so pretty.

For PC games you mighta missed:

AoE: 3
Enemy Territory, Quake Wars
F.E.A.R. if you have never played it.
BF 2142
The current RTS scene is somewhat lacking, I am waiting on SC2 while playing Civ 4 / AoE:3.

Wow I completely forgot about Age of Empires 3. I LOVED AoE and AoE2, but I could not play the third one because of the poor computer. Is it the same as the first two, or is it much better in this one? Always liked those games, good call!

Wasn't there some military based RTS that came out, I think, either last summer or this summer that had everyone all talking and going crazy about? Not World in Conflict, but I remember this game getting some very high scores on some of the internet sites. For the life of me, cannot remember it...

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Company of Heroes, it's awesome.

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

Get the Fall From Heaven II mod for Civ 4. You won't regret it.

AoE:3 is similar to the other titles. There are changes, the most major of which is the new Hometown (Kinda like an RPG here, your home town levels up as you complete missions/skirmishes, and as it levels up, it can send you additional troops/supplies/technologies. Each civ's home town is different. Kinda neat.)

The time period is different as well, and you won't see as much melee if you play AoE:3, it is the gunpowder age and musketeers and cannons are the norm, not chariots and calvalry, though calvalry is still present.

Troops diversity is a bit lacking, but all in all, a good RTS to tinker around with and enjoy.

Thanks everyone for your advice and input! Those of you who have not posted and are hardcore gamers (Givin and Finlainela (sp) are the first two that come to mind), feel free to chime in if you want.

And I will not play World of Warcraft. I re-activated my EQ account and am having fun in that for a bit, not sure how long it will last of course... but so far, the people I play with make it enjoyable. Just want something to do gamewise when I log in and nothing is going on, will take these above mentioned games into consideration.

Still not entirely sure if I want Orange Box on 360 or PC. I know it is probably better on PC; however, I (unlike many) enjoy and prefer shooters on my console than my PC. So still debating over that...

And speaking of EQ, don't laugh... I was retired for 12 months. Of course, sometimes old habits are hard to break

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That game will never die. I wonder what the 100 year veteran reward will be?!

Can't make your chars look like:

http://www.tessource.net/downloads/imag ... 366830.jpg
or http://www.tessource.net/downloads/imag ... 367344.jpg
or http://www.tessource.net/downloads/imag ... 316696.jpg

on 360

This is true, but if I had tried to make character models like that run on my PC, it would have melted down.

Elder Scrolls is one of the few games that is available cross-platform is worth playing on the PC as opposed to the console counterpart. Other than that, consoles pretty much dominate PCs in every feature imaginable.

That's a matter of opinion. I preferred it on the 360.

Why would I want to play Half-Life on a console?

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Kuwen Furyblades
Hunter of Memento Reejeryn
Champion of Faydark

Because it can handle more effects (Bloom+HDR) than computers can and it has updated graphics? (In this case of HL2.) And let's not forget, soon 360s and PS3s will have fully compatible mouse + keyboard peripherals and there will be absolutely zero reason to even consider gaming on a PC anymore. (Just my opinion.)

And to Neesha, I played Oblivion on the 360 too, and preferred it but I know that because of the large support for mods that it can have better replay value on the PC. I thought the experience was (and is) great on the 360, it had way better graphics when you consider that I have a PC that still runs with 1gig of ram and an ATI Radeon 9800xt. To get to the level of performance of my 360 I'd have to spend more than I spent on my 360. Not worth it imo.

I don't disagree that mods definitely make playing on PC more attractive. The best part about Civ 4, to me, is the Fall From Heaven 2 mod. Had I only played the game on an Xbox 360 (not that it is available), I would never had a chance to experience that.