[QUOTE="ionusX"]sound cards are only good for 4 reasons and 2 are sort of connected..
1) you plan on editing audio - this is because it allows greater control of how you here your playbacks and the quality of the audio improves
2) you have a nice expensive speaker system - this goes ahnd in hand with 1 if you dont have no.2 then no.1 becomes very difficult. having a sound system to pair with a soud card noticeably improves any audio you here.
3) your onboard audio has failed - this happens from time to time where a motherboards audio chipset will jsut die. but the rest of the board will continue functioning. i had this happen at school once and another time here at home and i couldnt get it to work again so i had to go fetch a sound card to overide it
4) you are a professional grade gamer - i mean this seriously if you are trying to go pro having one in your machine becomes a bit of half justified necessity. you see when your audio runs off the onboard its also required to use whats called directsound and direct audio. these are encoding softwares that are on your cpu. their fairly light weight but in the world of pro gaming the more efficient your system is the better. if you have a soundcard these two functions are taken over by the sound card entirely thus freeing up your cpu workload a little bit. however these two pieces of software are fairly lightweight(as stated) and the offloaded burden sometimes results in 1-0.5fps more than you would normally have but not always.
so id say unless you meet one of the four requirements skip sound cards. id also avoid any network cards promising "better gaming preformance" thats what someone who adbusts the "half truth claim" which is basically that its only true under these conditions or this specific way of using it or only in specific cases which is a topic fit for another discussion entirely
saswatsprakash
Got it. No, I am not trying for any pro-ism in Game-ism. Just for kicks, and time pass. And yeah, I was also thinking about the N/W card. Thanks for the info. All in all, my monitor is great, all other components (incl. Joystick, KB, Mouse etc.) are also upgraded. The only trouble was the motherboard. What would be a good gaming motherboard according to you??? And are there any motherboard-graphics card combo? Or should I just go for separate ones???? Don't be bothered about not having a new pc when it comes to rpgs especially, all the new ones are pretty much dumbed down action games with rpg elements sprinkled in anyway.
Fallout 1/2
Baldurs Gate series
Planescape:Torment
Vampire: Bloodlines
Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura
Ultima 7: The Black Gate and Serpent Isle
Temple of Elemental Evil (get the latest circle of 8 modpack)
Icewind Dale 1/2
X-Com: Unemy Unknown and Terror From the Deep
Jagged Alliance 2
D&D Gold Box Games
Knights of the Chalice http://www.heroicfantasygames.com/
Wizardry 7 and 8
Gothic 2
KotoR 2
Betrayal at Krondor
If you like non mindless/tactical shooters, check out Operation Flashpoint:Cold War Crisis and Resistance, Ghost Recon 1, Rainbow 6 Rogue Spear/Raven Shield, Swat 4.
You also have some great adventure games like - Secret of Monkey Island games, Blade Runner, Grim Fandango, Indina Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Sanitarium, Day of the Tentacle, The Longest Journey, Beneath a Steel Sky, Quest for Glory series, Gabriel Knight series...
bussinrounds
Hmm, that's a good list. Why, that's a great list. Thanks bro. Yeah, I generally like almost all sort of games, albeit, they must have a decent story line. And ofc, RPGs nearly always have great story lines, so my favorite.... Though, do the games you listed, namely Black Gate & Serpent Isle, Temple of Elemental Evil etc. contain blood and gore??? If yes, can you state a few more?? ToEE has blood proportional to your damage, and there are death animations. But the main strength of that game is the great d&d 3.5 turn based tactical combat. And good rpgs don't have to be heavily story driven to be good, and this is one of those kinds. They are dungeon crawls, like Gary Gygax's original pen and paper d&d modules, say. But the combat must be engaging, if that's the case. And that's where ToEE shines. (other games like this are the Wizardry, D&D Gold Box games, Knights of the Chalice, JA2, X-Com) Ultima 7 does have animated violence/gore also but is at the other end of the spectrum, when it comes to rpgs. It has a good story/dialog and a great interactive world, but with this game as opposed to ToEE, there is a lesser focus on combat, which makes exploration and conversation the main draw of the game. As far as the story goes, i'll quote a friend who has played alot more of the series than i , "I enjoyed playing U7, but I also enjoyed playing 4, 5 and 6 beforehand. I'm not sure what coming straight into U7 "cold turkey" would be like, but I enjoyed it because I was already familiar with the setting and plenty of back-story. Perhaps the buy-in to find out what continues to happen in Brittania is part of what makes the game so enjoyable -- I already know my way around (more or less), I know a lot of the characters, I know how magic/combat/items work... so it's easier to get into the story."
If you are really into a good story/dialog/writing, first and foremost, i would def put Planescape:Torment on the top of your list ! And Fallout 1 and 2 sounds like they would be right up your alley too. (GREAT GAMES) They have an interesting world (if your into post apocalyptic) good choice and consequences, alot of blood and gore, good writing/dialog/stories and turn based combat. (no full party control though, but you do get followers)
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