I've heard a lot of pro-console arguments, but one of the only, if not the only one I've considered to hold much of any merit is the exclusives argument. Questions like "Would you rather play Horizon Zero Dawn or ARMA 3?" get me thinking. But, while I was playing Super Mario Galaxy on my PC, the answer to this dawned on me. Perhaps it's not so much of a question of "Uncharted 4 or Undertale?" as much as it's a question of "Persona 5 or every other game on the Persona series for free?". Allow me to explain.
Some of you may have already caught on to what I'm referring to. For those of you who haven't, it's emulation. Your standard emulator a piece of software that decodes the data in a console game the same way the console would have on your computer. There are emulators for old consoles, and even those as recent as the PS3 and Xbox 360. The best thing is, most of the time the software is free, and you can get over 100,000 free games just from a single
Over 100,000 free games that aren't on the PS4 or Xbox One is hard to argue with when there are only 1,691 total games on the PS4 according to Wikipedia. On top of that, nearly every or every one of these emulated games and consoles are 100% free just to really put the icing on the cake. Not to mention, they include many of the other objective advantages of PC such as higher graphical fidelity than the console version along with mods.
COUNTERARGUMENTS DEBUNK:
"Emulation is piracy!" In the vast majority of cases, this is false. Emulation is completely legal, in fact, many emulators will take extra steps to make 100% sure no laws are broken, such as having you download a console's BIOS from its maker. If the company that made the game no longer makes money off of copies of it, there is nothing wrong with playing them for free. Money isn't going to the developers either way.
"Emulation is too complicated!" This is another counter that simply isn't true. Setting up the emulators and downloading the games is surprisingly simple, and if you're still having trouble, there are countless easy-to-follow tutorials online. On top of this, once you know how to use one emulator, you'll have no trouble at all with the vast majority of them.
"Emulation doesn't count!" This is a non-argument, and not a counter at all. If you can say emulation doesn't count, why can't I say exclusives don't count? You can't pick and choose what "counts".
"The graphics suck!" As mentioned previously, due to the customization of the emulators and mods, you can get much higher graphical fidelity than the originals. Second, graphics aren't the only benchmark for a game being good. They play a minimal role in quality, and exist with the main purpose of giving people eye candy in the trailers so that the developers can sell more game copies. Sure, the exclusive game's graphics will be better on the PS4, but that has minimal effect on a game's quality, and you'll still get a drastically better experience playing a PC emulated game that otherwise would've been equal to a PS4 exclusive.
"You need a fancy PC to run them!" Again, this is false. Emulators, especially those of consoles such as the PS2 and older don't need near as much horsepower as you might think. According to the PCSX2 Wiki, the recommended specs for the PCSX2 emulator are an Intel Core 2 Duo, an 8800GT graphics card, and 2GB of RAM. Many office computers will outperform that. Hell, you can get the N64 emulator on an Android phone!
"You'll get a virus!" As mentioned, there are many trusted sources for emulation, and, as long as you stick with them, you own't get a virus.
I hope you found this post informative. If you did, let me know. If you didn't, still let me know and I'll debate you on it all day long.
Log in to comment