Hello everyone,
Two things tonight ! First up :
Finished Deus Ex Mankind Divided …
Got the Pacifist approach achievement. Yep, shooty shooty game that’s possible to be played through without murdering anyone. Sure, limbs may have been broken and people put in hospital with severe concussions but … they’ll live right ?
Including that guy. You know, that one. The one I can’t talk about cos of spoilers and all that.
After a shaky start, where I was finding the cover movement system to be a bit clunky, something eventually clicked and I really enjoyed playing through this one. It still has its bugs, including crash to desktop and I had one tonight which was a hang up when reloading (You reload a lot the way I was playing …) But the bugs aren’t particularly game breaking and the game comes back up again on a reload. I didn’t lose my save at all …
I’ll be back playing this one again sometime. But not yet because I picked up The Outer Worlds in the latest Epic Games sale and that’s supposed to be amazing. I’ll play the original again too. There’s potential for further games in the series but something strange happened in the games industry around the time this came out and outside of things like Assassins Creed, the studios got very wary about continuing current IPs. Bit like how the Mass Effect series ended with Andromeda.
Hopefully there’s more to come from the Adam Jensen Deus Ex storyline. There’s definitely more potential there, especially with threads started in the emails and articles scattered through the game and that Whopper in the credits.
Gotta do the Golden Penguin mission too, I completely missed that this time.
What else tonight ? I’ve seen a few things about PC upgrades again and doing it on the cheap … So what would I get if it were around 20 years ago again and I was on a super strict budget ?
Before I dive in – disclosure note : I’ve never been offered any inducements by any hardware companies.
These all start with the core again and that’d be :
AMD Ryzen 3 3200G Quad core chip with graphics – £92. I’m not convinced the graphics here would allow for games like Deus Ex or other really pretty games but you can add a proper graphics card later. Point is, it saves £150-£200 as a get you going thing.
This goes in a MSI B450 motherboard for £99. This drops £75 on the board that I have. It’s not the newest or shiniest but should still be a good foundation.
(A small and important edit – if you’re looking at this post like a shopping list, DO NOT BUY YET. AMD are coming out with a B550 chipset which will go into better motherboards for about the same price.)
Memory spec calls for DDR4-2933. We’ll actually go up to DDR4-3200 here. It’s a bit faster and a bit cheaper. The system would clock it back to 2933 if it has to. Cost for 16GB – £91.
The common theme is that we’re accepting these compromises in order to get a more affordable machine. It’s a lower spec than what I have now … but that’s where I was 20 years ago where I had less disposable cash and income. What’s appearing here wouldn’t have an issue with games like Stellaris, Motorsport Manager and I suspect it’d be ok even with shooty games and Elite if the graphics were turned down a bit.
Power supply is going to be a Corsair 650W unit for £63. Don’t get a cheap, nonbranded power supply … it’s a false economy. It’s also just £10 to go from Corsair’s 550W unit to the 650W unit. That £10 is worth it for when you’d want to later add in a graphics card.
Case – AVP K-11 Mid Tower Case with acrylic side panel. It’s the cheapest Novatech have at £20.
SSD hard disc – Crucial P1 500GB M2, NVME for £73. Don’t worry about the arcane stuff there, just look at “M2” – this is where it plugs in … and “NVME” – this means it’s faster.
Conventional hard disc – Toshiba 2GB 3.5″ desktop drive for £56. Cheapest again and I think it’s worth going up a bit from the £37 1GB drive.
And that’s it !
How much ? £494 for that little lot. It isn’t everything you might want though … What’s missing that you might have expected ?
Processor cooler – is included with the processor. I’m actually still using the AMD bundled cooler in my machine, I haven’t had a reason to do the rigmarole involved in changing it.
Graphics – there’s a basic functionality on the processor again. But this would be the first thing to change in a short term upgrade.
Optical drives – these seem to have gone out of fashion with the streaming video services. However, what I’m actually doing at the moment is to play dvds through a USB drive which uses software that comes with Windows. (£23 for dvd). You could get an external blu-ray drive for £73, although this needs software. You can get the software for free from Leawo.
Windows – you can download and run Windows 10 for free … Here’s a Tomshardware article for more info (Link – run a script or ad blocker or both). However, you get a Please Activate watermark on your desktop and some options are restricted. A Windows 10 Home OEM licence will cost a bone chilling £110.
The other items you will want are :
Keyboard – honestly, go for something really cheap. Logitech have a wired keyboard for £10. Should be just fine. I like my mechanical keyboard better but £10 level membrane keyboards are ok too.
Mouse – start around £3-£10. Best to get this in a shop where you can test the fit to your hand. Mice are all sizes and shapes and you want one you can get along with. That said, I’d look at the Logitech mice first again, I’ve had a £30 ish Logitech mouse for a few years ago and it does good.
Monitor – there’s an IPS panel 22″ LG screen in Novatech’s listing for £87 but it’s listed as “Ordered upon Request”. I’d look at the 24″ IPS panel from AOC for £150 (Scan price). IPS screens give a better image and … the monitor is probably more important than anything else in the system, it’s what you’re looking at all the time.
Better make it kitty proof.
Oh and speakers – monitors can give sound but it’s very meh. There’s a pair from Logitech for £20 that look ok. You want your speakers to have a separate power supply and a volume control that’s going to stay accessible. Mine’s buried on the desk somewhere !
Beyond all that – if you’re into the flight or space games, I’d look at picking up a Thrustmaster Hotas X for £48. I have one, it does me fine for internet spaceships. (Although I am suspecting it of causing wrist issues).
Graphics – can’t buy my 1060 3GB card any more but it was around £200. I don’t like spending more than that on graphics, there’s definitely diminishing returns. A £400 card isn’t twice as good as a £200 card. Options at the moment are :£140 ish for a 1650 and the 1660 cards start at £210.
That’s it for me for tonight ! I don’t think I’ve missed anything …
There we go ! That’s it for me for tonight. Almost bed time !
Totally not going to immediately follow up that pacifist run by murdering everything. Actually not … I want to get the stealth achievement too and murder in the Deus Ex games is kinda noisy.
Besides … I think it’s The Outer Worlds next :-).
Stay safe everyone, be well.