Gamefaqs Annoyances

[UserNameGoesHere]

My biggest annoyance with gamefaqs is that they do not distinguish between DOS games and Windows games, despite their being entirely different systems. They just clump them both under "PC".

There is also perhaps a minor annoyance that they don't distinguish between Win16 and more recent Windows games, ... minor in that I don't recall any Win16 games actually worth having other than Tetris. And, yes, Win16 is also an entirely different system from more recent Windows.

The second biggest annoyance (and actually related to the first) is you can't search for games in range of release year. You can search for exact release year but that's not good enough when, say, you want to find all the games released in the 1980s without having to individually select every single year.

Also you kind of have to go out of your way to find the function to search by exact year anyway.

It's related to the first annoyance in that, since they don't bother distinguishing between DOS and Windows games, the best approximation is searching via ranges of release year if you're specifically looking for DOS games.

Why do they list about every other system on the planet as individual systems, yet just clump DOS and Windows together when they're as different as anything else on there? It makes no sense and it's annoying. So what you can play some DOS games under Windows under emulation? You can play NES games under Windows under emulation too and I don't see NES clumped with Windows, lol.

In before DOS hate. As much as many of you who remember DOS may dislike it, it was a serious gaming platform and had many excellent exclusive games. A true oldschool gamer should not overlook DOS gaming. As much as you may or may not have liked the OS, that has nothing to do with the quality of the games, many of which were excellent.

[StoneMcKnuckle]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

DOS gaming = PC gaming. Anything played on a PC is a PC game - regardless of what OS the game was written for.

Also, "in before DOS hate"? Who the hell hates DOS?

edit: also there's that whole thing about DOS being integrated into Windows for a really long time which makes it increasingly difficult to differentiate between them.

[UserNameGoesHere]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

DOS gaming = PC gaming. Anything played on a PC is a PC game - regardless of what OS the game was written for.

Also, "in before DOS hate"? Who the hell hates DOS?

edit: also there's that whole thing about DOS being integrated into Windows for a really long time which makes it increasingly difficult to differentiate between them.

DOS and Windows are as different as night and day. Yes, they both run on similar hardware, but the systems themselves are entirely different. May as well lump Mac OS X games in with Windows games as well then basing on that logic, since Mac OS X has been x86 for a while now. I hope you can see they're different systems though?

The only reason any DOS (or Win16 for that matter) binaries ever ran under Win32/Win64 Windows was because of emulation -- emulation which was spotty at best (DOSBox does a much better job if you're interested) and nonexistent on recent Windows. Windows literally pulled up a special emulation layer just to run that software.

The programming is entirely 100% different. The executable file formats are different (The Windows formats can embed DOS code but not the other way around, and only one piece of code could run at any one time. It's basically two completely separate and possibly unrelated programs in one binary. Very similar to Apple's Fat Binaries that held both 68k code and PPC code) They are, without a doubt, very different systems.

And as to who hates DOS, I'm glad you don't I just know practically everyone who remembers it that I've ever talked to tends to hate it for some reason or other.

[Charu]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

The only thing I recall from DOS I really hated was how you went about navigating drives and folders.

[StoneMcKnuckle]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

DOS and Windows are as different as night and day. Yes, they both run on similar hardware, but the systems themselves are entirely different.

Yes, they're different systems, although Windows has incorporated DOS (well, MS-DOS) in as a VM ever since Win3 which probably makes it difficult for a lot of people to tell them apart. Either way, DOS by itself is an OS for the PC, which puts it under the same platform as Windows.

May as well lump Mac OS X games in with Windows games as well then basing on that logic, since Mac OS X has been x86 for a while now. I hope you can see they're different systems though?

Mac is considered a different platform because you can't run it on non-Apple branded computers without using OSx86, and I'm pretty sure you understand this as well so I'm not sure I get what you're trying to prove here.

The only reason any DOS (or Win16 for that matter) binaries ever ran under Win32/Win64 Windows was because of emulation -- emulation which was spotty at best (DOSBox does a much better job if you're interested) and nonexistent on recent Windows. Windows literally pulled up a special emulation layer just to run that software.

The programming is entirely 100% different. The executable file formats are different (The Windows formats can embed DOS code but not the other way around, and only one piece of code could run at any one time. It's basically two completely separate and possibly unrelated programs in one binary. Very similar to Apple's Fat Binaries that held both 68k code and PPC code) They are, without a doubt, very different systems.

Yes, but that's irrelevant, isn't it? You're complaining about GameFAQs lumping DOS and Windows together as the same platform, which seems logical to me since, well, it is. AFAIK, game platforms are defined by their hardware, not their OS.

edit: hurr

[Pseudo Enigma]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

my only annoyance with gamefaqs is it's gamefaqs nuff said

[Shikari]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

my only annoyance with gamefaqs is it's gamefaqs nuff said

Be more clear. It's a good site, has tons of informations concerning pretty much everything, and dem W/Ts for noobs like me and 95% of mankind.

[FFR4EVA_00]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

the fuck is this shit

[Pseudo Enigma]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

Be more clear. It's a good site, has tons of informations concerning pretty much everything, and dem W/Ts for noobs like me and 95% of mankind.

clearly nuff said doesn't cut it

the community is fucking garbage, and the guide writers have gone to shit as of late. It's not like it's a secret.

[Pseudo Enigma]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

some of those guys are p.cool

[UserNameGoesHere]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

Yes, but that's irrelevant, isn't it? You're complaining about GameFAQs lumping DOS and Windows together as the same platform, which seems logical to me since, well, it is. AFAIK, game platforms are defined by their hardware, not their OS.

edit: hurr

All that proves is there exists another website with the same classification problem.

And, we'll disagree, because they're not the same platform. Therefore it is illogical to lump them together. A platform or system is defined based on what natively runs under it. DOS games do not natively run under Windows (They ran under an emulator which used to be but is no longer bundled with Windows and usually poorly). Windows games do not natively run under DOS (You could argue they ran under Windows running under DOS but that's not the same as this time you could think of DOS-based Windows itself as being the emulator)

The games themselves are very different and, in particular, DOS games could make full, 100% complete use of any aspect of the hardware whereas the same is false for Windows programs. It's technically possible for DOS games to be better than Windows games in every single way, since DOS provided no hardware limitations and the entire machine was open to being programmed by any program -- but it was harder to do so was all.

Should we say that GameBoy Advance and GameBoy are the same platform merely because a GameBoy emulator was builtin to GameBoy Advance? Should we say that Playstation and Playstation 2 are the same platform since a Playstation emulator was builtin to Playstation 2? What about Playstation and Playstation 3? What about Playstation 2 and Playstation 3, where only some Playstation 3's had a builtin emulator for Playstation 2? Yet all of these are shown as different platforms.

Should we say that various UNIXes, BSDs, Linux, BeOS, MenuetOS, OS/2, Minix, Windows are the same platform simply because they all can run on the same hardware?

It's quite obvious to me this is an oversight from gamefaqs (and apparently also IGN, and maybe others) and not any valid way to define platform.

Also, regardless of how one defines platform (and regardless if I agree with their definition), surely more specificity, more, better, and more intuitive search options, are always better than fewer. This is why many sites have a concept of an advanced search, for those search options which are less frequently used but which are conceivably desired by some and in case the "vanilla search" isn't good enough.

[StoneMcKnuckle]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

And, we'll disagree, because they're not the same platform. Therefore it is illogical to lump them together. A platform or system is defined based on what natively runs under it.

Well if that's how it's defined, then yeah, I'm definitely arguing for no reason here, as I was under the distinct impression that a platform is defined by its hardware alone.

EDIT: er, that definition was strangely difficult to find, but I did manage to find a couple of sites that support it. I'll yield.

Should we say that GameBoy Advance and GameBoy are the same platform merely because a GameBoy emulator was builtin to GameBoy Advance? Should we say that Playstation and Playstation 2 are the same platform since a Playstation emulator was builtin to Playstation 2? What about Playstation and Playstation 3? What about Playstation 2 and Playstation 3, where only some Playstation 3's had a builtin emulator for Playstation 2? Yet all of these are shown as different platforms.

It's when you say shit like this that I feel like arguing. I realize I phrased myself like a 3-year old in my initial post which might give you the impression that I think anything that can be emulated on a PC falls under the PC platform (to be precise, the emulator itself goes with the PC platform, not the hardware/software it's emulating), but I was trying to say that since DOS was integrated into Windows as a VM... Eh, you know what? This is faulty logic. I think I'm seeing the VM emulation of DOS as different from generic software emulation, but it really isn't.

I believe DOS and Windows in general are lumped together because it's more convenient that way, since most people actually ran DOS lumped together with Windows in the first place. This is roughly the same logic that makes me bunch PC Booter and DOS games together as well. (Let's not get started on that).

Should we say that various UNIXes, BSDs, Linux, BeOS, MenuetOS, OS/2, Minix, Windows are the same platform simply because they all can run on the same hardware?

Eh, I guess you're right. It's true that by my definition these'd have been bunched together, but I can see why that's stupid.

STILL DOES'NT CHANGE MY OPNION ABOUT DOS/PC LOL U CA'NT WIN

It's quite obvious to me this is an oversight from gamefaqs (and apparently also IGN, and maybe others) and not any valid way to define platform.

Also, regardless of how one defines platform (and regardless if I agree with their definition), surely more specificity, more, better, and more intuitive search options, are always better than fewer. This is why many sites have a concept of an advanced search, for those search options which are less frequently used but which are conceivably desired by some and in case the "vanilla search" isn't good enough.

Fair enough. This whole discussion really does make me wonder what exactly you use GameFAQs for. It's not for game FAQs? 'Cause you know, I just load up the site, type in the name of the game I want an FAQ for, and voilą. I'm not sure the site needs a more advanced search feature than that.

[hi19hi19]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

If they had any Mac-only games I bet they'd be lumped in under the "PC" title as well even though it's a different operating system.
(LMFAO GAMES ON A MAC GOOD JOKE)

[UserNameGoesHere]

Re: Gamefaqs Annoyances

Fair enough. This whole discussion really does make me wonder what exactly you use GameFAQs for. It's not for game FAQs? 'Cause you know, I just load up the site, type in the name of the game I want an FAQ for, and voilą. I'm not sure the site needs a more advanced search feature than that.

I'm glad you brought this up and asked. I mostly use gamefaqs for discovering games for older systems which I may not have known about (and which might be great games), or for nostalgia-ing; remembering about great games I'd forgotten about.

I'm actually glad someone remembers about PC booter games too.

If there is a game I'm trying to find some specific information on, I'll use gamefaqs for that too, but that's actually what I use the site for the least. I use it primarily for discovering and browsing "new" (to me, but actually old and great) games and reviews.

I try to avoid using actual FAQs from the site as much as possible as I'd prefer discovering as much as possible on my own, and it's last resort only. Sometimes it's necessary though (There's stuff in some games you would never figure out without some sort of guide -- this is especially true in games which, new, came with supplementary material, in many RPGs, and other similar stuff no one really figured out on their own)