Good Games on a Poor Graphics Card

userod

Hi there, I'm looking for recommendations for some good games that I can play on my laptop that will run well/smooth with a not so good graphics card. (don't even think it's a graphics card it's a display card i think not sure of the difference)... Anyway here is some spec listed below and thanks in advance:

Display/Graphics: Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator Driver for Mobile Report Mobile Inter(R) 965 Express Chipset Family
Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-Bit , (6.1.7100)
DirectX* Version: 11.0
Physical Memory: 4086 MB
Minimum Graphics Memory: 8 MB
Maximum Graphics Memory: 358 MB
Graphics Memory in Use: 89 MB
Processor: Intel64 Family 6 Model 23 Stepping 6 GenuineIntel
Processor Speed: 2394 MHZ
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T8300 @ 2.40GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.4GHz


Thanks again in advance.

Overheal

http://systemrequirementslab.com

Your machine would be great but you REALLY screwed the pooch by not opting into the Dedicated GPU option when you bought it.

cherryghost

anything over 5 years old should be playable. nuff said. an extra 100 euro and you could have had yourself a pretty good laptop!

cherryghost

its an Intel GMA integrated chip.

Overheal

From my experience, Deadspace was a deadend. The Input Lag issue was unsolvable at the time. Really made me wanna delete it line for line.

TerrorFirmer

Right...that's the old GMA family, not the new one. To be honest you're limited to games like Quake III, Call of Duty original, Soldier of Fortune 2, Unreal Tournament original, Battlefield 1942 that sort of thing. I've run Far Cry, Doom 3 and similar games on one, and it was so horrendously slow that it wasn't even playable at lowest setting and resolution. In terms of RTS, Dawn of War works OK, and stuff like Command and Conquer Generals, World of Warcraft, that type of thing.

userod

Overheal wrote: »

http://systemrequirementslab.com

Your machine would be great but you REALLY screwed the pooch by not opting into the Dedicated GPU option when you bought it.

Ya I bought it about a year and a half ago and didn't think I'd be playing any games atall on it. + it's an inspiron 1525 and there didn't seem to be any graphics upgrade option at the time. believe me i wasn't skimping. anyway i'm not too pushed, just wanna shoot a few people, maybe drive a few stolen cars etc, not overly concerned about graphics aslong as it isn't jumping like a kangaroo.

Thanks for the advice and recommendations guys. Gonna try call of duty 1. and a few more. What about splinter cell? or there was one before i played it was called delta force how would that run?

Also I remember playing a game before that was just a demo. there was a jeep with guns on it a plane with guns and a lake. we could play multiplayer over the lan but no serious graphics.we could kill each other, say my brother would be driving the jeep and i'd be driving the plane. you could do other stuff too. i used really love it but can't find it since. anyone think they might have any idea of the name of this?

CrinkElite

If your looking for something to play on that hardware I would reccomend you get your hands on

Morrowind Game of the year. (The writing, world design and attention to detail have yet to be surpassed)

also have a look at what these clever Ruskies have done with frontier elite

http://www.frontierastro.co.uk/Hires/hiresffe.html

there's also an opengl version.

If you haven't played frontier elite it's time to have a look at it. It's the immortal GOD of computer game design.

If you just want to play mutliplayer shooters. you should have a look at counterstrike-source. I believe this can be run at extreemly low settings and its a nice frantic shooter. (Portal is an interesting game that is also based on the source engine It runs fine on an Nvidia 4 series card.)

I got a right kick out of Thief 2X. It's a community driven total conversion for thief 2.
http://www.thief2x.com/default2.asp

Overheal

Given the good CPU you MIGHT be able to run CSS. I know on a mid range single core desktop with the samily family GMA this was impossible. Run the Systemrequirements lab before buying anything.

5uspect

Yep most source games are highly CPU dependent.
I'd pick up the Orange Box.

TerrorFirmer

5uspect wrote: »

Yep most source games are highly CPU dependent.
I'd pick up the Orange Box.

I wouldn't.

Half Life 2 runs 'okay' on the GMA900/950 at 640x480 lowest possible settings. The other games - CSS, Portal, TF2, HL2: Ep1/Ep2...all run like dirt. It's true that a faster CPU = better performance because the GMA does T&L through software rather then hardware, but it's still, at the end of the day, a terrible solution for games...because it wasn't designed for games. Besides, even if they did work like Half Life 2, at lowest resolution and settings...is that how you want to enjoy games? I doubt it.

(Portal is an interesting game that is also based on the source engine It runs fine on an Nvidia 4 series card.)

Geforce 4 series card is much, much faster then GMA900/950. Incomparably so. Even the horrible Geforce 4 MX would be considerably better. The Geforce 4 Titanium cards would be literally several times faster.

Anyway, yeah Delta Force should be grand, though it depends which one. Delta Force 1/2/Task Force Dagger/pre-2002 should be grand. Delta Force Black Hawk Dawn, Delta Force Xtreme, etc...probably not, unless, again, it was lowest possible settings.

Also I remember playing a game before that was just a demo. there was a jeep with guns on it a plane with guns and a lake. we could play multiplayer over the lan but no serious graphics.we could kill each other, say my brother would be driving the jeep and i'd be driving the plane. you could do other stuff too. i used really love it but can't find it since. anyone think they might have any idea of the name of this?

Delta Force or Battlefield? Hard to say really...

Overheal

Even the horrible Geforce 4 MX would be considerably better.

SHUT UP I loved that card

mikkael

Depends on what kind of games you're into, but I found these worked fine:

Carmageddon 1/2/3*
Hidden and Dangerous
Far Cry
Tom Clancy stuff
Rally Championship Xtreme
Colin McRae Rally 04

... and one of my all time faves, 'Thief - the dark project' ( there's a series, check 'em out ... well worth buying on fleabay for buttons )

Regards,

Tony

* 1 & 2 not XP compat., can be got to run with tinkering.

5uspect

Hang on it can run FarCry but not HL2?
Or do you mean at 640 by 480 min settings too?

mikkael

Yup, minimum settings I'm afraid.

5uspect

Has anyone suggested Deus Ex?
I remember running it on a crappy old Dell with integrated graphics easily enough.

There's also the original half-life and expansions.

the_syco

userod wrote: »

Minimum Graphics Memory: 8 MB
Maximum Graphics Memory: 358 MB

This card steals memory from your Physical Memory when it needs it. Unfortuneately, when a game checks how much memory it has, it's usually only at 8MB, and thus plays badly.

userod wrote: »

Also I remember playing a game before that was just a demo. there was a jeep with guns on it a plane with guns and a lake. we could play multiplayer over the lan but no serious graphics.we could kill each other, say my brother would be driving the jeep and i'd be driving the plane. you could do other stuff too. i used really love it but can't find it since. anyone think they might have any idea of the name of this?

Sounds like Battlefield 1942 or Battlefield Vietnam.

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Half Life 2 runs 'okay' on the GMA900/950 at 640x480 lowest possible settings.

I'm surprised that the Inspiron 1525 is a 965 series chip, as the Inspiron 1525 usually has anIntel GMA X3100 which isn't a bad chip.

=-=

The 965 chip is f**king old: I remember supporting laptops and PC's that had that chip 3 or 3 years ago. It also depends on the driver you use. I remember a specific driver allowed WoW to work, but any other driver (including newer drivers) caused problems. An odd one to say the least.

TerrorFirmer

5uspect wrote: »

Hang on it can run FarCry but not HL2?
Or do you mean at 640 by 480 min settings too?

This card steals memory from your Physical Memory when it needs it. Unfortuneately, when a game checks how much memory it has, it's usually only at 8MB, and thus plays badly.

The GMA is not comparable to normal cards. It's paper specs cannot be applied to requirements like other cards, or be used to judge how well a game will run. IT does a lot of its calculations through software rather then hardware on the card, so it often depends on what sort of demands a game makes of certain features irregardless of the base requirements. But yes, Far Cry runs at 640x480 low settings at 25-30fps on the 950. The Memory allocation works fine, when a game detects the memory there's nothing going on that requires more then the desktop 8mb - it's only when you start involving textures that that occurs. Realistically the card can't make use of more then 32-64 mb anyway.

I used to make screenshot threads on Notebook Review for GMA950/X3100/Go7400/8600MGT, here's the 950 one.

I've tried a lot of other games though that also worked OK, from memory here's more to add to the list:

Return to Castle Wolfenstein: OK at high settings at normal resolutions
Pariah: OK at low settings and resolution
Unreal Tournament 99: Fine at high settings and resolution
Unreal Tournament 2004: Mostly fine but prone to horrible framerate dips for no reason, online play would be difficult.
Command and Conquer Generals: OK at medium-high settings

I'm surprised that the Inspiron 1525 is a 965 series chip, as the Inspiron 1525 usually has anIntel GMA X3100 which isn't a bad chip.

Yes, drastic Improvement. You can play games like Call of Duty 2, Half Life 2 (at proper settings), even Call of Duty 4 worked for me with a lot of tweaking at low settings. Some general info and screenshots on the X3100 in games here. But remember a lot of these guys would be using relatively poor processors too, which can influence results. Though for example, one guy has Half Life 2 at 800x600 high settings @ 27FPS. In comparison I had Half Life 2 at 640x480 low settings @ 30fps (average run) on the 950.

Cuchulain

Mafia, some of the older unreal tournaments and medals of honor.

Naikon

Thief 1 + 2
Quake 3: Arena

Sorted:cool:

superfly

if you knew the exact model of GMA you could check here to see what it will play
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html

go to run, type dxdiag and it should say it under display

mikkael

Grim Fandango is supposed to be good, haven't played it but know loads of people who were mad into it.

CreepingDeath

I still love the old "Ghost Recon" games... NOT Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 though.

Sure most games have demo versions.
You can probably download a demo, check out the performance and if you like it, buy the full version.

userod

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Delta Force or Battlefield? Hard to say really...

I love you! It's Battlefield: I think the original one (looking at the pictures on the most reliable Wikipedia). Surely gonna be on some €9.99 shelf in some Game somewhere.

What with all these mentions of new games I'm starting to think of buying a new laptop... It's such a pity that the video cards aren't replaceable in these laptops. Would love to be playin a new version of that battlefield game now. Might try some of the old Delta Force aswell.

slowlydownwards

Can't believe nobody mentioned GTA San Andreas yet!!!

TerrorFirmer

slowlydownwards wrote: »

Can't believe nobody mentioned GTA San Andreas yet!!!

Probably because it doesn't run on the GMA950!!!!!

cherryghost

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Probably because it doesn't run on the GMA950!!!!!

it does. just tested it there. runs on low-mid at about 30+fps

TerrorFirmer

cherryghost wrote: »

it does. just tested it there. runs on low-mid at about 30+fps

According to Intel it doesn't work at all...probably because at regular intervals the experience is so horrible that it's a requisite to state that it doesn't work. I really doubt low-mid at 30fps+ is accurate in general, unless you're looking at walls and stuff. If you did a fraps run for 60 seconds driving around normal open areas, I'm sure the average rate would be pretty poor. Not trying to discredit your claim, but being realistic, when you play a game, you want to play it as a means of enjoyment throughout...not frustration and anger!

For example here is a list of what works and what doesn't on the 945 set, but it's more concerned with what technically works rather then what works to an acceptable satisfactory level. For example, all the games that receive the 'not working' label are games that literally do not even start due to lack of T&L or whatever...COD2, BF2, BF2142,and so on. There's a lot of games in that list under the green light that technically work,but they run like crap....what's the point? For example, UT2k4 runs on the 950, but its so erratic it's crazy. One moment you'll be getting 70fps in an open space, next, you'll be staring at a wall, but the framerate will fly all over the place, from 70, to 20, to 50, to 15, to 60...and so on. That is not worthwhile in my opinion...it's the same for a lot of games. The sweet spot for the GMA in achieving playability and maintaining good visuals, I find, is games running on the QIII engine....Wolfenstein...Soldier of Fortune 2...Call of Duty....and so on.

It also says Counter Strike Source works....well, yes, it works on a technical level....at about 15fps at 640x480 lowest settings. \

Of course, it depends on your CPU too, since alot of what has been video hardware for years is still done through software on the older GMA series....so using a Pentium 4/D versus a high end Core 2 would yield massive differences.

Interesting list here of what can possibly work with a strong CPU to emulate features and trick games into thinking T&L hardware is present...this guy has gotten amazing games to work on this GMA950 like Crysis, Left4Dead, and so on...none playable, but it's still an amazing achievement....but it will all depend on CPU...

Overheal

Overheal wrote: »

SHUT UP I loved that card

Wow. According to yougamers via 3dmark, the MX 440 was the most popular dx8 graphics card of all time.

http://www.yougamers.com/hardware/stats/yougamers/alltime/

TerrorFirmer

Overheal wrote: »

Wow. According to yougamers via 3dmark, the MX 440 was the most popular dx8 graphics card of all time.

http://www.yougamers.com/hardware/stats/yougamers/alltime/

Same reason cards like the Fx5200 and X300/550 was the most popular Dx9 card....massive OEM quantities.

cherryghost

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&DwnldID=18228〈=eng

i remember reading intensely before on this. heres the latest available drivers for windows 7. I can confirm that Battlefield 2 runs on 800x600 with everything set on low at about 35 fps, with the same graphics chipset and a core 2 1.66ghz


EDIT: http://www.intel.com/support/graphics/intel945gm/sb/CS-021400.htm