Gaming On A Netbook? 13 Great Titles Playable At 720p

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[citation][nom]Luscious[/nom]"Intel Atoms with integrated video will perform poorly in comparison"You, sir, have not tried hard enough:http://lgponthemove.blogspot.com/2 [...] -n570.htmlThe N570 is better than you suggest, never mind a Cedar Trail N2800. All rather moot though, as upcoming 11.6" ULV Ivy Bridge flavors will form a new class of netbook in 2012.[/citation]

Many of those won't work on an Atom at 720p with fluid frame rates, which was our target for this article.
 
[citation][nom]hardcore_gamer[/nom]Where is HL2... ...counterstrike , portal 1 ?[/citation]

Read the last page.

Half Life 2 and Portal are source games, even Counterstrike was too much for the C-50.
 
[citation][nom]jtt283[/nom]I'm not sure why you wouldn't be able to play Diablo II on such a system. It will be stretched, but playable, and runs in Win7 if you set compatibility to WinXP.[/citation]

Because it struggles on a discrete graphics card. The C-50 won't have what it takes to run it at 720p.
 
[citation][nom]s3anister[/nom]You could get Unreal Tournament 2004 to run on a netbook. I know I got that game to run on some seriously low end hardware back in 05'Great list, though. First one of these articles that I've read in a while that was agreeable. Oh and NSF Hot pursuit, now that is a game I miss playing.[/citation]

I've tried UT3 on an E-350 and it struggles at ultra-low resolutions.

A C-50 has far less juice, and if you *did* get it to work I doubt it'd be playable at 720p.
 
Just a small correction here. For the Quake 3 engine games you have listed Dark Forces 2: Jedi Knight. That's not correct. Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast was the first of those games to use the Quake 3 Engine.
Quake 3 had a wonderful engine and gave birth to some amazing games.
 
I play Diablo II on my widescreen laptop all the time; I play the game in a maximized window with the windows taskbar taking up a portion of the right screen to preserve the 4 x 3 ratio. It's pretty doable, although not always perfect. It should be playable on a netbook based on C-50 or better, although games that offer native 720 (or 768) would be easier.

Maybe I'll give Torchlight a try.
 
I know some of these were already mentioned, but I love me older games, so here's a list of everything I have been able to run successfully in Win 7 64, and they should run fine on a netbook or older hardware (as they are older too!)

Fallout 1, 2, and Tactics. (Though Fallout 1 can be dodgy in Win 7. Check forums. Fallout 2 has a widescreen patch)
Mech Commander Gold (Read the forums to get it to work)
Mech Commander 2. (
 
[citation][nom]Cleeve[/nom]Because it struggles on a discrete graphics card. The C-50 won't have what it takes to run it at 720p.[/citation]

Try the HP DM1Z (in either the E350 or E450 flavor). That thing handles L4D2 above 30FPS with no problems. A friend has it and games in it while traveling (using the battery, mind you).

Cheers!
 
Sorry for the double-post. It chopped my last one off.

I know some of these were already mentioned, but I love me older games, so here's a list of everything I have been able to run successfully in Win 7 64, and they should run fine on a netbook or older hardware (as they are older too!)

Fallout 1, 2, and Tactics. (Though Fallout 1 can be dodgy in Win 7. Check forums. Fallout 2 has a widescreen patch)
Mech Commander Gold (Read the forums to get it to work)
Mech Commander 2. (Awesome game)
Theme Hospital (There's a 3rd party dev who makes it work in Win 7 with some custom software)
Quake 2
Quake 3 Titles: American McGee's Alice, Heavy Metal F.A.K.K. 2 (Both really awesome, really long games that look fabulous)
UT, UT2003/4
Diablo II
STARCRAFT
Warcraft III
All Command and Conquer up to Generals Zero Hour.
Random Nugget of Awesome: WH40K Chaos Gate (Buggy, save often. AWESOME GAME)
Ghost Recon + Expansions
Duke Nukem 3D or really just about anything from G O G dot com (Wing Commander 1, 2, 3 FTW)
And every emulator you can think of (up to PSX emulators)
 
[citation][nom]Cleeve[/nom]Because it struggles on a discrete graphics card. The C-50 won't have what it takes to run it at 720p.[/citation]
Diablo 2 can't be run on a C-50? Methinks you misread that as Diablo 3, considering you're reference to 720p.

But on that note: are you guys going to do any benchmarking for the HD3000/HD4000 and Llano/Trinity with Diablo 3? I think a great many people would be interested in how Diablo 3 runs on some higher-end integrated graphics.
 
Great timing on this article, I actually happen to be using a similarly spec'd netbook as a stop gap while I am getting the funds together for a new PC (my last one came to an unexpected death a month ago). Even though my plucky little netbook putts along and struggles doing things I have long taken for granted, it does play a lot of older games just fine such as Dungeon Keeper 2 and many of those great point and click adventure games. GOG is a wonderful resources in this circumstance.

 
[citation][nom]Kyuuketsuki[/nom]Diablo 2 can't be run on a C-50? Methinks you misread that as Diablo 3, considering you're reference to 720p.But on that note: are you guys going to do any benchmarking for the HD3000/HD4000 and Llano/Trinity with Diablo 3? I think a great many people would be interested in how Diablo 3 runs on some higher-end integrated graphics.[/citation]


Quite right! I was thinking Diablo 3.

Based on feedback I think there might be enough interest for us to run another article on Diablo 3, with Ivy Bridge and Trinity included.
 
[citation][nom]Cleeve[/nom]Many of those won't work on an Atom at 720p with fluid frame rates, which was our target for this article.[/citation]
What are you talking about? Everything on that list runs fine on the N570 at 1366x768. Those games that don't need a 30FPS minimum still run, while those that do like X-Plane run at close to 50FPS.

I'm not advocating that competing products don't perform, or don't perform better, but it's wrong to suggest that a high-end Atom is useless. I've had great success with my HP 210 Mini doing all manner of things from 3D gaming to HD video. True, the 1366x768 display and 2GB RAM do play a role. I prefer the 10" footprint for size/weight, but 11.6" isn't all that bad, and the improvement ULV Ivy Bridge brings is huge.
 
[citation][nom]Luscious[/nom]What are you talking about? Everything on that list runs fine on the N570 at 1366x768.[/citation]

We'll have to agree to disagree.

My tests of both platforms does not support your conclusion. Either you haven't tried what I have, or your definition of 'fine' does not sync up with my own. :)
 
Can it RUN? Sure!
Playable? No fking way!
Only because it runs at avg 10FPS don't mean its playable! I don't see anyone playing on those little screens anything other then MMOs! I agree that the little screen, batery time and portability are killers here, but not for gaming!
 
Roller Coaster Tycoon was meant to be played on a low end PC. It is poorly built for stronger systems. It plays just the same as it does with an 8400GS with a Celeron D than it does with a GTX460 with a Core 2 Duo. You might as well play it on a laptop.
 
You hurt my feelings when you called Q3 decent :c

Regardless, this is quite relevant to my interests. I don't have a netbook, but I've found HD3000 on an i5-2410M to be... underwhelming. It's always fun to see how far I can push games' visual quality on weak hardware before it becomes unplayable though!
 
[citation][nom]K-beam[/nom]other great suggestions:- the original ghost recon+the 2 expansions+numerous mods- rainbow six raven shield+the 2 expansions- unreal- deux-ex- swat 3- serious sam- prince of persia - sands of time- GTR2- C&C generals+zero hour- empire earth- Far cry (?)And the whole POP Series[/citation]

- Prince of Persia: Warrior Within & Two Thrones
- Doom3
- Indiana Jones and The Emperor's Tomb
- Age of Empires II & III
- COD Modern Warfare
- Army Men RTS
- Duke Nukem-Manhattan Project
- Just Cause
- Lord of the Rings: The Return of The King
- Medal of Honor: Allied Assault & Allied Assault Spearhead
- Red Alert 2 and its many mods
- Obscure
- Rise of Nations Series
 
I didn't realize that Battlefront II even came out for PC, I may have to pick it up.

Also, -9000 points for recommending Spore. That game is absolute trash and has installs spyware too.
 
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