PC Building Simulator (2019)

Je ne m'attendais pas à jouer plusieurs heures à un jeu de simulation de construction de PC. Et bien sachez qu'on se prend vite au jeu. Le concept s'essouffle vite cependant à cause de la répétitivité inhérente aux jeux de gestion.

Peut être qu'il manque un mode réellement débutant qui serait plus pédagogique et expliquerais davantage comment s'articulent les composants d'un pc, quel est leur rôle et comment comparer leurs spécificité. En effet, rien de ce que j'ai "appris" durant cette session de jeu ne pourra être transporté à la vraie vie et c'est bien donnage pour un jeu qui s'allie aux grands constructeurs.

I got myself into a mode when the latest wave of sim games arrived and flooded me with enticement for relatively fresh concept ideas (Gas Station Sim, Train Station Renovation etc). Not only that, thanks to the growing trend of interfaces being made more accessible, the growing goals being made the carrot on the stick and modern engines being furthermore optimized, the simulation genre seems to be growing further beyond the niched obscurity and earning its place once more alongside other genres on the forefront.

One of those examples of such genre is this game, where you manage and run a PC workshop that offers services for computer owners, dealing with both hardware and software issues. When you come in, the shop has had poor service reputation and it's up to you save it and take it to a new path of glory. You start with small orders, like cleaning, deleting viruses and replacing PC parts, only to step up with new kinds of tasks including upgrading, overclocking and building a new PC from scratch. You can even use your spare budget to enhance your shop with new features for convenience, automatizing certain mundane tasks.

I wasn't as much a sim fan before but this is one of those games that made me believe how engaging, educational and even fun they can be. Even as I have fiddled with my own PC IRL by replacing and upgrading parts, there's something new I could take away from the game since they bring PC functions, technical specifications and performances to actual references like the brands, the 3DMark scores and comparisons. And the devs keep the game up-to-date with the new parts coming into existence.

Ultimately, I did find this game addictive for the first few hours but as the variety of tasks grows, it also gets heavier and the initial sense of progress already started to wear down. Although the IT support game mode made for a good change of tasks, it ended up the same and I felt after nearly a dozen hours that I can't look forward to pick this up again. Maybe it's because my interest lies somewhere else deeper than the working with computers, like being content with just the 101 class.

To summarize things, PC Building Simulator undeniably lives up to its genre's namesake, keeping itself faithful to real-world in terms of PC parts and functions as a reference. I suppose it will cater to the PC nerds, novice or not, that could see themselves sitting with this for quite a long time, especially with the constant updates being made to catch up with new brand part releases. However, the interest might wear down when the flow wears down due to increasingly heavier and more complicated tasks coming in time. For those who are on the fence, might want to test it and pick it up on a sale and wait with buying the DLC's.

Playtime: 13 minutes

In this game you run a PC repair shop. You read e-mails, order parts and work on PCs. If that sounds like a job it's because it is. To make matters worse the controls are fucking awful.

Unscrewing screws requires you to hold a mouse button, fine. But plugging in cables is done the same way and you have to hold it to pick up and plug in? Ugh. Why not just let the player drag the cable? On top of that the camera is extremely awkward and can't be moved freely. It's laser-focused on the case, with the last cable barely being visible when you turn to the left.

The most core part of the game, which has to be done for every single PC you fix, and it is painfully bad. Seriously, i couldn't stand it the second time, it's that bad.

Also, you install a virus scanner without booting in safe mode? What is this, amateur hour?

Well, its been a few years now, and yep, i'm still playing... The game is by no means amazing but it's definitely one of those low key chill games that make for a fun way to waste time and build something, again, and again, and again... (which is what brings me back to it) It's fun for those of us that build PC's maybe. (none of that back pain leaning over, or the fear of pushing something too hard, or sneezing from that dust!) The overclocking is the part of this i like the most. Ekeing out that last bit of performance and getting the hang of how far you can stretch something is strangely satisfying (i've sometimes 95%'ed OCs in minutes or first tries)

In the end this is a rather good (above average) sim-type game. If you have any interest in building a PC, i would recommend it. You might even save money by playing it by learning the common hardware problems and learn enough to know what part to replace.