I think I bought my first 3D accelerator just because I wanted to have one. More correctly it was a decelerator, the ViRGE DX. Most games use software rendering, so it wasn't that needed, but I was impressed by the bilinear filtering in Tomb Raider.
The was one game I did buy a card for, and that was Unreal. I found a cheap Matrox m3D, a PowerVR based card, which was a bit crappy compared to the Voodoo, but also cheaper and supported by Unreal. I spent hours looking at the tower flyby in Unreal using all the graphics cards I had.
I belive the game was Sim City 2000, it would not run on the card i had in my PC as it needed a VGA card with 512k of ram i think wow i cant remember that was back in 94 or somthing.. well before proper 3d cards..
I can always remember buying Sim City 2000 getting home, installnig it in DOS then only to get a message No VGA card detected... i weas gutted but i eventually saved up for a basic VGA card and got the game working.. and it was awesome
First card with 3d acceleration was a Matrox mystique and i think i probally got that for on of the Dark Forces games... not long after i got a vodoo card for it as well..
I did have a c64 before i has a proper IMB based PC but im not counting the C64 for this
Yep I can remember. It was to play a graphical text based adventure game called Scapeghost in VGA, so I was upgrading from CGA at the time.
Just checked and apparently this was back in 1989 as I bought the game on release. I'd built up a system and used the cheapest possible graphics card at the time with the idea of upgrading once I'd saved up enough for this more advanced display adaptor.
I had decent video cards in my computers for playing the games I was playing prior to EQ2, but when EQ2 came out I had to buy a new computer, including a new gfx card. Yes, the game was worth it to me.
Originally posted by mmoguy43 It probably doesn't completely depend on your age but could be when you started to take gaming more seriously. Can you even think that far back? I had a flashback to when I was a novice to computer upgrades but very much into PC games. I believe it was Lego Island that forced me into buying a *gasp* graphics accellerator card in order to play the game.
I also remember having to get my first Cable Internet service because players would kick me from game for having the dreaded 'Red Bar'. I was so happy the first time I saw green Starcraft latency bars.
While I have been with pc gaming for allot of years before Medal of Honor ( the original from "99) is what made me build my first actuall gaming pc. Not counting the "HOMECOMPUTER (MSX/Commodore/Amiga/Atari)" which I had before that, and most of the consoles till the ps2.
I am not really recalling what video card I used but think for a few years I bought ATI cards, think if I am not mistaken that Farcry 1 was the game that made me switch to NVidia and since never been using another brand then NVIDIA/Asus cards (currently 580GTX)
Seeing the Matrox Millenium mentioned a couple of times has rung a bell. But I'd guess there was another before that.
I also remember my Nvidia Ti4200 64mb fondly. Bought for playing Asheron's Call. I got the 64mb version (vs. the 128mb) after reading an authoritative article in Tom's Hardware explaining exactly why no more than 64mb of video memory would ever be required on a video card. Then or in the future. That author was obviously a prescient genius.
Here's another thing, though: Back in the early 90s, the purchase that showed that you were "serious" about PC gaming was not the video card (didn't need it, really). It was actually the sound card. I remember buying my first true sound card back in the very early 90s. It was either a Sound Blaster 1.5 or a 2.0.
The traps in Prince of Persia sounded wicked with that!
...very true indeed... Instead of the PC speaker or AdLib, you could get a hell of a lot better sound when buying Creative. My 1st soundcard was an AWE16, next AWE32 and after that the SoundBlaster Live 5.1. The last one I still have and is in my son's PC now. And as always, I'm still with SB, having thier last years top-model in my system. Though soundcards (and chips in general) have gone through a lot of changes and on-board sound is pretty good these days, there's still nothing better than a good creative card ;-)
Comments
I think I bought my first 3D accelerator just because I wanted to have one. More correctly it was a decelerator, the ViRGE DX. Most games use software rendering, so it wasn't that needed, but I was impressed by the bilinear filtering in Tomb Raider.
The was one game I did buy a card for, and that was Unreal. I found a cheap Matrox m3D, a PowerVR based card, which was a bit crappy compared to the Voodoo, but also cheaper and supported by Unreal. I spent hours looking at the tower flyby in Unreal using all the graphics cards I had.
I belive the game was Sim City 2000, it would not run on the card i had in my PC as it needed a VGA card with 512k of ram i think wow i cant remember that was back in 94 or somthing.. well before proper 3d cards..
I can always remember buying Sim City 2000 getting home, installnig it in DOS then only to get a message No VGA card detected... i weas gutted
but i eventually saved up for a basic VGA card and got the game working.. and it was awesome 
First card with 3d acceleration was a Matrox mystique and i think i probally got that for on of the Dark Forces games... not long after i got a vodoo card for it as well..
I did have a c64 before i has a proper IMB based PC but im not counting the C64 for this
Yep I can remember. It was to play a graphical text based adventure game called Scapeghost in VGA, so I was upgrading from CGA at the time.
Just checked and apparently this was back in 1989 as I bought the game on release. I'd built up a system and used the cheapest possible graphics card at the time with the idea of upgrading once I'd saved up enough for this more advanced display adaptor.
Riva TNT...in 98/99
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIVA_TNT
"you are like the world revenge on sarcasm, you know that?"
One of those great lines from The Secret World
Heh my first video card with 3d acceleration was riva tnt 2 m64
I had decent video cards in my computers for playing the games I was playing prior to EQ2, but when EQ2 came out I had to buy a new computer, including a new gfx card. Yes, the game was worth it to me.
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
DAoC
Any game I played prior didn't REQUIRE a video card.
Easy for me. GTX570M for SWTOR. First PC game I played.
Consoles for 30 years prior to that.
Bought a Riva 128 video card for Quake 2.
Because i can.
I'm Hopeful For Every Game, Until the Fan Boys Attack My Games. Then the Knives Come Out.
Logic every gamers worst enemy.
3DFX Voodoo 2 for my Quake 2 addiction.
Sennheiser
Assist
Thage
STARCRAFT!!!
I also remember having to get my first Cable Internet service because players would kick me from game for having the dreaded 'Red Bar'. I was so happy the first time I saw green Starcraft latency bars.
While I have been with pc gaming for allot of years before Medal of Honor ( the original from "99) is what made me build my first actuall gaming pc. Not counting the "HOMECOMPUTER (MSX/Commodore/Amiga/Atari)" which I had before that, and most of the consoles till the ps2.
I am not really recalling what video card I used but think for a few years I bought ATI cards, think if I am not mistaken that Farcry 1 was the game that made me switch to NVidia and since never been using another brand then NVIDIA/Asus cards (currently 580GTX)
fixed!
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
Seeing the Matrox Millenium mentioned a couple of times has rung a bell. But I'd guess there was another before that.
I also remember my Nvidia Ti4200 64mb fondly. Bought for playing Asheron's Call. I got the 64mb version (vs. the 128mb) after reading an authoritative article in Tom's Hardware explaining exactly why no more than 64mb of video memory would ever be required on a video card. Then or in the future. That author was obviously a prescient genius.
1st computer didn't have a video card. Packard Bell 386N+ back in 1991 time frame.
...very true indeed... Instead of the PC speaker or AdLib, you could get a hell of a lot better sound when buying Creative. My 1st soundcard was an AWE16, next AWE32 and after that the SoundBlaster Live 5.1. The last one I still have and is in my son's PC now. And as always, I'm still with SB, having thier last years top-model in my system. Though soundcards (and chips in general) have gone through a lot of changes and on-board sound is pretty good these days, there's still nothing better than a good creative card ;-)
gosh...first pc i built strictly because of gaming...probably my rage 128 and age of empires.
still have that card in my attic
Me too same time frame.
I can't really recall the game at all, it might have been doom
but i remember the PC (mostly)
486 DX4-100 cpu, 8bit Soundblaster Card
a vga card (forgot what, how much ram)
got a voodoo 3d accel (with passthrough) cable for it ..
all hooking up to an awesome 14" CRT monitor
apart from the screen size, my keypadless (nonesmart) touchphone is more powerful