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3D Games Will Entice You To Purchase a 3D Television

Playing games in 3D right now requires a lot of work on your part, or at least a lot of money. An Nvidia rep told me that you could get a decent 3d-capable tower for $800-$1,000, but it was telling that the setup they had me playing on at the press preview for the game had a to-be-announced Nvidia GPU inside a 3.5-foot-tall tower with a plexiglass side to show off the water cooling inside. Sure, it’ll work with a slower computer, but if you want a great experience, expect to pay top dollar.

That’s because 3D gaming will basically require a doubled framerate to get video as smooth as we’re used to with 2D games, as it’s processing a frame for each eye instead of one for both.

But that’s fine. Unless you’re a hardcore PC gamer or a serious early adopter, I wouldn’t suggest running out and dropping $4,000 on a tower. What was exciting about this was that it felt like a glimpse into the near future.

PCs, after all, aren’t where the majority of players get their gaming done. They play consoles. The PS3 is getting 3D capabilities this summer through a couple of firmware upgrades; the same is coming to the Xbox 360 sometime soon. In any case, even when the PS3 and Xbox 360 get 3D support you’ll need a new 3D HDTV that supports HDMI 1.4 to run em, so it won’t suddenly make 3D gaming mainstream.

And since 3D requires a doubled framerate, you shouldn’t expect to be able to play the current crop of console games in 3D even when the PS3 gets that ability, because most of them are already pushing the console hard to hit its framerate as-is. Doubling that will not work out very well.

3D gaming is cheap and will encourage a new generation to accept 3D as a benefit, not a burden. The current generation – folks 25 and above – still see 3D as a gimmick. Kids will see 3D as an extension of the immersive experience gaming has offered them their entire lives.

Mark my words: the vast majority of TV viewers will never have a 3D TV in their home. Maybe some die-hards will buy a few pairs of glasses to watch the Super Bowl in 2015 but you and yours will probably never find any good reason to go 3D. However, if you’re a gamer you owe it to yourself to try a 3D set-up and perhaps upgrade. It’s a lot of fun.

So sorry, everyone. The 3D TV party is over. 3D TV is, in short, the Laserdisc of this era and what comes next – the perfection glasses-free 3D television displays. The current crop of 3D TV is an interstitial technology aimed at grabbing a few upgrade dollars. If TV manufacturers really cared about selling a whole new crop of TVs, they’d try much harder to convince the world that it needs what they’re selling.

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