A deep dive into this week's best PC Gamer forum threads

This week on the PC Gamer forums, a round-up of the community's favourite indie studios, gaming worlds we wish we could live in, a discussion about gameplay vs. graphics, and story moments in games that have stuck with us. 

As June has been quite an unusual time with many stuck indoors looking to beef up their PCs, we decided to partner with our friends at Lenovo to give away a special Lenovo Legion bundle kit to kick start their gaming dreams. The lucky winner will be receiving a Lenovo Legion Y25 Monitor, a keyboard, mouse, cap, t-shirt, hoodie, and last but not least, a 2L water bottle.

This giveaway ends soon so to be in with a chance of winning this Lenovo gaming bundle, click the link here and find out how to win.

This is what's been going on in the PC Gamer forums this week:

The PC Gamer Studio Spotlight: Have your say

At PC Gamer, we try to shine a spotlight on indie studios, celebrating and amplifying their work to the wider gaming community. We are always open to hear who some of your favourite indie studios are. Here are the community's recommendations this week:

Studio ZA/UM, Anshar Studios, Gamera Interactive—Sarafran

Amanita Design, Flying Wild Hog , Hyperstrange, Owlcat Games, Wastelands Interactive, Red Barrels, Warhorse Studios, Destructive Creations— OsaX Nymloth

For more studio recommendations checkout this thread here. 

What gaming world would you live in, if it was real?

Gaming and escapism go hand in hand. We engross ourselves within these immersive worlds every time we play our favourite fantasy RPG’s or action-adventures. So, if you had the choice to snap your fingers and magically appear in a world of your choice, even if it was for 24 hours, where would you go? Check out some interesting places our community would love to be swept away to: 

‘From a life-of-ingenuity-and-comfort standpoint, I’d live in The Sims world. Living in a place where I can develop a huge amount of skills, have actual job security, have the potential to build the house of my dreams, easily form strong friendships and experience an almost constantly exciting romantic life, and have the ability to create a potion of prolonged youth to boot. What’s there not to like? (Honourable mention: Stardew Valley.)—MauMM

‘Star Trek, assuming you're not living anywhere dangerous, is probably the most utopian, with war and capitalism completely gone. If choosing from a universe that started in games, I'd probably choose Mass Effect, outside of the places that experience war or disaster of course. Just a nice, quiet planet or space station with the advanced technology to make life very comfortable.’—Pifanjr

Discover more worlds in this thread here. 

Gameplay vs. Graphics

What side are you on? Do you prefer clever, satisfying mechanics and detailed skill trees? Or do the graphics define your gaming experience? The debate is ongoing. Here’s what our community thinks:

‘General rule of thumb is Gameplay over graphics but some games are just too gorgeous to not play even if the storyline sucks, I mean what is the storyline in simulators? Exactly, have that experience with amazing graphics.’ —DXCHASE

‘For me It's always a mixture of the two. Some older games like Company of Heroes have fantastic gameplay and reasonable graphics. A newer game like Mafia 3 had good graphics but the gameplay was mediocre - still worth playing but it's not something that I would consider going back too. Then we have remasters - the recent Call of Duty remasters have actually been pretty reasonable. A good single player campaign with pretty old graphics that have been brought up to date.’ —Rolfil

‘As with all these things, there is not one thing that is better than the other. There are plenty of text adventures I have played with absolutely no graphics - but then there are games like Skyrim where I love to just endlessly walk around the forests, that wouldn't have the same effect with bad or zero graphics.’ —Dan

Want to join the discussion? Fight the good fight here. 

Story in games

Do you remember the last time you were moved by  game's story? Our community memebers share their favourite stories from their most immersive experiences:

Mass effect the battle against sovereign. Watching the big bad reaper get its just rewards was satisfying as all hell. its like a massive bully or predator suddenly having the roles reversed and the hunter becomes the prey and the evil monster deserved a horrible explosive death. Oh and to top it off, humanity being made a perm member of the council after being slagged off by the galaxy.’ —Johnway

‘Hi. The best story I've ever experience was: The Longest Journey.
I also love the characters. I truly pray they remake this into a AAA 3D open world game, for 3D open world games are but extension of the point & click, adventure games (thanks to Shenmue for being the father and inventor of 3D open world games).’ —Alvin777

Read some more favourites here. 

Top trending threads:

What was the first video game you remember playing?
Can real-time strategy come back from the brink of death?
Your favourite building/management games
What RPG did you FINALLY find time to play?