It is a well-known fact that netbooks suffer from having horrible performance when it comes to gaming, and even with developments such as NVIDIA’s ION graphics chip, gaming performance is still only passable at best. Is there any way to improve netbook gaming performance without giving up on the ultraportable platform altogether to settle for a more powerful full-sized laptop or desktop? Apparently, there is, as far as Steam games are concerned, and it involves getting down and a bit dirty with the program to enter a few commands.

To be able to optimize any netbook for Steam games like Half Life 2, Portal, and Counter-Strike: Source, you need only follow the steps enumerated in the Blogee forum thread that we’ve linked to below. You can do this right now as long as you have Steam installed, as well as a couple of games, of course. But know that this is not 100% guaranteed to allow users to play without causing a great deal of frustration. Still, anyone is free to perform the “mods” necessary for this trick and the worst that could possibly happen is that you’ll have to reinstall your Steam client. Check out the full instructions below.

Forum thread Via Blogeee

How to improve gaming performance of netbooks with Source games on Steam is a post from: Eee PC

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For some it may come as no surprise but, the classic Command and Conquer games work well on netbooks. The games require low resources and a light installation. Command and Conquer: Red Alert, Tiberian Dawn and Tiberian Sun & Firestorm are free to download from here.

The games can be run by either decompressing the files, or emulating CD images. You can see Tiberian Dawn in action on an Asus Eee PC 1000HE, which like many netbooks, features an Intel Atom N270 CPU, 1GB of RAM and integrated GMA 950 graphics.

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3 Command and Conquer games for your netbook is a post from: Eee PC

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The Diablo clone game, Torchlight which runs very well on netbooks, has been reduced. Originally at 15 Euros, you can now pick the game up for 7.99 Euros. The game, available on Steam, is currently in the “specials”. Some describe the fact that it is on Steam, as being the only disappointment with the game, as you’re required to log in, but for many this won’t be an issue. You can view the game in action below.

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Torchlight reduced to 7.99 Euros is a post from: Eee PC

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Over at LaptopMag the folks benchmarked the HP Mini 311 with 3DMark06 along with trying Far Cry 2 on the ION powered netbook. Users asked for more specific tests to be done which relate to very popular games. They asked for the netbook to be tested with Spore, Call of Duty 4 and World of Warcraft. Call of Duty 4 has already been demoed on the HP Mini 311 which you can view here.

Laptop Mag listened to their readers and have videos of the netbook playing both World of Warcraft and Spore. Overall they were pleased with the results. They even made use of the 1080p HD Video out and connected it up to a Samsung HD TV and the results are very impressive. While doing their tests, they’ve also played the HD trailer of “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” back, which apart from some motion blur, had smooth playback. You can view their videos of the games and trailer tested here.

Spore and WoW tested on HP Mini 311 is a post from: Eee PC

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If you’ve ever looked for a game for your mobile phone, you’ve probably come across Gameloft, who have been producing games for quite some time now. As well as supporting many models of mobiles, they also support iPods, iPhones as well as having downloadable console games more recently. That’s not all they’ve added though. The Gameloft website now has a dedicated page to games for netbooks. All the games support the standard netbook resolution of 1024×600 along with Windows XP, sorry Linux users.

They haven’t added many games yet, so the collection is limited for four games, but four games made specifically for netbooks, is better than no games at all. There’s currently four games on the site at the moment. Bubble Bash, Block Breaker Deluxe 2 and Chess Classics are all available for $2.99, where as Brain Challenge is slightly more at $4.99.

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Gameloft produce games for netbooks is a post from: Eee PC

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Apparently, some people thought the leaked Acer Hornet nettop was going to be a game console that will be positioned against the Nintendo Wii, so Acer executives were prompted to squash the said rumors and set the record straight about the Acer Hornet. They didn’t give any more information than what was available in the leaked presentation slides, but they did say that the Acer Hornet will be something more than just games console, being an Intel Atom/Nvidia Ion-based nettop PC. Not sure if this will be publicly unveiled during CeBIT, but we’ll be on the lookout to let you know if anything happens.

Via Digitimes

Rumor of Acer planning a game console launch squashed is a post from: Eee PC

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Gizmag have done a little research on which games run perfectly well on a netbook – games that don’t need the resources to play them that netbooks generally don’t have.

The netbook they used to test the games out is the Lenovo IdeaPad S10 which should mean any Atom based netbook using the Intel GMA 950 graphics module will run the games with no problems also, allowing gamers like myself to enjoy some light gaming relief on our netbooks.

Obviously, you won’t be playing games like Crysis, which is hugely resource intensive, on your netbook but, there are some great titles that Gizmag have noted as working on their S10 including Beneath a Steel Sky which is a free classic adventure game, popular MMORPG Eve online and a handful of Steam titles. Of course their list isn’t exhaustive, there are many other games that a netbook can handle and if any of our readers know of any other working games and would like to add to the list we’d love to hear from you.

Gaming is Great on a Netbook is a post from: Eee PC

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