You need to count yourselves lucky actually... before the competition I had a 32MB GeForce 2 GTS in my machine :-) Only reason I didn't switch to the FX5200 prior to that was that from the specs it loses about .5mil texels on the fill rate compared to the GTS (and it shows).

I know my machine spec is a little on the low side (not through choice I can tell you), but (and before you say... I know they have big budgets and lots of time) games like Half Life 2 manage OK with it by removing excess baggage in the scenes and providing alternatives to shaders etc.

This next bit isn't a rant about or an attack on anyone, its just my thoughts about the whole PC/hardware uprgade situation.

Its one thing that really gets me with the games market today, the constant need to upgrade your machine. Its all well and good if you're loaded, but if you're not its a real annoyance (my language is normally a lot harsher at that point, but seeing as I'm in good company ;-)). My machine was rendered obsolete about 2 months after I built it when AMD upped the FSB speed of the Athlons. Shortly after that the RAM was rendered obsolete and somewhere in the middle, my graphics card became old news. That was about 6 years ago.

Fantastic graphics using all the funky hardware does NOT make a game playable and enjoyable... it can enhance the experience, but if the game is dull it won't matter how many of the latest GPU's you throw at it... it will still be a dull game. And this is where the PC market could learn a thing or two from the console market IMHO. Consoles of course don't have the luxury of being able to upgrade the hardware... instead you have to get the best out of what you've got (this is clearly visible when you look at the progression in quality of games for say the PlayStation and the PS2). This is something the PC market has failed to do since the dawn of time IMHO.

So, in short (in accordance with competition rules).... you need to make your game run with all the judges hardware, including my slow old Athlon 800 (since that is my normal everyday desktop machine). If I can't get it running and playable it will be nil poit from me here on in I'm afraid and I don't want that. I want to play all of the games I've read about because they all sound like they are going to be fun games.