re: I need an affordable gaming PC.

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ha, I was like, I'm NOT going to go over $700 on my build......$850 later...

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I said I wouldn't go over $1200 on mine, $1500 later, haha. I'm looking into the GTX980 at the moment, but I'm probably going to hold off to see how people feel about them. Ah, the perks of justifying PC purchases through being a software engineer. I never get questioned as to why I need or want more for it.

As for the OP, it's very possible to build something decent at that price. I tend to stick with Intel processors and Nvidia GPUs, which tend to be a bit more expensive. I still believe that an i5 mixed with a GTXx50 Ti (Ex: GTX 750 Ti) tier card will give you one of the best starter gaming PCs on the market because of the ability to ease of upgrading CPUs to the i7 and the optimization in the Nvidia GPUs. I had AMD years ago, and I will almost always go with the Intel/Nvidia pairing now. I find that they tend to have a better ownership experience, but I'm not here to debate the AMD/Intel thing.

There's a decent guide here from ILikeLSUToo on the subject. He goes with a 7970 on his list, but like I said, I'd usually go with a corresponding Nvidia card. Other than that, I recommend it.

If you're going to be gaming, though, don't forget to buy quality in the important areas as well. A lot of gamers buy shite motherboards, cooling, and most importantly, power supplies. I've seen people purchase what they think is a decent PSU (For example, RAIDMAX's unrated 750W PSU), and their machine takes damage from them going postal. I've seen a guy lose an 680 SLI set up from buying a shite PSU. I always recommend a 80 PLUS Platinum rated PSU from a trusted brand like Corsair. I have a Corsair 860AXi, which is a bit overkill for a single 780 setup, but I'd rather have quality than have to replace parts later. A good motherboard and PSU are two INTEGRAL parts to start with. Don't make the mistake a lot of people make and go for the flashy parts first (best CPU or GPU) if you're on a budget. It's better to get quality of the important stuff and upgrade to an i7 and 770/780 (or 980) later.

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Why not 8.1 with classic shell start menu? It's practically identical in interface, but 8.1 is a bit leaner and has a few extra security enhancements under the hood.

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I always tell people this. The public let it's emotions take over to consider Windows 8.1 a bad operating system. I was really hesitant to switch over, and after a really in-depth trial period, I switched completely over to 8.1 as my main OS. I've heard 9 could end up being the best of both worlds, which is awesome considering how great 8.1 is. In every area, I get better performance on 8.1, and I have Start8 so it's like nothing changed for the worse.

Hell, I chose to replace some of Windows tools with UNIX tools when I installed Git, and I rarely even open my Linux/OS X dev environments.