Poll: Is The "PC Elitist" As Common As The Escapist Would Like To Think?

[Waaghpowa]

You do realize that spiteful assholes are just going to vote yes in an attempt to make people look like assholes right?

I've been called an elitist for simply stating that I prefer to play games on my PC. I personally think that the "elitism" is overblown, similar to a racist saying that all black people are criminals when white people are just as bad, if not worse.

 

[6037084]

I can prove that my PC's better in almost every way to any console (more games, emulators, raw power, better controls + ability to use gamepad, mods, more customizability etc ) , and if that makes me elitist then I'm an elitist

 

[Anthony Wells]

I can prove that my PC's better in almost every way to any console (more games, emulators, raw power, better controls + ability to use gamepad, mods, more customizability etc ) , and if that makes me elitist then I'm an elitist

as said (well....hinted at moreso) in my earlier post it still comes down to preference. your "better controls" is subjective to the game, the pc, and the gamer playing. but im not trying to deny the pc's superiority..it is superior and i plan on getting one one of these days but i need the money first.

 

[Fishyash]

PC fans like to say how technically superior the PC is as a platform for gaming (which is undeniably true). Console fans call the PC gamers elitists (which is stupid to be honest). But I don't doubt that people think their favourite platform is superior.

Honestly in my (ableit few) years of PC gaming I have yet to come across a "PC elitist". Seeing a so called "bad community" as a main turn off for an entire platform is petty at best.

The most annoying thing though are the idiots who dub the elitists as the "PC community" (which I don't even think EXISTS). Same with the idiots who dub the rude CoD/halo/BF gamer on xbox live as the "console community" (again, I don't even think such a thing exists).

You want to know the actual "PC commnity" and "console community"? They are the reasonable people who honestly don't care about the other consoles. There are definately more important matters than X platform vs Y platform within the gaming community, and each have their advantages and disadvantages. However there will still be people who don't know better, trying to argue.

With my limited experience of the escapist though, the PC elitists are few and far between. What I am personally seeing are either people who are joking in reference to the PC gaming master race joke from ZP (Like half of the posts you linked to @Antitonic) or are being unfairly dubbed as PC elitists just because they are stating that they prefer playing on PC (although it is unwarranted in an unrelevant thread) because of the technical strength and versitality.

Obviously it can't be denied. There are PC elitists around. People saying that consoles are for children, how "console kids" make playing online on consoles insufferable, etc..

 

[loc978]

A difficult thing to judge, to be sure... to view "console gamers" as "lesser gamers" one has to essentially think in blanket statements. To think that there is an absolute line that no gamer must cross, and that line is ownership and use of both a gaming PC and a current-gen gaming console.
Sort of a lesser version of cultural bigotry, like saying "everyone in the US is a morbidly obese, cowboy-obsessed city dweller" or "All English people have bad teeth"... or even "killing is always bad, it can never be justified"

So no, I don't think there is such a thing as a "lesser gamer"... However, when one touts their chosen console as absolutely superior to all other gaming platforms because it's relatively inexpensive, easy to hook up and use, and it happens to be the one they own... well, that person is an idiot.
PCs do have advantages over consoles, and they're quite technical. That in itself could be considered a disadvantage, because it requires a bit of knowledge to get into gaming effectively on the PC. If you take an off-the-shelf windows system, install a few games and just play 'em with no tweaking or maintenance, you will have an inferior gaming experience to someone who does the same with a console. You will encounter bugs, performance issues, et cetera. However, if you learn to tweak your PC and use various software tools, you can do practically whatever you want with your games [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bifmj1O3D24].

Console gamers are just people who don't want to spend several grand on a rig...

A $1300 build has lasted me over 4 years. I'm starting to want an upgrade, but it's not truly necessary yet.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Clearly you are new here.

A few weeks on the Escapist will answer your question.

Ninja'd. This site has a majority of PC gamers (in terms of userbase). So the elitism does crop up around here frequently.

A survey was done about 2 years ago and the split was 51% PC and 49% consoles or something along those lines. It is perfectly natural and normal to see more people on PC towards the end of a console gen as the PC becomes an all round better option in everyway(well, monetarily the better option as PC needed for ultra settings a few years will still run 99% of things on ultra until the end of this console gen due to hardware stagnation). The opposite is true at the start of a console gen. More people flock to consoles as they tend to be the better option as they offer equal or higher end graphics for their price than PCs. Then it shifts to equal and finally more PC gamers.

So no this site is not skewed user wise and has a fairly even fanbase all things considered.

I think where the PC gaming elitism really gets people's backs up is when they attack the games for being "dumbed down for the console". Just append "gamers" to that. Ta-daa! You now have an insult directed at everyone that:
a) Uses consoles.
b) Liked the game.
That the game was somehow built to appeal to "the masses", "the lowest common denominator" or just idiots. Which rather implies that if you like it, you are the masses, the lowest common denominator, or just an idiot. In the spirit of generosity, a lot of them seem to mean that as a criticism of the game developer rather than an assertion of superiority (rather than being pure trolls, or real elitists that mean it). They equally don't seem to realize how badly it comes across.

Yes some games are dumbed down for consoles but that is not because console players are stupid people. It is out of necessity of control schemes and what consoles can handle.
dumb down, Informal . to make or become less intellectual, simpler, or less sophisticated: to dumb down a textbook; American movies have dumbed down.
Yes it is used in a pejorative way a lot of the time but you can't deny that a good few games are made simpler for consoles. The reason is t he control scheme. Consoles need simpler control schemes due to the input option. Does that make it bad? No it doesn't it makes it different and a lot of the best things in life and things we use the most are very simple things.

Here is another definition that suits it a lot better.
Dumb: lacking some usual attribute or accompaniment; especially : having no means of self-propulsion .

I am not going to lie, many people do say it to be bad but not everyone means it that way just because many perceive it that way. To think that the same controls and mechanics work for both and should be the same is laughable as it just wouldn't work. They need to be somewhat tailored to the platform.

What this does do which is a good thing, is make game designers be economic with control schemes. They need to cut the fat. This means that we have less pointless controls that no one ever really uses anymore. It does lead to control clustering too. Basically this is evident in games like CoD(mostly bomb games like S&D) and BF. Trust me when I say it is irritating when I lose a clan scrim because the dev has pick up weapon and bomb defuse on the same button. Especially, when there is no option to have it elsewhere.

Although misleading poll is completely misleading.

OT: No platform or system is better but they are tailored to different experiences and suit different people which is why they both exist in the market. It is also why we have handheld and mobile gaming. Yes some console games are simpler than some PC games but that does not make them bad or better. There are perfectly legitimate and objective pros and cons to all platforms and even trying to deny that is lying to yourself but in the end it does not matter.

To answer the threads title no PC elitists aren't as common as some people on the forum make them out to be. As I said above in a survey awhile ago the site was practically 50:50 and it is not unusual to see a PC-centric shift at this stage in a console gen. There are plenty of console martyrs and elitists too. However, we could grow up and accept the realities of the situation. This could help us build a healthier hobby for everyone.

 

[Anthony Wells]

im frightened by the growing number of yes's....

 

[ElPatron]

Please don't vote in the poll if you do not consider yourself a PC gamer

That's fair. Oh wait, I'm being sarcastic. Its actually retarded and biased.

Not getting the point: skill level 89.



How are you going to ask console gamers if they feel that consoles are "worse" if you are trying to understand other pc gamers?

 

[CoveringFire]

Yes, the PC is the superior platform. Does this make console gamers inferior? No. They just either can't afford an up-to-date PC setup or choose to play consoles anyway.
I love my PC, I wouldn't go back to consoles for the world, but the majority of people such as myself don't 'look down upon' console gamers and PC elitists are few and far between.

Your the first person I have seen to actually say "they can't afford an up-to-date PC setup." Thank you, so fucking much. As some one who doesn't know shit internally of a computer the whole "make your own" doesn't click with me. So I have to go out there and buy a suitable rig, which is gonna cost me some cash, and is why I like consoles so much.

Theres not actually a great deal in it when you think about it. I've just put £500 down on new hardware for my PC that brought me right up to date. Launch price for the PS3 was more than that as i recall. Also saving £5-10 per game can add up quickly.

I grew up using consoles, and i only got started on PC gaming because back in the day consoles had no networking. It is easy to see how consoles are taking over as it is just more convenient for most users. You can sit in front of a nice big tv and chill out.

Swings and roundabouts, etc.

I think the biggest cause of conflict between console and PC gamers is down to development and penny pinching on the part of developers. Prime example of this is Battlefield 3. All along it was claimed that PC was the primary platform. Then after launch the developer admits that actually they switched platform mid way through because its quicker. At the end of the day PC users feel let down as the maps are scaled back to meet the consoles requirements. A little more effort could have seen larger maps for PC that suited 64 player servers, and cropped versions for the consoles with lower limits.
A lot of what gaming is today was brought about by us PC gamers, to have the platform put on the back ring in favour of "old technology" to save time, money and effort is gutting.

On the other hand theres also a group of people out there who believe the console is superior. At the end of the day, it depends how you want to play. Why would you give a crap what someone else plays?

 

[Something Amyss]

It seems that people who whine and complain about PC elitism being everywhere are actually much more common than PC elitists.

If that's the case, Escapist PC gamers are doing an awesome job of misleading me.

So? I know more people who complain about racism then I know racists. This doesn't mean anything.

But it's handy logic to dismiss claims that racism exists.

 

[ElPatron]

It's more common to hear someone spitting gems like these:

-- You need to invest $2000 on a gaming PC
-- It's an hassle because computers fail a lot

It is more common to hear someone saying that the PC advantages over consoles are meaningless.

I only answered "Yes" because a good part of console owners do not care that much about games. You know, those guys who only buy FIFA/Madden. Or possibly CoD if they are into FPS.

If not everyone who goes to the movies is a cinephile and not everyone who listens to music is an audiophile, then not everyone who plays games is a "gamer".


EDIT:

ITT: PC GAMERS BEING REASONABLE TO DEFEND THEIR SYSTEM, CONSOLE GAMERS COMPLAINING ABOUT PC GAMERS TO DEFEND THEIR SYSTEM.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

im frightened by the growing number of yes's....

You shouldn't be the poll and title ask 2 very different questions and many people do not read the poll and assume it is the same. Many more just vote and leave.

 

[Evil Smurf]

you get small groups within pc elitistism. My brother wil only use a Mac (we only have them, although I emulate windows). It annoys me as he will talk all day about how much Macs are better then PCs and not see that PCs are better at somethings (Skyrim for example). I hate elitism in all forms

 

[Kimarous]

I consider myself a hybrid. There are tons of games I have on my PC, but also quite a few for my consoles (main one PS3, but I still play the others). I don't really focus on my specs (hell, don't even know HOW to) or consider console gaming as "lesser" by any extent; the main difference I experience is with how the game controls. Some games just play better on PC or console better than others. That's probably why I'm not such a big fan of Portal 2; my mother got me the PS3 version instead of PC, which is what I would have preferred. Only plus to that is the increased capability for co-op gameplay, which I had written off for my PC experience (not that I've ever bothered with it).