Why is PC gaming "dead"?

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

PC gaming isn't dead, and it never will be.

1) DRM. Piracy is so much easier on a PC than on current-gen consoles, so the PC versions of games are shipped with stuff like online activation, background programs, etc. The majority of console games don't have DRM, simply because it's a lot tougher to pirate them.

I call bullshit on this. Fallout: New Vegas was already on Pirate Bay a week prior to release, but only for xBox 360. Whiney publishers who don't want to own up to a shit game will fall back on this fallacy every single time.


Note how you don't see Valve, Bioware, Bethesda QQing about piracy. Their shit sells so well on PC they have no need to QQ.

I just have a little something to add to that on PC v Console piracy. Although while it is easier on PC you don't get accurate numbers for consoles. People who I know who have pirated some PC(well I only know they did Plants vs Zombies but still pirating) downloaded it themselves. Now everyone I have ever met who pirates console games does not download it themselves but buys it off a guy. So 1 person has downloaded a pirated console game once and is then selling it on about 15 times. The 15 is just pure speculation as it is even harder to pin the true number of console piracy. You also just have to look back at the million 360s that were banned from XBL due to pirating. So it is just as wide spread on consoles as well as PC.

 

[gigastar]

I guess the main reason why people think PC gamind is dying (NOT to say it is dying) is because of Microsoft. After the advent of the Xbox and the 360 Microsoft shifted most of its gaming support to console games and mostly left all its published, ported and developed PC games to rot.

Still while companies like Valve kick around, PC gaming will be as easy to kill as a kitten made of titanium.

 

[maggot man]

exactly! i agree completely as we can already use msn, facebook and switter on a xbox not to mention the ability to download films and music soon we will be able to simply surf the web on the next gen

 

[Danceofmasks]

I've always kind of hoped Microsoft would release a solution that breaks the barrier between the 360 and a PC.

They were experimenting with getting Gears 2 games that combined 360 and PC players ...
During playtesting, they found that having a kb+mouse is such a huge advantage mediocre PC players were dominating elite 360 players.

Now, rather than fine tuning their system (not that I'm suggesting this as an option, but making a mouse for the 360 wouldn't be rocketscience), they decided it's too hard and tossed the idea in the bin.

I didn't mean let them play multiplayer with each other.

Read my post again ...

What exactly are you suggesting, allowing 360 games to be run on PCs?
For most games, and this includes almost every shooter, PC versions are superior to 360 versions.
Compared to a controller, which requires games to "cheat" for you via aim assistance, kb+mouse is so precise the very notion of even having aim assistance is downright ridiculous.

For games whose control schemes are too difficult to rework, well .. you can already plug in a 360 controller to a PC and use that.
Heck, I have a 360 controller set up for browsing youtube, that's how lazy I am.

The main reasons people use consoles over PC is 'cos it's cheaper, they have bigger TVs than monitors, and they want to play on the couch.
If they have to use a PC anyway, it's throwing out those advantages .. they'd be idiots to actually use an inferior version of the games (by that I mean the 360 version, in case it isn't clear).

 

[Delusibeta]

I used to be a hardcore PC gamer, but then FIFA 11 was much better on consoles. I go over to my friends house and play FIFA a LOT now. The only time I play on the PC is to play some Dragon Age: Origins.

I wouldn't say I think PC gaming is dying or dead, but I know there are a lot of PC gamers like me, slowly migrating towards consoles.

You went back to consoles for FIFA? And for the version with (apparently) the best PC port yet?

Honestly, I'd understand it if it was something like Gears of War or Uncharted, or something similar that's exclusive to consoles and not guaranteed to get a sequel next year (e.g. anything made by Platinum Games), but FIFA?

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

While PC isn't dead, it's certainly not the most attractive choice for gamers.

Errr... what?

Speak for yourself. PC gaming is the most attractive choice for most PC gamers. That's why most of them ARE PC gamers.

Notice how I said gamers and not PC gamers. Most gamers play mainly on the console. It's just a fact.

PC gamers are gamers. You didn't say "most gamers" the first time.

As for your fact, let's see something to substantiate it.

I never said "most gamers" the first time either i know. Stop putting words in my mouth. I just said the word "gamers" I know what I said.

So what are you trying to say? You said the PC isn't the most attractive choice for gamers - no qualifiers whatsoever, so unless you're trying to say that PC gamers aren't gamers or that 'gamers' without a qualifier means non-PC gamers exclusively, your statement was bollocks - There are gamers that find the PC the most attractive choice.

Also you want substantiation? All righty.

Here's a link to a chart done by ARS, a technological research group:
http://ppmartin.wordpress.com/2008/05/14/pc-gaming-loosing-ground-to-console-gaming/

That alone shows that since 1998 consoles software sales have smoked PC sales like pork.

Ah yes, based on NPD Group data I see. You do realise they can't include most digital sales because digital distributors refuse to disclose their numbers, right? I don't think anyone but the most rabid Valve fan would think that omission would be enough to swing the numbers the other way but it is still a rather important sales factor for PCs. To the best of my knowledge NPD Group numbers don't cover MMO subs either, which is a gigantic chunk taken out of PC earning.

The problem is there's no way to know how many PCs are out there being used for gaming. Hell, you can pull up stats for sales of discreet GPU cards but how many of them end up in gaming rigs? No one knows.

Of course, without a more comprehensive set of numbers to work from (ie, ones that don't exclude some of PCs major earners) we can only take a punt... also sales figures don't cover piracy and the like which, if you believe some publishers, is costing them untold billions.

So what are you trying to say?

Go back and read all of the points I said to support that statement, which you aparently chose to ignore.

Ah yes, based on NPD Group data I see. You do realise they can't include most digital sales because digital distributors refuse to disclose their numbers, right?

Well when Valve holds %70 percent of the Digital Distrubution market for PC and doesn't make the billions that most major console based companies make every year that kind of tells me that much more people purchase console software. Meaning much more people play games on console.

 

[Delusibeta]

Well when Valve holds %70 percent of the Digital Distrubution market for PC and doesn't make the billions that most major console based companies make every year that kind of tells me that much more people purchase console software. Meaning much more people play games on console.

Objection: Valve is a private company, and thus doesn't release revenue figures. For all you know, they could be making billions. Also, Sony and Microsoft isn't solely about consoles. Didn't Nintendo post up a loss last year?

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

It's not dead, but it is smaller than console gaming.

No it's not.
It's bigger than all the consoles put together.

In which way specifically? Cause it's sure as shit not in software sales.

That and the PC just doesn't have as large a range of genres as consoles do.

There are more major and renowned developers for consoles so that's were the investments are.

The PC just hasn't had the amount of classics it did in the 90s.

Now it's crappy console ports, zombies, zombies, zombies, uninspired FPSs and RTSs.

no genres?

*points to the steam store genre selector*

no companies?

*points to the entire developer selector for steam*

No money in sales?

*points to the money made by steam every single year*

want me to go on? because i can do this all day.

You didn't prove how those lead to PC leading in any fashion.

Steam Genre Selector: Most of the games on steam that are not RTSs, Valve, or uninspired FPSs sell better on console.

Steam Developer Selector doesn't prove anything. Thete are still more major developers on the consoles than there are that work with Steam. That is a fact. There are lots of developrs that aren't on Steam pal.

And never did I say no money in sales. I'm pretty sure that Black Ops can prove that alone. I highly doubt Steam makes as much money as company like EA, Activision or Square Enix based just off of Steam alone. My point was that consoles in general make more money for devs and publishers than PC. That's also a fact.

Basing your entire arguement off of Steam was stupid. I'm talking ALL PC and ALL console. Steam is just one aspect of the PC. And if your going to say things like, "points to money made by Steam", put up a link to help your point out.

Last time I check Valve was making $70 million.

Last time I checked the Activision part of Activision Blizzard was raking in 2.9 billion a year. Which is my point. PC isn`t dead but it sure as shit doesn`t make money like major console companies do.

so you're basing the sales on ONE MULTIPLATFORM GAME? and never did i say its ALL steam. List the developers if you want but the fact of the matter is that most developers are mulitplatform. Sell better on console? Where are you basing your facts since digital distribution don't divulge their numbers.

For your information you are trying to compare A DIGITAL STORE TO GAME PUBLISHERS. STEAM IS NOT A PUBLISHER, ITS A STORE. Why not compare Target to mcdonalds while you're at it? Console developers? That implies the console exclusive companies which limits the companies to console exclusive developers which are quite small. If you notice console developers are big because consoles are expensive to develop for and high risk while the PC is low risk and cheap to develop for. Your gaggle of "big dogs" can't stand a fucking chance against the thousands of developing studios on PC. Need i pull out the game numbers of PC games versus console games?

I never based my arguement off of one multiplatform game. I based off of a company. I didn't mention a game. Nice try at word twisting. You essentially used Steam for all of your points so I pointed out that one company makes a massive amount more than Valve which deals mostly with PC. You really need to learn how to argue. And in terms of the big dogs not standing a chance against the thousands of developing PC studios, that statement is just asinine. You want to pull numbers out to prove me wrong? Allow me.

Out of the top 10 best selling video game franchises only one of them is exlusivlely PC. The Sims. The rest are console exclusive or games that were released on all platforms but sold more on consoles due to PCs always getting shafted on release dates.

Black Ops alone, which is the most Pirated PC game of this year, still made $1 billion dollars faster than Avatar, the top best selling movie of all time.

Yes there are thousands of developing PC studios. Likewise for console based studios. There are probably more developing console developers than on PC. Please name these thousands of PC studios. Then name what they've done. The develoing console studios grow faster then the developing PC studios. This can be show with Blow Entertainment, The Behemoth, and many companies that have released indie successes on XBL/PSN. I personally haven't heard of many developing PC studios but apparently you claim there are Thousands.

I never said PC was dead.

But comparing it's growth to the console industry is just silly.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Well when Valve holds %70 percent of the Digital Distrubution market for PC and doesn't make the billions that most major console based companies make every year that kind of tells me that much more people purchase console software. Meaning much more people play games on console.

Objection: Valve is a private company, and thus doesn't release revenue figures. For all you know, they could be making billions. Also, Sony and Microsoft isn't solely about consoles. Didn't Nintendo post up a loss last year?

Yes, Valve doesn't post it's revenue.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/119/119351.html
There's that.

And I know that Sony and MS aren't solely console companies. You'd have to be stupid to think that.

And so what if Nintendo posts a loss? They are one multibillion dollar company where there are dozens of other multibillion dollar companies. And Ninty`s loss was $280 million. They still have the billions that they have been making for the past 5 years so I think they`re good.

I can only think of two companies making any substantial manoey off of the PC. Valve and Blizzard. Both due to one major product. Steam and WOW respectively.


Even though I made a point of saying PC isn`t dead in my original post I still have to deal with people. Say one bad thing about PC and now I`m arguing with two people. I merely pointed out how the PC just isn`t marketable like it once was. Calm down.

 

[Delusibeta]

Yes, Valve doesn't post it's revenue.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/119/119351.html
There's that.

Founded in 1996, the company started off with a bang by publishing the highly successful Half-Life in 1998.

:/

I question the accuracy of that website. Sierra published Half Life.

 

[RaikuFA]

im not either but ive dealt with a lot of pc gamers who acted like what my previous post said.

What, this?

its mainly pc gamings attitude towards new people. asking which OS the best? youre the devil incarnate in a pc gamers eyes. it turns off a lot of newer pc gamers. thus making them stay to console

Odd. I've never seen someone abused or ripped on for asking that question (at least, not unless they started acting like a dick). Most PC gamers I've seen answering that will answer either Win XP or Win 7 and then go on to heap abuse on other Windows OSes and bemoan the lack of proper game support for Linux.

i have. its really annoying to see someone try and ask what the best part is for playing X game and nearly every pc gamer in said topic jumped on them over asking saying they dont deserve to play pc games if they dont know.

lesson? PC gamers are only killing their own medium when they act like this. if they stop acting like this, then there will be less people saying pc gaming is dead

 

[imperialreign]

There's nothing really odd about that twist considering now that when the big game devs finally got their (relatively) piracy proof systems, the big issue suddenly became used games (leading to THQ's and EA's Project Ten Dollar bullcrap).

Agreed - although, the odd thing is, DRM usage in the RUS gaming market is on the uber-1337 level. They do employ some severely draconian forms of DRM . . . I have nothing against such measures at all, personally I think they actually do what they're intended to do. But the average user has a bad mental image of what DRM is and does, and that negative image has stirred a lot of grief and mis-information.

Funny, though . . . the RUS gaming market has lowered PC game prices in order to combat piracy, and it's actually worked. PC titles are roughly 1/4 of what console titles sell for, and such a maneuveur has actually been effective at cutting down on the number of pirated titles.

The US gaming market could learn from that.

Hey, titles by CDProjekt (The Witcher), Bohemia Interactive (the original Operation: Flashpoint) and Croteam (Serious Sam) are already reserved as well as GSC for STALKER.

Agreed. only reason I pointed out GSC (STALKER series) and 4A Games (Metro2033), they're the more "well-known" for being of the RUS gaming market origin. But, the above goes to show that there have been other big-ticket titles from Russian developers.

 

[Atmos Duality]

-sniporama-

Good post: but...

a) WoW is, by definition, competing against console games as well. Likewise, I'd argue that Call of Duty is having a similar effect to userbases of console (and PC) games.

b) Although I wouldn't argue that, out of the gaming systems, PC piracy is well known to exist, it's fairly insignificant compared to music piracy (for example). And even then, I don't think you give enough credit to the handheld pirating scene.

c) Fair point, however the same argument can also be applied on consoles directly.

a) WoW was a major industry-changer for PC. Even today, unless it's an RTS or some wild new Indie game (or, ugh..Zynga) I don't really hear about many games made specifically for PC now.
You really have to go digging for them (though many sites are trying to prop up the indie-market now by word of mouth).

CoD is simply capitalizing on an already super-popular genre. WoW re-forged the MMO market almost in its entirety; it was not all that popular except in Korea (I used to play a couple of those old-ass MMOs. Apart from Everquest, they were not that well-populated).
Activision found what their market wants, and they are going to exploit the shit out it.
Halo Reach was all the talk until Black Ops came out; while that might be a point in CoD's favor, the fact that Reach commanded such a presence before then shows how fickle this market can be.

b) Though I'm comparing games to games (markets, that is), music piracy is done primarily via PC given how stupidly easy it is; that logic could very easily extend to movies and video games. Thus, I can say with certainty that piracy on PC is, by far, the most widely known.
As for handheld piracy, well, you got me there...in Japan. Though I suspect that the majority of the pirated content moves via PC as well before even reaching the R4.

"Stand next to the train long enough, and you'll see who gets on and who gets off." (to invent a totally unnecessary metaphor)
Awareness is key. Awareness drives marketing, but it also drives word-of-mouth (which can indeed lead to the black market).

There has been no real media coverage of the R4 here in America, though I am aware that Nintendo has spent a tremendous amount of capital just tracking those illicit companies down and suing them.
This might change in the near future, or it might get glossed over by the torrent of obvious piracy that's sure to strike the 3DS.

c) Yeah, between consoles, this point applies as well, though I'd like to believe that's because the market has been slowly trying to bring consoles "Up to PCs" in functionality [sub](while systems like Games for Windows Live are trying to drag PCs back down...I kid! I kid!)[/sub].
When you get right down to it, a Console is a computer with a defined hardware and software profile.
I mean, shoot, the Dreamcast ran a modified version of Windows CE (as did the original, pre-patch PSP), and it was shown that you could run emulation software on it without needing an electrical degree.

Hardware performance aside, the major practical differences are in the controls, and it's not like you can't plug a USB mouse and keyboard into any modern console and use those (if the developers or firmware allowed it).

 

[Levi93]

during the steam sale im wondering how a thread like this even exists, i mean over the alst week or 2 i've bought enough low priced high quality PC games to last me until the next winter sale.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Yes, Valve doesn't post it's revenue.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/119/119351.html
There's that.

Founded in 1996, the company started off with a bang by publishing the highly successful Half-Life in 1998.

:/

I question the accuracy of that website. Sierra published Half Life.

Well seeing as how it's Yahoo one of the biggest companies in the world I can trust it. The "publishing" was probably a typo. We're talking about Valve's revenue here.

 

[Delusibeta]

Yes, Valve doesn't post it's revenue.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/119/119351.html
There's that.

Founded in 1996, the company started off with a bang by publishing the highly successful Half-Life in 1998.

:/

I question the accuracy of that website. Sierra published Half Life.

Well seeing as how it's Yahoo one of the biggest companies in the world I can trust it. The "publishing" was probably a typo. We're talking about Valve's revenue here.

Its titles are available for console systems and portable devices from Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo.

I still question the accuracy of that webpage. Since I question the accuracy of the webpage, I therefore question the accuracy of the specific figure they've come up with. Valve has, far as I know, not released a game for a Nintendo console, nor any handhelds.

 

[AzrealMaximillion]

Yes, Valve doesn't post it's revenue.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/119/119351.html
There's that.

Founded in 1996, the company started off with a bang by publishing the highly successful Half-Life in 1998.

:/

I question the accuracy of that website. Sierra published Half Life.

Well seeing as how it's Yahoo one of the biggest companies in the world I can trust it. The "publishing" was probably a typo. We're talking about Valve's revenue here.

Its titles are available for console systems and portable devices from Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo.

I still question the accuracy of that webpage. Since I question the accuracy of the webpage, I therefore question the accuracy of the specific figure they've come up with. Valve has, far as I know, not released a game for a Nintendo console, nor any handhelds.

Fair enough, but yo probably can get Valves company report somewhere. I just didn't want to pay $43 to get a 153 report that shows it in PDF.

 

[subject_87]

It's not dead; Valve is still around, we just got a new Civilization game and WoW expansion, there's Minecraft, and the continuing success of Steam.

 

[doodger]

For a while PC gaming wasn't too healthy, but now it's as strong as ever. Even more than console, i'd say

I'd doubt that statement. I'm not some "Rabid Console Fanboy" like some other people, but I can tell you that PC gaming is pretty much behind console gaming in most cases.

The reason why PC gaming isn't as popular as console gaming is simple, playing games on a PC is too confusing/annoying for the average consumer. Most people (me included, sadly) have no bloody idea about graphic cards or modems or anything involving any of that. That's why consoles are so popular, no downloads, no having to spend hundreds of dollars constantly upgrading it, no having to have a slight idea what adjusting the settings on a game would do to it. All you have to do is pop in the game and play it. It's a shame because PC games actually do look pretty good, there are some PC exclusives that I would just love to play, unfortunately, to the average consumer. Getting a PC meant just for gaming is too expensive, too confusing, and probably just to stressful.

Now, I know I'm probably just going to get the standard, "Lol, just build your own PC!" remark, but here's the thing... Most people don't know how, most people don't know anything about graphic cards, or modems, and when you say build your own PC, most people probably just think that means going to a factory and buying each individual piece for a PC and putting it together with a screwdriver or something. Plus, even if you do build it, it usually costs around 500 or so dollars, which is 200 more then what I payed to buy an Xbox 360 elite, not to mention the constant upgrades you would need to keep running with the same PC for years.


Not trying to say PC gaming is dead, not trying to insult PC gamers, just trying to give my opinion.

I wasn't very clear, i meant to say i think that there are some PC releases that are better than console releases. Most of what you said is true, and it's a real shame that it's hard to get into pc gaming. Altough buying a good 500 dollar pc is a great investment as you need a computer aniway those days.