PC Gaming: Is it in trouble?
- Thread starter Tinman
- Start date
sycogrim
MyGaming Comp Authoritah
of course the sales would have dropped look how many great titles have been released this year and not to mention that we are also going through a recession so... that could have been seen by anyone.... obviously as countries our resolving their issues then life will go back to normal anyway 
Tinman
MyGaming Silverback
Whats the difference between something that is declining, and something that is dying?
Sounds like the same thing to me
I truly hope that publishers do have it in their hearts to carry on developing exclusively for the PC. It would be a sad day if the likes of Anno, Dawn of War and Empire were to end.
Grimspoon
The Hoff
Whats the difference between something that is declining, and something that is dying?
Sounds like the same thing to me
I truly hope that publishers do have it in their hearts to carry on developing exclusively for the PC. It would be a sad day if the likes of Anno, Dawn of War and Empire were to end.
Problem is piracy is killing the industry.
sycogrim
MyGaming Comp Authoritah
i cant disagree there... Piracy has put a huge hole in the PC Gaming industry.... which is why DRM is an Asset in most cases and requires online access to activate... which i certainly dont have a problem with
Keldarza
New member
I disagree
Steam doesnt release sales stats - so a very real possiblity is that the sales figures as many more games makers avoid "pulishers" and "box games".
Also, look how well world of goo did for itself (DRM free!). Those sales are also unrecorded as they dont go through any other media besides online.
Is PC gaming dying/declining? I dont think so, only changing focus.
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OmegaFenix
The Legendary Troll Hunter
Problem with PC gaming is the PC. If someone made a pc where u just put the disk in and install then play it would all be brilliant. But its not like that. Look at Murph. Some stupid app that most people don't even know runs stopped him from playing Red Faction. No such hassles on Consoles. Yes there are certain titles u can only play on pc, RTS that sort of thing. But as for the rest... consoles are moving forward, making it easier and easier to enjoy gaming with out all the hassles of a pc.
Azimuth
New member
Nah, PC gaming isn't going away anytime soon. It might be a minority market these days, but the fact is, there are loads of PC hardliners who wouldn't touch a console on (stupid) principle, or people will just can't afford console games, or people who prefer PC gaming for whatever reason. And where there's a market, there's someone cashing in on it.
Besides, some genres (RTS in particular) are simply much, much better suited to mouse and keyboard control. Until consoles broadly adopt those peripherals (and it won't happen in this generation), the PC is going to be king here.
If anything is killing PC gaming, it's piracy (whether in fact, or simply developer/publisher perspective) and dumb DRM policies. And whining. My god, PC gamers can whine.
Besides, some genres (RTS in particular) are simply much, much better suited to mouse and keyboard control. Until consoles broadly adopt those peripherals (and it won't happen in this generation), the PC is going to be king here.
If anything is killing PC gaming, it's piracy (whether in fact, or simply developer/publisher perspective) and dumb DRM policies. And whining. My god, PC gamers can whine.
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OmegaFenix
The Legendary Troll Hunter
Games are cheaper on PC but u spend thousands on upgrading every year or 2.
Dohc-WP
Ron Burgundy
not really most publishers are realising that the pc is being neglected over console and thus they have changed their stance on not making pc versions of games, look at how capcom has gone and released most of its major titles on pc (all getting critical acclaim for the quality of the ports) or how sega has increased its pc releases by ten fold over the past 2-3 years.
Stefan9
New member
PC gaming is not going anywhere. Some of those industry insiders have been proclaiming the doom of pc gaming since I started gaming.
PC gaming might not be king anymore but it still has lots of good games.
Yes we won't see many exlcusives anymore. Reason being quite simple in order to cover expenses of modern games you need the sales from multi platforms.
At the end of the day the pc market and console market are different. PC gamers genereally like customization, we like to tinker with our systems and like the fact that we can setup the system with the hardware we like. This doesn't appeal to the console gamer, he just wants to get home and pop in the disc and play.
No reason why you can't have pc gaming and console gaming.
Personally I never care for these sales data due to the fact that 99% of the time they don't include the digital distributor in those figures. Its well know in europe and the US that pc gamers have moved to digital in large numbers so this skews these figures a lot.
PC gaming might not be king anymore but it still has lots of good games.
Yes we won't see many exlcusives anymore. Reason being quite simple in order to cover expenses of modern games you need the sales from multi platforms.
At the end of the day the pc market and console market are different. PC gamers genereally like customization, we like to tinker with our systems and like the fact that we can setup the system with the hardware we like. This doesn't appeal to the console gamer, he just wants to get home and pop in the disc and play.
No reason why you can't have pc gaming and console gaming.
Personally I never care for these sales data due to the fact that 99% of the time they don't include the digital distributor in those figures. Its well know in europe and the US that pc gamers have moved to digital in large numbers so this skews these figures a lot.
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Its actually hard to tell what the status of PC gaming is at the moment and where it actually stands in relation to the consoles.
Why? Because digital distribution isn't included in the statistics, only retail sails. Steam is pretty big at a 20mil + user base last I checked (which was a while ago), Direct 2 Drive is very popular, EA has its own digital distribution, Blizzard is bringing in their own distribution and you can already purchase and download WoW + the xpacs off their site and Impulse is slowly growing.
Digital distribution is very mature on the PC and many including myself use it almost exclusively to buy games, especially in first world counties, so the stats for PC sales are far off.
That said, I highly doubt PC sales can keep up with console sales. Its an enthusiast gaming platform.
If the PC were to die off as a gaming platform though, it would have far reaching consequences for every gamer. PC is the platform where the hardware innovation really happens, the newly released ATI 5970 and i7 CPUs proving that again. It keeps Intel/AMD/Nvidia/ATI driving forward at lightning speed.
Consoles are essentially PCs wrapped up in pretty cases with a custom O/S, so PC directly contributes to their progress. All the big name hardware manufacturers/designers use much of the experience they gain on the PC platform to create/copy hardware for the consoles. Not to mention that NVidia/ATI, the only two competent GFX card designers at the moment with years of experience and optimization behind both, would be put under financial strain, drastically slowing any progress they would make, once again having an impact on pricing and progress in the console domain.
Why? Because digital distribution isn't included in the statistics, only retail sails. Steam is pretty big at a 20mil + user base last I checked (which was a while ago), Direct 2 Drive is very popular, EA has its own digital distribution, Blizzard is bringing in their own distribution and you can already purchase and download WoW + the xpacs off their site and Impulse is slowly growing.
Digital distribution is very mature on the PC and many including myself use it almost exclusively to buy games, especially in first world counties, so the stats for PC sales are far off.
That said, I highly doubt PC sales can keep up with console sales. Its an enthusiast gaming platform.
If the PC were to die off as a gaming platform though, it would have far reaching consequences for every gamer. PC is the platform where the hardware innovation really happens, the newly released ATI 5970 and i7 CPUs proving that again. It keeps Intel/AMD/Nvidia/ATI driving forward at lightning speed.
Consoles are essentially PCs wrapped up in pretty cases with a custom O/S, so PC directly contributes to their progress. All the big name hardware manufacturers/designers use much of the experience they gain on the PC platform to create/copy hardware for the consoles. Not to mention that NVidia/ATI, the only two competent GFX card designers at the moment with years of experience and optimization behind both, would be put under financial strain, drastically slowing any progress they would make, once again having an impact on pricing and progress in the console domain.
Deceptor
New member
Same here.