The Future of PC Gaming?

bobbonew | November 02, 2008 | Blog | PC

In this blog post Britney Zilz of gotgame.com examines the world of the PC gaming market, and things aren't looking too good. While World of Warcraft stands out above all as the front runner in PC gaming, can you honestly name four others?

The PC gaming industry is in risky waters for some time to come.

So what hope is there for the PC? Unfortunately, things look grim, though there is hope in unusual places. Of course, MMOs will help to keep PC gaming alive; I don’t think WoW will be leaving us anytime soon. And with the increase in casual gaming by women (playing arcade or card games online), those kind of game sales will help to booster the PC as well.

In addition, an alliance was formed earlier this year, including Intel, Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Advanced Micro Devices, all companies with an interest in keeping PC gaming alive. And that’s the specific goal of this group. So hopefully they’ll do some good for the PC in the next few years.

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Comments

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chautemoc | November 02, 2008

Well, The Witcher apparently sold a million copies...
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bobbonew | November 02, 2008

I dunno, I really have to agree with the blog writer. The only real selection of games I know of is WOW and only a few others. More people in the world have PC's than consoles, so why wouldn't the PCs be targeted more?
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  chautemoc | November 02, 2008
  
  Many reasons..most stemming from the open nature of it..the piracy thing causes a lot of shite too..I mean, devs think piracy is killing it..but I think most gamers see the devs as jerks for thinking so, and pirate their games for thinking that way/using DRM...it's not a factor much with console gaming so noone says anything about console gaming dying...for the piracy thing and the closed nature...
  
  But yeah, it would be nice to see it get back to where it was..I'd love it. Hopefully the proper circumstances evolve as such to allow it to happen..
  - 1 thumbs!
    VeGiTAX2 | November 03, 2008
    
    You could have summed it up easily. Why it's not a target based on unit sales? Low-end / Integrated video.
    
    The epic marketshare that the GMA950, X3100 and FX5200 have is honestly absurd given their lack of features and abilities. The low-end solutions they pack into the system are nothing but a joke for anything but video playback. Someone on the forums asked about their 7150M for their laptop, it has no dedicated memory, it has no pixel or vertex shaders and is essentially a lump of silicon just wasting space.
1 thumbs!
RabidChinaGirl | November 03, 2008

Doesn't take a genius to see that the blogger's argument is seriously flawed and lacking. I think on a global scale, PC definitely has a firmer hold and wider appeal -- who doesn't own a computer these days? Believe it or not, consoles aren't exactly found in every household in the developed world. On the other hand. His narrow scope is really no excuse to be drawing such brazen assumptions.

Besides, this "PC gaming is dead" thing never goes anywhere. Every time some one tries to be controversial by bringing it up, people argue and no conclusions are drawn. I, for one, own an Xbox 360 but still use my laptop for gaming when the option presents itself.

On another note, I'm pretty tired of people saying that World of Warcraft is the only big title out there for PC. That's like saying Halo is the only big title on Xbox 360.
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  Gamesta100 | November 03, 2008
  
  But that's not to say that everyone who owns a PC uses it for gaming.I personally do all my gaming on console.
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Arcaida | November 03, 2008

I personally just don't see as much effort being put into the PC gaming market. The kind of games we get are a lot more varied, and 'good' titles (at least in my standards) are few and far inbetween. Granted, consoles are just the same for me. I guess I've always looked at the intentions of the platform. The PC wasn't really designed as a gaming platform, whereas an Xbox or Playstation is almost entirely built around gaming. Sure, a PC can out-perform them, but I think to the common person that a computer is more of convenience tool than anything. E-mail, internet and data storage, if that.
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  RabidChinaGirl | November 03, 2008
  
  And a "common person" probably doesn't own a console either. It's about perspective and where you look.
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Sabre 220 | November 03, 2008

VegitaX2 hit the nail on the head. Integrated video is useless, and the average computer doesn't even have dedicated graphics. When I first bought my computer, it cost more than a PS3, but it couldn't play a game decently to save its life. I upgraded it myself, but that's because I like the whole process of upgrading components, but the average Joe doesn't.

Also, developing PC games are no walk in the park. The developer has to try and make sure that the game runs well and looks nice on a varied bunch of hardware, from brand new $3000 powerhouses to a budget gaming machine. All this is more time consuming, and if sales aren't great the developer has no incentive to continue. Crytek is a great example, as they say they will no longer be focusing exclusively on the PC gaming market.

Another thing that may be affecting the PC gaming market is the price to performance ratio of computers compared to consoles. They can never match consoles for cheapness. Yes, computers can do much more than an average home console, but people generally want the best of everything at the lowest price.

Im dedicated to my PC, and do most of my gaming on it. I don't even use my 360 at the moment. But when compared to consoles, there's only a small minority who do all their gaming on a pc, and are bothered to spend the cash in order to make it crush a PS3/360.