GDC '08: PC Gaming Alliance founded Said member companies include PC hardware manufacturers Acer Inc./Gateway Inc., Dell/Alienware, Intel Corp, and AMD. AMD also owns ATI, a leading manufacturer of PC graphics cards, whose chief rival, Nvidia, is also on the PCGA board along with PC game peripheral Razer USA. Rounding out the list are game developer Epic Games and the biggest third-party publisher on the planet, Activision. www.gamespot.com/news/6186307.html
It´s kind of sad that even companies in a PC gaming alliance actually focus more on consoles then PC's.
"Does any one really cares what Molyneux says?"
Heh, saw that one comming, miles away.
CliffyB:" PC gaming is doing bad"
"Hah! Epic makes bad games anyway, screw Epic!"
Peter Molyneux:"PC gaming is doing bad"
"Oh yeah!? well nobody cares what you have to say anyway!"
Meanwhile, more and more developers are hopping over to the console gaming platforms.
Multiplatform is where the $$ is at.
if more and more PC games are becomming multiplatform games and thus have to limit themself to console specs, then what is the point of paying more money for a gaming PC in the first place?
i fully retract any earlier statments about the PC being a thriving gaming platform when i relised that there hasn't been a good in space flight sim since descent freespace 2 in 1999.
So what kind of things can developers use on PC that can't be done on consoles. Internet? Now avaible on consoles. Mods? Now avaible on consoles. alternative control schemes? Now avaible on consoles.
This isn’t about what can be done it’s about which platform allows for innovation any coputer can be built to do anything you want,. Closed single purpose platforms, however, do not and never will foster innovation. They are designed and built with a single purpose in mind and can be extended to support new functionality. If the designer didn’t envision it some upstart programmer can’t come along and do it.
Network gaming did not and could not have started on the console because it would have required the console designer to put expensive hardware into the device with no guarantee it would ever be used.
Internet gaming could never have been developed on the console for the same reason.
3D gaming and all it’s all its first person offshoots couldn’t have been developed first on the console for the same reason
MMO’s could never have come to consoles first for the same reason.
Most of the game types we know and love today could never have been developed without PC gaming because the hardware required for them to work would never have been put into consoles if they games didn’t already exist on the PC.
Originally posted by Gameloading And the Wii remote is more then just point & click, you can find the full list of possibilities on google.
Neither are the pointing devices the Wii controller was devised from. The things the Wii controller and these pointing devices need to know and send back to the computer is identical.
So what kind of things can developers use on PC that can't be done on consoles. Internet? Now avaible on consoles. Mods? Now avaible on consoles. alternative control schemes? Now avaible on consoles. PC been ahead in terms of graphics like you pointed out, but it seems to be stuck in it's RTS - FPS -MMO genre the last couple of years, and I recall the Sims as the only game with big innovation the last couple of years. And while a game like complex RTS might be very difficult to play, Deep action games such as Ninja Gaiden would be a nightmare to play on a keyboard, so it really goes both ways. Has PC gaming ever changed the ways we both play? Not really. We started with a keyboard and today it still is a mouse & Keyboard. Just look at how much console controller have changed over the years. And the Wii remote is more then just point & click, you can find the full list of possibilities on google. But to add to the thread:
Peter Molyneux doesn't like the current state of PC gaming either and call it "Tragic", he seems to agree with developers such as CliffyB and Infinity Wars, who also criticized the current state of PC gaming. ""I think it's a huge tragedy. I mean, you might as well say PC gaming is World of Warcraft and The Sims... The weird thing is everyone's got a PC, they're just not buying software for it," commented Molyneux." www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php
One word.
Scale.
For every 20 guys you can see on your screen I can have one hundred. For every 20 metres you can have on your map, I can have 100. For every 20 AI's I can have 100. For every 20 players online, A PC can have one hundred. Where you can have a 500 metre view distance, I can have 10,000.
If you just want to play COD, a few AI's battle it out in a tiny arena, or a few humans shoot each other in a tiny arena online, you don't really need a PC.
And frankly you don't need a PC anyway, the scale offered you in todays consoles is massive compared to games of 10 years ago anyway. There are plenty of old giant sized PC games that will easily convert to the console. It's a powerful machine.
But really, when I want to simulate a medieval siege. Or a Cold War battlefield. When I want to fight not with 5 or 6 AI's in a 1/4 kilometre square COD3 map, but instead want to fight in a 512 man Battalion with hundreds of fully usuable vehicles and weapon systems in a satelitte mapped full sized 30 square kilometre recreation of the Bagdad's green zone, the PC is king.
You see, I don't want to be part of a 512 strong Battalion, I want to be part of a 100,000 strong force. I don't want to be restricted to 30 square miles of map, or a 10 km view distance, I want life sized reconstruction. I don't want limits at all.
When I want to model entire universes with living breathing economies, thousands of intertrading factories and space fleets and races. Fly amongst them, generate my own epic fleet battles and participate as any element of them I choose, space walk inside asteroid based mining complexes.... Battlestar Galatica on the Xbox 360 isn't going to do it.
When I want to mod, I won't be using my XBOX to make mods with my little controller, I will make them on my PC. Using any number of my already learnt purpose built softwares to make my content. And it will be an expensive gaming rig I use to make my mods with. It will need to be. As soon as you start modding, consoles become instantly redundant.
I don't think you will find many PC gamers out there who are goin to miss Peter Molyneux, Cliffy B and Infinity Wards' contributions to the PC games scene. We don't want COD 3, Gears of War or Fable 2. They are right to be looking elsewhere to sell their products.
These people make tiny "quick to market" kiddy games. We don't spend thousands of pounds on our hardware because we are intrested in this kind of thing. If you aren't pushing the envelope, it's off to consoleland for you son.
Apparently there is going to be an announcement this week at GDC about the creation of some PC Gaming Alliance (Nvidia, AMD, Microsoft, Intel, etc). Their one purpose is to save PC Gaming from extinction.
How do they plan on doing it? They want to standardise the PC and make it more like a console. By creating a PC that is not customizable, they can hope that PC game developers will start making games that will be run on the "pc console".
Is that really the answer to PC gaming?? Do we really need another console in the market?
If you really think about the consoles nowadays they are pretty much the equivalent of some pc's. The hd maybe lower end but the graphix and the ability to d/l and play online is very much like a pc...but with a controller. I say making a console isnt gonna help because there is already PS3's and Xbox 360's. I also agree that the PC's top games is MMO's / FPS's but these will slowly fade since the consoles are slowly tapping into those games. FPS's you can see is already everywhere. The gamers need a new addiction MMO's are getting majority of the gamers money and time nowadays.
I think that's really a bit of a stretch. That so called "Fastest growing segments" are probably made by a few big hits as opposed to a lot of games doing well on the PC platform. Developers don't complain at a lack of sales because they want to. Something tells me that a big part of the "growth" has to do with MMORPGs and WoW.
Wow, is that small list meant to justify paying 800$ for a gaming pc? That's amazing, you can get a list about 3 times as large if you spend that money on consoles, and that' would be a list without low budget indie stuff.
Another great example of Moore's Law. Give people access to that much space (developers and users alike) and they'll find uses for it that you can never imagine. "640K ought to be enough for anybody" - Bill Gates 1981
I think that's really a bit of a stretch. That so called "Fastest growing segments" are probably made by a few big hits as opposed to a lot of games doing well on the PC platform. Developers don't complain at a lack of sales because they want to. Something tells me that a big part of the "growth" has to do with MMORPGs and WoW.
Wow, is that small list meant to justify paying 800$ for a gaming pc? That's amazing, you can get a list about 3 times as large if you spend that money on consoles, and that' would be a list without low budget indie stuff.
Developers don't complain about a lack of sales growth at all.
Just a load of whiney console developers hyping up their products. My new Teh console title is teh shizzle because PC's are teh suxxors and teh console is teh greatest. Buy it in shops now.
What did you think they were going to say. "Actually my new console game isn't as good as the PC games currently on the market".
You really lap up sales hype GL.
Now, while it is certainly true that the bulk of PC game sales are taken up by a few big hit titles, the same is equally true of console sales. Not every title is a hit and publishing houses make their money not necessarily on each individual title, but by taking a spread bet accross multiple titles.
Not every game sells as well as COD or Halo or WoW, but it is those titles that are driving sales.
Neither is it resonable to compare the total number of PC releases with the total number of console releases. Do you really feel the need to compare the total releases on 6 or 7 different games platforms before you have something that shines up against a PC?
Each platform has it's own developments and it's own market. Each platform needs a certain amount of titles available to it before it is market viable. For the consoles that means in their first couple of years they must rush to saturate the market with enough titles to warrant the additional hardware expenditure. (A problem the PC market doesn't immediately suffer). Which is why every launch year we see a plethora of game studio's focusing on console releases. Sony and Microsoft and Nintendo are driving these development with heavy launch investment.
You should expect to see more new platform releases at this time. In the long term I see no reason for consoles sales not to continue to expand. I see no reason for PC games ever to overtake them in their primary markets either. (Fords outsell Ferrari's. Always have, always will).
However, while this is certainly a cross-over market, the Xbox game market is not the PC game market. Anytime there is a shortage of PC games on offer for this market, that gap will be filled by someone who see's the opportunity and likes money. It's a multi-billion pound industry. That is a lot of money.
The thing for me is, although there is an impressive list of up and coming console titles on release this year, there isn't one of them I think is worth paying £45 for, let alone £45 plus £200 for an Xbox, or £45 plus £300 for a PS3 or even both. Not even the very reasonably priced Nintendo has anything that grabs me. (The DS has Advanced Wars, which is tempting).
So it really doesn't matter how many games that I don't want are available for console this year, what matters is how many games I do want are.
Like the man says, it's going to be a good year for PC gaming this year.
On my Radar,
Codename Panzers, Cold War.
Armed Assault 2.
WoW expansion.
Lock on The Black Shark.
Warhammer Dawn of War expansion.
Operation Flashpoint 2 (<--- bah will be a console port).
Elite IV.
X3 Terran Conquest.
Storm of War: Battle of Britain.
Spore.
Vampyre Story.
Empire: Total War.
Savage 2.
Really that's enough for me, but there are also some wildcards out there that might surprise me.
This list alone has more than one title that I am willing to spend £500 upgrading my systems for, but still nothing on Console that grabs me for £200.
I think that's really a bit of a stretch. That so called "Fastest growing segments" are probably made by a few big hits as opposed to a lot of games doing well on the PC platform. Developers don't complain at a lack of sales because they want to. Something tells me that a big part of the "growth" has to do with MMORPGs and WoW.
Wow, is that small list meant to justify paying 800$ for a gaming pc? That's amazing, you can get a list about 3 times as large if you spend that money on consoles, and that' would be a list without low budget indie stuff.
Developers don't complain about a lack of sales growth at all.
Just a load of whiney console developers hyping up their products. My new Teh console title is teh shizzle because PC's are teh suxxors and teh console is teh greatest. Buy it in shops now.
What did you think they were going to say. "Actually my new console game isn't as good as the PC games currently on the market".
You really lap up sales hype GL.
Now, while it is certainly true that the bulk of PC game sales are taken up by a few big hit titles, the same is equally true of console sales. Not every title is a hit and publishing houses make their money not necessarily on each individual title, but by taking a spread bet accross multiple titles.
Not every game sells as well as COD or Halo or WoW, but it is those titles that are driving sales.
Neither is it resonable to compare the total number of PC releases with the total number of console releases. Do you really feel the need to compare the total releases on 6 or 7 different games platforms before you have something that shines up against a PC?
Each platform has it's own developments and it's own market. Each platform needs a certain amount of titles available to it before it is market viable. For the consoles that means in their first couple of years they must rush to saturate the market with enough titles to warrant the additional hardware expenditure. (A problem the PC market doesn't immediately suffer). Which is why every launch year we see a plethora of game studio's focusing on console releases. Sony and Microsoft and Nintendo are driving these development with heavy launch investment.
You should expect to see more new platform releases at this time. In the long term I see no reason for consoles sales not to continue to expand. I see no reason for PC games ever to overtake them in their primary markets either.
However, while this is certainly a cross-over market, the Xbox game market is not the PC game market. Anytime there is a shortage of PC games on offer for this market, that gap will be filled by someone who see's the opportunity and likes money. It's a multi-billion pound industry. That is a lot of money.
The thing for me is, although there is an impressive list of up and coming console titles on release this year, there isn't one of them I think is worth paying £45 for, let alone £45 plus £200 for an Xbox, or £45 plus £300 for a PS3 or even both. Not even the very reasonably priced Nintendo has anything that grabs me. (The DS has Advanced Wars, which is tempting).
So it realy doesn't matter how many games that I don't want are available for console this year, what matters is how many game I do want are.
Like the man says, it's going to be a good year for PC gaming this year.
On my Radar,
Codename Panzers, Cold war.
Armed Assault 2.
WoW expansion.
Lock on The Black Shark.
Warhammer Dawn of War Expansion
Operation Flashpoint 2 (<--- bah will be a console port)
Elite IV.
X3 Terran Conquest.
Storm of War: Battle of Britain.
Spore.
Vampyre Story.
Empire: Total War
Really that's enough for me, but there are also some wildcards out there that might surprise me.
The people complaining about PC market are PC developers, not console developers. Unreal Tournament is PC franchise, not a console franchise. Call of Duty is a PC franchise, not a console franchise, and its developers worked on Medal of Honor before CoD. Peter Molyneux is mostly known for his work on the PC, not the consoles. The criticism isn't comming from people who published a console game on the PC, the criticism is comming from PC developers who's games used to do well on PC, but not anymore.
The Xbox 360 had 7 titles reach 1 million copies sold in the holiday of 2007, and in total 35 games on the Xbox360 have reached 1 million copies sold. I seriously doubt that PC has that many copies sold in the same timeframe. In comparisson, I don't think there is a lot of motivation to develop exclusive software for the PC anymore.
Cleffy isn't promoting Unreal 2004, he is promoting Gears of War.
COD and Unreal are all multi-platform franchises.
They are made to the specification of the lowest common denominator the Console.
They aren't "PC titles", they are console ports. The developers you have quoted are all currently attempting to sell their console versions of that franchise. The interviews you are quoting from are promotional. They are part of an active sales campaign for console games.
What did you expect them to say, "don't buy our console products they aren't as good"? "We are ashamed to report that Crysis is a better game"?
You've even taken these iunterviews from ones given to "Xbox magasine". What did you really honestly expect them to say to their target audience to which they are attempting to sell things to? "Yeah XBoX is crap, we hate it, we could make better games for the PC and in fact we do"?
You believe this stuff because you want to believe it. They tell you how smart you are for buying an Xbox. they tell you how much better the games for the Xbox are, and then they try and sell you one.
Show me a PC game developer talking about the PC and saying he isn't going to make enough sales? It won't happen either. He is being interviewed to promote his product. All the Cryssis dev's will be saying how much better the PC is. You won't find a quote from them saying, "actually, do you know what, the PS3 is much better than the PC, you should buy Gears of War".
I tell you mate PC games developers don't even talk like this. They don't sit around wondering if the XBOX is better than the PC. They never bother to big up their products Vs other platforms.
They don't have to.
This year,(next month) I will be turning my computer room into a 6 seat Avro Lancaster. with seats for the pilot and all the gunners and for the navigator bomb aimer.
As a team we will be going online to take a 6 hour round trip to Germany. Smoking and drinking all the way. When we get there, we are going to bomb Germans. Real Germans.
COD and Unreal are all multi-platform franchises. They are made to the specification of the lowest common denominator the Console. They aren't "PC titles", they are console ports. The developers you have quoted are all currently attempting to sell their console versions of that franchise. The interviews you are quoting from are promotional. They are part of an active sales campaign for console games. What did you expect them to say, "don't buy our console products they aren't as good"? "We are ashamed to report that Crysis is a better game"?
Show me a PC game developer talking about the PC and saying he isn't going to make enough sales? It won't happen either. He is being interviewed to promote his product. All the Cryssis dev's will be saying how much better the PC is. You won't find a quote from them saying, "actually, do you know what, the PS3 is much better than the PC, you should buy Gears of War".
This year,(next month) I will be turning my computer room into a 6 seat Avro Lancaster. with seats for the pilot and all the gunners and for the navigator bomb aimer. As a team we will be going online to take a 6 hour round trip to Germany. When we get there, we are going to bomb Germans. Real Germans.
That doesn't even make any sense. There is no reason for Epic or Infinity Ward to promote console versions of their games over PC versions. Those games are made for the lowest common dominator, but that dominator isn't consoles, it's mid end PC users. Neither UT3 nor CoD4 make use of everything the Xbox360 and PS3 have to offer. You seem to think that every PC gamer has a hig end PC, which ofcourse is not the case. And especialy in terms of gameplay not much has changed. Call of Duty 4 pretty much sticks true to its roots and is now merely put in a modern warfare coat. UT3 PC version actually differs from the Playstation 3 version.
One of the reason World of Warcraft's graphics were lacking from a graphical standpoint is because they wanted to appeal to a larger user base and well...is there anything that needs to be said about WoW's success?
Now show us some numbers that include monthly subscriptions for MMOs. There is nothing wrong with PC gaming - money is just shifting from box sales to subscriptions which doesn't get counted for some reason.
We know blizzard alone is taking in over $624 million a year , (I'm only counting 4 mil subscribers )
And those numbers don't take into account people who have both a 360 and a PC. Take some of those big selling titles (like Orange Box) and release them only on PC and those numbers would be much different.
Now show us some numbers that include monthly subscriptions for MMOs. There is nothing wrong with PC gaming - money is just shifting from box sales to subscriptions which doesn't get counted for some reason.
We know blizzard alone is taking in over $624 million a year , (I'm only counting 4 mil subscribers )
And those numbers don't take into account people who have both a 360 and a PC. Take some of those big selling titles (like Orange Box) and release them only on PC and those numbers would be much different.
Subscriptions should not count in sales figures. How would that help retailers??
COD and Unreal are all multi-platform franchises. They are made to the specification of the lowest common denominator the Console. They aren't "PC titles", they are console ports. The developers you have quoted are all currently attempting to sell their console versions of that franchise. The interviews you are quoting from are promotional. They are part of an active sales campaign for console games. What did you expect them to say, "don't buy our console products they aren't as good"? "We are ashamed to report that Crysis is a better game"?
Show me a PC game developer talking about the PC and saying he isn't going to make enough sales? It won't happen either. He is being interviewed to promote his product. All the Cryssis dev's will be saying how much better the PC is. You won't find a quote from them saying, "actually, do you know what, the PS3 is much better than the PC, you should buy Gears of War".
This year,(next month) I will be turning my computer room into a 6 seat Avro Lancaster. with seats for the pilot and all the gunners and for the navigator bomb aimer. As a team we will be going online to take a 6 hour round trip to Germany. When we get there, we are going to bomb Germans. Real Germans.
That doesn't even make any sense. There is no reason for Epic or Infinity Ward to promote console versions of their games over PC versions. Those games are made for the lowest common dominator, but that dominator isn't consoles, it's mid end PC users. Neither UT3 nor CoD4 make use of everything the Xbox360 and PS3 have to offer. You seem to think that every PC gamer has a hig end PC, which ofcourse is not the case. And especialy in terms of gameplay not much has changed. Call of Duty 4 pretty much sticks true to its roots and is now merely put in a modern warfare coat. UT3 PC version actually differs from the Playstation 3 version.
One of the reason World of Warcraft's graphics were lacking from a graphical standpoint is because they wanted to appeal to a larger user base and well...is there anything that needs to be said about WoW's success?
Epic and Infinity Ward both promote their games to their primary audience. The audience for which the game was designed.
There is no console on the market that is comparable to a mid range PC. There is no console on the market that can match the power of a minimum spec PC on sale today. The lowest common denominator is not the $800 gaming machine, it's not even the $400 gaming machine, surprise surprise, it's the $200 gaming machine.
Both UT3 and Cod4 make use of everything the PS3 and Xbox 360 have to offer. That's it. You've seen all it has to offer. No more surprises for you until PS4.
UT and Cod Use two extremely scaleable engines. They can run on 3 year old PC's and they can all the features on next years computers too. Whatever system you run them on, they will be optimiseable, scaleable to the systems maximum capabilities.
On the Xbox 360, you've seen it. If you are expecting more, you will be waiting for the rest of your life.
CoD and Gears of War, ("Cliffy" didn't make UT3, he made UT2004 and Jazz Jackrabbit) are console titles.
In their promotional intervirews the developers of these games have heralded the Xbox 360 as the superior gaming platform. Which of course is very unsurprising since they are attempting to sell to Xbox owners.
The reason they are being promoted as console games to console gamers, is because that is what they are. Gears of War hasn't even been released on PC yet, and when it does, it won't sell well because it is a console port.
CoD 3 wasn't even released on PC. less than Half of all CoD titles have been available on the PC. Only CoD was a PC title, the rest have all been "all platforms". (ie nerfed).
CoD was never going to sell well on the PC again. It is a franchise title. It offers nothing new to the genre. It advances nothing. It doesn't attempt to advance anything. It's just formula smush, churned out as fast as possible. One a year. A Quake mod. It doesn't make full use of PC owners very expensive equipment because it must run on Consoles too.
A light shooter that didn't take long to make and doesn't take long to play. Who but the most mindless of idiots, who but the same morons who think they bought a supercomputer for $200 are really going to get all that excited by it.
When you go into MacDonalds and the advert says they sell the worlds best tasting burger, you don't have to believe them. It's ok if you want to believe them I suppose, but really, they don't. They just want you to buy it.
So when they tell you the Xbox is a powerful supercomputer more powerful than computers 2 and 3 times the price, and that console games are so superior to PC games, that PC games will never be played again, just remember that the peope saying this to you are only talking to you at all because they are trying to sell you something.....and tomorrow they will be trying to sell you something else.
Likewise when The Toyota Yaris wins Car of the Year award again next year, do not sell your Porsche. (Not even if the designer of the Yaris says that he did).
There is something that needs to be said about WoW's success, yes, it isn't a console game and no console game has ever been as successful as WoW. Nor as much fun, neither could any console on the market reproduce it's graphics on their highest settings. (This requires a total of 947 MB RAM) Nor are Blizzard developers discussing the failure of the PC market or advocating the Xbox as the future of gaming.
TG: But then you have Cliffy B come out and say that PC gaming is in disarray and...
Mark Rein: Oh he's an idiot [laughing]. No, he's a great guy. Cliff makes console games though, right? He's on a console team that makes what is primarily a console game.
Comments
Does any one really cares what Molyneux says?
It´s kind of sad that even companies in a PC gaming alliance actually focus more on consoles then PC's.
"Does any one really cares what Molyneux says?"
Heh, saw that one comming, miles away.
CliffyB:" PC gaming is doing bad"
"Hah! Epic makes bad games anyway, screw Epic!"
Peter Molyneux:"PC gaming is doing bad"
"Oh yeah!? well nobody cares what you have to say anyway!"
PC gaming is here to stay.. so you might as well /wrist now
Meanwhile, more and more developers are hopping over to the console gaming platforms.
So your right, PC gaming here to stay...Because it's simply There, the little alternative to consoles, where the vast majority of gaming is happening.
Multiplatform is where the $$ is at.
Multiplatform is where the $$ is at.
if more and more PC games are becomming multiplatform games and thus have to limit themself to console specs, then what is the point of paying more money for a gaming PC in the first place?
i fully retract any earlier statments about the PC being a thriving gaming platform when i relised that there hasn't been a good in space flight sim since descent freespace 2 in 1999.
PC gaming has been extinct for almost a decade
This isn’t about what can be done it’s about which platform allows for innovation any coputer can be built to do anything you want,. Closed single purpose platforms, however, do not and never will foster innovation. They are designed and built with a single purpose in mind and can be extended to support new functionality. If the designer didn’t envision it some upstart programmer can’t come along and do it.
One word.
Scale.
For every 20 guys you can see on your screen I can have one hundred. For every 20 metres you can have on your map, I can have 100. For every 20 AI's I can have 100. For every 20 players online, A PC can have one hundred. Where you can have a 500 metre view distance, I can have 10,000.
If you just want to play COD, a few AI's battle it out in a tiny arena, or a few humans shoot each other in a tiny arena online, you don't really need a PC.
And frankly you don't need a PC anyway, the scale offered you in todays consoles is massive compared to games of 10 years ago anyway. There are plenty of old giant sized PC games that will easily convert to the console. It's a powerful machine.
But really, when I want to simulate a medieval siege. Or a Cold War battlefield. When I want to fight not with 5 or 6 AI's in a 1/4 kilometre square COD3 map, but instead want to fight in a 512 man Battalion with hundreds of fully usuable vehicles and weapon systems in a satelitte mapped full sized 30 square kilometre recreation of the Bagdad's green zone, the PC is king.
You see, I don't want to be part of a 512 strong Battalion, I want to be part of a 100,000 strong force. I don't want to be restricted to 30 square miles of map, or a 10 km view distance, I want life sized reconstruction. I don't want limits at all.
When I want to model entire universes with living breathing economies, thousands of intertrading factories and space fleets and races. Fly amongst them, generate my own epic fleet battles and participate as any element of them I choose, space walk inside asteroid based mining complexes.... Battlestar Galatica on the Xbox 360 isn't going to do it.
When I want to mod, I won't be using my XBOX to make mods with my little controller, I will make them on my PC. Using any number of my already learnt purpose built softwares to make my content. And it will be an expensive gaming rig I use to make my mods with. It will need to be. As soon as you start modding, consoles become instantly redundant.
I don't think you will find many PC gamers out there who are goin to miss Peter Molyneux, Cliffy B and Infinity Wards' contributions to the PC games scene. We don't want COD 3, Gears of War or Fable 2. They are right to be looking elsewhere to sell their products.
These people make tiny "quick to market" kiddy games. We don't spend thousands of pounds on our hardware because we are intrested in this kind of thing. If you aren't pushing the envelope, it's off to consoleland for you son.
If you really think about the consoles nowadays they are pretty much the equivalent of some pc's. The hd maybe lower end but the graphix and the ability to d/l and play online is very much like a pc...but with a controller. I say making a console isnt gonna help because there is already PS3's and Xbox 360's. I also agree that the PC's top games is MMO's / FPS's but these will slowly fade since the consoles are slowly tapping into those games. FPS's you can see is already everywhere. The gamers need a new addiction MMO's are getting majority of the gamers money and time nowadays.
The PC gaming market is a multi-billion dollar industry with hundreds of millions of gamers
worldwide. Leading research firm DFC Intelligence calls PC gaming “one of the fastest-growing
segments of the interactive entertainment market” and projects that the PC game business will
grow more than 80 percent over the next five years, with major increases in the number of PC
gamers, revenue from digital distribution, and PC hardware sales.
www.pcgamingalliance.org/en/news/press_releases/2008_02_19_pcga_launch.pdf
Reasons why it's worth to be a PCgamer in 2008
www.systemwars.com/forums/showthread.php
I think that's really a bit of a stretch. That so called "Fastest growing segments" are probably made by a few big hits as opposed to a lot of games doing well on the PC platform. Developers don't complain at a lack of sales because they want to. Something tells me that a big part of the "growth" has to do with MMORPGs and WoW.
"
Reasons why it's worth to be a PCgamer in 2008
www.systemwars.com/forums/showthread.php"
Wow, is that small list meant to justify paying 800$ for a gaming pc? That's amazing, you can get a list about 3 times as large if you spend that money on consoles, and that' would be a list without low budget indie stuff.
So?..70% of the consoles games are not even worth the $70 price tag.
I think we're going to find a lot more high quality console titles then PC titles in 2008.
Xbox 360 lineup (Note: Outdated):
forums.gametrailers.com/showthread.php
PS3 lineup (Not all of them):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUJ2JR-v8rU - Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da0sZSzuk4I - Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6r7iUn7Qdok - Part 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-3lpVHiDYw - Part 4
COD4 really shows the quality of console gaming
Another great example of Moore's Law. Give people access to that much space (developers and users alike) and they'll find uses for it that you can never imagine. "640K ought to be enough for anybody" - Bill Gates 1981
I think that's really a bit of a stretch. That so called "Fastest growing segments" are probably made by a few big hits as opposed to a lot of games doing well on the PC platform. Developers don't complain at a lack of sales because they want to. Something tells me that a big part of the "growth" has to do with MMORPGs and WoW.
"
Reasons why it's worth to be a PCgamer in 2008
www.systemwars.com/forums/showthread.php"
Wow, is that small list meant to justify paying 800$ for a gaming pc? That's amazing, you can get a list about 3 times as large if you spend that money on consoles, and that' would be a list without low budget indie stuff.
Developers don't complain about a lack of sales growth at all.
Just a load of whiney console developers hyping up their products. My new Teh console title is teh shizzle because PC's are teh suxxors and teh console is teh greatest. Buy it in shops now.
What did you think they were going to say. "Actually my new console game isn't as good as the PC games currently on the market".
You really lap up sales hype GL.
Now, while it is certainly true that the bulk of PC game sales are taken up by a few big hit titles, the same is equally true of console sales. Not every title is a hit and publishing houses make their money not necessarily on each individual title, but by taking a spread bet accross multiple titles.
Not every game sells as well as COD or Halo or WoW, but it is those titles that are driving sales.
Neither is it resonable to compare the total number of PC releases with the total number of console releases. Do you really feel the need to compare the total releases on 6 or 7 different games platforms before you have something that shines up against a PC?
Each platform has it's own developments and it's own market. Each platform needs a certain amount of titles available to it before it is market viable. For the consoles that means in their first couple of years they must rush to saturate the market with enough titles to warrant the additional hardware expenditure. (A problem the PC market doesn't immediately suffer). Which is why every launch year we see a plethora of game studio's focusing on console releases. Sony and Microsoft and Nintendo are driving these development with heavy launch investment.
You should expect to see more new platform releases at this time. In the long term I see no reason for consoles sales not to continue to expand. I see no reason for PC games ever to overtake them in their primary markets either. (Fords outsell Ferrari's. Always have, always will).
However, while this is certainly a cross-over market, the Xbox game market is not the PC game market. Anytime there is a shortage of PC games on offer for this market, that gap will be filled by someone who see's the opportunity and likes money. It's a multi-billion pound industry. That is a lot of money.
The thing for me is, although there is an impressive list of up and coming console titles on release this year, there isn't one of them I think is worth paying £45 for, let alone £45 plus £200 for an Xbox, or £45 plus £300 for a PS3 or even both. Not even the very reasonably priced Nintendo has anything that grabs me. (The DS has Advanced Wars, which is tempting).
So it really doesn't matter how many games that I don't want are available for console this year, what matters is how many games I do want are.
Like the man says, it's going to be a good year for PC gaming this year.
On my Radar,
Codename Panzers, Cold War.
Armed Assault 2.
WoW expansion.
Lock on The Black Shark.
Warhammer Dawn of War expansion.
Operation Flashpoint 2 (<--- bah will be a console port).
Elite IV.
X3 Terran Conquest.
Storm of War: Battle of Britain.
Spore.
Vampyre Story.
Empire: Total War.
Savage 2.
Really that's enough for me, but there are also some wildcards out there that might surprise me.
This list alone has more than one title that I am willing to spend £500 upgrading my systems for, but still nothing on Console that grabs me for £200.
I think that's really a bit of a stretch. That so called "Fastest growing segments" are probably made by a few big hits as opposed to a lot of games doing well on the PC platform. Developers don't complain at a lack of sales because they want to. Something tells me that a big part of the "growth" has to do with MMORPGs and WoW.
"
Reasons why it's worth to be a PCgamer in 2008
www.systemwars.com/forums/showthread.php"
Wow, is that small list meant to justify paying 800$ for a gaming pc? That's amazing, you can get a list about 3 times as large if you spend that money on consoles, and that' would be a list without low budget indie stuff.
Developers don't complain about a lack of sales growth at all.
Just a load of whiney console developers hyping up their products. My new Teh console title is teh shizzle because PC's are teh suxxors and teh console is teh greatest. Buy it in shops now.
What did you think they were going to say. "Actually my new console game isn't as good as the PC games currently on the market".
You really lap up sales hype GL.
Now, while it is certainly true that the bulk of PC game sales are taken up by a few big hit titles, the same is equally true of console sales. Not every title is a hit and publishing houses make their money not necessarily on each individual title, but by taking a spread bet accross multiple titles.
Not every game sells as well as COD or Halo or WoW, but it is those titles that are driving sales.
Neither is it resonable to compare the total number of PC releases with the total number of console releases. Do you really feel the need to compare the total releases on 6 or 7 different games platforms before you have something that shines up against a PC?
Each platform has it's own developments and it's own market. Each platform needs a certain amount of titles available to it before it is market viable. For the consoles that means in their first couple of years they must rush to saturate the market with enough titles to warrant the additional hardware expenditure. (A problem the PC market doesn't immediately suffer). Which is why every launch year we see a plethora of game studio's focusing on console releases. Sony and Microsoft and Nintendo are driving these development with heavy launch investment.
You should expect to see more new platform releases at this time. In the long term I see no reason for consoles sales not to continue to expand. I see no reason for PC games ever to overtake them in their primary markets either.
However, while this is certainly a cross-over market, the Xbox game market is not the PC game market. Anytime there is a shortage of PC games on offer for this market, that gap will be filled by someone who see's the opportunity and likes money. It's a multi-billion pound industry. That is a lot of money.
The thing for me is, although there is an impressive list of up and coming console titles on release this year, there isn't one of them I think is worth paying £45 for, let alone £45 plus £200 for an Xbox, or £45 plus £300 for a PS3 or even both. Not even the very reasonably priced Nintendo has anything that grabs me. (The DS has Advanced Wars, which is tempting).
So it realy doesn't matter how many games that I don't want are available for console this year, what matters is how many game I do want are.
Like the man says, it's going to be a good year for PC gaming this year.
On my Radar,
Codename Panzers, Cold war.
Armed Assault 2.
WoW expansion.
Lock on The Black Shark.
Warhammer Dawn of War Expansion
Operation Flashpoint 2 (<--- bah will be a console port)
Elite IV.
X3 Terran Conquest.
Storm of War: Battle of Britain.
Spore.
Vampyre Story.
Empire: Total War
Really that's enough for me, but there are also some wildcards out there that might surprise me.
The people complaining about PC market are PC developers, not console developers. Unreal Tournament is PC franchise, not a console franchise. Call of Duty is a PC franchise, not a console franchise, and its developers worked on Medal of Honor before CoD. Peter Molyneux is mostly known for his work on the PC, not the consoles. The criticism isn't comming from people who published a console game on the PC, the criticism is comming from PC developers who's games used to do well on PC, but not anymore.
The Xbox 360 had 7 titles reach 1 million copies sold in the holiday of 2007, and in total 35 games on the Xbox360 have reached 1 million copies sold. I seriously doubt that PC has that many copies sold in the same timeframe. In comparisson, I don't think there is a lot of motivation to develop exclusive software for the PC anymore.
Cleffy isn't promoting Unreal 2004, he is promoting Gears of War.
COD and Unreal are all multi-platform franchises.
They are made to the specification of the lowest common denominator the Console.
They aren't "PC titles", they are console ports. The developers you have quoted are all currently attempting to sell their console versions of that franchise. The interviews you are quoting from are promotional. They are part of an active sales campaign for console games.
What did you expect them to say, "don't buy our console products they aren't as good"? "We are ashamed to report that Crysis is a better game"?
You've even taken these iunterviews from ones given to "Xbox magasine". What did you really honestly expect them to say to their target audience to which they are attempting to sell things to? "Yeah XBoX is crap, we hate it, we could make better games for the PC and in fact we do"?
You believe this stuff because you want to believe it. They tell you how smart you are for buying an Xbox. they tell you how much better the games for the Xbox are, and then they try and sell you one.
Show me a PC game developer talking about the PC and saying he isn't going to make enough sales? It won't happen either. He is being interviewed to promote his product. All the Cryssis dev's will be saying how much better the PC is. You won't find a quote from them saying, "actually, do you know what, the PS3 is much better than the PC, you should buy Gears of War".
I tell you mate PC games developers don't even talk like this. They don't sit around wondering if the XBOX is better than the PC. They never bother to big up their products Vs other platforms.
They don't have to.
This year,(next month) I will be turning my computer room into a 6 seat Avro Lancaster. with seats for the pilot and all the gunners and for the navigator bomb aimer.
As a team we will be going online to take a 6 hour round trip to Germany. Smoking and drinking all the way. When we get there, we are going to bomb Germans. Real Germans.
One of the reason World of Warcraft's graphics were lacking from a graphical standpoint is because they wanted to appeal to a larger user base and well...is there anything that needs to be said about WoW's success?
LOL
Now show us some numbers that include monthly subscriptions for MMOs. There is nothing wrong with PC gaming - money is just shifting from box sales to subscriptions which doesn't get counted for some reason.
We know blizzard alone is taking in over $624 million a year , (I'm only counting 4 mil subscribers )
And those numbers don't take into account people who have both a 360 and a PC. Take some of those big selling titles (like Orange Box) and release them only on PC and those numbers would be much different.
LOL
Now show us some numbers that include monthly subscriptions for MMOs. There is nothing wrong with PC gaming - money is just shifting from box sales to subscriptions which doesn't get counted for some reason.
We know blizzard alone is taking in over $624 million a year , (I'm only counting 4 mil subscribers )
And those numbers don't take into account people who have both a 360 and a PC. Take some of those big selling titles (like Orange Box) and release them only on PC and those numbers would be much different.
Subscriptions should not count in sales figures. How would that help retailers??
That doesn't even make any sense. There is no reason for Epic or Infinity Ward to promote console versions of their games over PC versions. Those games are made for the lowest common dominator, but that dominator isn't consoles, it's mid end PC users. Neither UT3 nor CoD4 make use of everything the Xbox360 and PS3 have to offer. You seem to think that every PC gamer has a hig end PC, which ofcourse is not the case. And especialy in terms of gameplay not much has changed. Call of Duty 4 pretty much sticks true to its roots and is now merely put in a modern warfare coat. UT3 PC version actually differs from the Playstation 3 version.One of the reason World of Warcraft's graphics were lacking from a graphical standpoint is because they wanted to appeal to a larger user base and well...is there anything that needs to be said about WoW's success?
Epic and Infinity Ward both promote their games to their primary audience. The audience for which the game was designed.
There is no console on the market that is comparable to a mid range PC. There is no console on the market that can match the power of a minimum spec PC on sale today. The lowest common denominator is not the $800 gaming machine, it's not even the $400 gaming machine, surprise surprise, it's the $200 gaming machine.
Both UT3 and Cod4 make use of everything the PS3 and Xbox 360 have to offer. That's it. You've seen all it has to offer. No more surprises for you until PS4.
UT and Cod Use two extremely scaleable engines. They can run on 3 year old PC's and they can all the features on next years computers too. Whatever system you run them on, they will be optimiseable, scaleable to the systems maximum capabilities.
On the Xbox 360, you've seen it. If you are expecting more, you will be waiting for the rest of your life.
CoD and Gears of War, ("Cliffy" didn't make UT3, he made UT2004 and Jazz Jackrabbit) are console titles.
In their promotional intervirews the developers of these games have heralded the Xbox 360 as the superior gaming platform. Which of course is very unsurprising since they are attempting to sell to Xbox owners.
The reason they are being promoted as console games to console gamers, is because that is what they are. Gears of War hasn't even been released on PC yet, and when it does, it won't sell well because it is a console port.
CoD 3 wasn't even released on PC. less than Half of all CoD titles have been available on the PC. Only CoD was a PC title, the rest have all been "all platforms". (ie nerfed).
CoD was never going to sell well on the PC again. It is a franchise title. It offers nothing new to the genre. It advances nothing. It doesn't attempt to advance anything. It's just formula smush, churned out as fast as possible. One a year. A Quake mod. It doesn't make full use of PC owners very expensive equipment because it must run on Consoles too.
A light shooter that didn't take long to make and doesn't take long to play. Who but the most mindless of idiots, who but the same morons who think they bought a supercomputer for $200 are really going to get all that excited by it.
When you go into MacDonalds and the advert says they sell the worlds best tasting burger, you don't have to believe them. It's ok if you want to believe them I suppose, but really, they don't. They just want you to buy it.
So when they tell you the Xbox is a powerful supercomputer more powerful than computers 2 and 3 times the price, and that console games are so superior to PC games, that PC games will never be played again, just remember that the peope saying this to you are only talking to you at all because they are trying to sell you something.....and tomorrow they will be trying to sell you something else.
Likewise when The Toyota Yaris wins Car of the Year award again next year, do not sell your Porsche. (Not even if the designer of the Yaris says that he did).
There is something that needs to be said about WoW's success, yes, it isn't a console game and no console game has ever been as successful as WoW. Nor as much fun, neither could any console on the market reproduce it's graphics on their highest settings. (This requires a total of 947 MB RAM) Nor are Blizzard developers discussing the failure of the PC market or advocating the Xbox as the future of gaming.
TG: But then you have Cliffy B come out and say that PC gaming is in disarray and...
Mark Rein: Oh he's an idiot [laughing]. No, he's a great guy. Cliff makes console games though, right? He's on a console team that makes what is primarily a console game.
www.tomsgames.com/us/2008/02/20/gdc_long_live_pc_gaming/
PC gaming is really in a turmoil now. hope a game will come for salvation