You pretty much summed up the situation. The Devs are acting like the music industry, blaming piracy for lack of sales when it's really their crappy music. Last year I bought and sold my gaming rig because I played through all the interesting games in a few months and realized that my comp would be obsolete by the time more good games came out.
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You pretty much summed up the situation. The Devs are acting like the music industry, blaming piracy for lack of sales when it's really their crappy music. Last year I bought and sold my gaming rig because I played through all the interesting games in a few months and realized that my comp would be obsolete by the time more good games came out.
Gaming technology can be revived by releasing the hardware companies from the glacial pace of DirectX updates, so that hardware dictates to OS, as should happen. Games make demands of hardware, but hardware makes demands of the support software; MS is trying to force the dependency in the opposite direction.
As for content, gameplay, etc., MS has no possible say in that.
MS, GTFO. You're screwing everything up, as usual.
As for content, gameplay, etc., MS has no possible say in that.
MS, GTFO. You're screwing everything up, as usual.
blurredvision
Lifer
The total lack of good games is in a roundabout way because of piracy, which makes it the biggest problem. I don't think everyone really understands how piracy affects game sales, which in turn affects developers, which in turn affects potential developers who once were considering PC development. Currently, there's no good way to prevent piracy without pissing off the majority of the single-minded PC gamers who want innovation, but don't want to pay for it.
PC games are already cheap. The bigger titles obviously start out at $50, but most of those games are available at $40 a month or two later, and a lot of games start out at $40 (or even $20-$30 on occassion). You certainly can't say that for console games. Most console games only see a drop in MSRP if sales are extremely bad or if they are carted to a budget line (i.e. Sony's Greatest Hits line).
StrangerGuy
Diamond Member
Remember the great console port known as Halo from Microsoft?
PC games aren't cheap if you consider the amount of money going into upgrades. Some gamers may have unlimitted funds to buy every pc game that comes out, but considering the meager lifespan of a pc most are very choosy and would rather put that extra 50 bucks into the next tier video card rather than a game that they're unsure they'll like.
BTW, Microsoft probably helped PC gaming most when they stopped the xbox360 from using the mouse and keyboard for input devices. This is really the only thing the PC gaming has going for it imo. Piracy with consoles is much less than PCs, and online cheating in games is more difficult with consoles. But who in their right mind wants to play an FPS or RTS with a thumbstick?!
Nextman916
Golden Member
you forgot to add crysis 🙂
shortylickens
No Lifer
Whats sad is few people realize we cant keep suing each other for money. The economy wont work like that. Sooner or later someone has to produce something of value.
It wont be the entertainment industry, but its something to think about.
PingSpike
Lifer
If the people that want innovation are the same ones that don't want to pay for it...well then you don't have anything to lose by pissing them off.
I don't know. You can blame piracy...but there were always pirates, and always will be. I've thought the cdkey online systems we have in place were pretty sufficient in that regard. PC users are used to having a certain amount of control over their applications, which is why most of the cd protection mechanisms are met with such animosity. I mean, having the cd in the drive to play? I have a gigantic hard drive with all the game files on it...if I wanted to deal with disk swapping all day I would have bought a console. I know this has been discussed before, but antipiracy measures usually work by punishing people that bought the game. Pirates just strip out the crap anyway. And then when you have every remaining PC Gamer downloading cd cracks for games they bought...what have you done besides bring the cracker scene a little closer to your buying demographics heart?
I could just as easily argue that the gaming industries more aggressive antipiracy measures are the cause of the lost sales. There's no statistics to back it up either way, there was no poll of people with illegal copies on their system asking whether they would have paid for it if they HAD too, not that its results wouldn't be skewed anyway. 😛
One things for sure though, more cd copy protection systems haven't boosted sales of bad titles. You can lock down your crappy game like fort knox all you want, but people aren't going to rush out and buy a piece of crap just because they can't download a piece of crap anymore.
bamacre
Lifer
One possible way of combatting piracy is to make games cheap, or even free, by addding advertising to the games. I also think Steam is a good way of not only combatting piracy but also keeping everyone on the same game version for online play. There are other ways, developers will have to innovate here just as they need to innovate gameplay.
PingSpike
Lifer
I thought steam was a good effort at combating piracy as well. People still b|tched and complained about it, and they did have some valid complaints about its buggy initial release. However its pretty solid now IMO, and I really like not having to worry about what I did with my cds or having to install a cd crack just to keep from scratching up said cds. And if you read what microsoft is suggesting in regards to their plans for PC Gamings future, it sounds a lot like what steam is doing right now...except that it will probably be as much a vehicle for OS sales as it is a distribution network.
The cheap thing is sort of the same deal. We're seeing a lot of bizarre game ideas already being distributed through steam for a cost well below your average title. I've said it before, but I think this kind of system is what we're looking for. All of the different stuff these days comes out of the mod community, and steam is giving some kind of way to sell this as a product. They're not full blown new games, so they shouldn't really command the same price. But they are a product thats marketable. We're of course seeing some griping about that since most people aren't used to paying for mods. But then again, only the really good and polished ones can actually command sales...and those ones IMO are worth their small cost.
Spore isn't 100 percent original. Remember Sim Earth? Actually, I liked that game better. The only reason Maxis doesn't make cool games like that any more is because of EA.
Piracy is to blame for PC gaming's decline, but so are bland, unoriginal games. And dare I say it, PC gamers might share some of that blame too? PC gamers hardcore seem to be very grumbly and dificult to please.
Piracy is to blame for PC gaming's decline, but so are bland, unoriginal games. And dare I say it, PC gamers might share some of that blame too? PC gamers hardcore seem to be very grumbly and dificult to please.
BladeVenom
Lifer
Blaming piracy is pure BS. Just a convenient excuse from the gaming industry. Not having copy protection on a game doesn't decrease its sales, and having the best copy protection certainly doesn't increase its sales. If anything copy protection hurts game sales. I know I would never knowingly buy another game with the Starforce copy protection trojan.
Galactic Civilizations 2 has zero copy protection on it. Its from a small developer with a very limited advertising budget, and it seems to be selling very well. No copy protection, and you can download it from their website whenever you like if you damage your CD.
Galactic Civilizations 2 has zero copy protection on it. Its from a small developer with a very limited advertising budget, and it seems to be selling very well. No copy protection, and you can download it from their website whenever you like if you damage your CD.
HamburgerBoy
Lifer
You mean the tactical strategy game by Bungie that Microsoft raped? Indeed I do.
It is quite possible that this is just PR. However, if it is not, then there is much to think about. Microsoft, can and make anything they want in just about any market happen, if they really want it. If they are really going to try to push PC gaming upwards, then I have no doubt that it will go upwards.
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