"PCs are good for anything, just not games"

[MmmSkyscraper]

Originally posted by: CP5670
I personally can't have fun in an FPS using a controller. I tried it a few times and had trouble just moving around. It feels like trying to play an RTS with a racing wheel. I've been using a mouse/KB for far too long to get used to it.

You adjust, like anything else. I've used a keyboard/mouse for the last 20 years but I coped.

 

[Czar]

the Intel Integrated Graphics is one of the problems

another one is the rise of laptop owners

another is the stupid size and power requirements of high end graphics cards, which makes it so that few people buy them because of their size and it takes longer for the high end graphics card to be ported down to the laptop market.

 

[Krakn3Dfx]

I can see his point, integrated graphics are an afterthought these days, if Intel wanted to support gaming on the PC, which would be a wise move, they would spend more time on their integrated graphics solutions. Something 8600GT level with 256MB of dedicated memory would not cost a lot more to implement as the absolute bottom of the barrel gaming card, and it would go a long way as far as giving PC buyers a viable option for gaming. My son runs an 8600GT in his PC, and everything runs great at medium settings for him at 1024 or 1280.

Epic has come out and flipflopped quite a bit since UT3 tanked on the PC, but I think this is the first thing they've pointed out that genuinely makes sense as a deterrent to PC gaming. People who buy PCs to play games make up a significant percentage of total PCs sold, but it's gone down quite a bit in the last 4-5 years due in large part to the belief that it takes a $3000 Dell to run a game like CoD4 or Frontlines: Fuels of War. The fact is, these games will easily play on a PC built at a $500-$700, and play well.

Also, companies like AMD, EVGA, etc. would do well NOT to post pictures of games on really low end videocards like the Radeon 7000s and fx5200s they're still schilling to an unsuspecting market for $40-$50. How many posts do I see everyday asking about some crapass 64-bit card with 512MB of RAM slapped on that purports to run the latest in gaming technology? Quiet a few actually, it's pretty sad.

The stigma of cost associated with PC gaming has come to roost on the market, and companies like Intel, Dell, Microsoft, etc are doing nothing to prove these myths are false. The only way people will know that they can have a decent gaming PC at a low price is by checking sites like this where those of us who know point it out, and how potential PC gamers are taking the time to do that?

Probably not many at all.

 

[tigersty1e]

They need to drop that Unreal crap....

There have been way too many versions of that game. Stop milking it.

"You pay twice as much money for 30% more performance... That is just not right."


This guy's talking about super-high end... You can get a nice rig for just a little over low-end and up with a decent gaming rig. So it's like pay twice as much and get 120%+ more performance.



Stop the Unreal franchise, put out a decent game and then stop whining about poor sales.

 

[KeypoX]

Its really only a matter of time till pc gaming is insignificant. While most on these forums would disagree you are indeed the minority of gamers. I have been a devout PC gamer for a long time but I am sick of having to upgrade every year just to play games. Its so much more affordable to buy a console and stick with it for years. What does a xbox 360 cost? 299? That is cheaper than most high-mid range video cards, cheaper than high-mid processor, and it generally going to run games at respectable frame rates.

But i also cannot play certain games with a controller. So using keyboard/mouse like controls for FPS and RTS is the only way. consoles need to make use of them and then i would stop playing PC games altogether. Now if we could start buying PC's at console prices that would work for say 3 years with all the newest games then it would be a different story.

 

[Krakn3Dfx]

Originally posted by: KeypoX
Its really only a matter of time till pc gaming is insignificant. While most on these forums would disagree you are indeed the minority of gamers. I have been a devout PC gamer for a long time but I am sick of having to upgrade every year just to play games. Its so much more affordable to buy a console and stick with it for years. What does a xbox 360 cost? 299? That is cheaper than most high-mid range video cards, cheaper than high-mid processor, and it generally going to run games at respectable frame rates.

But i also cannot play certain games with a controller. So using keyboard/mouse like controls for FPS and RTS is the only way. consoles need to make use of them and then i would stop playing PC games altogether. Now if we could start buying PC's at console prices that would work for say 3 years with all the newest games then it would be a different story.

When they start selling consoles that will let you browse the web, IRC, check email, watch last night's Lost, and play a game, all at the same time, each in it's own window, let me know.

The PC is not JUST a gaming machine, and until Microsoft gives you the option to run your games in a window while you run other apps, and until they let you just download free user made content from the internet at a whim and install it with your 360 games, and until they give you the option to access IRC or the web or a word processor or anything else other than games and their pay online content, you can't compare the two.

PC gaming isn't going anywhere, because gaming is only 1 aspect of the PC, and while great, innovative, trouble free games like Company of Heroes, TF2, WoW, Sins of a Solar Empire, etc still sell well on the PC, which they are, there's always going to be a dev house that will be willing to strive to build quality games on the platform.

 

[Krakn3Dfx]

Originally posted by: tigersty1e
They need to drop that Unreal crap....

There have been way too many versions of that game. Stop milking it.

"You pay twice as much money for 30% more performance... That is just not right."


This guy's talking about super-high end... You can get a nice rig for just a little over low-end and up with a decent gaming rig. So it's like pay twice as much and get 120%+ more performance.



Stop the Unreal franchise, put out a decent game and then stop whining about poor sales.

Yeah, the myth that PC gaming is more expensive than console gaming is pretty tiring. Yes, you can go out and pay $3000-$10000 for some god PC, but that's pretty stupid. You can build a PC for $500-$700 that runs everything well, and have a machine that isn't just a gaming machine, but also a multimedia powerhouse and a communications station to the world.

And, for me personally, playing a game like CoD4 on my PC is infinitely more enjoyable than it is stumbling around with auto-aim turned on with a console.

 

[AstroManLuca]

A point I like to make during PC vs. console debates is that it costs very little to game on a PC. Games cost the same (actually slightly less on the PC), and if you already have a pretty recent computer (something that a lot of people have), it only costs $150 to slap a decent gaming card in there. That's a lot cheaper than buying a console.

Of course, that leaves out people with computers that are either too old to handle gaming regardless of the GPU, or ones that don't have slots for graphics cards at all, but that's just like how there are a lot of people out there with previous generation consoles.

 

[KeithTalent]

Originally posted by: KeypoX
Its really only a matter of time till pc gaming is insignificant. While most on these forums would disagree you are indeed the minority of gamers. I have been a devout PC gamer for a long time but I am sick of having to upgrade every year just to play games. Its so much more affordable to buy a console and stick with it for years. What does a xbox 360 cost? 299? That is cheaper than most high-mid range video cards, cheaper than high-mid processor, and it generally going to run games at respectable frame rates.

But i also cannot play certain games with a controller. So using keyboard/mouse like controls for FPS and RTS is the only way. consoles need to make use of them and then i would stop playing PC games altogether. Now if we could start buying PC's at console prices that would work for say 3 years with all the newest games then it would be a different story.

There are many people that love to perpetuate the fallacy that you must upgrade annualy to play new games. This is simply not true, unless you absolutely must play at an extremely high resolution with very high frame rates. If that is case, then I would argue you are getting a better gaming experience (higher resolution and prettier graphics, this is without mentioning the benefit of KBM) than your console counterparts for the additional cost, so it is all relative.

KT

 

[ja1484]

Originally posted by: pontifex

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: pontifex
don't most pcs (even with integrated graphics) still have a slot that can be used for a separate video card? so you're not really stuck.

Yes they do, but what happens with the family that buys a $400 budget dell because they are on a budget? I doubt they can pour $200 more into a dedicated gaming card. On top of that, low end PCs tend to have questionable processors and memory, albeit, again, upgradable.

i was just commenting on the ability to upgrade, not your financial position. is a family use budget PC going to be used to play high end games anyway? highly doubt it.

Congratulations. You just stated the problem Tim Sweeney was pointing out. Reading comprehension FTW?


I also think a lot of people are having trouble thinking clearly. Some things to keep in mind:

- Epic makes plenty of dough from engine licensure
- Epic is still rolling in money from Gears of War and their previous releases

Most importantly...

- Epic does not particularly care who buys their title, as long as someone does.


This last one is what amuses me so much about internet fanboyism, whether it be to a certain platform, company, whatever. I know people on AT love to fight about which console, which game, which company, but the guys in the industry don't. In fact, they're generally very civil to one another (Denis Dyack excluded). Development companies with console focuses don't hate development companies with PC focuses or vice versa. In fact, they're all adults and realize they're making the same product really...the only difference will be how the buyer consumes it. They don't infight because that's a stupid waste of time they could be using to make money. Hell, they buy and compliment each other's shit after release.

I know in order to fight properly on the internet you have to pick camps and shit, just don't get confused into thinking that's how the real world works. There's a small percentage of people who need to carve the world into ridiculous factions for some reason, and then there are the rest of us who have grown out of that shit and mostly focus on hedonism.

 

[Thraxen]

Originally posted by: Krakn3Dfx
Yeah, the myth that PC gaming is more expensive than console gaming is pretty tiring. Yes, you can go out and pay $3000-$10000 for some god PC, but that's pretty stupid. You can build a PC for $500-$700 that runs everything well, and have a machine that isn't just a gaming machine, but also a multimedia powerhouse and a communications station to the world.

This is the key here... most people don't build PCs nor do most care to attempt to upgrade them. And unless you are doing some sort of media related activities, you don't need a modern PC to do the typical web surfing, e-mail, and Office activites most people use their PCs for. Integrated graphics and a 6 year old processor can do just fine for most people. Hell, for many people their cell phones are their "communications station to the world".

Also, most people don't take their PCs and gaming as seriously as people do here. Gaming is a mere diversion and they want to be free of driver conflicts and the like and for many people they don't really care to sit at their PCs to play unless they are goofing off at work. So all this talk about how cheap it is to build or to slap a mid-range card into a PC is beyond the point for many people.

Another factor is home theaters. Many people have already invested in what they consider decent entertainment centers. A console slaps right in there and they're off. Most people aren't going to care to spend what it would take to get the same out of the PCs or even know how to do it in the first place.

I personally play both PCs and consoles fairly extensively. And, yeah, Crysis looks awesome and all that... but I'm still sitting by myself in my office. My consoles are attached to a decent HT that features an SVS that literally shakes the house and in a room where lots of people can sit around and enjoy what's going on. It's just a different environment. It's not all about pricing, or upgradeability, etc... there's alot more that factors into this than you guys ever bring up.

 

[ja1484]

Originally posted by: Thraxen
It's just a different environment. It's not all about pricing, or upgradeability, etc... there's alot more that factors into this than you guys ever bring up.

Yeah, but as you and I know, the discourse in this place is not for having rational discussion. The purpose is to yell as loudly and as longly as you can for your personal preference and run an unfunded marketing campaign for your fanboy-object of choice.

Let's not fool ourselves. No one heads to internet forums to interact with others in a meaningful fashion.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: Thraxen
It's just a different environment. It's not all about pricing, or upgradeability, etc... there's alot more that factors into this than you guys ever bring up.

Yeah, but as you and I know, the discourse in this place is not for having rational discussion. The purpose is to yell as loudly and as longly as you can for your personal preference and run an unfunded marketing campaign for your fanboy-object of choice.

Let's not fool ourselves. No one heads to internet forums to interact with others in a meaningful fashion.

total nonsense

speak for yourself and people who think just like you

 

[ja1484]

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: Thraxen
It's just a different environment. It's not all about pricing, or upgradeability, etc... there's alot more that factors into this than you guys ever bring up.

Yeah, but as you and I know, the discourse in this place is not for having rational discussion. The purpose is to yell as loudly and as longly as you can for your personal preference and run an unfunded marketing campaign for your fanboy-object of choice.

Let's not fool ourselves. No one heads to internet forums to interact with others in a meaningful fashion.

total nonsense

speak for yourself and people who think just like you

QED.

 

[Schadenfroh]

the decline of the PC as a gaming platform

Speaking of game sales, here is something that I have been trying to put together (I considered turning it into a separate thread, but I am holding off for 2008 annual reports to give the PS3 and Wii a fair running), here it is:

Most of the time people combine the revenue generated by the Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo gaming platforms into a single category to pit against the PC. Today, I take a look at the revenue generated by several popular impartial companies (impartial defined as not producing a gaming console). Only revenue from the current generation competing platforms will be listed.

Sources:

• Activision 2007 Annual Report, page 29
• EA 2007 Annual Report (retrieved from EA's website under investor relations), page 112
• THQ 2007 Annual Report, page 33

2007 Annual Reports (all in US dollars)

PC

• Activision: 78,886,000
• Electronic Arts: 498,000,000
• THQ: 149,000,000

Xbox 360

• Activision: 200,394,000
• Electronic Arts: 480,000,000
• THQ: 134,908,000

Wii

• Activision: 54,636,000
• Electronic Arts: 65,000,000
• THQ: 30,025,000

Playstaiton 3

• Activision: 53,842,000
• Electronic Arts: 94,000,000
• THQ: Not Found / Listed

Total Revenue of THQ, Activision, and EA

• 1. Xbox 360: 815,302,000
• 2. PC: 725,886,000
• 3. Wii: 149,661,000
• 4. PS3: 147,842,000

Notes

• The 2007 annual reports were for march 2006 - march 2007, this is a bit unfair to the PS3 and Wii
• Vivendi (owners of Blizzard), did not list their games division's revenue based on individual platform. But, Blizzard did bring in 1.2 billion in revenue and produced the vast majority of the revenue of Vivendi's game division. It is pretty obvious where the bulk of that revenue is coming from.
• Ubisoft (being a European company) listed theirs in Euros, if someone wants to convert their annual report by platform to the value of the USD in march 2007, feel free to do so and I will post it in the OP.
• I was unable to locate a breakdown per platform of Take-Two interactive's 2007 annual report

Please help expand this by posting revenue on a per platform basis from the 2007 annual reports of other companies and I will add them to the OP and totals. I do not have all the time in the world to dig through all of them and notify me of any mistakes in my figures so that I may correct them

I hope that this might prove interesting and again, please post some figures from other companies.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: Thraxen
It's just a different environment. It's not all about pricing, or upgradeability, etc... there's alot more that factors into this than you guys ever bring up.

Yeah, but as you and I know, the discourse in this place is not for having rational discussion. The purpose is to yell as loudly and as longly as you can for your personal preference and run an unfunded marketing campaign for your fanboy-object of choice.

Let's not fool ourselves. No one heads to internet forums to interact with others in a meaningful fashion.

total nonsense

speak for yourself and people who think just like you

QED.

*exactly* .. you have nothing of substance to say
quod erat demonstrandum

as Schadenfroh, showed PC gaming is NOT in decline, it is not in disarray ... CRAP games come with excuses and/or DRM
--and Good Riddance to the Devs and Publishers that are Whining babies who can't make a game their fans CARE about - instead they make excuses and live on past glories and recycle and repackage old ideas in pretty new graphics.

 

[tigersty1e]

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: pontifex

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: pontifex
don't most pcs (even with integrated graphics) still have a slot that can be used for a separate video card? so you're not really stuck.

Yes they do, but what happens with the family that buys a $400 budget dell because they are on a budget? I doubt they can pour $200 more into a dedicated gaming card. On top of that, low end PCs tend to have questionable processors and memory, albeit, again, upgradable.

i was just commenting on the ability to upgrade, not your financial position. is a family use budget PC going to be used to play high end games anyway? highly doubt it.

Congratulations. You just stated the problem Tim Sweeney was pointing out. Reading comprehension FTW?


I also think a lot of people are having trouble thinking clearly. Some things to keep in mind:

- Epic makes plenty of dough from engine licensure
- Epic is still rolling in money from Gears of War and their previous releases

Most importantly...

- Epic does not particularly care who buys their title, as long as someone does.


This last one is what amuses me so much about internet fanboyism, whether it be to a certain platform, company, whatever. I know people on AT love to fight about which console, which game, which company, but the guys in the industry don't. In fact, they're generally very civil to one another (Denis Dyack excluded). Development companies with console focuses don't hate development companies with PC focuses or vice versa. In fact, they're all adults and realize they're making the same product really...the only difference will be how the buyer consumes it. They don't infight because that's a stupid waste of time they could be using to make money. Hell, they buy and compliment each other's shit after release.

I know in order to fight properly on the internet you have to pick camps and shit, just don't get confused into thinking that's how the real world works. There's a small percentage of people who need to carve the world into ridiculous factions for some reason, and then there are the rest of us who have grown out of that shit and mostly focus on hedonism.

Ironic how you mention fighting.. when it's mostly the PC fanboys defending against the console fanboys attacking saying PC gaming is dead or is dying.

1. Epic dogging PC gaming.

2. PC gamers defending.

Every 3 months, you'll see a new thread in this forum from some noob saying how PC gaming is dead... it's not how it used to be back in the day.... quiting PCs and moving on to consoles....

 

[jdoggg12]

Personally i think beefing up integrated gfx solutions are a bad idea. I think most people are either going to be gamers or they arent on a pc. The person with integrated graphics is probably on a budget system with a mediocre cpu, mediocre ram, etc... They bought that computer for doing computing. If they ONLY wanted to game, they'd understand they can buy something out of the box (ps3/360) or 'gaming' computer, or can mod what they have. If they dont understand the basic needs of gaming on a computer, they probably shouldn't be doing it on there in the first place.

IMO its kinda like weekend track racing. Consoles are like your stock sports cars while PCs are your modded track cars.

 

[Thraxen]

Originally posted by: tigersty1e
Ironic how you mention fighting.. when it's mostly the PC fanboys defending against the console fanboys attacking saying PC gaming is dead or is dying.

1. Epic dogging PC gaming.

2. PC gamers defending.

Every 3 months, you'll see a new thread in this forum from some noob saying how PC gaming is dead... it's not how it used to be back in the day.... quiting PCs and moving on to consoles....

WOW... that is absurdly wrong. It's largely the PC fanboys that are obsessed with consoles and that are always blaming anything that goes wrong in the PC industry on consoles. Look how many threads there are in this forum that are directly about or that degenerated into some sort of console bashing. It's constant here. Always posting any news item like this very thread and then proceeding to bash on consoles. You said it yourself, most of these threads are by PC GAMERS that are making the decision to move over to consoles. You almost never see actual console-only gamers coming in here and stirring up anything... you PC-only guys are stirring shit up yourselves. And you don't see any sort of obsession with PCs over in the console forum. It's here... in the PC forum.

 

[apoppin]

that's because this IS the PC gaming forum

some PC gamers - [gasp, didn't you know?] - consider themselves "elite" and look down disdainfully at "the children and rednecks playing consoles"
-this silly attitude is 'noted' - over my personal objection as a PC gamer

 

[Schadenfroh]

Originally posted by: Thraxen
And you don't see any sort of obsession with PCs over in the console forum.

This comes to mind

 

[Thraxen]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh

Originally posted by: Thraxen
And you don't see any sort of obsession with PCs over in the console forum.

This comes to mind

Yeah, so you dug up a thread from last September. Shall I link a few threads where PC gamers bash on consoles? How far back do you think I'll have to go? Oh wait... this IS one of those threads.

 

[ja1484]

Originally posted by: apoppin
some PC gamers - [gasp, didn't you know?] - consider themselves "elite" and look down disdainfully at "the children and rednecks playing consoles"
-this silly attitude is 'noted' - over my personal objection as a PC gamer

Which only makes is that much sweeter for those of us who play on ALL platforms and look down our nose at silly pretend-elitists who willingly restrict themselves for the sake of maintaining a pretend-allegiance.

I have one cause: Hedonism. The rest of it, I couldn't give a fuck.

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: Thraxen
It's just a different environment. It's not all about pricing, or upgradeability, etc... there's alot more that factors into this than you guys ever bring up.

Yeah, but as you and I know, the discourse in this place is not for having rational discussion. The purpose is to yell as loudly and as longly as you can for your personal preference and run an unfunded marketing campaign for your fanboy-object of choice.

Let's not fool ourselves. No one heads to internet forums to interact with others in a meaningful fashion.

total nonsense

speak for yourself and people who think just like you

QED.

*exactly* .. you have nothing of substance to say
quod erat demonstrandum

Not so much. It's more that regardless of what I say, you're not here to base your position on available information - you're here to try and force agreement with your point of view through argument, either because you're emotionally attached to your position for some ridiculous reason or you're a troll. Those are the options.

I really don't care what other people like or why. What's retarded is when people try to argue opinion as fact, which is pretty much what the PC and Console Gaming Forums here at AT are - a "my opinion is better than yours" circle jerk, which is exactly what I was getting at in the original quote above.

 

[Zenoth]

The PC's were never created with gaming in mind in the first place, some people need to remember that. It's not like gaming forced the creation of the first PC's. The PC platform has the potential of holding huge games, very complex ones, due to the computing power (always potentially) found on PC's. If PC's today were as weak as a PS2 there'd be no reasons to stay behind. I find it totally normal to say that Consoles are better for maintaining gaming alive, without them the PC market alone wouldn't be attractive enough for millions upon millions of gamers around the world, and the whole video gaming industry would enter a very deep crisis.

And let's also not forget that, for most of us here we all grew up with Atari, Nintendo and Sega, we didn't grew up on IBM's and 486's, and those who did grow on PC gaming back then are today only a minority. And, additionally, let's not forget about the PRICE of a DECENT gaming computer, something enough to play the latest games. On Consoles you don't have to worry about the price and the upgrades after you buy the machine, all you might want to consider afterward are the extra peripherals, and that's it. The big irony within all of this is that Consoles tend to BECOME what they always stayed away from in the past. I mean look at the Dreamcast, it had a frickin' mice, keyboard, a web-browser and Sega introduced the first well organized on-line network for it (compared to the past attempts of it before the Dreamcast). It turned out that the DC was later labeled as a "PC wannabe". Today the so called Consoles can play movies... so they aren't GAMING platforms anymore, they are ENTERTAINMENT platform, and that's a label dating back from the first Nintendo ENTERTAINMENT System.

The bottom line, for me, is the following: I loved Console gaming, it made its time, today I play more on my SNES than I played on the PS3 or 360 at my friend's place because the games on today's Consoles are mostly all boring (with a few exceptions, mostly found on Nintendo platforms, which is NOT surprising, they and Atari started it all, they know what they're doing, others are mostly throwing fast food at us and then they ask us to run a marathon with that crap as our source of energy and inspiration, no thanks). And even though today I "prefer" PC gaming, it too isn't necessarily being devoid of crappy games, especially since the past couple of years.

 

[TehMac]

Originally posted by: ja1484

Originally posted by: pontifex
don't most pcs (even with integrated graphics) still have a slot that can be used for a separate video card? so you're not really stuck.

Yes they do, but what happens with the family that buys a $400 budget dell because they are on a budget? I doubt they can pour $200 more into a dedicated gaming card. On top of that, low end PCs tend to have questionable processors and memory, albeit, again, upgradable.

So families can spend 400 dollars more for an xbox 360 when they could just use that 400 dollars to upgrade their PC?


Makes a lot of sense.