Some good points there, although when you put it like that, I’m not exactly sure how hopeful *I* am, heh. Games are costing more to develop, which require bigger companies to fund, that are increasingly risk averse. Which means they want bigger returns on their investment.

All of that points to developing for the “larger” market. I’ll never argue that the PC games market is bigger then the console one. While yes, more people do have PC’s, they certainly aren’t buying games for them. Have they not been educated that there PC can play games? Yes, thats part of it.

However I run into people all the time who “Bought a game for the computer, that won’t run” and they are frustrated “I have a Nintendo, and Nintendo games work. So why won’t computer games work on my computer?” The lack of standardized hardware means more confusion and so it’s more work on the end consumers part.

You don’t even need to spend $2000 on a solid gaming rig. $1000 is enough to get one with all the bells and whistles. Infact they sell new dual core machines for around $300 now. Put an extra $200-300 in it, and you have a very respectable gaming PC.

As I wrote in a previous article, PC gaming just isn’t for everyone. It’s more work, Period. (Just updated to new drivers that make Crysis run even better, but cause issues with my old game Oblivion. It’s a PITA to deal with). Which automatically restricts the size of the market, it just isn’t going to have that mass appeal.

But like you said, there is just more freedom. Mods are great, you can get almost totally new games! Not to mention general freedom (Oblivion has the command console. Great for when you get stuck/glitched on a quest etc. Can’t do that on the console)

As PC’s ever evolving hardware surpass the fixed generation of consoles (my 8800GT is pretty much on par, if not better, then a Xbox360) the gap will widen between the two, making the PC look more attractive. However there is a concern, that developers will focus a lot more on console (to chase the $$$) which could mean that their multi-plattform titles will not take full advantage of the PC hardware, as they have the constraints of the consoles at the forefront. (Unreal Engine 3 is a good example, PC titles can’t turn off texture streaming. Which is a feature most useful on the consoles and not necessary for modern PC hardware). Which could be a problem.

It’s not so much that the PC market is shrinking, because I don’t think it is. It’s more so that the market is being eclipsed by the size (and $$$) of the console one. But as long as there remains enough people to make PC gaming profitable, then it should hopefully survive.

What I don’t get it that nobody sees the connection. The connections I’m speaking of (Part A) PC game development started to really stagnate at the exact same time “next-gen” consoles began their life cycle onto the market place. (Part B) PC game development started to really stagnate at the exact same time we are seeing small cutting edge companies being merged or aquired by large corporate entities. In the last 3 years we’ve also seen exclusive licensing of the most successful titles be taken on by these very same large corporations.

(Part A expanded on) When all sorts of articles were being published just a couple short years ago about “next-gen” consoles, there were common themes, the hardware itself was costing more to make (console hardware in it’s traditional business model are sold at a loss) and the licensing fees for game titles were going up, dramatically in fact. We have a new generation of console technology that requires new skills for current employees and/or hiring of newly skilled employees.

Then factor in the macro business environment, we’re in a period of time where large corporations who do not meet their earnings expectations get taken to the wood shed on the stock markets and recently we’ve entered into a period of the credit crunch. It’s just harder for even large corporations to get the up front cash they need to invest in projects that don’t pay back immediately.

(Part B) The merger and aquisition has been a blessing and a curse. We now have large corporations who make video games and earn billions doing it. How cool is that? These large corporations have the finacial muscle to secure exclusive licensing deals with real world entities (EA and the NFL for example). The mandate of any business is to continue to grow and the way that large corporations grow is through mergers and aquisitions. Unforatunately this has the down side that these once cutting edge innovators move into a restrictive corporate environment. There is also simply less players on the field pushing the envolope, nevermind developing for one platform or another.

But the big head scratcher for me is, who the heck doesn’t have a computer these days? I see similiar bemoanings that you need a $5k computer to play game XYZ. Says who? I built the rig that I am typing this message out on last year for roughly $2300 CDN dollars. The same rig today would cost around $1800 and is still a very good system that can run the best of games out right now at full detail. I’m sorry that folks have bought into the marketing ploys of the hardware manufacturers but you really don’t need to spend multiple thousands of dollars every year or half year, that’s simply not true and hasn’t been true of PC gaming for the past 10 years. Well invested money on a PC will net you at a minimum 3 years of ‘…don’t need to muss with the puter…’.

The monster selling point of PC gaming has been almost totally overlooked all of a sudden…that is…replayability of a game on PC is vastly (VASTLY) superior to the console gaming environment because of a simple 4 letter word…mods.

Now don’t get me wrong, the current state of the PC game market is alarming. But I think we’re in a down cycle right now for PC game development. It’s part of a larger and interconnected market place. That’s actually really cool because 5 years ago, gaming on any platform was almost fringe and frowned upon. Now it’s “the” thing to do, it just so happens that the new consoles are stealing a lot of thunder. Imagine that, stealing a lot of the market place’s money after the multi-multi-million dollar marketing campaigns to get you to go out and buy that new X-whater or P-whatever the latest Non-mindo.

I think 2009 is the year watch.

Thanks for reading and hopefully see ya out there.

PC gaming certainly isn’t for everyone. The console is more attractive for many people, hence its popularity. But I think what is important to note is that as long as their remains a critical mass of PC gaming enthusiasts then there will continue to be a PC gaming platform.

Those that say the PC is “evolving” into more mainstream-friendly games, miss the point. It’s not the platform that is important, but rather what it represents: ie. the type of game experiences you can have. If those are lost, then so is the platform itself.

I’ve been tweaking Crysis recently, to finally do my singleplayer playthrough. So much time spent getting it to look as good as it can while stiff giving decent performance. In the process I ran into a command (time_scale x), where you can quite literally change the rate time passes in the game. And not just that “clocks move faster”, but if you slow time down, then the whole game slows (eg. slow motion). Which has caused me to lose many hrs just messing around all “Matrix” style, slowing down time and fighting tons of soldiers.

All this isn’t something you are going to encounter on the console.

Now this would of course change if I had a fancy TV that had a VGA input jack. Then I’d definitely play more PC games - but from my couch.

Another thing that kills PC gaming is rampant piracy and the need for users to upgrade hardware often to run games at their full potential. I can’t be bothered with that, so I only upgrade if someone is giving me their old, unwanted hardware. Otherwise, I’m fine.