Lack of PC games on shelves

dr.bollocko

I was sceptical of playing a COD title on a console, but COD3 on the 360, as a singleplayer title kicks ass.
Its a shame that the multiplayer sucks ass but still, I couldn't stop playing it and I was expecting a total lemon.

AnCapaillMor

Piracy has hit Pc games big time. any pc title is pretty much avalible on the net for download. With a PC crack, it involves cracking the title, with consoles it involves getting your console chipped and pretty much rules you out of any online gaming. I've the 360 myself, but 90% of the time i'm pc gaming. I can PC games going the way of direct2drive, steam or EA downloader. I've a net connection so i'm down with it. PC all the way.


as for the whole, joystick mouse, i can't play Gears of War, aiming without a mouse, i can't bloody do it.

Stephen

My local gamestop has almost 0 PC games besides a bunch of poxy MMO's and the sims 2

**** 'em, more orders for play.com

MisterAnarchy

PC Game Titles in general seem to be very limited these days.
Its mostly strategy or football manager games being released over the last few months.
Where are all the shooters gone ?

abccormac

I was flicking through edge in the newsagents today, and they had an article about PC gaming. I only took a quick look at it, but they said PC games sales had dropped by 10% every year, for the last 5 years in a row.

Thats a massive drop in sales coinciding pretty closely with the widening availability of broadband, and the easier access to pirate games that comes with high download speeds.

The online capabilities of the newer consoles are removing the one unique selling point that PC gaming has had until now and I think that could be one of the last nails in the coffin of PC games. Personally I own an xbox 360, a ps2 and a PC, and play games on all of them, but the convenience of knowing that my 360 will be able to play any game that comes out for the next 4-5 years without any upgrades compared to my laptop which won't be capable of playing new games in a year or two really outweighs any benefits the PC has as a gaming platform.

All in all I can see PC games becoming a very small market over the next few years. The inconvenience of having to upgrade regularly for the player, and the widespread piracy of your work for the developer will end up killing it off.

projectmayhem

abccormac wrote:

I was flicking through edge in the newsagents today, and they had an article about PC gaming. I only took a quick look at it, but they said PC games sales had dropped by 10% every year, for the last 5 years in a row.

how much of that is just a sheer lack of games? PC games have a tendency to either be stunning, or mediocre. everything after hl2 felt "meh", and even now we're gearing up for ep2. this year includes that, stalker (hyped to bits) & spore (among others).

i'd say at the end of 2007 we'll be reading articles about how "2007 saved pc gaming", but 2008... eh, not so much

Zillah

mukki wrote:

If i was you i'd just buy a games console
you wont need to worry about drivers problems

You mean you won't be able to upgrade to superior drivers?

tweaking settings

Optimising settings. You know, like making it look really really pretty or reduce them to account for that awful chopp framerate consoles are known for.

harware upgrades

"Worry" about? Upgrading is great, it makes things better. The closest option with consoles is to throw them out and buy the next one.

or downloading update patches ever again

..or getting improved or adittional content..

abccormac

projectmayhem wrote:

how much of that is just a sheer lack of games?

I don't disagree that there's a lack of games for the PC, the question is why is there a lack of games. I would say it's in part because of piracy reducing profitability.

And Zillah, most people find upgrading drivers to be a chore, settings only need to be optimised because every PC runs on different hardware, upgrading is a pain when your top of the range graphics card is merely average six months down the line, and consoles now have the same potential to provide online cotent updates as the PC.

The PC is a fantastic games platform, if you can afford the 1000 euros or so to get set up with something half decent and are prepared to fork out a few hundred euros more every now and then for a new processor or graphics card. If you're not technically minded or don't have deep pockets a console is often a more sensible option.

Manic Moran

abccormac wrote:

The online capabilities of the newer consoles are removing the one unique selling point that PC gaming has had until now

Ahem, ahem...

The vast majority of games I have on my PC wouldn't have a hope of being played on a console, unless the console comes with a keyboard.

Try playing Falcon 4: Allied Force on a Playstation 3.

NTM

de5p0i1er

eire_dd wrote:

I've got a 360...but as far as I'm concerned there are games that are just meant to be played on a PC...

Your right there. Sometimes you need a mouse and keyboard.

johnny_ultimate

Excuse me while I join the disinfranchised masses, but was disgusted today when I went searching for Dreamfall in town, which I expected to find easily and for thirty euro or under
After trying every game shop between grafton street and Henry Street I finally came across a lone copy in HMV Henry Street at a price of 50 euro.
Consider me irked.

abccormac

There's no technical reason to stop you using a keyboard and mouse on a console though, the xbox360 and ps2 have usb ports and i assume the ps3 does aswell. The fact that things like flight sims and other niche market products end up on the PC is probably more to do with the costs of developing for the PC compared to a console.

andyps2.5

I played both pc and console games before and this how I see it. PC games have a huge varity of games but they will only work if you upgrade your pc with the right parts for the game. Console games are easier to work since there little or no divers to add-on but there isn't as mush games.

Personally I prefer Console games mostly because you never run into bugs in the middle of the game. but for now I'm back to the pc games, I'm tring to aviod buying more games and save for ps3.

DarthWraak

andyps2.5 wrote:

Personally I prefer Console games mostly because you never run into bugs in the middle of the game.

Not necessarily. The GTA series on the Playstation was as bugged as hell. I can remember in San Andreas where you couldn't build up your stats anymore for some reason, which caused me to delete and restart the game

But the PC wins here actually, as most games have patches released to counter such bugs. However, this system of patching is coming (or has already come) to consoles.