I have been reading several articles stating that PC sales have been tanking hard. Giving way to Consoles, Smart Phones, and Tablets. While the thought of the MS empire falling does put a little smile on my face. I cant help but think of what will happen to the PC Gaming market.
I cant see myself playing a complex game like Sins, Gal Civ, or Planetary Annihilation on a "Tablet". I am used to building my own hulking "super gaming computer". Hand picking the best components for when the next big thing comes out. If that market disappears, Will we be stuck playing these complex games on "windows surface"? with no keyboard, or mouse? The specs of these types machines do not impress me in the slightest. I can not see them having the power to render the graphics, or perform the complex calculations of today's games.
A console is a different story, because they are designed specifically with gaming in mind. Many PC games now are basically console games ported over to PC format, or they are made with multiple platforms in mind. I own a PS3, and i am impressed with how games play on it. It will be interesting to see what the next gen consoles can pull off.
However that still leaves the question of PC gaming, and where it stands now. What happens when the venerable PC is finally deemed "Obsolete"?
Don't you have such high hopes now for the future of mankind?
Next we'll have cars and planes that require constant internet connections...
The non knowing average guy is exactly the problem. It is the same guy that made Steam large and powerful.
It is sad actually... back then when PC gaming was for hardcore geeks.... we always wished that PC gaming would be more democratic which much more people into it.
Now it is.... and our worst nightmares are becoming true.
Google, Facebook and many more companies are making money by selling YOUR private data to the highest bidder.
A money source game developer now also have detected. Things like Origin or Ubi Launcher are maybe 10 % about DRM.. 10 % about easier advertising and 80 % of getting valuable information about your customer that you then can sell to the highest bidder.
Of course that they make millions with your data doesnt make the game any cheaper for you.
Vote with your wallet.... dont buy anything until they change..... lethal force is the only language they understand!
For those of you that don't have kids, especially younger teen/pre-teen it may be hard to understand the always plugged in connected nature of this generation.
It's more likely for them they can't understand why you would want to play unconnected to the world around you. Consequently I think your arguments against being connected are losing ground.
I think some (not all) of the gripe here is that being always connected isn't possible...
Some people have poor internet connections that cut out....some people have weak wifi networks that cause problems....some people live in areas where power outages occur on a regular basis...
At my current place of residence, I have to deal with all 3...I have power outages all the time (laptop helps but you still lose your internet for a while), my wifi network cuts out every once in a while, and the torrent trolls that I live with cause me to disconnect from servers quite frequently...
This doesn't even address the fact that I may be in a location with my laptop that has no internet access (road trip, flights, etc.)...
I personally don't have an idealogical stance against steam or a game that requires constant internet....but from a practical standpoint it simply is not viable for me to enjoy playing such a game....part of the reason I don't play on ICO anymore is because there was no guarantee I'd even be able to stay connected to ICO to for several hours at the time (and I'm not talking about ICO's problems with DCs and MDs, though those were the main reasons)..
Not everyone can buy the luxury car.
If video games are comparable to luxury cars, then we are all part of the upper class....
Video games (both PC and console) are and have been for quite some time an element of all social classes in western society. The very very poor may not be able to afford them, but even lower class people do partake in the video game phenomenon (especially consoles).
Even if you considered video games to only be middle class entertainment, plenty of people from the middle class live where power outages are common and internet is not stable. Plenty of middle class people also travel a lot.
Yet the analogy still stands. Video games are a luxury and are marketed to those that can afford them.
Also, the idea that the youth that have had cell phones and instant access to Internet from early elementary school will somehow give this up when older is almost laughable. The Gaming Industry appears by their current actions to be marketing to the next generation of gamers, not the ones on their way out.
If the market is large enough for the disconnected crowd, I'm sure there will be some gaming companies willing to build and sell games to you.
I dont think it has to do with "class" at all. Poor people still manage to acquire PS3's, and Xbox's.
I think it is more to do about the uneducated, and ill informed. The "Dumb Ass Masses" so to speak. That will blindly buy into anything, because an advertisement tells them they want it. No research is done into what the requirements are, or what you will need to play this next big thing you didnt know you wanted until some suit told you you did.
The other end is the parent buying this thing because their kid is having an "i want this" tantrum. The parent has absolutely no clue what they are buying. They are just getting it to shut their kid up.
At my current place of residence, I have to deal with all 3...I have power outages all the time (laptop helps but you still lose your internet for a while), my wifi network cuts out every once in a while, and the torrent trolls that I live with cause me to disconnect from servers quite frequently...[/quote]
US invented the net and yet you lag behind so heavily.
Do you have fiber in the major cities, ADSL in more rural areas and 56k in areas like a Mississippi swamp?
How can you have poweroutages? I mean, the US is a 1st world country and shouldn't have poweroutages. Call the landlord or an electrician
WiFi problems? New computer or repair it.
Yeah I know I sound like Captain Obvious but I really am surprised over the crappy internet you have in the states and the power outages. So please explain. I'm interested in hearing how it can be like that
It's not that we can't have higher internet speeds like in Europe it's the ISPs around here are pretty greedy.
How can you have poweroutages? I mean, the US is a 1st world country and shouldn't have poweroutages. Call the landlord or an electrician WiFi problems? New computer or repair it. Yeah I know I sound like Captain Obvious but I really am surprised over the crappy internet you have in the states and the power outages. So please explain. I'm interested in hearing how it can be like that
America's infrastructure is in dire need of repairs, with no way to pay for the required work to keep things going. Google it.
If you are looking to start a US vs. Europe debate, know that the US has far more rural area to deal with than Europe does (at least western, northern, and southern Europe)...in any case, I never said I didn't have access to internet where I live (the access issue applies only when traveling)...you can get internet access pretty much anywhere in the states...
Second, a landlord or an electrician has absolutely no control over power outages that are the result of an issue at a power plant, etc...if it was a simple issue of getting an electrician then no one any where in the world would have power outages....
The quality of your wifi network is not at all going to be fixed by getting a new computer...and I think it's safe to say my computer isn't too old to handle wifi seeing as it's 5 months old...the problem with my wifi is that 1) there are 10 people living here in a large area sharing signal off of 2 routers and 2) we occasionally lose internet (and cable) for no apparent reason (this is relevant to wifi because the routers seem take longer to reboot than the modem, cable and DVR does)...
To elaborate more on the issue of power outages and internet/cable loss, I would estimate that we have about 2 or so power outages a month...of the almost 4 years that I've been here, we've only loss power for a prolonged period of time (half hour or more) twice, and one of those was coupled with a severe ice storm...most times the power simply flashes, but that's all you need to lose your internet, get disconnected, and be screwed...the internet/cable cuts out less often, but there are occasional times where the internet speed severely lags for no apparent reason (and yes, we've checked to make sure no one was torrenting or downloading at the time)...
Living with 9 other people means you are sharing internet with nine other people...some of them hardly use it...some of them torrent stuff all the time, and even when a torrent client caps the bandwidth you can still get lag spikes and disconnects from servers (have it happen all the time with ICO and xbox live)...I personally don't torrent but if you seriously think it's a simple matter of "yo peeps, stop torrenting so I can play SimCity because MY NEEDS ARE MORE IMPORTANT", then I don't think we have anything else to discuss...
The bottom line is that I don't have a problem with my internet situation when the typical Halo 4 or Black Ops 2 match is 10-15 minutes....I can even tolerate the risk associated with typical 1-2 hour games...but losing 4 or 5 hours on a singleplayer game building a city that I plan to come back to crosses the threshold, and thus I won't be buying SimCity until I end up living somewhere else...
This turned into quite the debate now didnt it.
I am sorry but that is a pretty dumb argument.... PC games hardly compare to luxury cars.
Besides, the case here is that the industry is more and more upgrading the once cheap and affordable Ford into a 500000 € Ferrari.
With the insignificant difference that said 500 K car will actually be broken after half the age of the Ford.
Yes, thats right... you pay 10 times the money for half the car... if you are lucky.
Now tell me... is this the direction the market should take? I dont think so.
Your not nearly as smart as Sel is Ares so I won't bother to reply.
To be fair, I think it is quite apparent that internet quality and ease of access is increasing quite rapidly...10 years ago, we had dial-up internet in my house...now we have broadband internet and a wireless router that gives us internet almost everywhere in the house (excluding basement)...I think that many people have similar stories, and I think that 10 years from now the idea of being in any sort of civilized building without good wireless access will become pure fiction...
But, that's 10 years from now...and very few video games have a longevity even close to ten years...
As it stands now (and for the likely future of games like Diablo 3 or SimCity), a lot of people who would play those games don't because they know they just don't have the internet stability to do so...I know I fall in that category, because until I graduate I am stuck with the power outages and limited internet options of the rural Midwest...and even after I graduate, who's to say I won't get a job at a school out here?
I think a bigger question is the overall business model of companies like EA...how is it that time and time again they could do something that royally pisses off a lot of people, yet still be incredibly financially successful...how does that business model even work????
I don't know why it works, but obviously it does...I am disappointed that EA has made this decision, and I will be disappointed if console games start going that route as well....but who can hardly blame them? Regardless of how many people it alienates, the business model works...EA still rolls in the cash, and people still buy its products time and time again.
Can you really blame console makers for adopting the same model?
I am a young guy at 23, but I don't need to be always plugged in. Gaming for me has always been about the singleplayer experience, with multiplayer always being secondary. Multiplayer for me has always been what we now call split-screen, when consoles only had two controllers at most, and playing with or against my brother was fun when he wasn't dominating. Connecting consoles to the internet is so alien to me that I still haven't done it yet.
A vast majority of 12-13 year old kids have cell phones, skype and tweet with friends, have ipads, build worlds with minecraft, kill zombies on COD, play LOL, watch youtube when they aren't playing minecraft or LOL, etc... They are connected and get antsy when they aren't plugged in.
Your not the same generation I'm talking about. Your over a decade behind them which is a light years of difference.
heh one year ago all I had was unlimited 3g that I was lucky enough to find out about at the last minute before the buyout by Verizon was finished...my neighbors were still on dialup, poor saps.
I was well into my twenties before I had a cell phone or a computer. Technology makes me feel much older than I really am.
If that was the case stuff like Google Fiber in KC would be impossible. The real issue is telcos suppressing competition robber baron-style. It's a failed market in the US.
If PC gaming future has, Yoda does not know.
PC gaming present, Yoda enjoys.
PC gaming past, Yoda fondly remembers.
Economic analysts go to hell, can. Bunch of amusing fakers, all of them are.
It's certainly not a failed market. The market pushes companies to where the money is. The money in the United States is in population dense areas. Dense US areas have comparable tech services to the best in the world. The problem in the Unites States is SPACE, or density. It's not economically viable to supply world class internet (or other expensive modern services) to small towns of only a few hundred people without massive government support.
For the record population density in Europe is 2.5 to 4 times what it is in the United States (depending on the numbers you look at).
"Blame the telcos" is a bad answer. They certainly do some things wrong, but it's too simplistic.
And to be on topic: PC Gaming isn't going anywhere. The DISCUSSION about the death of PC gaming is basically as old as gaming consoles.
That's how I'm feeling watching my kids...
And I work in the industry getting my first phone in my late 20's. We had one phone between the two of us for four or five years before we got a second phone. My kids aren't allowed a cell phone until towards the end of their 8th grade year (which they can't take to school until High School). The two left beg and plead but we just throw common sense back at them.
That said, their overall exposure to technology rivals the Atari and Tandy computer I had as a kid.
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