These days there something that worries me a great deal. The articles I read on various websites about how PC gaming is slowly dying. Or how when I walk into a Best Buy, or EB Games, or any other electronic outlet there is a huge decrease in available options for purchase when it comes to software and PC accessories.

First off let me explain something: YOU might be asking yourself right now why would I post this topic under the components section of the forums, and the answer is simple.

Because most of us in here are enthusiasts who use our systems for gaming and overclocking, the components section is where many of us come to find answers to questions or help others out who are having issues. ALSO since most of the components we buy are for gaming or high performance use I figured this area would be the best place to post my topic, since the situation I'm writing about will most likely affect us all.

So I will get right into it then. Have any of you realized the lack of support for PC products as I have? It seems everywhere I go now the PC sections are getting smaller and smaller. When I walk into EB games or other similar shops they tell me now that they are phasing out PC games and that their entire PC inventory is on sale for discounted prices. I go to Wal-Mart and what used to be a two section isle has been converted into a 5 ft long shelf with 15-20 titles to choose from( unfortunately all priced wrong, and with the wrong stickers attached to the shelving units as is Wal-Mart’s standard operating procedure). I go to Target and find what used to be a sizeable selection of recent PC software and gaming titles reduced to almost nothing but again a 5 foot long shelf.

I used to have one good standby, COMPUSA which always had an excellent selection of PC Software, now out-of -business. Circuit city used to be pretty good, they to are now removing their PC Software inventory and everything is currently being marked down, and the best part, they are on their way out the door too, trying to sell out.

So with all the vendors and retailers removing PC stock(including performance parts and hardware) from their shelves where does this leave all of us?? Sure you can say the internet!! But that doesn’t help you when even most of our larger sites our trimming down their offerings as well. And what about the excitement you get when you get to pick up the box look at the graphics and read the titles description. There is a tangible sense of value when you are holding the box in your hands. All of this leaves me with a huge sense of worry. I know this must be disheartening for software programmers and game design firms out there trying to make a living.

I honestly have been a PC gamer almost my entire life, I used to play the first Wolfenstein and Doom games when they were on little floppy disk's. I have been playing Blizzards' games since the first Warcraft, and Unreal since it's first version. Command and Conquer when it looked like little green squares driving around in the snow
( those were tanks) and Wing Commander too. The first Mech Warrior games. I have played them all. I also collect the boxes and keep all of my games in their original boxes. I currently have 80 mint condition game boxes. I never pirated any of the games I have played, and I think pirating sucks. I believe pirated software is the number one reason why PC gaming is going the way of the dinosaurs.

My biggest concern comes however from the hardware side of the matter, as Nvidia and ATi are at war with each other trying to build the greatest graphics cards known to man, and many of us are willingly buying them, and stacking our computers with 4+ GB of ram, and quad processors and extreme cooling systems all to be able to play the newest games at the most maxed out graphics options. Many of know that our PC's are often times 5-10 times faster than even the PS3. It's actual graphics solution is based off of the Nvidia 7800 series GPU. Take (2) GTX280's and you could easily be 10 X faster on any current game on the market compared to the PS3.

But what happens to all of us if PC gaming DIES?? All of our hard earned money and time spent configuring and building the best machines our money can buy will be wasted. Where will our hobby go? Where will the desire to make an awesome gaming system come from, ...it wont. That’s just it, if PC gaming dies, there are many other markets soon to follow. The graphics card market would crash for anything really above mid-level or entry level net surfing purpose GPU's and would revert back to integrated chips. High performance motherboard manufacturers would suffer, as would high end audio card makers. Many of the LCD manufacturers would see huge drops in revenue on anything larger than 1280X1024 screen sizes. Literally if PC gaming goes, the entire performance market would soon crash down as there would no longer be the demand from consumers for such high end components.

Recent articles involving the makers of Crysis, Titan's Quest, and now even John Carmack and ID software express they are switching their focus to consoles primarily because PC games just aren’t selling anymore. THE makers of Grand Theft Auto 4 and Mass Effect were within a hairs thickness of not releasing their games for PC this time around until the PC Enthusiasts spoke up. Console sales and gaming is wiping the floor with PC's and all the evidence supports this. But what about those of us who really dont like consoles, are we just a niche market now? I have a PS3 and honestly the only games I play are Need for Speed Carbon and Fight Night Round 3, I play PS2 games on my PS3 right now more than anything else in the PS3 library. Don't get me wrong I have 10 PS3 games, but problem is once you play through em thats it. They dont have the replay value that PC games have and dont require as much skill.

The point of my writing is to express grave concern for the PC gaming market, and to bring to light the fact that if you are "Pirating" software, you need to wake up and realize that you are killing your own favorite hobby. Many of us love our machines that we have worked for and built, and many of us use them everyday for gaming, internet, movies, and various other uses. But people if we cant bring the focus back to where it all began, (with PC's) then the Console vs. PC wars are lost, and so is our beloved past time that separates so many of us from the casual console gamer. Don't let it happen.

PAY for your games, respect the designers and programmers, who have devoted their lives to making you awesome entertainment, and start showing these development firms that the PC is still alive and kicking.

Well said

+5

I really think the two biggest problems are:

#1 Most common bought pc's don't have the hardware to run newer games. You can't own a 600$ dell with intergrated graphics and expect to run a new game. We live in a age where most people buy pre-built systems for under 1000$. Only gamers and enthusiasts buy or build pc's with the hardware required for the latest and greatest games. With a console, you buy it, and its good to go for 2-5 years. Their is no upgrading or compatibility issues with console games. Until most pc's can run most new games out of the box, Pc gaming will be just a niche market.

#2 Piracy!!!!! It's sad when a game has more pirated copies floating around then physical/paid for copies. People always want something for nothing, and eventually, if this keeps up, we will have NOTHING.

The reasoning is simple. Consoles release to a wider audience. Little Johnn down the street probably doesn't know how to install/run/tweak a PC game on his HP w/ onboard video. However his xbox 360 is ready to go out of the box when he buys a game! And many many more people have consoles than PC's capable of running newer games.

pretty much anyone can use a console gaming system. Not everyone has the hardware or know how to run PC games.

PC games aren't going anywhere I'm sure, but it will most likely not as popular as console gaming in the near future.

Also, as far as high end hardware in PC stores the reason there isn't a good selection is that those stores dont move that hardware very fast. Hardly anyone would buy a video card or sound card at a shop that charges 20%+ more than if they order it off of the internet. Same goes for software. That coupled with the popularity in consoles is killing retail hardware and software stores, but its mostly because of internet shopping and has less to do with the fact that consoles are getting more popular.
MMOs and most FPS/RTS games will always have a home on PCs for the most part. But expect to see that selection in your local best buy or circuit city dwindle more and more over time. I order all my games online anyway.

I would hate to see PC gaming go. That would be sad

Sorry but piracy is just a scapegoat some big name companies use to draw attention away from the inherent flaws with their "blockbuster" games.

Two titles are proof of this:
sins of a solar empire
The sims

I would be a bitch and quote everything.

But i decide to leave my trolling skills aside for now. Abotu distribuition of PC games, i would look to Steam and for MMORPGs. Etailers are good place to look at.

Basically only EA and a few more are still trying to go the normal distribution chain. The rest evolved. Welcome !! About piracy you can join us in Games section witch has enormous discussion always rolling with excelent numbers,facts, loads of friction and RobWright just telling us to chill a bit.

Ill leave you with a phrase, a oxymoron but, truth none the less:

Piracy is the competition in a market of exclusives.

Piracy is a real problem. It is not a scapegoat. When a game sells 1mil copies and 5mil copies have been pirated there is a problem. Are the pirated versions better? No.. they are free... Many people are cheap. They will spend 2,000 on a "Gaming" PC then not spend the 50$ on a game. It's quite pathetic. Game producers and such need to cover their costs and turn a profit. Would you stay in business if you were unable to turn a profit? No, I didn't think so. PC games and Games in general have ridiculous production costs, right up there with hollywood movies. If you want to be ignorant and think that piracy is not an issue, thats fine, but I for one don't like the feeling of sand in the eyes...Pull your head out...

People can pirate console games as well if they have the knowledge needed.

There are even emulators for the Nintendo DS and GBA so people can simply download roms off the internet and play the games for free on the PC. With the DS you can buy an R4 and play pirated games right on the DS itself.

I guess that explains why the handheld market hasn't been profitable just like the PC market amirite?

Yep. PC gaming is slowly dying, and being replaced by the console. Hell, at some point your home PC may be replaced by a console, as they are getting PC-Like functionality with web-browsing and other little programs.

Piracy is a problem, but no so much as that up until recently you could buy an entire PS3 for less than a good graphics card. And the PS3 was thought to be expensive. It's a lot cheaper than the 1-2 grand a year some people spend on their gaming rigs to keep up to date.

That's not a way to induce mass market appeal. Most homes have crappy computers with integrated graphics, and can't play the new titles. I'm glad AMD is going the route it's going.. with cheap GPU's, cheap motherboards with somewhat decent onboard GPU's, and soon ehough cheap CPU's with GPU's embedded. Robust entry level and cheap enthusiast platforms is the only way to save PC gaming.

I'm sorry, but what you just said is the main reason I am convinced that piracy is no where near as dangerous as you and various companies say it is, because the figures you just used, were, to be frank, pulled out of your ass, you have NO IDEA how many people pirated the game instead of buying it, and so its fair enough (as far as statisticians are concerned) to assume that every copy of the game that didn't sell, was due to the person who would have bought it pirating it instead, and it doesn't seem to occur to people that its possible that there is a fundamental flaw with the GAME, and people aren't taken in by all the hype out there (hence why I don't think crysis would sell, even on the console). So to summarise, if you are able to accurately count the number of times its been pirated, i'll believe you, but until then, sod off and stop using it as a scapegoat so you can keep churning out rubbish games and then sueing people for not buying it. (I don't deny there will have been lost revenue, just not nearly as much as is claimed)

i see two things that have to change in the pc gaming industry for it to succeed in the future.

Firstly, something needs to be done about piracy. Steam is a good example of what to do. If all games could work through steam, or some other similar system, piracy would shrink quickly. but i think for this to work there needs to be only one of these such systems, like having steam and nothing else.

Secondly, some effort needs to be made for the "average joe" to understand some of the more technical aspects of pc gaming. Go to a store and read the bottom of a pc game box. The requirements can be confusing. they often state: "minimum Pentium 4 2.6Ghz", and then they go and add something like "or athlon 64 3800+". to some people, this will make no sense at all, especially with the amd part. 3800+ isn't a clock speed, it's a model number. i swear i have actually seen games that say things like this. Game developpers also need to not list a minimum video card requirement by the amount of memory onboard. I have an old geforce 7600GT with 512MB of DDR2 memory, and it's light years behind my radeon HD 4850, also with 512MB of memory. AMD might be on to something with their AMD game! but it needs to be adopted by more game developpers and hardware manufacturers. Such a system IMO would clear up a fair bit of confusion.

To go with that last point, pc OEM's need to also make an effort to sell more capable low-end systems. Intel integrated graphics can't play any game made within the last 3 or so years. In a $600 computer you don't need to put in a super fancy video card, but at least something in the mid-range should be there. Even nvidia's new 9500GT might be a viable option. it's not amazing, but it sure as hell is faster than anything intel can come up with. At the same time, Intel needs to wake up and start making faster IGP's. AMD's 780-series motherboards have half-decent graphics chips built in. Some research is needed in this area to try and produce a more capable onboard solution.

I did pull that number out of my ass. Very good, you got me. Sometime take a look at some popular bit torrent sites and see how many times a game has been downloaded. My numbers were more of a ratio then a exact figure. A lot of companies figure it about 5 pirated copies to 1 sold copy from what I have read. It could be more, or it can be less, but the fact is that games are being massively pirated. I looked around after I bought Crysis and I saw that on one bit torrent site that just one of the many pirated versions of crysis floating around had been downloaded over a million times.

If a product is bad or one does not like it, how does justify stealing it? This argument makes no sense. "The game sucked and was buggy, so i stole it" WTF is that? Should we all go out and start stealing new Pontiac cars because they suck? If you don't like something you don't have to subject yourself to it, its easy. Most PC games offer a FREE demo or Beta. If that sucks don't deal with it. It's simple. But to say "it sucks, so I stole it" is just plain ignorant.

Ummm haven't we been told for the last 15 years that PC gaming was dying? Yet here it is.

You think its dying because you dont see as many games in stores? How about FilePlanet and Steam?

You're saying if gaming dies that the LCD market is going to stop producing 19" or greater LCD screens? Obviously you've never worked in an office. Hell everyone here is using at least 1440x900 monitors, several have dual 22" monitors setup.

You think memory, CPU, and mobo companies are going to die off because the smallest niche of their revenue will be gone? Please, AMD/nVidia make their money off cards that go in Dells, not enthusiast cards. Same goes for memory and mobo manufacturers.


As long as people are using PCs, they will be making games for them. As long as there are PCs and consoles, the consoles will win.

Please post this in the section it belongs and put a warning saying "Wall of text ahead" in the title.