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Console Games Sales Beat Out PC
ttol writes "In the Star Tribune, they write that "PC games fell 6.2 percent through the first 10 months of this year, making the first such decline ever." They go on to say that consoles will break record sales this year, and that there is a shift towards console gaming from PC. Is this due to the fact that there are now three major contenders (XBox, Playstation 2, Game Cube) and all the advanced features they offer (DVD ability on the first two etc)? I, for one, will continue with my Battlefield 1942 on my PC."
Given that a console costs a fair bit less than even the most basic PC, and is lot easier to look after (no BSOD or GPF on a console - yet), this should be filed under 'no-brainer'...
-MT.
Console gaming is more consistant, easier to "get in the game" and now online.
A console (depending on which) will run you $150 - $200. 1/2 the price of the hottest PC video cards alone. There is no installing, no tweaking, put in the game and go. You simply cannot beat a console for ease of use. Not to say anything is wrong with PC gaming but Mom and Dad arent going to buy thier kid a $2000 PC when they can pick up a GameCube with Metroid for under $200, and it still looks *damned* good. When all ya need to worry about is 640*480 and identical hardware, life is much easier on the developer as well.
- "Scientia non habet inimicum nisp ignorantem"
it's always been easy to pirate games. in fact, rampant PC game piracy has been on the table for as long as commercial games have been available. in the early 90's, groups like the SPA spread propaganda like wildfire. only difference is, nobody listened to them.
so, please don't make this more than it is. an industry blames declining sales on real, solid market factors, and you want to blame it on such a nebulous factor like piracy?
Although I'll admit that cost, ease of use, and superiority of games are the main reasons for the trend (like most poeple are saying), I did notice another factor that hasn't been mentioned here or in the article. If you and some friends just want to sit down (in the same room) and play a multiplayer game, do you really have a choice? How many PC games do you know of that allow more than one player on a single system at once? The consoles have that market cornered. People like playing games against their friends, and they especially like it when they can do so just sitting next to eachother on the couch.
Online multiplayer is really a different animal altogether. It will only supplement social console gaming, not replace it. Even once the consoles of the future are seemlessly online, the "controller #2" will still get a LOT of use.
pc gamers dont always have to wait. nor do console owners. Usually a game seems to come out for the system best suited for it. You typically see FPS's and RTS's come out for the pc and then the console, while a game like The Thing, which is more suited to a controller comes out for the console first then PC.
I guess its very hard to argue that piracy affects sales when piracy on a platform has always been around. I remember tape to tape copiers were a godsend when I was about 12.
Come to think of it, reducing piracy by switching to CD didn't seem to have much of an impact on sales either before or after burners became affordable.
The only platform worth developing for, if you write a computer game, is Microsoft Windows. The only API considered worth using is DirectX. I try to avoid running Windows if I can, and DirectX is a horrid, horrid API. Factor in irresponsible coding of drivers that lead to crashes, and irresponsible coding of the game itself (called the let's ship it now and release a patch syndrome), and you have a recipe for disaster. There are just too many variables to manage, too many things that can go wrong.
Oh, and last I checked, PC's don't have Rez.
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
I'm keeping the name to myself because I don't want to get fired, but trust me.. we're a major national player.
We support several platforms in our store... PS2, PS, X-Box, Game Cube, PC, GameBoy Advance/Color, N64, and Dreamcast. Our slowest moving platform out of them all is definatly the PC. The only PC stuff that moves are MMORPGs and The Sims. Sports titles on the PC are dead. We shrank our shelf-space for PC titles to make room for the other platforms. No one is buying PC hardware from us ( video cards, sound cards, network cards, joysticks ). None of it is moving this Christmas.
Meanwhile, all the consoles are hopping. You see... everyone's tried of all the problems you get playing PC games: Graphics too slow, Windows full of bugs, hard drive full, downloading patches, need a frickin network for multiplayer, etc. It's bullshit.
OR, you can shell out $200 and get a nice console w/ DVD functionality. Open tray, insert game, close tray, and that's it! You're off and playing. Games are no more expensive. They're bug-free compared to PC games. Want multiplayer? Buy a second gamepad.
PC games are collecting social security... and picking out thier casket and plot. They're not DEAD, but they are dying fast.
Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.
Anyone else notice the same game being made for gamecube, xbox, ps2, and pc? All being released simulatenously or very closs together? Well if this is the case then the PC is outgunned 3 systems to 1. Right now console's graphics power is beginning to be eclipsed by PC's power. PC games will peak up after Doom3 and games based off that engine and other "NextGen" engines come out.
I remember my first and last console, the Atari 2600 and its great (well, compared to the Apple ][ potentiameter joysticks) joystick.
The consoles I've played (PS2, mainly) suffer from what I'd call awful controllers. They're hard to control from a reaction standpoint. Their size and awkwardness is compounded by the games' reliance on a lot of other, small buttons that are hard to press while still controlling motion *and* actually holding the controller.
A true joystick can provide 3 axis of movement and allow you to hold onto the controller, freeing a hand to operate other buttons without conflicting with basic movement or controller handling.
Obviously based on sales alone, this isn't a major stumbling block for other people, but I know I'd like a PS2 a whole lot more if there was a controller I could wrap my hands around.
Oooo, three major contendors. That's so very different from the last generation of consoles, when it was only Sony, Sega, and Nintendo...
As for advanced features, there are some extremely cheap DVD players on the market that sell for little more than the consoles' DVD remotes.
As for the reasons... consoles are cheap, they don't come with the endless hassles of PCs, and many more people run BSD/Linux/OS X and can no longer play Windows games on their computers.
As for why the change is happening now, who knows? Perhaps recently a new demographic that prefers consoles has been pushed into the gaming market.
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Umm if any of you noticed, very recently PCs have become very popular. The problem is that people wanted bargain PCs, so they rush out and buy some $500 E-Machine and expect it to run everything they throw at it, never run out of space, never break, and run insanely fast. Well, that never happens, the comptuer runs 40% of the stuff you install, crashes every day, runs out of space in a week on morpheus (and broadband) and runs slower than dirt, and dirt's pretty slow! In comes the console, each console has standard hardware, whenever you buy a PS2 it's going to be like every other PS2 ever created (well there's extra stuff you can buy but the games run the same), any game you buy for that console will work and you ALWAYS get a decent framerate.
It also doesn't help that games have become way more advanced recently. I remember when I had a 50MHz 486 with 16 megs of ram (which was alot at the time), it wasn't fast, but it ran every game I installed on it (C&C Red Alert, Quake 2, Dark Forces, Journeyman Project, more that I can't remember). Now there are games like Doom 3 (which doesn't seem to work nicely on any hardware but it's just beta), B&W, UT 2003, all of them require a decent 3D card. Unfortunately the average computer today doesn't come with a decent 3D card, or in some cases enough RAM. So anyway, while alot of computers may have been bought recently, and alot of pretty good games have come out, people don't have the computers needed to run these games (or the money to buy one) so they get angry and go out to buy an xbox or a PS2 or whatever and 10 games for $700 (which is still cheaper than the PC required for most games to run smoothly.)
People have mentioned Linux as a reason for PC game slumps? Are you serious? I would wager Linux's presence has no effect on PC game sales.
Speaking for myself, I prefer PC games hands down over consoles. However, if I had to buy a gift for a family member who likes games, I'd get a console. Consoles are cheaper and easy-to-use, as has been pointed out. The steps needed to play a console game out of the box vs. the PC equivalent are ridiculously simpler.
Plus, consoles are sitting-around-the-sofa-with-friends machines, wheras PC's are sitting-around-alone-in-your-underwear machines. Introducing the social element to a game (including sports) seems to always draw crowds. FPS's suck on console, but other genres are much better with a pad than with mouse and keyboard, like flight games, driving games, etc.
I did just that. I dot tired of fighting with Windows and video card drivers.
Amen!
I've done this myself.
Do you find yourself using the console or the computer more now? When I had a lot more games on my machine I found I played more games than I do with the console. Maybe that's just me!
A few years ago I got a game called Creatures. Then Creatures 2 and Creatures 3. Played the game itself like a maniac for a few months. Then while playing C2 one creature I wanted was going to die because of genetic defects. Not sure why but I spent a month writing a plugin for the game that could monitor the game and optionally inject creatures to prevent them from dying. I also wrote a program to read the game's image files and draw the creatures from the game. Currently it's being used to put images of them in web sites. And all this information I needed was on the official site.
None of this would have been possible on a console of course. I've heard it's been ported to gameboy advance, but I never heard anybody talk about it much. It can't be the same thing. What I want in a game is first that it's good of course, and second that I can poke around when I get tired of the normal game.
If anybody is feeling curious, the latest version is available for free here, and there's a Linux version.
On the flip side, buy a computer (or components to make a PC), spend the afternoon (or day) putting it together, install OS, tweak OS, download drivers/bios updates, install game.... usually at this point there is a crash somewhere (BSOD or GPF), look for a patch to the game, look for the beta drivers that will let you play the game with your hardware.... and on and on and on.
You get the picture. I have to admit to having built a monster PC, but still playing games on my PS2. Sure the hardware on the PC is more suited to playing games, but it just is not worth the hassle of trying to get the games to run. I stated this in a letter to the editor of Maximum PC and got ripped for it.... but it is true....we are from the government - we are here to help...
I'm using my computer now as much as I used it before. But I'm playing more games with the console than I've used to play with the computer. The console has made playing games so much easier that it encourages me to play more. And at the same time, NOT playing with my computer gives me more time to do useful things with it and not to fight with driver dependencies. A win-win situation, I would say.
No, I doubt I could imagine playing NWN on a TV. But I play it at 1024x768. On the other hand, I could never imagine seeing Metroid on anything other than my TV screen. It's all about which way you're looking for.
Resolution does not equal good graphics. Final Fantasy X was one of the most beautiful looking games I've seen, on that TV. Crappy graphics are crappy graphics at any resolution.
I don't care much for sports or racing. I also really like good graphics, and 3D simply is not up to par on that.
From what I've seen so far, none of these kinds of games seem to exist on any console; partly because the TV resolution is really limited. So does that mean that I'm stuck with the PC forever? Or are there any games that fit this profile on any of the major consoles?
I'd really like to switch. But right now, it looks like I can't.
I play mostly military sims - IL2 Sturmovik, Operation Flashpoint and Ghost Recon (though it has a more cartoony feel than anything else). I have yet to see a serious combat game on any console, but I would like to. Halo was great fun because of the AI that fought with you, but I'd like to be able to control them. Of course you can't do that with a traditional console controller, or you could but it would take 15 seconds to tell a squad to go left or something. I don't know if there's a keyboard or similar accessory for XBox, but there should be one. Not standard (it would make it too much of a computer) - a 3rd party product would be fine. Playing games on a TV (even if it is only 27" - but high quality 27"!) is definitely better, and it *does* have a more social feel, if anything involving video games can.
Also the wide range of PC hardware can be an advantage for those games that scale to meet the hardware's capabilities. IL2 Sturmovik is a great example of this: you can turn the detail down on a low-end machine and play it smoothly, but if you have lots of memory and a fast CPU and video card, you can turn everything up and it'll look much better than any flight simulator on a console would 'cause the hardware is just better.
Consoles have that social advantage that PC's just don't have... 2 to 4 people or more can play against each other on the same screen - on the sofa with their feet on the coffee table no less - and talk smack about each others mothers all night long. You can't do that on the PC.
Even LAN parties seem dorkish and antisocial in comparison.
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There's not really much of a "war" per say going on between PC games and consoles. It's like saying that there's a war going on between fans of rap music and fans of rock music, it's two different audiences that even sometimes listen to both. It's not like anyone is going to stop producing rock music because (ugh) rap is more popular. Usually when a game enjoys large amounts of success on one platform they bring it over to the other one (ie. Final Fantasy 7 and Tony Hawk to PC, Ghost Recon to consoles)
PC games are geared towards a more intellegent, connected, hardcore gamer, focusing on genere's like RTSs, MMORPGs, and online shooters (many of which have adopted Counter-Strike's turn based system over "run and gun"). Could you picture Warcraft III having nearly as much success as it did on a PS2? America's Army? Ghost Recon? Neverwinter Nights? These games require a more mature, dedicated gamer, willing to invest large amounts of time into their video game addiction. Often times that is why the PC gaming experience is also so rewarding.
You have console gamers: dropped $150 on a cool new console, picked up GTA: Vice City or Madden 2002, they want to chill out for a night, not invest hours into creating a cool new scenario, role play as a dungeon master, devise real life military tactics only to wait 10 minutes to shoot maybe 1 person, or have a 2 hour game of Warcraft. They want to see Tommy Vercetti use swear words and shoot people.
It's a totally different market, geared towards different types gamers. The reason console games outsell PC games is simply because there's a lot more casual gamers out there. However, as long as there's always intellegent gamers out there, there will always be a market for intellegent games.
"In a Democracy, people get the kind of government they deserve." -Winston Churchill
I think the single most important reason why console game do well is exactly the single most important reason why cellphones do well: They are easy to use. Switch it on, press a couple of buttons and off you go. No matter how much easier computers have become they are still very difficult to use when compared to gadgets.
I think both microsoft and sony will attempt to make their consoles more and more capable in that they will go online, do surfing, mail, messaging etc without the user having to wait eons for the programme to load. They might even start integrating stuff like office (XBOX version) eventually. If it still works like a gadget people will use it and like it.
Another factor in gaming is that there are extremely few really innovative games. Most follow well known genres because the publishers are afraid of taking risks.
Mario World and all the other kiddie games
A significant fraction of people who have enough free time to spend a significant amount of time and money on video games are people who have not graduated from high school. Thus, kiddie games make money.
Even if you leave out the fact that most children can save up their allowance and afford a console but not a PC, most of the PC titles available nowadays are first-person shooters, real-time tactical sims, or massively multiplayer online role-playing games. Most FPS games are rated M for graphic violence; stores will card buyers, and many parents will shy away. Most RTS games require more concentration than the average elementary or middle school age player can handle; kids won't want them. Most MMORPG games are rated M for signing a contract and paying real money every month; kids can't buy them.
Oh man, the console games just blow the PC games away in terms of depth and playability...
If you intended this as sarcasm, then you probably haven't played many good console games. Have you played Super Mario Sunshine? But have you actually played it, or are you answering based on your preconceptions of what a "Mario" game is like? There's more depth in Sunshine than in some of the more mindless FPS games.
Will I retire or break 10K?
For the most part, that's true. Metroid Prime suffers from a rare, but widely reported lockup bug. I've had it happen to me once. My friend's new Bond game for the PS2 has had some weird, but rare gltches every now and then- like massive slowdowns to like 2 FPS on deathmatch levels. I had a problem with a consitent lockup on FF7 a few years back. The new LOTR games on the XBox and GBA both have their share of problems.
It isn't that it doesn't happen. It is just less frequent. I fear that the use of hard drives in consoles will make QA less off an issue, since they will be able to apply patches.
This is going to sound real odd, but I used to be an avid PC gamer...since the c64, but I now own 3 consoles and rarely even use my PC anymore. What is odd about this is that I feel like I've 'outgrown' PC style gameplay, and now prefer kiddie-style GameCube and PS2 games.
The main reason? I can't play PC games on the couch with my girlfriend. Back when I lived in a dorm, and being social was unavoidable, I could get away with playing counterstrike 4 hours a day. But today, the last thing I want to do when I get off work is to hunch over YET ANOTHER computer keyboard and play games either by myself or with random idiots on the internet.
I want to relax on the couch. I want to play a game where my girlfriend and anyone else who happens to stop by can join in. I can think of dozens of console games that meet this criteria, but not really any PC games.
To me, having fun with friends will beat out stunning, immersive 60fps fragfests anyday. And, no, I don't like making friends online.
RESOLUTION
-Until HDTV is widespread and consoles are rebuilt to compensate, why would I take a giant leap backward by lowering my gaming experience to a television screen?
PORTABILITY
-I can run high-end 3d games on my Mac Powerbook G4. I can run them in the backseat of a car, on an airplane, or in bed. Why would I want to tie myself to a television screen?
[[Insert Sophomoric Movie Quote Here]]
Just another person saying "me too". I don't like the idea of having to pay an arm and a leg for an inferior operating system that I have no control over, have to worry about licenses on my fucking home computer, and start juggling anti-virus software and personal firewall applications, just to play games. I used to do just that (albiet shortly), with Windows 98 and Redhat.
But, I suppose I wised up. Now I just run RH 8 on my PC. No license fees, it was only $40 (yes, I do pay for my copies), and I don't need a bunch of other applications running on top of it just to keep me safe and running OK. As an added bonus, I get all of my productivity software for free or for much, much less.
I no longer buy PC games unless they are Linux ports. I don't like any game company that only develops or licenses for the Windows platform. I know that they have to make a living, but fuck 'em, that's just my opinion. I have turned down jobs that pay more (in some cases $5,000 more a year) then I make now because the job entailed using Microsoft technologies or furthering their monopoly. If I, the little guy, can win out with my concious and reject a few extra thousand to prevent evil from spreading, then so can they. For games I now have my GameCube and my Gameboy Advance, and I'm happy.
Food for thought: The GameCube with 2 games and the Gameboy Advance with a battery adaptor all together cost me far less then a copy of Microsoft Office and Windows XP would have - especially in the long run.
1- Consoles do not run Windows, and are therefore much more stable.
2- A console does not need a $350+ video card upgrade every 12 months to run the current batch of games.
3- Console games are not regularly released in a beta state by broke game companies that need sales to finish the code and release a giant patch.
4- The more time we spend parked 12" away from a monitor at work, the more we value gaming ten feet away on the La-Z-Boy.
People act as if this is some sort of new phenomenon - the fact is depending on what numbers you count (whether you include hardware and accessories, whether you count worldwide or just US, etc.) the console game industry is anywhere from five to twelve times the size of the PC game industry. That doesn't happen overnight - in fact, I'd bet it's been that way since the days of the Atari 2600. The 2600 sold 28 million units over its lifetime, mostly in the US - does anyone really think 28 million people had PC's (especially for gaming purposes) in this country in, say, 1982? I sure don't. I don't think PC's reached that sort of penetration until the mid 1990's.
There was a time after the video game crash of 1984 when I would guess the PC game industry probably eclipsed the console game industry for a couple of years. But ever since the debut of the NES in 1985 console gaming has been gaining momentum again, and it's only accelerating as the PC game industry slowly dries up.
PC gaming has become very hit driven, and that's really screwed up the economics of it. A lot of people (especially here) think of PC gaming as some sort of panacea of free ideas where any average joe can break in with a brand new concept and make money, but despite the tighter control by manufacturers that actually better describes the console industry than the PC game industry. PC gaming has become little more than MMORPG's, real-time strategy, first-person shooters, and The Sims. It's become extremely tough for the little guy to break into the market. Meanwhile, console developers have better distribution and co-marketing with manufacturers. It's a lot easier for new concepts to gain traction (though the console industry is still very genre-oriented, it's not quite as hit-driven as the PC game industry. It's very easy for a decent game to make money without breaking the top 20). Most console games are games you'd never see on the PC because nobody'd ever take a chance on them, whereas most of the better PC games do appear on consoles.
People have been talking about convergence for a long time, but it seems to me that what we're really seeing is divergence. Instead of using one PC for all sorts of productivity and entertainment applications, we're using many devices for specialized applications. People just seem to like gaming on consoles better than on PC's, and eventually games on PC will probably be pretty few and far between. The PC itself is being redefined and will probably end up more limited in scope than what we've traditionally used them for in the past (despite this "media center" BS that MS is trying to push through) - I'm guessing the laptop form factor will eventually take over as the default PC configuration in the home, which will limit gaming upgrade options even further. No big loss; game consoles are cheap and powerful and there's no real drawback to using one over a PC for gaming.
Sure, BF1942 appeals to you and me, but not to most people enough to buy a good PC, get broadband, etc.
Look at a typical PC gamer. They're often kind of geeky and own only a couple games. They'll speend a year playing Everquest. The only FPS they'll play for two years is Counter Strike. The only RTS they'll play is Starcraft. And usually they only play one of those three games. They'll be REALLY good at their own games, but that is all they ever buy.
Look at a console gamer's library. Typically this is any teenager and now a days many adults. They'll have a football game or three, a hockey game, a wrestling game, a couple fighting games, a couple driving games, a couple platform games, a couple RPGs, etc.
A PC RPG fan will get stuck in Diablo forever, while a console player will beat FFn then buy FFn+1 and Grandia and Mario Party. A PC FPS fan will play BF1942 online for months while a console FPS fan will play Metroid Prime and Halo and then buy Gran Tourismo and Grand Theft Auto.
It's not hard to figure out why console sales are up and PC sales are down. Console games are fun and have an end. PC games are designed to be played for much longer. Console owners end up owning much more games and a diverse selection of games.