PC Gamers Too Good For Consoles Gamers?

thsoundman sends in a blog post from Rahul Sood, CTO of HP's gaming business, who claims there was once a project in development at Microsoft to let Xbox users compete against PC users playing the same game. According to Sood, the project was killed because the console players kept getting destroyed by their PC counterparts. He wrote, "Those of us who have been in the gaming business for over a decade know the real deal. You simply don't get the same level of detail or control as you do with a PC over a console. It's a real shame that Microsoft killed this — because had they kept it alive it might have actually increased the desire of game developers and gamers alike to continue developing and playing rich experiences on the PC, which would trickle down to the console as it has in the past."

Comments

Not a surprise

[SquarePixel]

It's not really surprising. There are some console players good with a gamepad, but it really doesn't work as well as a mouse and keyboard combo. With FPS games you cannot turn your character as fast and precisely as you want to, and don't even get me started on how real-time strategy games work with consoles. Keyboards also have a lot more keys available.

There is also significant amount of more intelligent gamers on PC who play strategy games, old games like nethack and adom, simulation games... They have a strategit intelligence. Consoles on the other hand are quite much just racing games, fighting games and some badly controlled FPS games.

PC gamers are also more active in modding community, programming and everything else since it's an open platform.

Re:Not a surprise

[Quaz and Wally]

PC Gamers are also much more attractive.

Re:Not a surprise

[NoZart]

As if Racing or fighting games can not be just as sophisticated as FPS. Plus all the other genres on the consoles that can demand a high level of skill.

The notion that PC gamers are more intelligent is just elitist bashing. Just because a gamer is proficient in some RTS, doesn't mean he cannot be a complete moron otherwise.

I have seen state class FPS players get stumped by something as simple as tetris.

Re:Not a surprise

[Anonymous Coward]

Its not a surprise because its been done. Twice.

Quake 3 Arena on the Dreamcast allowed cross PC-Dreamcast competition. Even though the Dreamcast version allowed for keyboard+mouse control, PC gamers absolutely dominated the scene.

Shadowrun on the 360 allowed for cross PC-Xbox 360 competition as well. Supposedly PC gamers also destroyed 360 users (although the game was plagued with lag, control and balance issues)

Re:Not a surprise

[Peganthyrus]

I pity you FPS addicts who will never know the pleasure of weaving your on-screen character through an intricate ballet of running, jumping, dancing, and attacking. There's a real pleasure to choreographing your moves on the fly in a third-person game and watching a superbly-animated character perform them that's totally lost when you're a viewpoint with an arm and a gun hanging somewhere beneath it.

FPS games are designed with a keyboard and mouse in mind; handheld controllers suck for these actions. But if the tables were turned, with games designed around a controller, I suspect you'd find that the PC players would be the ones defeated by an inadequate interface. I mean, boot up MAME and try playing Robotron with a keyboard, see how far you get, then go find a lovingly-maintained cabinet of the same game and feel the joy of grabbing dual joysticks.

Re:Not a surprise

[Toonol]

You're only talking about FPS. What about, for example, strategy games or serious simulators? I am sure PC players would pwn console gamers in those.
In fact, you can already put mouse and keyboards for 360, but they still don't seem to compare.

Nah, that's ridiculous. You're arguing that PC gamers are just gosh darn more skilled and intelligent than console gamers; more handsome, too, no doubt. Which group are you in? Let me guess... a PC gamer, coincidentally.

PC gamers obviously dominate console gamers in FPS and twitch RTS because of the the input method. That's it. The number of 360 owners that play with a mouse/keyboard is negligibly small. The mouse is a much faster and more precise controller than an analog stick. The wiimote, as an alternative, is in-between the two; I suspect if there was a multiplayer, cross-console FPS between Wii and 360 owners, the Wii owners would dominate the 360 owners. Not because they're better players; it's because of the edge their controller gives them.

In a way, if a 360 owner could hold their own against a PC owner in a FPS, I would argue the console 360 owner is probably a much better player. Winning because of a better hardware configuration isn't really a test of skill.

Your statement about PC gamers being better at strategy games or serious simulations is just silly, unless by 'strategy' you mean something like Starcraft, which is as much a twitch game as it is strategy.

Re:Not a surprise

[khraz]

I pity you FPS addicts who will never know the pleasure of weaving your on-screen character through an intricate ballet of running, jumping, dancing, and attacking
...you know, like in Quake 3.

Re:Not a surprise

[nacturation]

The Shadowrun developers said that the console players would routinely beat the PC players.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9iSzLaI9fw

The YouTube user aolish's comments sum it up pretty well:

1st Post: the biggest problem with the cross-platform play between PC and 360 on Shadowrun is that the developers nerfed the PC mouse control scheme in an effort to balance the playing field between Analog and Mouse users. This is the main reason why I never got this game. Even worse, to better even out the playing field, developers went the extra mile in giving analog users aim assist while the PC players get nothing.

2nd Post: If thats not enough, FASA also implemented a feature which causes the reticle to EXPAND during quick movements, thus lowering the players accuracy with a mouse, making it impossible to quickly turn and maintain accuracy, reducing the potential advantage of playing with a mouse. This game had a TON of potential only for it to be dragged down because of ideas like this. I do realize this was done to even out the playing field but there had to have been a better way.

Listen to what the developer says... "our job is to make sure it's a fun experience where both sides feel they can play against each other". Isn't their job to simply connect the two games together? Why the ensuring of a fun experience so that they feel they can play together? He'd never say this about two PCs playing together. So yeah, they nerfed the PC.

FPS games for the console

[Anonymous Coward]

Hahahahaha

Keyboard and mouse

[nobodylocalhost]

All it amounts to are full keyboard and mouse, and microsoft can make a ton of cash by selling them as add on accessories for the xbox360... They are just being stupid and stubborn clenching to the controller

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[Hatta]

Yep. It's not that PC gamers are inherently more skilled than console gamers. Take the best PC gamers and the best console gamers and put them on consoles and PCs respectively, and you'll still see the PC destroy the console.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[CambodiaSam]

I tried a third party accessory that lets you plug in a keyboard and mouse, but the latency was nasty. It just wasn't responsive enough to be usable. If they sold a keyboard and mouse that compared to the PC gaming experience, I'd buy it.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[Moryath]

But you have to turn off aim correction. And most console gamers wouldn't know what to do with themselves once that crutch is gone.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[Bai jie]

They don't want to sell a richer experience, they want to sell dumbed down crap that a larger market will buy in to.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[MooseMuffin]

It has nothing to do with being stubborn. They won't put keyboard/mouse support on the xbox for the same reason they didn't allow PC players to play xbox players - people sticking with the controller would get destroyed. Why would they want to intentionally ship a console in which the standard hardware puts you in a position to fail?

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[cowscows]

The important thing to realize is not that the input types evolved to improve gameplay, but rather that the games evolved to fit the controllers that were commonly available. FPS's were born on the PC, so it's not surprising that they're best played with the keyboard/mouse. Platformers did most of their growing on consoles, and that's why they work better there.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[epiphani]

No, the PC gamer on the console would still win.

He would rage at the damn xbox controller so hard that he would beat the guy using his PC with it until he had a concussion.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[amicusNYCL]

Take the best PC gamers and the best console gamers and put them on consoles and PCs respectively, and you'll still see the PC destroy the console.

TFA claims they took the "best" console players and "mediocre" PC players, and the PC players still won every time.

They don't even need to market a different controller to consoles. The main thing they can do to help balance the field is to cap the PC version's mouse sensitivity to at or lower than that of the console's turn rate, and only use a few keyboard keys to do everything.

Even so, I'm sure PC players would still win. The mouse is simply a far superior pointing device to anything controlled by my thumbs.

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[enderjsv]

You're right. A lot of console gamers wouldn't know what to do with themselves. In fact, a lot of console gamers would be incredibly surprised to realize that all this time, they've been using aim-assist (I say aim assist instead of auto-aim, because auto-aim can also refer to mods that are far more influential than aim assist). If you were to ask the random console Bioshock player or Left-4-Dead player if the game had aim assist, I wouldn't be surprised if most of them said "no." But they do.

Personally, I think it's kind of a testament to how well aiming assist has been implemented into console games. It's almost transparent, and still allows for a wide range of skill. PC gamers who don't play console games very often probably still think of aim-assist the way they think of auto-aim, that the cross-hairs instantly snap to a players head or that bullets that wouldn't have hit magically hit their targets. While the latter is still the case in some games (like left 4 dead), the former doesn't exist in any game that I am aware of. Instead, the aim-assist acts more like a weak magnet. Large analog movements have less impact the closer you get to your target. So in, say, Call of Duty, holding the analog stick all the way to the right when not targeting an enemy causes you to turn quickly. But when you're targeting a person, the person acts as kind of a magnet which means you can use larger analog movements to fine tune your shot. It's an amazing system that works considerably well and is the ONLY reason fps games work on consoles.

That being said, as a PC gamer and a console gamer, I have to say I think there are quite a few PC gamers out there who still think there's little-to-no skill involved in console shooters and that playing a console shooter couldn't POSSIBLY be as fun as playing it on the PC. I think this is a shame as I find console games with clever aim-assist to be quite fun, not at all frustrating, with a ride range of skill levels and very entertaining.

RTS games, on the other hand...

Re:Keyboard and mouse

[WastedMeat]

Some people enjoy the controller. I like being able to sit back on a couch without a keyboard in my lap and old text book as a mouse pad. It is certainly not as precise, but really, why does anyone care? It is a game. Do you refuse drinks at the bar so you can have that slight advantage when you play darts with your friends? Lots of testing has gone into balancing the games for the default controller; it is not the most precise way to play but those are the rules of the game. As long as people are not hooking up keyboards and mice to ruin the experience for those of us who had enough keyboards and mice at work, I will continue enjoying a game pad. You should borrow my AR-15, spin half a turn and aim, and see which controller best simulates the experience. Real guns (and people) have moments of inertia. A controller that introduces some clumsiness certainly doesn't break the immersion.

The real question is...

[7Prime]

who had more fun?

Re:The real question is...

[Monkeedude1212]

The winners. At least statistically, winners have more fun.

Mouse/Keyboard Vs Joystick/Eight Buttons

[eldavojohn]

I got a wireless mouse and keyboard working on my XBox 360 and then played through Modern Warfare 2 in single player mode. On my back projection TV from 1999, I was doing on average a lot better on XBox live than I was with the control pad. We set it up on my friends massive LCD with a very high response time and I felt unstoppable. It seems when you increase the input devices and give me finer tuned control I can concentrate on that and get further up the curve more easily. Might not be the same for some people but if you want to walk all over people, see if your device supports keyboard and mouse through USB and then relearn the game. It took a while but it got to the point of not being fun anymore.

I'd imagine on average the PC user would trounce the XBox 360 user. For me the killer aspect was reducing having to use my thumbs on two joysticks to look around down to the two dimensional plan of my mouse pad. Had to tweak the sensitivity a bit but really two different worlds.

Re:Mouse/Keyboard Vs Joystick/Eight Buttons

[turing_m]

Except folks who use those mice(?) with the trackballs. You guys are just weird

RSI sucks, that's the reason for the trackball. In FPS it's hard at first but I think I got within about 80-95% of my ability with the mouse (estimated just after a stint using the trackball). The problem with using a mouse is that the pain from RSI eventually drops my performance to where it's below that with the trackball, so it's not sustainable.

No fun having your arse handed to you

[syousef]

Re:The real question is...who had more fun?

It's not usually a lot of fun having your arse handed to you.

Re:No fun having your arse handed to you

[Smauler]

Can I get more performance out of mouse/keyboard? Sure. But I have less fun when I do so!

Why on earth do you have more fun when you're able to control your game less well? I really don't understand where you're coming from with this - I personally just get a little frustrated when on my new console I can't control my character as well as I did back in PC DOOM days (though I have enjoyed some FPS's on consoles). How is an inferior interface adding to the experience?

Re:Solution seems obvious:

[osu-neko]

You know a joystick costs somewhere between one half and one fifth of the cost of the game?

I'm reeling over trying to process the idea of someone interested enough in flying to buy Flight Simulator but not interested enough to buy a joystick. That seems to be a logical contradiction...

That's really what it comes down to

[Sycraft-fu]

The mouse and keyboard are superior controllers for most types of games. In the case of FPS games, the difference is night and day. There's just no way to stack up with a controller, no matter how good you are. Now for other games that is not always the case. Personally I have a game pad, a flight stick, and a wheel since I love games and I get out the controller that is appropriate for the game. However FPSes, MMOs, strategy games, RPGs, the mouse/keyboard reign supreme.

This is also why you'll see some differences in PC and console FPS design. Console FPSes use auto aim, of course, but also deal with things in a slower, less engulfing, fashion than found in some PC FPSes. With a gamepad you cannot quickly whip your character around and check your back, so it is no fun to have something where you are getting jumped from all sides. However on a PC, sure, that's a good way to add to the challenge and bring fast reflexes in to play.

Some games are just not good for consoles. Nothing wrong with that, just something to accept. As for cross platform play, I'd love to see more of it, however it just needs to be done right. In the case of any shooter games, make it co-op only. Also choose the games wisely. Street Fighter 4 probably would work well cross platform, no real advantage anywhere there. Bad Company 2, not so much the console people would get slaughtered.

Re:That's really what it comes down to

[PopeRatzo]

The mouse and keyboard are superior controllers for most types of games.

Not only is gaming on a computer superior from a control point of view, but the difference in console control has led to the horrible "innovation" of third-person gaming.

Anyone who has played an immersive first-person shooter and the clumsy third-person game (I'm thinking Splinter Cell Conviction, Mass Effect 2, etc can tell you that the 3rd person shooter is a big step backward. Instead of feeling like you're actually in the game, you feel like you're controlling a marionette with slack wires. Walk up to a low wall in a third-person game and you don't know if your character is going to jump over it, use it for cover or just run into it and stand there. You end up making adjustments that necessarily detract from the experience.

Sure, there are games on consoles that are fun, but at what price to gaming overall? I often think that we'd be a lot better off if the Xbox and Playstation had failed. In fact, sales of the PS3 have only now become profitable for Sony, who like Microsoft clings to consoles in order to enforce their greed, using the unprovable statement that "piracy" has made PC gaming less profitable as rationale. Well, if sales of the PS3 have only recently become profitable, then it stands to reason that Sony is more than willing to lose money in order to cling to its agenda of locked-down, locked-in computing. The same agenda that led to rootkits and other abominations by Sony. One reason I refuse to buy a console is because I choose not to enable this attack on computer gaming, which is still the killer app of the personal computer.

That unwillingness to enable bad corporate behavior prevents me from purchasing other products too, and from companies that I have supported in the past, like Apple. I still replace my Mac Pro and Macbook Pro every few years, but I won't buy an iPhone or iPad. I don't want to lend my two cents to Apple's belief that people will buy anything they make, no matter what. Of course, the effect of my partial boycott is non-existent, but at some point I've got to be able to live with myself, and supporting consoles (and third party shooters) and locked-down platforms would make living with myself harder than it already is.

Re:That's really what it comes down to

[capebretonsux]

While I agree with most of what you say, I think that if it were done with a ton of testing before release, a fps could work out quite well. The catch is you'd have to keep the console gamers confined to a tailor made 'class', say a heavy-armor soldier with heavy firepower, and keep pc gamers with lightly-armored and lightly weaponized soldiers. Rather than worrying about how to balance classes using the traditional methods, use the limitations of the differences between the console and pc as the limits of the playable characters in the game itself. We expect heavier classes to turn slower, move slower than lighter classes. Not sure if most gamers have both a console and a pc, but I'd guess that many do. Of course, the best scenario of this would have it sold as downloadable content, which could be installed on both a console and pc, while only being charged for a single copy (playable key) of the game itself (I figure we're dreaming of cross-platform gloriousness anyways.) Part of me still wishes, of course, that they still had released it anyways... who wouldn't want to beat up on console gamers all night long? I'd have bought a copy.

Re:That's really what it comes down to

[twidarkling]

I'd wager that if games capped the turning speed on mouse controls console gamers would be _much_ more competitive with PC gamers. As it stands now though, PC gamers have an advantage that I would have to classify as unfair, not superior.

"If you handicapped someone, they'd have less of an advantage."

I'm sorry, but you're looking at it completely back-ass-wards, and possibly as stupidly as you can. You do not get an even playing field by artificially limiting how well the best players can do. If it's purely an equipment difference, you improve the bad equipment.

If you're going to make it so that I can't play to the best of my ability, just to make up for the bad equipment other people are using, I'm probably not going to enjoy the game very much. You'll have your even playing field, because all the PC gamers will have walked off it.

Re:That's really what it comes down to

[PopeRatzo]

most PC owners would rather pirate than buy

Only the **AA believes that. And you, AC.

Re:Moddable fighting games

[jack2000]

There's the big one MUGEN, I'm sure if you dig some into it you can find others.

Look at your controller... Now back to me

[quark101]

The Old Spice guy agrees with this article.

Re:Curious

[Toonol]

none, microsoft have expressly forbid mouse support in xbox games

And you know, that actually makes sense, at least for multiplayer games. If they allowed a mouse in most competitive games, it would be as disruptive as allowing cheat codes. Players shouldn't be allowed to get an advantage because they've bought an extra peripheral. Same reason PC vs Console doesn't work in competitive settings.

Re:Curious

[Moridin42]

So... there aren't any flight sticks for flight sims, steering wheels for racers, arcade sticks for fighters, or turbo settings on 3rd party controllers because players shouldn't be allowed to get an advantage because they've bought an extra peripheral?

Perhaps there is an actual, consistent argument for not permitting a mouse to work with a console, but that most certainly is not it.