Are Video Games nearly dead?

[DC 536]

Who the hell said anything about running them at top spec? GTA V on the PS4 and Xbox aren't being run at "top spec" compared to the top setting on PC so your point's rather wasted.

I've always thought that being able to run the same games as consoles at a higher spec is the main attraction of PC gaming when it comes to cross-platform releases.

 

No-one is says mods don't exist (far from it), but while they are common / prevalent in the circles we frequent, from the general public's POV, they are a relatively minor niche in PC gaming (to use an admittedly basic analogy, it's like wrestling; pretty much everyone knows that wrestling exists, but the majority know of WWE and that's it. They have no knowledge of minor / indy promotions and the fans of that are a sub-set of the general wrestling fanbase. The modding community is just like that).

 

PCs and consoles have co-existed for decades and there's no reason for that to change. The initial question was are videogames nearly dead and the answer is no (on PC and on consoles). However, I firmly believe that the average gamer will buy a console for gaming and there will always be a market for it in the foreseeable future.

 

You almost seem to be taking this personally for some reason and I have no idea why.

[dsrchris 190]

Personally I don't really like gaming on my laptop. It just doesn't feel...comfortable, I guess? And to make it comfortable, it involves a whole load of faff each time with plugging the laptop into my TV and fiddling with controllermate to customise my controls and gumph.

 

It's a hell of a lot easier to hit the power button on a console and veg out on the sofa. I'm fairly sue I'll always be a "computer for working/surfing, console for gaming" kind of guy.

[DC 536]

Yeah; with the PS4, it's just hit the PS button, pick the game from the crossbar and play.

[Evil Gringo 279]

The only problem I have now is basically the same issue as Chris.

 

I had to install the following updates for games I bought and installed on my X-Box even though I own the disc...

 

Far Cry 4 - 2gb

Halo: Master Chief Collection: 16gb

Forza Horizon 2: 4gb

Mortal Kombat X - 2.4gb

 

There are more but not one single game, even on the day of launch, has actually allowed me to put in a disc and just play the god damn game. Even stuff like Lego Batman 3 and Wolf Amongst Us needed a 100mb update or so.

 

Publishers need to stop releasing games that are incomplete or broken to match deadlines. Do what they did in the old days, until you knew when something was going to be finished and fully tested just loosely commit to a year. AC: Unity got pushed back a month and it was still a hot mess when it was released. By the time I finally rented it in February 2015 and had to download a HUGE updated before I could play (around 4gb) it was fixed but that sort of time span and update should not be required for something that cost so god damn much to make and had been in development for two years.

[Omega 354]

I've always thought that being able to run the same games as consoles at a higher spec is the main attraction of PC gaming when it comes to cross-platform releases.

 

No-one is says mods don't exist (far from it), but while they are common / prevalent in the circles we frequent, from the general public's POV, they are a relatively minor niche in PC gaming (to use an admittedly basic analogy, it's like wrestling; pretty much everyone knows that wrestling exists, but the majority know of WWE and that's it. They have no knowledge of minor / indy promotions and the fans of that are a sub-set of the general wrestling fanbase. The modding community is just like that).

 

PCs and consoles have co-existed for decades and there's no reason for that to change. The initial question was are videogames nearly dead and the answer is no (on PC and on consoles). However, I firmly believe that the average gamer will buy a console for gaming and there will always be a market for it in the foreseeable future.

 

You almost seem to be taking this personally for some reason and I have no idea why.

 

And I firmly believe the opposite of just about everything you've said. You're also massively wrong about modding but I'm not here to convince you about it and I don't care enough to keep saying the same thing over and over when my point and reasoning is pretty clear.

[Evil Gringo 279]

Modding is like DLC really. If you own a PC game and you love it enough you will mod it to expand your experience just like you will get DLC if you love a console game enough. Difference is modding is open ended in its possibilities where as DLC is limited to what the developers and publishers wish to give you and driven by them trying to make more money from you where as modders just really love the game.

 

Look at G-Mod as well. It is HUGE and all it is really is people modding the Half Life 2 game and engine but oh my, how they have opened it up to so many different possibilities. But like I say it is massive at the moment in terms of popularity and people are building and modding and creating new stuff every day.

 

It is one of the things that Vanoss and his friends play on the most - Vanoss has over 11m YouTube subbers, that means quite a large portion of those at some point will try the game meaning a possible audience of what, up to 11 million possible modders or soon to be modders or just people enjoying the work of other modder's?

 

I'm not a huge PC gamer or modder but I have mods for stuff on my n64 emulator, like No Mercy, I have mods for Panzer General 2 and Pacific General and Peoples General, mainly to make them work on 64-bit OS systems (PG2 was developed in a time where people could still run MS-DOS as their OS of choice) but also with new scenarios, campaigns, units and all sorts.

 

Like Megs says, modding has been around for a long time and is hugely popular, the earliest mods I remember playing where for Civilisation 2 back in 1996 and I even modded Champ Manger 1997-98 using the editor they included with the game to create an accurate World Cup 1998.

 

If something is there on the cheap or even free that people can find for their existing games to make that enjoyment and investment last longer then they will.

[Omega 354]

If you check out any minecraft content on youtube it's all people running different mods of the game, the reason minecraft is still so popular is because of the community content and less about the updates to the game. Skyrim is also still being played because of the mods that change up the game play whilst the elder scrolls online is dying on it's arse.

[The Fury 65]

I must say I do like my pc games with total war series and football manager.

 

can someone tell me why on earth it takes ages to install games on xbox one and not as much time on ps4?!

[etz 78]

The thing is, a huge chunk of the "pc gaming" figure is actually coming from casual mobile gaming, at least in the stats I've seen, so they can be a bit misleading, especially as they also count web based "games", like farmville.

 

Personally, I'd be pretty surprised if things don't go down the console + tablet route for most casual gamers (actually, it pretty much has already, just from friends facebook statuses). PC's in the traditional sense are largely superfluous at home if you haven't got specific tasks in mind. Consoles have the bonus of being on your TV without any hassle, which hooking a laptop onto and off of can be a pain, not to mention connector wear and tear on the laptop etc. Plus, PC's have a habit of going wrong and being expensive to fix, yadda yadda yadda, so on and so forth.

 

Of course, for hardcore gamers, the PC is where it's at, always has been, always will be. We're are also the people who pay for Day 1 DLC and horse armor, so we'll always be catered for. But, we mostly have consoles too.

[Evil Gringo 279]

PC's aren't always expensive to fix. If you go for a like for like part then the part should now be cheaper as unless you somehow blow a CPU or graphics card on the week or month you buy it the part will now be older and therefore cheaper, its only if you go for a newer part that it could be the same price or more expensive.

 

Plus most of the time, when people 'break' PC's it is a software fault or an error they have caused which can be fixed quite cheaply or at no cost at all. If you look after your PC then it shouldn't break any easier then a console really.

[Omega 354]

You can't lump tablets in with pc's except to say that they offer another reason why having a console becomes more of a luxury.

 

I don't expect the console to die in the next year or anything but I look at all the various console manufacturers there have been and then. Consider whilst console creators come and go the PC remains because it never relies on one manufacturers ideas.

 

Look at Nintendo, sat firmly atop the console tree for so long and now reliant on a mobile platform. When Sony or MS fail to capture a decent market share and that leaves you with one console out there, never good for an industry to rely on one source for innovation.

 

All the while there's a universe of possibilities being explored on the PC where there's no limits on design. Real indie gaming can create a game from nothing, it can buck trends and isn't reliant one the single input of how one company believes gaming goes.

[DC 536]

Consider whilst console creators come and go the PC remains because it never relies on one manufacturers ideas.

Neither do consoles.

 

Sure, a lot of consoles / console manufacturers have gone by the wayside, but there has always been someone else to step in and take over with their own console to keep the market alive.

[Omega 354]

That's not my point though DC.