Are Consoles Holding Back PC Gaming?

[RobertR1]

Avoiding being an early adopter gets around a lot of problems. Don't buy a GPU on day one, or buy a game on release day. That's never in your best interests.

I think today's PC gaming is vastly more accessible than it has been in the past. Even the recent past. Hardware works better today than it did 8 years ago or so. VIA chipsets anyone? Win9x? DOS?!

If you want the freedom that we have to do just about whatever we want with the hardware and software, I think it's impossible to approach the plug-in-and-go nature of the consoles. Those boxes are the pinnacle of non-freedom but you get the ultimate in mindless simplicity as a result of the tight control.

Besides, is accessibility actually beneficial to game quality? It seems to me that some of the best and move innovative games have been made in the "worst of times" and that the console world doesn't get better games because everything is "so easy to set up". Having a massive new group of people on tap to buy the games doesn't guarantee quality either.

It's not in my best interest to buy a game on release day?

This is exactly the conditioning I was referring to. PC gamers are expecting to have major issues with games! That's ridiculous! I can't recall the number of games I've played on the 360 this generation that I bought Day 1 without issues because the number is so high. Same thing with prior gen of consoles. The devs know that if they release buggy games on closed platforms, their sales will suffer. On the PC's it's an accepted. Clearly not accepted by the masses as they do their gaming on consoles.

Here's who I'd recommend PC gaming for. Someone who is will to wait a year to play a game. By that time, hopefully, the game has been stabilized, the mod community (if it exists for this game) has put out some worth content and the hardware has been optimized for game. Getting a PC game on Day 1 is like asking to get kicked in the balls and praying it doesn't hurt this time.

 

[swaaye]

It's not in my best interest to buy a game on release day? This is exactly the conditioning I was referring to.

Heh. Actually I like paying $20 or less for a game instead of $50. And since I've been playing games for 25 years and since I write software, I know that there will be problems. That's how software works, period.

Consoles didn't have the ability to have patches but oh yea that's changing now with their hard drives. You think older console games didn't have problems?

RobertR1 and Scott_Arm, you two are just a bit jaded methinks.

 

[Scott_Arm]

I had problems with my last two video cards, which were no longer cutting edge, where newer drivers introduced graphical and performance problems in games that had previously been stable. Download the hotfix driver for the new game you just got, and some of the other games you have stop working. Great.

As for quality control, PC gaming was horrible for a long time. It might be better now, though judging from the PC forum there are many problem games still. The thing is, the console is still far better in terms of stability and bugs, and the advantages of PC gaming are dwindling.

If the solution to PC gaming is to play old games, like Stalker, Oblivion and Deus Ex, then consoles are hardly holding back PC gaming.

 

[swaaye]

The only advantages on PCs are modding, a few unique games, MMOs and extra hardware power. If none of that matters to ya, then by all means head on over to locked-down console land.

Gaming in general lately is losing its appeal to me because there are few games that feel new and exciting to me these days.

The industry is being most affected by huge game budgets and IMO realignment of game development priorities to target a gamer with different interests than was historically the case.

 

[Scott_Arm]

...That's how software works, period.

Except on consoles. Seriously, the quality control in console games is vastly higher. The only game I've played this gen that had any serious problems was NHL10. The extent of those problems in NHL was occasional freezing in one of the game lobby screens. But since the game boots up in a few seconds, and you can get back to where you were without having lost anything, it's hardly a show stopper. That is literally the most severe bug I have experience in a console game for the last couple of years. I don't think I experience anything on any of the PS3 games I played.

You put the games in the machine, they work.

 

[swaaye]

Well I don't really know first hand how amazing PS3 or 360 are because I don't own them. Why not? Because the games I want are also available for the PCs that I already own. But really, honestly here, PC gaming just isn't making me mad from the endless problems you two guys seem to have.

I know that I can't mod games on consoles though. That's one big reason I avoid them. And there's no STALKER series (one of which is only about 4 months old now?) I've been playing DIRT 2 as well which plays awesome on my old 8800GTX at 1360x768 16X CSAA on the TV.

If you want to see some retro console instability, I can name some N64 games for ya though! Oh and you don't want to play Morrowind for Xbox unless it's the "fixed" GotY (or was it Platinum) edition. There are plenty of older console games that were messy.

 

[homerdog]

It's not in my best interest to buy a game on release day?

This is exactly the conditioning I was referring to. PC gamers are expecting to have major issues with games! That's ridiculous! I can't recall the number of games I've played on the 360 this generation that I bought Day 1 without issues because the number is so high. Same thing with prior gen of consoles. The devs know that if they release buggy games on closed platforms, their sales will suffer. On the PC's it's an accepted. Clearly not accepted by the masses as they do their gaming on consoles.

Here's who I'd recommend PC gaming for. Someone who is will to wait a year to play a game. By that time, hopefully, the game has been stabilized, the mod community (if it exists for this game) has put out some worth content and the hardware has been optimized for game. Getting a PC game on Day 1 is like asking to get kicked in the balls and praying it doesn't hurt this time.

I play lots of PC games and rarely do I feel "kicked in the balls". It happens sometimes (STALKER games tend to be shit on release), but the good far outweighs the bad in my experience. Especially in the last couple of years.

As far as hardware goes, my PC is a bastion of reliability in comparison to Xbox.

 

[Scott_Arm]

Your PC might be, and mine were generally pretty good, minus a few big problems, but if you read game forums there are a lot of PCs with severe problems out there. Valve sees five times as many game crash reports per gaming minute on the PC compared to Mac. This could be a combination of drivers, overclocking, viruses, application conflicts and bugs in their own code. All of it speaks to a platform that is undeniably less stable than both Mac and console as platforms. People who are not computer savvy are not going to want to deal with any of that. They can plug in a console, pop in a game disc and it will work. The benefits for PC gaming are becoming less distinct now that consoles are catching up (and sometimes better) in the online space. Modding is the one space that PC has as an advantage, which I'd say is a niche advantage, and I expect the console space to catch up in that regard next gen. Consoles will have 250 gigs of storage as a minimum next gen.

The only thing holding back PC gaming is PC gaming.

 

[Neb]

I play lots of PC games and rarely do I feel "kicked in the balls". It happens sometimes (STALKER games tend to be shit on release), but the good far outweighs the bad in my experience. Especially in the last couple of years.

As far as hardware goes, my PC is a bastion of reliability in comparison to Xbox.

I share your experience. Rarely does game give any problems on my system, very rare. Reliability is top and same on other systems I maintain. With RROD in mind and then the problems with the black Xbox/Crystal Xbox I had last-gen I am in heaven with a PC!

You put the games in the machine, they work.

Until the disc gets scrathed, machine dies just after 1 year warranty or just after a week. Warranty for consoles are crap, 1 year but only 30 days to get it exchanged in store else you have to send it to Microsoft/Sony and wait for weeks.

 

[swaaye]

The grass is always greener on the other side, I guess.

 

[homerdog]

Your PC might be, and mine were generally pretty good, minus a few big problems, but if you read game forums there are a lot of PCs with severe problems out there. Valve sees five times as many game crash reports per gaming minute on the PC compared to Mac. This could be a combination of drivers, overclocking, viruses, application conflicts and bugs in their own code. All of it speaks to a platform that is undeniably less stable than both Mac and console as platforms.

I also see these severe problems being reported and with the amount of gaming I do it baffles me how I am never affected. PC is overclocked and I do tons of stuff (IQ tweaks, image mounting software etc.) that would be considered abnormal for the average user. And I can count the number of CTDs I've had while gaming in the last year on one hand. Last problem I had was Just Cause 2 demo crapping out when using the CUDA effects, and that due to my being lazy and not updating drivers in 6 months.

And "console gamers don't want to deal with updates" is not a valid response; went to fire up some UC2 on my PS3 the other day and had to install a *mandatory* update that took ~20 minutes - longer than a video driver update that doesn't even require a reboot.

OTOH the only console game I've completed recently (Uncharted 2) locked my PS3 up 3 times on my first playthrough. The Heavy Rain demo froze on me too.

The industry is being most affected by huge game budgets and IMO realignment of game development priorities to target a gamer with different interests than was historically the case.

I agree.

 

[Davros]

I
OTOH the only console game I've completed recently (Uncharted 2) locked my PS3 up 3 times on my first playthrough. The Heavy Rain demo froze on me too.

But surely that can be explained by justice

 

[Sigfried1977]

As a console gamer first and foremost I do agree that in general you get a more stable and carefree experience, but it isn't by any means devoid of issues. I bought my PC around January (Win 7 64) and I still have yet to experience a full on system crash. Besides Cryostasis (which suffers from the Stalker curse apparently, yet it was still one of the most fresh and unique experiences I had with games in a long time) which likes to boot me to the desktop on a regular basis, all the games I own on the thing run pretty much flawless and perfectly stable. I keep the system lean and tidy, and I guess it helps.
On the other hand I had dozens of crashes while playing Fallout 3 on my PS3, plenty of crashes with Dragon Age (also PS3), skipping music issues with Wipeout HD, crashes with Tomb Raider Underworld, Sacred 2, Assassin's Creed locking up the system and so on and so forth. Even if it might sound like a Weaaboo-thing to say, but unstable software seems to be a Western thing mostly. The Japanese stuff is usually polished to a high shine.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Until the disc gets scrathed, machine dies just after 1 year warranty or just after a week. Warranty for consoles are crap, 1 year but only 30 days to get it exchanged in store else you have to send it to Microsoft/Sony and wait for weeks.

You can install games on the hard drive. If you take care of a DVD it will last a lifetime.

Is the warranty on your PC or pc parts any better? I really doubt it.

 

[Sigfried1977]

^thing is when a PC's DVD drive craps out on you, you can just throw it out and replace it yourself. You don't have to send the whole system in.

 

[Neb]

You can install games on the hard drive. If you take care of a DVD it will last a lifetime.

Is the warranty on your PC or pc parts any better? I really doubt it.

You have to add a bigger HDD and loose the consoles warranty in the process to accomodate several games.

Yes, PC parts have 1-5 years warranty and within atleast one year the store has to handle the exchange for a working part.

 

[joker454]

I play lots of PC games and rarely do I feel "kicked in the balls".

I still get that kicked in the balls feeling sometimes on PC, it's a bit frustrating. The last PC game I bought was Metro 2033, and like most PC games it just wouldn't work out of the box. It would error out with a missing physxloader.dll error, or something like that. It took a little over an hour to get the game working as the first 7 usual "works for me" solutions didn't work, but eventually I found the exact sequence of steps needed to fix the problem. So while I did have the patience myself to fix the issue, I can empathize with others that are simply fed up with that and just moved to console.

And "console gamers don't want to deal with updates" is not a valid response; went to fire up some UC2 on my PS3 the other day and had to install a *mandatory* update that took ~20 minutes - longer than a video driver update that doesn't even require a reboot.

That's just the PS3 though, it's a terrible console for updates in that they tend to be large and download really slowly. Patches in general on PS3 are a painful process. The 360 though patches executables in mere seconds, and installs are optional so you can just instantly play if you want to.

Heh. Actually I like paying $20 or less for a game instead of $50.

I can definitely understand that as well, but then the PC guys need to stop asking why the PC platform on its own cannot support big budget games when people have that kind of mentality. Likewise, buying 20 games for $50 on steam deals is fun, but it does not pay the development bills.

 

[swaaye]

I still get that kicked in the balls feeling sometimes on PC, it's a bit frustrating. The last PC game I bought was Metro 2033, and like most PC games it just wouldn't work out of the box.

See I think this is where people don't really understand the diversity of the PC software landscape.

I can whip up an app that's $50 and sell it and MS isn't going to come by and validate it for me to make sure it's not shitty. Does that mean the PC world is riddled with horrible non-functional software? Well yes I suppose it is!. But that's just how it is! We have freedom to do whatever we want. This is a strength IMO. The diversity of the personal computing world is unbelievable. It would be an awful thing if personal computing became anywhere near as restricted as console "computing".

I think the vast majority of games are decent software. But yea you occasionally get one from a little company without a lot of money or experience and then you run into problems. It's unfortunate that some people aren't patient enough with these companies nor capable of actually doing a quick search to find out if a piece of software is problematic. And of course Internet forums, where gamers hang out, have their anonymity that allows everyone to have their easy no-consequence self-fulfilling self-deserving meltdown.

Re my $20 statement and your saying that those like me who occasionally don't buy games not on day 0 are causing the end of the world, well yeah right. How about the console rental land? I can't rent games. I can't even sell my used PC games anymore because of the DRM and serial key stuff. But console people rent away, beat a game, and then that's it. Consolers also have the huge used game market where they buy and sell like crazy.

Besides, sale prices work magic for sales volume. Since a video game doesn't have much in the way of material value to build and ship out, who cares if it's low price high volume or high price low volume sales? I've bought some games that I never even considered due to some Steam sales. On the other hand, I need to stop paying full price for gems like Far Cry 2 and AVP3. Eeek.

 

[joker454]

I can whip up an app that's $50 and sell it and MS isn't going to come by and validate it for me to make sure it's not shitty. Does that mean the PC world is riddled with horrible non-functional software? Well yes I suppose it is!. But that's just how it is! We have freedom to do whatever we want. This is a strength IMO. The diversity of the personal computing world is unbelievable. If the end user can't figure out how to work things, well they can just go away.

Well you kinda got your wish, the end user did go away

Re my $20 statement and your saying that those like me who occasionally don't buy games not on day 0 are causing the end of the world, well yeah right. How about the console rental land? I can't rent games. I can't even sell my used PC games anymore because of the DRM and serial key stuff. But console people rent away, beat a game, and then that's it. Besides, sale prices work magic for sales volume. Since a video game doesn't have much in the way of material value to build and ship out, who cares if it's low price high volume or high price low volume sales?

It would have to be incredibly high volume to compensate, and the volume simply isn't there. Starting low with pricing doesn't always work either because if for example all PC games started new at $30, then people would still wait to buy them because they would expect them to hit $15 on sale soon.

 

[AlphaWolf]

^thing is when a PC's DVD drive craps out on you, you can just throw it out and replace it yourself. You don't have to send the whole system in.

Maybe, as long as they make the replacement part. It isn't always as simple as replacing a drive (do dvd drives ever actually fail? the cd drive in my 386 still works fine). And hopefully there isn't an issue with the drivers screwing up something.