Iron Draggon
04-28-2009, 02:01 PM
PC Gamer June 2009 Editorial:
"Hop into the Wayback Machine with me for a sec. Let's set the dial back to 1999, a mere decade ago. now, ask your former self who you think the biggest players in PC gaming will be circa 2009. (And try to do so without screwing up the space-time continuum, thanks very much.)
Now, without even tagging along on your lovely time-traveling jaunt. I can guess with 100 percent accuracy three names you'd absolutely never dream of including: Capcom, Sega, and Square Enix.
Funny how much things can change in just ten years. For starters, you've got Sega: Once a proud console manufacturer, now a console-agnostic publisher, still fueld by its Japanese roots but with a nascent PC tradition brewing thanks to its smart purchase of Creative Assembly, the team behing the beloved (and unapologetically hardcore) Total War franchise. Then, you've got Square Enix, the most Japanese of Japanese console publishers, with a storied history of profoundly Japanese console RPG's, including the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest franchises. At press time, however, Squenix was circling around a purchase of Eidos, and I'm told by insiders that this potential pickup has nothing to do with Japan and everything to do with expanding into the US and Europe with Western-style, PC-friendly games. And that's not even mentioning the fact that Squenix is publishing Supreme Commander 2, the eagerly anticipated sequel to Cris Taylor's beloved PC strategy masterpiece.
But perhaps most interesting to me is Capcom - and not so much because I'd welcome a half-decent port of Resident Evil 5, but more because of what Christian Svensson, Capcom's veep of strategic planning, has been saying recently. Shortly after joining the PC Gaming Alliance, Svensson made the rounds on the web chatting about Capcom's interest in the PC. The p[rimary takeaway: "The PC is global, and it's ubiquitous," Svensson told PC-centric blog Rock Paper Shotgun. In other words, the PC is the perfect platform to penetrate new markets around the world, especially emerging markets where consoles aren't the primary platform of choice. And while that might not seem all that important to those of us in this fully emerged market that we call America, what it does mean is that smart companies like Capcom are starting to see the PC as the enormous opportunity that it is. And more money for them means more - and, dare I hope, better - games for us.
So step into the Wayback Machine, dial yourself back into the present, and join me in this issue's celebration of PC gaming. The future looks bright indeed, thanks in part to three unlikely publishers. Anyone care to speculate on what surprises we'll see in the next decade?"
Gary Steinman, Editor in Chief
And most posters on DP laughed at me for calling Midway on not seeing the enormous opportunity that publishing MK vs DC on the PC would be... Well at least Capcom is smart enough to see that publishing SF4 on the PC equates to even more money for them, and they're not going bankrupt like Midway is!
HMM... so if I'm so wrong about the value of PC gaming, and games like MK vs DC on the PC, how is it that this editorial makes me sound so right about it? Things that make you go HMM, indeed... But I'm sure I'll get attacked for daring to post this here too... The concept of the PC as a better platform for gaming than any of the other consoles still just doesn't compute for some people... Thankfully though, those idiots aren't the ones deciding the future for PC gaming! Instead, we've got Capcom, Sega, and Squenix working on it!
So I hope everyone is still enjoying SF4 on 360 & PS3... when it comes out for PC, it's gonna blow both of those versions away, especially with Sega Saturn USB controllers. Or XBOX360 controllers, if I choose to use those instead...
Now all the PC needs is Wii remotes, and... wait... yeah, it already has those too! So all it needs is games from Capcom, Sega, and Squenix that use them!
Yep, you gotta love modern gaming these days for sure! It's so much better than it was when the PC was finally just getting over DOS, and moving on from Windows '95 & '98 to ME & XP! It had just gotten Roller Coaster Tycoon, which ended up inspiring a shitload of sequels and other roller coaster sims that never appeared on any of the consoles until RCT3 was transformed into Thrillville by Frontier! All we had for coaster sims on consoles was Coaster Works, AKA Jet Coaster Dream on the Dreamcast! What a blocky nightmare! And in 1999, we didn't even know the PC was gonna be getting Disney's Ultimate Ride series soon, nor that for the truly hardcore, there'd be Ultra Coaster, Hyper Rails, Scream Machines, and No Limits! We just had RCT1!
Now, if we could just get some NEW roller coaster sims coming out again... Like another sequel to Ultimate Ride! UR2 would make Disney the king again!
"Hop into the Wayback Machine with me for a sec. Let's set the dial back to 1999, a mere decade ago. now, ask your former self who you think the biggest players in PC gaming will be circa 2009. (And try to do so without screwing up the space-time continuum, thanks very much.)
Now, without even tagging along on your lovely time-traveling jaunt. I can guess with 100 percent accuracy three names you'd absolutely never dream of including: Capcom, Sega, and Square Enix.
Funny how much things can change in just ten years. For starters, you've got Sega: Once a proud console manufacturer, now a console-agnostic publisher, still fueld by its Japanese roots but with a nascent PC tradition brewing thanks to its smart purchase of Creative Assembly, the team behing the beloved (and unapologetically hardcore) Total War franchise. Then, you've got Square Enix, the most Japanese of Japanese console publishers, with a storied history of profoundly Japanese console RPG's, including the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest franchises. At press time, however, Squenix was circling around a purchase of Eidos, and I'm told by insiders that this potential pickup has nothing to do with Japan and everything to do with expanding into the US and Europe with Western-style, PC-friendly games. And that's not even mentioning the fact that Squenix is publishing Supreme Commander 2, the eagerly anticipated sequel to Cris Taylor's beloved PC strategy masterpiece.
But perhaps most interesting to me is Capcom - and not so much because I'd welcome a half-decent port of Resident Evil 5, but more because of what Christian Svensson, Capcom's veep of strategic planning, has been saying recently. Shortly after joining the PC Gaming Alliance, Svensson made the rounds on the web chatting about Capcom's interest in the PC. The p[rimary takeaway: "The PC is global, and it's ubiquitous," Svensson told PC-centric blog Rock Paper Shotgun. In other words, the PC is the perfect platform to penetrate new markets around the world, especially emerging markets where consoles aren't the primary platform of choice. And while that might not seem all that important to those of us in this fully emerged market that we call America, what it does mean is that smart companies like Capcom are starting to see the PC as the enormous opportunity that it is. And more money for them means more - and, dare I hope, better - games for us.
So step into the Wayback Machine, dial yourself back into the present, and join me in this issue's celebration of PC gaming. The future looks bright indeed, thanks in part to three unlikely publishers. Anyone care to speculate on what surprises we'll see in the next decade?"
Gary Steinman, Editor in Chief
And most posters on DP laughed at me for calling Midway on not seeing the enormous opportunity that publishing MK vs DC on the PC would be... Well at least Capcom is smart enough to see that publishing SF4 on the PC equates to even more money for them, and they're not going bankrupt like Midway is!
HMM... so if I'm so wrong about the value of PC gaming, and games like MK vs DC on the PC, how is it that this editorial makes me sound so right about it? Things that make you go HMM, indeed... But I'm sure I'll get attacked for daring to post this here too... The concept of the PC as a better platform for gaming than any of the other consoles still just doesn't compute for some people... Thankfully though, those idiots aren't the ones deciding the future for PC gaming! Instead, we've got Capcom, Sega, and Squenix working on it!
So I hope everyone is still enjoying SF4 on 360 & PS3... when it comes out for PC, it's gonna blow both of those versions away, especially with Sega Saturn USB controllers. Or XBOX360 controllers, if I choose to use those instead...
Now all the PC needs is Wii remotes, and... wait... yeah, it already has those too! So all it needs is games from Capcom, Sega, and Squenix that use them!
Yep, you gotta love modern gaming these days for sure! It's so much better than it was when the PC was finally just getting over DOS, and moving on from Windows '95 & '98 to ME & XP! It had just gotten Roller Coaster Tycoon, which ended up inspiring a shitload of sequels and other roller coaster sims that never appeared on any of the consoles until RCT3 was transformed into Thrillville by Frontier! All we had for coaster sims on consoles was Coaster Works, AKA Jet Coaster Dream on the Dreamcast! What a blocky nightmare! And in 1999, we didn't even know the PC was gonna be getting Disney's Ultimate Ride series soon, nor that for the truly hardcore, there'd be Ultra Coaster, Hyper Rails, Scream Machines, and No Limits! We just had RCT1!
Now, if we could just get some NEW roller coaster sims coming out again... Like another sequel to Ultimate Ride! UR2 would make Disney the king again!