Retailers to nix PC games?

[Oobgarm]

http://www.gamespot.com/all/news/news_6085583.html

An interesting bit of news, what do you guys think about it?

[Iron Draggon]

I think anyone who says that the PC is undersupported as a gaming platform is a total idiot who obviously has no clue whatsoever just how many games are released for it every month. You'd have to be a fool to believe that all those games aren't enough. Especially considering that PC games aren't just plug & play where you can have hundreds of them and switch back & forth between them all constantly without having to uninstall & reinstall all the time because your 200GB hard drive can't possibly hold them all fully installed all at once. If they really wanna see PC gaming take off like console gaming has, then they need to find a way to run the games without having to install them. That's the only real advantage that consoles have over PC's, and most likely that's the main reason why consoles are so much more popular than PC's. Oh, and of course the fact that a decent PC gaming rig costs at least $3000 while most consoles debut at only $300 is probably a huge factor too.

[Griking]

Honestly, I'm a big PC gamer and it wouldn't bother me in the least if Gamestop and EBworld stopped carrying PC games. In the stores near me the amount of shelf space that they give PC games is already almost non existant. Not to mention that they're prices aren't anything special either. Christ, have you ever seen how much these stores ask for PC HARDWARE like sound cards? No wonder they don't do that much business in that area. I've always looked at these stores as videogame and action figure stores and NOT computer game stores.

When I want a new computer game I'm more likely to go to my local Best Buy or CompUSA for it. Either that or ebay.

[YoshiM]

I'm not surprised at how high the hardware goes for in these stores. They don't buy the volume to be able to discount them like the Best Buys or Wal-Marts of the world. Not that I'd buy my hardware there anyway.

Iron Draggon: I think you are making the PC gaming world look more like a mountain than the mole hill that it is. Even for the common person all they have to do is slug in a CD and Windows will typically auto start it. Then it's just follow the dialog boxes with *maybe* a decision on how much stuff they want to put on the hard drive. And most programs have an uninstall icon so IF they have to make room for another program (people actually have this problem these days?) it's a simple double click.

You don't need to spend $3000 to get a "decent" gaming rig. Heck until about maybe last year I could play a lot of modern games with my poor old 600 MHz Athlon. About $1,000 can get the average Joe Gamer a Dell 2.6 GHz P4 with 256 MB of RAM, 40 GB (7200 RPM) Hard Drive, monitor, and a 128 MB GeForce FX 5200. That's a good bit o' computer that will run ALL of the available games out there. Not everyone needs 500 frames per second :P .

The PC has always catered to a different crowd. Even when there were Nintendo-ish games on the computer like Commander Keen or Duke Nukem (pre-3D) the computer game isle was filled with more "complex" type games F-15 Strike Eagle, Covert Action and Airborne Ranger. The early to mid 90's were practically a golden time for PC games as we were given such gems as The Dig, X-Com UFO Defense, Darklands, Mechwarrior 2, Ultima 7, Elder Scrolls Arena and Daggerfall, the Front Page Sports series and more.

For the PC game industry to "get better" they have to diversify. For the last how many years this platform has been a commercial glut of RTS, FPS and "Tycoon"-style games. They need to go back to the 90's and have a larger offering of genres. Can I get an RPG that is NOT a Diablo clone (besides Morrowind) or perhaps NOT an MMORPG? How about more flight sims?

That's my 2 zenny.

[Oobgarm]

Excellent points, Yoshi.

As a drone for GameStop, I can vouch for the fact that our percentage of PC software sales is rather low, with most of the sales coming from the titles at the top of the chart, or new releases. Most of the PC shoppers scoff at our meager selection, and head elsewhere (usually Best Buy on our recommendation). We've seen an influx in product coming in, but most of it is the sure-fire money making software, rather than the more obscure titles most of the PC savvy gamers are after.

Back when EB was known as Waldensoftware, they did a good deal of business in PC, and Babbage's did as well. Funcoland was never known to sell anything but consoles, and that's why their sales numbers are so low.

[maxlords]

Well, I buy all my PC titles at Staples, Wal-Mart, Best Buy, and Future Shop. I almost NEVER buy PC titles from EB, and that was before I stopped buying from EB on general principle. I think that PC gamer will just automatically go to other stores.

As for gaming PCs...I think mine ran about $500 and I can run Tron 2.0 on it with moderate effects active. I'm planning on adding a $100 video card...that'll make it about $600 total for a nice middle of the road gaming PC that'll run everything at high res until Doom 3. I have well over 100 PC games myself, and I've never had issues with installing and uninstalling. Most PC gamers are just used to it. I think the PC gaming market is doing the same as it has for years....steady.

[Iron Draggon]

Well when you collect as many PC games as I do, you're constantly having to uninstall things to make room for your newest aquisition, no matter how big your hard drive is, so yeah some people do still have that problem these days, and it totally sucks. I can't afford to just keep buying external hard drives so I can have everything installed all the time, and I shouldn't have to either. Buying all those games all the time costs more than enough as it is.

It's not that installing & uninstalling is really that much of a hassle in itself, it's the fact that so many PC games are set up just like console games that's a pain in the butt. YAY, I finally unlocked everything in that overly difficult game so I can just have fun with it, but only for as long as that game and all of it's files remain intact on my hard drive. Should I ever need to uninstall or reinstall it for any reason, all of my progress will be lost, and I'll have to re-unlock everything all over again too. This isn't very much of a problem when all of the progress information is stored in a savegame file that you can simply backup and restore (provided the author isn't paranoid that you'll download somebody else's savegame file online so you don't have to endure his crap) but more often than not, progress information is hidden in some obscure file in the registry, or worse yet the game is coded in a way that prevents you from even restoring your own saves, much less installing ones that you've downloaded. Ever tried to restore your scenario progress in RCT? It's pretty much impossible, unless you have a hack patch, and many versions of the game are coded to prevent you from installing any hacks to get anywhere too. To put it bluntly, Chris Sawyer is quite anal about his RCT scenarios.

So for one thing, PC games really need to start using memory cards and other types of removable storage devices for saving your game information, instead of hiding it in some obscure place where you'll never find it and it wouldn't do you any good to locate it anyway because it's unrestorable. Fortunately alot of developers have already realized this, but many are still in denial that you would ever have a need for such a feature. As far as they're concerned, once you install their game, you'll never want to uninstall it, and nothing ever goes wrong, so nothing will ever happen to that information. Either that, or they think you'll actually enjoy having to redo everything.

Now, as for the cost of a decent gaming rig, even if you've convinced yourself that a $1000 rig is decent because that's all you can afford, that's still more than 3 times what the average console costs. Quite a difference. Sure, you can use a PC for alot more than just gaming, but do they really need to cost as much as they do? Even the cheapest entry level systems are still $500, and even the consoles can run rings around those, so if you only have $500 to spare, why not get a $300 console with a keyboard and all the other accessories, so you can play better games and still surf the net too? Agreed, you'll have way more games to choose from that way anyhow, so if all you wanna do is play games, why would you spend a huge chunk of cash on a system when you could use that money to buy tons of games instead?

And don't get me started on Generic FPS/RTS/RPG Tycoon Clone Infinity! You definitely have a very valid point there. I'm so sick and tired of the whole PC gaming industry revolving around the most retarded genre ever created (FPS) while it pretty much ignores every other genre there is! Yeah, they have their token RTS clones, and their RPG pity parties, and they still can't figure out that roller coasters made RCT alot more popular than the generic tycoon game formula ever did all by itself, but all hail the mighty FPS clones! This genre is the king of recycling the same stupid game indefinitely! If you've ever played one FPS in your life, then you've played them all, but you've gotta have this newest one because it has some different graphics!

Which finally leads me to the modding scene, the one advantage that PC gaming will hopefully always have over console gaming, but even that is mostly just more of the same, thanks to the industry. The only modders who ever get any real attention are the ones who mod FPS, and all the rest might as well be playing console games, because they'll never be recognized anywhere outside of their own modding communities. I should know, I mod Disney's Ultimate Ride series. If I modded Half-Baked or some other lame FPS, I'd probably be on the cover of PC Gamer by now, but since "nobody" cares about coaster sims besides RCT, who cares what I've done to them?

BTW, since the only coaster sims worth playing are almost exclusively on the PC now, and console gaming lost most of it's magic after the death of 16bit, my last console purchase was a Dreamcast, and I'm only getting a PS2 for the same reason that I got a Dreamcast. Whenever there's a new coaster sim available that isn't being made for the PC, then I have to have whatever console it's made for, because I'm extremely fanatical about roller coasters! I even got my first PC because of RCT, so I could care less about FPS games.

But do you think that even with dozens of PC coaster sims besides RCT, which technically isn't really a coaster sim anyway, that the industry gives a hoot about coaster sims? The best ones on the market right now are online only downloads created by very small groups of people like me, because the stupid industry doesn't have enough sense to make any new coaster sims that aren't just some kind of RCT wannabe or a blatant ripoff of one that's already been done several times, and they won't even acknowledge that more people are playing coaster sims like No Limits than they play RCT now! They just keep talking about how many copies of RCT they've sold before! Meanwhile, most of the people who bought RCT are paying some German college student $25 to download the hottest PC coaster sim ever created!

So yeah, I feel you on the need to diversify note, bigtime. Once they find something that sells, it becomes a formula, and then all they do is keep on cranking out the same old formula over and over again, until everybody gets tired of it or they notice that a potential new formula seems to be working. That's why I can't wait for FPS to finally die. For the life of me, I can't recall what kept the industry afloat before the invention of FPS, and I don't think that anyone in the industry can recall either. The way they act now, you'd think that surely the entire PC gaming industry didn't even exist before FPS, because it certainly doesn't seem to think it could possibly survive without it!

[Raedon]

There are some problems with the PC as a gaming platform. The first being that if the game isn't online then it is copy party fodder.. So games like Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 go from friend to friend fast once one gets it off MIRC or threw NEWS or the ol, IM trade.
If you check the PC numbers you will see the big money makers are the ones that require a online Key to play online.. BF1942, UT2k3.. Though I have seen kids open boxes of FPS's, write the key down and leave the open box with game. Far from the crime of just taking the CD.. There is no law that keeps anyone from opening a product and writing down information located inside.
Now games like The Sims are different as the main demographic is women.

Next you have the fact that games that sit on the shelf for more then 2 years are to old to sell while old NES games still bring in money.

[Nature Boy]

I'm sure if EB & GS marketed it well they could build up their PC business. It seems to me that they're constantly pushing the console stuff and the PC stuff is just there if you happen to notice it. When was the last time anybody asked you to preorder a PC game there?

The PC games industry would be just fine, though, even if they do drop it. I'm willing to bet their sales are low because PC gamers go elsewhere anyway, so dropping it will have a minimal effect on the industry as a whole.

[SoulBlazer]

Uh, you guys DID see in that article that the CEO of EB said that his stores will keep carrying PC games? O_O

I probaly spend more time on the PC then playing consoles, and I get many of my new games at my local EB. You just often have to pre-order the new stuff to make sure you can get it. I'd agree with some of the suggestions on how they can make PC gaming bigger, however. I find most PC games more 'mature' and serious then console games, and there's some things PC games can do better (FPS's and strategy games).

Heck, just look at my currently playing list below. LOL

[zmweasel]

I think anyone who says that the PC is undersupported as a gaming platform is a total idiot who obviously has no clue whatsoever just how many games are released for it every month.

The "idiot" in the Game Developer article was referring, I believe, to quality of support as opposed to quantity. All the best PC developers are now being essentially forced by devlopment costs and anxious publishers to give equal weight to console games: Warren Spector (Deus Ex), id Software (DOOM 3), et cetera. Most of the developers exclusively "supporting" the PC are garage groups who can't afford to get into the console market.

All your other points are very solid.

-- Z.

[Ed Oscuro]

Interesting thread. I can't imagine my local Babbage's getting out of the PC business...that'd clear out about half the shelf space...but wierder things have happened, I suppose. Need to go look for some bargins :)

[calthaer]

Ah yes, the 90s! A time of darkness and storyline hell for comic books, but a time of great ingenuity and truly the golden age of PC gaming.

Unfortunately I think the Internet has had a rather negative effect on copy protection in terms of the PC. It's also doing bad things for the music industry as mentioned in another thread, but it used to be that universities were the only places where cracks were readily available. I know in high school in the early- to mid-90s I wouldn't have even known where to begin to get a crack for a game. Now it's easy. Remember they used to have all those password wheels and stuff like that? I suppose those were ineffective in deterring copiers...

Without multiplayer online play (of any sort - even if it doesn't check your CD key against a central server like Battle.net the crackers usually don't produce a crack for each patched version of the game...so you might crack it and be unable to play online once a new patch comes out), it's tough for games.

But the unique benefits of PC games - being able to create / buy expansions and mods, being able to patch and make it a better game, being able to play online in most cases WITHOUT paying a second fee on top of your internet connection fee, and even just the benefit of the mouse and keyboard combo...I think there will always be a place for PC games.

It's just that developers are stuck in a rut. PC games generally don't sell as well and publishers just aren't willing to shell out the cash to develop quality titles unless they are almost positive it will sell (i.e. - it's an RTS, FPS, or RPG, or it's by Will Wright, Peter Molyneux, Richard Garriott, etc.). It's a shame, because IMO the greatest games of all time have been PC games - games not only with good gameplay but also excellent stories. In fact I'd argue that most of the innovation in games in the past 10 years has been PC-based. Games like Thief, the whole MMOG thing, unique games like Myst, or Freedom Force, or Heroes of Might & Magic, Deus Ex...the list could go on and on.

Not that console games aren't fun - I enjoy them. I just don't see as many really bold, unique, intelligent designs really done well. Sure, they've translated a lot of their old 2D gameplay to 3D and done that well, but I guess I'm not convinced that their designs are all that original. The most original thing I can think of for consoles was Animal Crossing, and that smacks of "The Sims" all over. I mean, there's little twitch games and stuff, but...

[brykasch]

well myself, I find that if a game is coming out , I check first to see if it is coming out on a console. If so I will get it unless it has no on-line play and the pc version does. I love my pc but it is just easier to play a game in the living room with the surround sound on the big tv in my chair. That and there jsut havn't been alot of games that I have wanted for the pc. Warcraft III, Neverwinter Nights, And Temple of Elemental Evil are the biggest releases out so far that I have gotten. I bought the C and C collection but only because it was 13.95 at sams club. I play diablo 2 online but even on ff11 I am waiting for the ps2 version. I get alot of gaming out of my amd athlon 950, but the graphics situation is nuts. I bought my ati 9600, but i had been using an ati aiw 7500 since 99. Not to mention driver, os, problems. Hell try getting 98 and before games running in xp its hit and miss. i don't like that. Yeah there is alot of piracy on pc games, but it is more hassle as well, hunting down patches and cracks etc. Hell you can't even sell sw galaxies used due to the account issues that sony has. Not to mention what the other guy said about saves etc, some companies put them in so many place syou can't find em. The market isn't dying it just needs to improve itself, beyond the rpg, fps, and rts market. Hell ea is the only sports developer in the game. Jus tlook at development time and money it seems like both are more on the pc as well

[YoshiM]

Pretty interesting thread thus far.

Iron Draggon: Consoles, save for the Dreamcast, cannot go online to surf the Net out of the box. For Xbox you have to hack it (either with chip or a game save) to put Linux on it. You can get a hard drive and Linux package for PS2 but that will set you back $200 (comes with network adapter, hard drive, keyboard, mouse, monitor cable) so now you are getting close to a low end computer at that price. So if the person wants to surf, they gotta get a computer (which you can get for about $300 with monitor from Wal-Mart's web site if you just wanna do non-gaming stuff as it comes with Linux).

As for PC cost, a good chunk comes from the software that's installed. Windows and such ain't free. Then there is assembly, testing and such followed by shipping. Besides, the people who want serious gaming hardware more than likely BUILD their own PCs which chops the price down to a pittance. I'm building PCs at work that have decent hardware (I don't do cheapy stuff) and clock in at under $400 for the hardware INCLUDING monitor. The rest of the cost is Windows XP and Office XP licenses (which is like $85 and $250 just for the friggin' stickers).

Then down to money after your PC purchase. Another perk of PC games are the bundles, the bargain bin and the online freebees. First the freebees. There are TONS of free games online and many of them are good. You may have to do an all-nighter downloading on a dial up for some but it's a gold mine in them there web. And I ain't just talkin' about demos, either. The the bargain bin. Take the fantastic Freedom Force. I bought that game right when it came out. I think it was $40. About a year later, Wal-Mart and other places sell it for $15. For the prospective PC gamer on a budget there's nothing like cruising the bargain section and getting some great games on the cheap. Even if you don't cruise the bargain bins, the big sellers come down in price faster than console titles. Then the bundles. For not a lot of dough you can get 5 games for usually less than the price of a console title. Slightly older games but still having enough to battle with the big boys you get a lot of gaming for the buck. With console games you hope that the game you want gets a "Greatest Hits" status.

[SoulBlazer]

Wel said, Yoshi! I could'nt have said it any better myself! ;)

That's why I play more PC games then console games. :D

[Iron Draggon]

The "idiot" in the Game Developer article was referring, I believe, to quality of support as opposed to quantity. All the best PC developers are now being essentially forced by devlopment costs and anxious publishers to give equal weight to console games: Warren Spector (Deus Ex), id Software (DOOM 3), et cetera. Most of the developers exclusively "supporting" the PC are garage groups who can't afford to get into the console market.

All your other points are very solid.

-- Z.

Thanks. I didn't think of it in that context, but you're absolutely right. The quality of most PC gaming support is abysmal, and often nonexistent. Often I never even get a reply to my emails for support, and when I do, it's usually either a form letter or someone who's obviously reading from a cheat sheet. Even the official community for the Ultimate Ride series that I mod for has very little corporate support. The modders are mostly the ones who are helping everyone out, so not only are we providing support for our mods, we're providing support for the base game too. This is partly why I get so peeved that FPS modders are usually the only modders who get any sort of recognition in the industry. In the UR modding community, we modders have been providing the only additional content for the games for a year now, and before that we were even providing the stuff that corporate had promised but never delivered on, and we're still doing it all for free too!

Now that XP compatibility thing, boy does that make me mad too. Some games seem to be programmed not to work with XP, even in compatibility mode, on purpose! I have tons of old 95/98 games that work just fine with XP, without even having to run them in compatibility mode. Then I have several that will only run in compatibility mode, which is fine, but then I have quite a few that simply won't run in XP, no matter what I do. So of course the first thing you do is search for a patch. If it was popular enough in it's heyday, chances are you'll find what you need to get it running again easily. But then there's all the obscure stuff, which of course is mostly what I'm into because I can get it cheap, and it doesn't matter if it was released the same year as XP was, nope they're not about to provide a patch for it, your favorite moldy oldies are just garbage now, unless of course you want to resign yourself to dual OS hell. Thanks, but no thanks, I don't miss those games that much. I guess I'll just keep waiting for a better 95/98 emulator.

Anyhow, EB & Gamestop I would sorely miss if they ever quit carrying PC games, because they're among the best sources for older titles on deep discount. I can find forgotten gems on retro gaming sites and online outlets all the time, but usually only at a premium, plus S&H. And then there's good old EB & Gamestop! If they aren't practically giving it away in the store, you can order it from them direct, and the S&H is free if you know how to do it. I buy most of my PC games from them after they've been reduced. Only the really hot titles that I just can't wait for will get me to go into CompUSA or BestBuy or WalMart or Target or wherever to pay full price or hopefully at least special weekly sale price for them. I've even gotten so that I check the online price at EB & Gamestop before I go to one of their stores, so I know how much it really costs! That's their biggest problem right there. They mark their games down in their systems automatically, but they almost never mark them down on their shelves, so people see them on the shelf still at full price and put them back down without knowing that all they have to do is ask for a price check and they'll usually get a very pleasant surprise for their trouble! I can't tell you how many times I've taken $20-$50 games to the counter and found out that they ring up at $5-$20 instead of the price on the box.

So no wonder their PC sales are lacking. They're too busy keeping up with all their console stuff to even keep their PC inventory moving off their shelves! I wouldn't have it any other way though. That's why I can still find really old stuff from several years ago there for only a few dollars, instead of having to order it online for an arm & a leg and then some. I'm probably more than half of their measly 5% or whatever it is here in Houston all by myself, just on all the older titles that I buy from them all the time. But of course sometimes I'll go ahead and pay full price for things that I want there too. I used to do almost all of my console shopping there, so I try to keep them in business, even though I don't support them anywhere near as well as I did when I was mostly into console gaming. The guys at my local stores here have always taken very good care of me, giving me free magazines and promos and demos and whatever else they think I'd be interested in, because I used to spend all my money in there literally every single day for several years. I love EB & Gamestop! They're two of my favorite places to go shopping!

[YoshiM]

The problem with some software not running in XP is because the OS does things "differently" than what the software was designed to work with. Good example is The Elder Scrolls: Redguard. I try to run that game and it wants some sort of exclusive access to the hard drive (at least, that's what Windows tells me) and Windows 2K/XP won't allow that for control and stability purposes. Not the software's or the developer's fault as they coded for the home and pretty much until XP was released the NT kernel wasn't a typical install for Joe Consumer.

There IS a way to play your favorite old games and it won't take software like System Commander to do it. However you WILL have to pay quite a few bones for it. Virtual PC for Windows does a pretty good job of emulating a PC. It creates a virtual hard drive that you install an OS onto and set up and you'll have a fully functioning PC within your PC. You will need a fairly fast machine (I'd say a 1.5 GHz with at least 256 MB of RAM) to get good classic game speeds.

[Iron Draggon]

Well my system is fast enough, but why spend extra money for something like that when all you have to do is install a second OS under XP? A second OS is what I'm trying to avoid installing. So what is this System Commander? That sounds like it might be what I'm looking for, if it's just software that I can install to make them work. And how do you find out what the problem is? My system never gives me a reason why they aren't running, they just don't run. You try to boot them and nothing happens, or the intro screens run but it locks up or crashes as soon as the actual program starts loading.

I can live without all my old DOS games, which usually don't work with XP's DOS emulator, but these developers that staunchly refuse to update their old 95/98 software for XP compatibility really irritate me. I have one series where I can't play the prequel and the first installment anymore, but I can still play the two sequels, and they have no plans to update the former. Now that's just plain rude. A whole series that's only half playable now. Lovely.