Is The Computer Gaming Industry Finished?

[Erax]

The PC game industry may take a dive for a few years, but there will be a renaissance later. Look at what happened to boardgames. Hasbro bought up all of the classics, several important companies went under, and the 'death of boardgames' was announced. Then suddenly the Germans arrived on the scene and turned the market in a new direction.

If the big PC game companies all move over to consoles, someone will take up the PC market.

[David E. Gervais]

Q1: How many PC games do you know of that are on DVD?

Q2: How many people do you know with a DVD burner on their PC?

If your answer shows that Q2 > Q1 then what incentive do publishers have to make games on DVD? What is a company to do when the 'means to copy' has already been inserted into the market? Why would a publisher take the risk of selling to a market where the 'Pirates' have such a huge head start?

Remember 'Myst' the all-time greatest seiing PC game ever in the history of PC games? Can you tell me why it sold so well?.. When it came out on the market there were virtually no other 'made for CD' games out there. Sure there were many 'floppy games' that were transfered onto CD. But myst was the first to take full advantage of the CD. Also, CDRW's were virtually non existant. So everyone with a shiny new CD-Rom wanted something to show it off. What did they do? they bought Myst.

That kind of success will never hapen again, it can't, simply because the 'novelty' and 'close to pirate-free' enviroment will never happen again. Why? because (as we see whith the DVD situation) the means to pirate have won the battle and now precede the game market.

A few more questions..

Q3: How many people do you know with a game console?

Q4: How many of these do you know have pirate copies of console games?

If Q3 > Q4 then there is (in the eyes of publishers) a better chance of making money (profit) in the game console market. Why then would they turn away from this potential cash cow?

What the PC market needs is a 'TRUE' way to curb piracy. Whether it needs to be 'physical' or 'soft' in nature I don't know, but something needs to be done, or the PC game market will be left to the indipendant development companies. (not to say this is a bad thing but without the 'Big-Guns' in the PC game development market, things will just never meet their potential.)

Nuf said.

Cheers!

[ November 08, 2003, 11:28: Message edited by: David E. Gervais ]

[Erax]

I pretty much agree with DEG. Many people bought Myst as a means to show off their CD-Roms. We are talking about people who never bought another game before or since. So Myst did not sell as a game so much as a CD-Rom accessory. That opportunity will not come again.

I am not certain that piracy (or the lack of it) was a relevant factor, but that's just my opinion.

[se5a]

I dont think pc games will die...
the whole thing about PC games is that you can minimise word or whatever, launch SEIV play a turn or to then when the boss comes over alt tab back to word...
well ok maybe not but you get the general idea, its easy to launch a game then exit it and run something else and visa versa.

that being said though, I would not be suprised if eventualy PCs Consoles and TVs merge somewhat...
hell, I can already watch DVDs on my computer, I can also watch TV with a TV tuner card.

[Fyron]

The relative lack of piracy of console games is only going to Last a couple more years (if that). Once DVD burners come down in price... You can already find ISO images of most modern console games on the internet. The only real way to prevent piracy (other than requiring a constant internet connection to authorize the running of the program from a central server...) would be to make the games come in a form that is very difficult to duplicate, such as game cartridges, AND to not have a hard drive on the console. The introduction of the hard drive + internet + ethernet more than anything just opens up the console to piracy to no end.

[deccan]

Originally posted by se5a:

that being said though, I would not be suprised if eventualy PCs Consoles and TVs merge somewhat...

Well, merging PCs and TVs is already happening. That's what Windows XP Media Centre Edition is all about.