PC Gaming Continues to Grow

Andy Chalk

One Flag, One Fleet, One Cat
Nov 12, 2002
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PC Gaming Continues to Grow


The PC Gaming Alliance says the global PC games market grew to over $18 billion in 2011.

Yes, the $18.6 billion [http://www.pcgamingalliance.org/]. China led the way with 27 percent growth, accounting for $6 billion in revenue all on its own, while the U.S., U.K., Japan, Korea and Germany, despite being "mature markets," collectively posted 11 percent growth overall with revenues totaling $8 billion.

Much of the revenue growth came from expected sources. Zynga and Nexon each pulled in about $1.1 billion for the year, primarily from PC games, while free-to-play proved to be another major source of income, particularly in Asia. But while the rise of F2P has led to many predictions of the death of the subscription model, the PCGA report singles out Rift and Star Wars: The Old Republic as games that have "enjoyed very strong sales." Other big PC success stories include Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3, Skyrim, Assassin's Creed: Revelations and "sports games" from EA and Konami.

But the real savior of the market, which should come as no surprise, is the advent of digital distribution. "The PC Gaming juggernaut continues unabated across the industry and geographic boundaries. While reports of gaming sales at retail show signs of struggle, the impact hasn't been as great for PC gaming, which had an earlier adoption of newer formats, business models and delivery with digital distribution, free-to-play and subscriptions fueling PC gaming's strong global growth," said PC Gaming Alliance President Matt Ployhar.

"For example, Valve's market-leading Steam digital distribution service now reports over 40 million users, and traditional retailers are following suit by investing in this space more heavily, such as GameStop's acquisition of the Impulse digital distribution service," he continued. "Not only investment dollars, but real revenue and profits, are now being generated solely from purely digital business models, formats, and delivery."

The PC's future looks pretty bright, too: The "Horizons" report predicts that widening broadband coverage and improvements to digital delivery platforms and global payment methods will push the PC gaming market value to $25.5 billion by 2015.


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thomaskattus

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Dec 15, 2011
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That is good news for the PC gaming industry. Also good news for the glorious PC Gamer Master Race.
 

ph0b0s123

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Jul 7, 2010
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Let PC hating and the PC snobbery begin.....

Increases are good, I just don't know if the increases cut much ice if they are in creases on not very much to start of with, in comparison to the figures consoles post....

Also what is the guy with two thumbs up supposed to represent?
 

Soviet Heavy

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Jan 22, 2010
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That's nice. I may be a little apprehensive about everything going digital, but my recent splurge on Steam Sales might override that thought.
 

Zen Toombs

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Nov 7, 2011
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Cool. I was planning on shifting to PC gaming once I can no longer use my 360 anyways, so the increase in support should be nice.
 

Qitz

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Mar 6, 2011
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ph0b0s123 said:
Let PC hating and the PC snobbery begin.....

Increases are good, I just don't know if the increases cut much ice if they are in creases on not very much to start of with, in comparison to the figures consoles post....

Also what is the guy with two thumbs up supposed to represent?
Oh the hating and elitism has been going on LOOOONG before this post. As for the guy, probably represents PC Gaming being "A-Ok."

and, as is required for any thread about PC Gaming and Death.

 

fix-the-spade

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Feb 25, 2008
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Ah, it's nice being part of the undead master race.

Happily zombies since before the NES came out...

...although I can see DRM becoming the problem that swings the growth/contraction of PC gaming back towards contraction. It used to be compication and price, soon it's just going to be accessing your game.
 

Qitz

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SirBryghtside said:
Ha, that's a little outdated now :p

(bottom right)
I'm sure most people would prefer to pretend that game just doesn't exist so it still works :p
 

gigastar

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Sep 13, 2010
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I think this is directly attributed to the unusually long console generation were in.

Also that image is in desperate need of an update. Duke Nukem Forever will not be remembered for being a classic 90's shooter put in stasis for 10 years, Spore probably wont be remembered at all until someone brings up SecuROM and Bioshock was a multiplatform release, so championing it as a high point in PC gaming seems a bit pointless.
 
Feb 13, 2008
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http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/116201-PC-Gaming-Continues-to-Grow

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/116191-After-the-Next-Generation-Game-Consoles-Will-Disappear

"May I borrow your headset? This is a console user, rainbows make me cry! Over."
 

XMark

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Jan 25, 2010
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It's only natural for PCs to get the upper hand towards the end of a console generation, when PCs are way ahead, hardware-wise.

But the lines between consoles and PCs are fading away from both ends of the spectrum anyways, so in a few years there won't even BE a console vs PC debate.
 

Tireseas_v1legacy

Plop plop plop
Sep 28, 2009
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While shooters, RPGs, and racing games have clearly shift to the console, simulation, RTS, TBS, and MMOs haven't been able to get off the mouse and keyboard. Only Sony has even been attempting to merge the two (Dust 417 anyone?), but that's a relatively minor game with a MMO already attached to it.
 

Scarim Coral

Jumped the ship
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Oct 29, 2010
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I guess it was the right timing for me to enter PC gaming so let it grow, more games for me to buy.
 

Viridian

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Jan 25, 2012
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The Gentleman said:
While shooters, RPGs, and racing games have clearly shift to the console, simulation, RTS, TBS, and MMOs haven't been able to get off the mouse and keyboard. Only Sony has even been attempting to merge the two (Dust 417 anyone?), but that's a relatively minor game with a MMO already attached to it.
Yeah, some genres just can't seem to make the switch. Maybe it's because of functionality? For instance, fighting games (Soul Calibur, Mortal Kombat) just plain work better with controllers, and the buttons seem to lend themselves to combos better. RTS games though, tend to work better with a mouse (Halo Wars, in my opinion, would've been better off with one).

Shooters shifting to consoles weirded me out at first though. On one hand, I think that the mouse offers better aiming capabities, but maybe the control sticks on a controller offer better movement control as a trade off? I dunno.
 

Redlin5_v1legacy

Better Red than Dead
Aug 5, 2009
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For a dying market that will vanish off the face of the Earth any year now this seems pretty unlikely. Clearly someone crunched the numbers wrong and we're all going to be playing consoles exclusively by 2014. Right?

/sarcasm
 

Blunderboy

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Jove said:
So does anybody want to post on Movie Bob's big picture video about PC Gaming is dead now?
I suspect you may have missed the point of that episode.
 

XT inc

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Jul 29, 2009
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Every single time I fall in love with pc gaming again, my ass gets burnt by some derped up game that I pay full price for and have to spend hours slogging through forums and back ally hardware sites trying to deduce why oh why me.

I can't complain because it costs a lot less than console games, but whoever determines system specifications is a joke. Recommended settings should be, the game on full bore ultra settings and really test out the problems. They should be hitting the tech builders to build some sort of unity so there isn't so much variation that leads to powerful pc's derping up early current gen games in spite of being way way more beefy.

But maybe that is because my pc can run skyrim, deus ex, bfbc2, crysis on ultra and high, and then darksiders on low res chugs like a cup of crushed glass and expired cream. How on earth did they get allowed to release a video game with visual settings of resolution and vsynch, hate me some console ports.

 

Xenowolf

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Feb 3, 2012
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Speaking as someone who was once a console gamer predominantly but is now beginning to shift towards PC gaming due to my growing disillusionment with console gaming, this feels like very fitting timing for this news.