DracoSuave said:
If PC gaming is better than console gaming, what barriers are stopping it from being the most popular outside of certain PC-based genres (MMOs, RTSs, etc)
The average consumer and the fact the average consumer cares more about things being as simple as possible rather than being good.
I hate to say this, but there are reasons that the PC isn't as prevalent a platform and you can't simply handwave those reasons with a 'It's just better' and a torrent of fanboyism while decrying the fact that the platform is dying.
Yes, there are reasons?
And?
None of those reasons mean it's not better, just that it's not as attractive to your average consumer.
Also, PC gaming isn't dying at all.
According to people PC gaming has been "dying" for 20 years.
Those are to contradictory opinions. Either it is better or it is dying.
Hate to break it to you, but it's pretty much accepted nowadays that Social Darwinism is total bollocks.
Things can be better and yet still lose out.
Fact is, some -aspects- of PC gaming is better, but others are absolutely terrible. Developers will mention the problems inherent in having less unified hardware than consoles. Comparing raw stats between a console and a PC is as valid as comparing the clock speed of an intel and an AMD. That's nice , band allut the numbers aren't comparable given the architecture differences.
That doesn't mean they're not comparable, you just have to account for the differences.
My PS3 might have had its network hacked... but I don't have to run and do research on the latest anti-virus and anti-spyware in order to use it without having a million pop-ups up.
Neither do I. It called being sensible and not downloading a load of spy-ware in the first place.
In fact... looking at the Ram issue of a console vs a PC, how much of the RAM in a console is dedicated to the game itself? Almost all of it. How much in a PC? Well, let's see, running your anti spyware, anti virus, directx, drivers, drivers, more drivers, SecoRom, Steam, and whatever other non-game related cruft you need to run to keep things going smoothly, plus interface elements for each of the above?
It's. Not. Comparable. If you think it is, you're wrong.
Well, I know for a fact that all those things can run on 4 gig of RAM or less. So, given my system has 8 gig of RAM available for use, that leaves
at least 4 gig left over for dedicated gaming. More than any console.
Fact: PC Gaming isn't making as much money as console gaming.
That's the ONLY fact that matters, and if you can't get THAT through your head, then blaming consoles, console gamers, or anyone else is a waste of time and bandwidth. Instead, look at THAT problem, and do what you can to solve it, not make it worse.
That's exactly the fact I'm looking at, console gaming makes more money because the average consumer prefers things to be simpler rather than better. So they buy the simpler thing rather than the better thing.
From there, people who want to make money see that they should make things simpler in order to make that money, and dedicate themselves to the simpler systems.
The result being that the better, more complex, system is left out in the cold.
What is the original cause of that, the people who throw their money and the simplest and least complex things, regardless of their actual quality.
Of course, you can arbitrarily redefine the word "better" as "the most appealing thing". But that doesn't change anything, it's just an attempt at an equivocation fallacy.
Yes, consoles are much simpler to use than PCs.
Yes, most people prefer simpler things.
Yes, as a result gaming PCs sell a lot less well than console. Equally, their games.
So, yes, I feel it's quite clear the cause of a lot of dumbing down in gaming is down to your average console player not wanting games to be any more complex.
And so, yes, I feel quite justified in blaming said console players for the dumbing down.
Edit: Just to clarify, I don't just confine this view to gaming, but all consumerism. I very much dislike how much of the world is being made a simple as possible because people refuse to learn how to use more complex things, and as a result functionality is lost. Console gaming is simply the occasion of this at hand.
Cause, how do those boycotts [http://www.joystiq.com/2009/11/13/how-not-to-boycott-modern-warfare-2/] work out for ya?
Well that was a real non-sequitur...