id's Tim Willits Likes Games For Windows

[Andy Chalk]

id's Tim Willits Likes Games For Windows

In a recent interview, Microsoft's [http://www.idsoftware.com] new Games For Windows initiative.

"Some people say it's a little too Big-Brotherish [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Brother_%28Nineteen_Eighty-Four%29], but it's a legitimate progression of making the PC feel more - not like a console, but like a closed system," he said in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz.

While some gamers have expressed concern over the scheme's Windows Vista [http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/default.mspx]requirement, as well as an annual subscription fee to connect with Xbox Live and play online, Willits claimed it's a necessary adjustment. "I believe it will help us in the future," he said. "The whole system's young and Microsoft's made some mistakes, but they're fixing it." He also stated his belief that the system would play a significant role in the battle against software piracy, which according to Willits "is killing the industry."

Games For Windows is a new standard for PC videogames set by Microsoft in an attempt to make Windows-based gaming as simple and accessible as console gaming. In order to qualify, games must meet a set of Microsoft-mandated requirements, including Vista Games Explorer compatibility, support for normal and widescreen resolutions and a simplified installation option.

The full text of the interview with Willits and id CEO Todd Hollenshead is available here [http://www.gamesindustry.biz/content_page.php?aid=27037].


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[Bongo Bill]

Xbox Live proper is a good service, but it's already facing competition from free services whose features and usability could conceivably reach the standard that Microsoft set. It really is inevitable that one of them is going to do a better job overall without compulsory payment for the main feature (which I take here to mean online multiplayer, not peripheral features like leaderboards), and then go cross-platform. I'd predict a partnership between Steam or Gametap and Sony or Nintendo. What, then, would be the incentive to use Live, aside from just the exclusive titles (which are a rarity)?

I'm just not convinced that this kind of service has a real future unless it abandons the subscription model. But I admit that I am very strongly biased against subscriptions - could just be wishful thinking on my part.

 

[Andy Chalk]

I'm with you, but I'll take it a step further: I will not pay for an Xbox Live-type service. I've paid for subscriptions to individual online games (Air Warrior), and I've paid for online game networking software (Kali), but this seems a different matter entirely. (If I wasn't being pressed to go slug boxes for a friend who's moving out of his apartment now now NOW, I'd stay and put a bit more thought into exactly why.) Perhaps I'm too much of a throwback, or I'm too old and set in my ways to move ahead with the industry, but I'm honestly failing to see how this benefits gamers in any way.

 

[Bongo Bill]

The benefit is pretty clear. Gaming is going mainstream, the mainstream are much more social than the traditional audience, and the traditional audience flocks to anything that lets them stay connected to their friends constantly. Know what they're playing, see who's doing better than you, talk to them as if they were right there in your living room. I don't get it either, but it is apparently pretty neat, and Live is doing a good job of bringing that connectivity to gaming.

 

[Andy Chalk]

But hardcore PC gamers aren't the mainstream. Which you may counter by saying that's too bad for PC gamers because sooner or later Darwin gets us all, but as a guy who remembers (and is comfortable with) selecting address, IRQ and DMA for his sound card, I can say honestly that I'm not down with this. Do I dare draw the line between PC gamers and console gamers? I'll go that mile, too. There is a difference. Crossover is increasing, and I'm even willing to admit that consoles are winning, but there remains a small Caiger Mall-esque group of die-hards who don't want to see PC gaming streamlined and simplified for the mainstream. In fact, they want the opposite; they want to see the strengths of the PC exploited for unique and particularly non-console gaming experiences. Games For Windows is laudable for its efforts to rejuvenate PC gaming, but its apparent consolization (YES I SAID IT) of the format leaves me more concerned for the future of PC gaming as just another dumping zone for generic third-person shooters and racing games than anything else.

It's a difficult position to take, because it's both largely unrealistic and based on a very possibly misplaced idea about a PC gaming "underground" that wants less Gears of War and more Bad Mojo. It's also largely nostalgia-driven; I love PC gaming, and it's mostly because of all the awesome shit that happened in the 1990s. Hell, the more I think about it, the more I feel as though I could talk myself out of this position without any real effort. I better stop.

 

[Bongo Bill]

It doesn't matter that PC gamers aren't the mainstream: what matters is that Microsoft is willing to bet that they will be the mainstream. Or, rather, that the mainstream will take to PC gaming again. And, to that end, they intend to make it more comfortable for mainstream use. Which means, as you say, consolization.