Is PC gaming a cycle?

[Korten12]

First off, I own a good pc and have put alot of hours into it Cause something like this might be asked.

Im not going to be talking about PC gaming dying becuase its not but I think PC gaming is hitting a cycle. PC gamers pirate, more developers make DRM(or what evers it called cant remember) to prevent pirates and then people complain and then pirate the games and then repeat. Now people think that if they stopped making DRMs then people would be obligated to buy the games.

Now that is true to an extent but even if they got rid of DRM people will continue to pirate and pirate and then more DRMs will appear.

so is PC gaming in a cycle and can it be broken?

 

[Souplex]

The only way the cycle can be broken is the inevitable takeover of consoles. Sure we will get the bad with it too, like needing to buy what would have been included with the main game five years ago as DLC, but in the end we win.

 

[delet]

Makes sense, they probably are. It'll be broken just as soon as this horrible DRM crap is fixed though.

 

[Nincompoop]

Secure consoles and streaming services like OnLive would prevent it. If not these will be dominant I think the cycle will continue.

I believe it was Shamus who said developers should offer more benefits of having the actual product. I think this is a neat idea, which developers should take to them. It might limit the piracy a bit.

 

[Korten12]

I don't think it was ever in a cycle! I'm still having exactly as much fun as I am when I started it!

However, you could say it is if you're only talking about big name titles, then yes, they go through times of treating the PC like a place to put everything great and then switch to basically acting like trolls, annoying the community.

As for people who genuinely care about the PC market, like Stardock, they're still releasing the same quality product year after year.

And in my opinion, I'd much rather play a nice game of Galactic Civilizations 2 then I would want to play a fundamentally broken copy of Assassins Creed 2. PC gaming is not dead, you just have to put a little effort into it.

yeah im mainly talking about all the big titles, like with C&C4 now with no dedicated servers, MW2, and like you mentioned Assassins Creed 2. Though I feel it has hit a cycle its still very fun. its just sad to see it in this cycle when it should all be fine.

 

[kingcom]

As for people who genuinely care about the PC market, like Stardock, they're still releasing the same quality product year after year.

Stardock is simply smart enough to realise that they should stop caring about pirates, they cant stop them and so have decided to simply put the quality in their product and make games for them.

 

[fix-the-spade]

More of an undulation than a cycle, and it only undulates in the west.

Eastern Europe, Russia, far east except Japan, PC gaming is the ruler by an enormous margin. Even if our blockbuster titles slow down or dry up when you look past them you'll notice shed loads of PC games come out and many, many times the number of players than all three console services combined. It goes up and down but it's pretty much always there.

Now the console system is a cycle. It goes up, gradually 'killing' the PC market as major publishers push up unit and development costs and focusing ever more risk on ever narrower bands of products. Then it all goes tits up, several console makers either drop out or go bust until only Nintendo remains. Nintendo don't like thord party publishers, not one bit. Faced with this option the major publishers return mostly to the pc and porting for consoles and the whole sorry cycle starts again with some new names, PC games and Nintendo.

I reckon the current generation is going to struggle towards the end of it's life if it really is running for 10 years as the cost of the consoles will be hard to justify against a £3-400 gaming pc, it's getting close to that way now.

 

[Trivun]

See, going back a bit, Arkham Asylum last year had the right idea when it came to DRM. The developers basically made it so that only legitimate copies would have access to most of Batman's moves, which were vital to completing the game (like the Glide Jump and the like). Pirates were reported as complaining to the developer about glitches in the game where they couldn't use certain moves, and had messages back saying basically "screw you, stop stealing our games". The pirates were inconvenienced and the honest customers weren't affected either way. That's what we need to see more of in DRM. It'll still be cracked anyway, it always is, but at least it hinders pirates for a while without causing unnecessary problems for honest gamers too.

 

[Plurralbles]

when was the last time PC gaming was tring to be so regulated by the big companies?

And I find it funny that they're doing it. The Unreal Engine has been released and is available to anyone who wants it. The modding community is strong. If the big gaming companies don't want to make 'em for Pc anymore, there will ssimply be smaller companies and individual groups who pick up the slack. I dont' understand the allure of consoles that the consumers seem to fall for. Theyr'e becoming computers. Secure, highly restrictive and closed development, computers. Lame socks.

 

[Korten12]

See, going back a bit, Arkham Asylum last year had the right idea when it came to DRM. The developers basically made it so that only legitimate copies would have access to most of Batman's moves, which were vital to completing the game (like the Glide Jump and the like). Pirates were reported as complaining to the developer about glitches in the game where they couldn't use certain moves, and had messages back saying basically "screw you, stop stealing our games". The pirates were inconvenienced and the honest customers weren't affected either way. That's what we need to see more of in DRM. It'll still be cracked anyway, it always is, but at least it hinders pirates for a while without causing unnecessary problems for honest gamers too.

wow that is a good DRM.

 

[Void(null)]

I don't think we are in a cycle, I think we have been fighting the exact same problem for 20 years and have made exactly zero headway.

 

[Void(null)]

To further prove the point, I just found out that in 2009 they did a "Dont copy that 2"

 

[Hurr Durr Derp]

The current DRM problem is a vicious cycle, and one that can only be broken in 2 ways:

1) People stop pirating.
2) DRM becomes a serious anti-pirate in stead of anti-customer measure.

Number one won't happen, and number two isn't likely to happen anytime soon either. Though I do agree that stuff like what they did for Arkham Asylum is a step in the right direction for #2.