It's the End of the War as We Know It

[Fallingwater]

Worse, not all games will support GFWL

GFWL is a steaming pile of horse dung. I thank Shiva every day that not all games support it, and I wish a painful death for it and anyone who ever had anything to do with its creation.

As for the "PC gaming is dying, whaaa what are we going to do" brigade, kindly read here [http://adrianwerner.wordpress.com/] and stop worrying.
My prediction: PC gaming is heading for a darker age, which will see mostly indie releases and small-time developers (good) and crappy console conversions (bad). PC gaming is not going to die, for several reasons.
Reason one: consoles and casual games are a fad; they are the new fancy thing that all the cool kids are doing. In a few years the mainstream herds are going to get tired of it and dedicate their attention to the next thing the entertainment people cram down their throats. Then, PC gaming will see a new dawn, and gaming will (hopefully) go back to being a thing for nerds who don't give two hoots about social status.
Reason two: the worst day on the PC is still going to give you a much more satisfying experience than the best day on consoles. Pay attention to games that don't necessarily have a budget of a million bajillion dollars, avoid crappy conversions and don't give in to hype, and you're going to have a ton of fun whatever the situation. Though admittedly doing this requires knowing how to use your brain...
Reason three: despite the rise of consoles, the PC hardware industry is worth a ton of money. Lose the games, and suddenly there are a lot of people who have no motivation at all for buying new CPUs and video cards. Nobody wants that to happen.
Reason four: PC gamers might have become a minority, but we are a tenacious bunch. Even if you were to remove new games, we'd make new ones and modify existing ones ourselves. There's never going to be lack of content for the PC, one way or the other.
Reason five: modding. Nuff said.

There are probably other reasons, but I've written a long enough post already.

 

[Aurgelmir]

Sure but here's the thing: what if all my friends are on XFire (or another similar software/protocol) and none of them are using Steam? People like these exist and... while a person might convince one or two friends to move, if he has say 20 of them, it'll be a nigh impossible task to do.

Well that is kinda what I am hinting to, you are to obsessed with the old ways that you are not willing to flock together to play...

Anyhow, this is only one of the points that were being discussed and a lot would argue that the former, open way wasn't too bad after all.

What are these benefits from closed systems that are being asked?

Well for one it was mentioned that not having dedicated servers would break up the communities, something the consoles would not suffer (Since they have their internal communities)

You know, I'd understand this kind of suggestion if it weren't for the fact that their current solution was far more expensive (and will continue to be far more expensive in the long run) than the past system they were using for COD4. Dedicated servers for these sorts of games are largely community-operated, so after a while server costs basically drop down to nothing as IW themselves don't have to host any servers at all.

As for special treatment, I'm all for console gamers getting the benefits PC players have been used to having. Not the other way round where a game has to be gimped on one platform to achieve the exact same experience everywhere. I personally hate the idea of an open platform being squandered like this. The idea that once I got a game, I can do just about anything I want with it. Being able to dick around with a game once I've gotten tired of playing it vanilla... well, that's partly what fascinates me about games in the first place.

Well yeah dedicated user run servers are probably going to be less expensive in the long run, but still the developer needs to develop the system for it.
As for the "I can do whatever I wanted with it" part... well yeah that part I can agree sucks a bit, and that is why I do not discuss that part, I just think the "communities will die" part of this discussion is not a valid point.

In the end its up to us players on an open systems job to keep the community together, not the developers.

 

[unacomn]

"Worse, not all games will support GFWL"

For the record, this is actually a good thing. GFWL is a an insult to anyone who likes to play games in multiplayer, and a save haven for piracy.

 

[Woe Is You]

Well yeah dedicated user run servers are probably going to be less expensive in the long run, but still the developer needs to develop the system for it.

Yeah, but here's the thing: the system has largely already been developed. COD4 supported them and MW2 runs on a tweaked version of the same engine. Why do I know this? The hacks that were run on MW2 are almost completely unmodified hacks for COD4. Again, far less work had they done it the old way. And it isn't like IWNet didn't need a boatload of work into it.

And new things are fine, of course, but the listen server model isn't really new. We already know what its benefits and disadvantages are (some of us were there before Quake and have tried the console systems) and that's partly where the anger stems from. Trying to sell something old and tired as really new and revolutionary.

 

[Shamus Young]

Worse, not all games will support GFWL

GFWL is a steaming pile of horse dung. I thank Shiva every day that not all games support it, and I wish a painful death for it and anyone who ever had anything to do with its creation.

As for the "PC gaming is dying, whaaa what are we going to do" brigade, kindly read here [http://adrianwerner.wordpress.com/] and stop worrying.

I'm no fan of GFWL either.

I certainly never suggested that the PC was "dying" although several people seem to be reacting as though I did. But it do think it's worth noting how things are going to change. I also predict this is going to be a trend: We'll see more games dropping DS support as time goes on.

 

[Lordmarkus]

Great article. Solid points indeed.

I will probably be publicly lynched for saying this but I think that the IWNET works fine.

The community bit doesn't bother me since noone were on voip, in CoD 4 or MW2 now, so for me it's hard to belong to a community. Secondly, i finally have a system that gives a total mix of multiplayer gameplay and maps.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Greed <.< They still want the money from PC gamers however small the community is ($60 price tag) but they dont want to put in the leg work to make it different than the console versions. So to sum it all up they are greedy sons of bitches. (mind you id be more than happy to give them the extra $10 if they kept the multiplayer like that of Cod4:MW)

You might've, but the problem probably is that not enough people would to make it feasible

well the fact they got 12% where as the market of PC gamers is usually around say 20% (being generous) even with the so called "boycott" you think people arent willing to pay the extra $10? Are you crazy?!

they would make back the money they spent on dedicated server support on day one Just from the PC consumers

p.s. thats the entitlement thing Funk was talking about, yall think its fair to have more features and pay less. Thanks for proving a point.

 

[Zersy]

PC gaming shall always remain regardless how bad the times are.

This is coming from someone who is a console gamer but has played enough PC to know what he's talking about.

 

[JeanLuc761]

p.s. thats the entitlement thing Funk was talking about, yall think its fair to have more features and pay less. Thanks for proving a point.

It not entitlement if it's a system that has existed for over a decade. For that matter, explain to me how it's "fair" for PC gamers to suddenly have to pay more and get less just to be even with the console crowds?

 

[Hedberger]

The thing i'm most pissed off about is that there is no way in hell that i'll ever get a decent ping since i live in the middle of nowhere with a 5 m/bit connection. I'm lucky if i can find a game as close as Stockholm and in that case i'll still have around 80+.

 

[Tony Harrison]

p.s. thats the entitlement thing Funk was talking about, yall think its fair to have more features and pay less. Thanks for proving a point.

It's actually more like the console players are prepared to pay more for less features. That's how it's been since day one. People can have this console centred point of view, like children making sure their siblings don't get more food, but comparing features like that is irrelevant. If it's on the PC: it's other PC games they are comparing it with.

 

[DTWolfwood]

It's actually more like the console players are prepared to pay more for less features. That's how it's been since day one. People can have this console centred point of view, like children making sure their siblings don't get more food, but comparing features like that is irrelevant. If it's on the PC: it's other PC games they are comparing it with.

Tony your point is valid, compared to other Shooters on PC this Mewtwo is an epic fail. Not to mention the price hike. except you fail to understand that in the end IW and Activision is in the Business of MAKING MONEY with games. Whether console games are willing to pay more or not is irrelevant. Majority Rule. If you still want games for PC you better be willing to pony up the cash or they will just not bother with it.

It not entitlement if it's a system that has existed for over a decade. For that matter, explain to me how it's "fair" for PC gamers to suddenly have to pay more and get less just to be even with the console crowds?

Jean please explain to me y they should even make the game for you if your too petty to pay what 85% of their market already pay? So yeah ok lets SPEND MORE on a product that makes us LESS revenue. THAT MAKES PERFECT BUSINESS SENSE <.<

Thanks for missing the point guys i was REFERING TO THIS MANS RESPONSE! Please read with some CONTEXT Thanks

What was IW's reason for removing dedicated server support from the PC version, anyway?

Greed <.< They still want the money from PC gamers however small the community is ($60 price tag) but they dont want to put in the leg work to make it different than the console versions. So to sum it all up they are greedy sons of bitches. (mind you id be more than happy to give them the extra $10 if they kept the multiplayer like that of Cod4:MW)

You might've, but the problem probably is that not enough people would to make it feasible

Im happy with the feature set for my PC shooters. They work. And i'll be happy to give them the $10 extra since PC version do have more features than their console counterparts. Toby assumes we are so petty as to ***** about a price hike if they kept the PC version like it always was.(as in entitled to MORE for LESS) CONTEXT ppl CONTEXT.

No doubt they completely screwed us this round.

 

[copycatalyst]

I can see that they can save money by not providing the servers themselves, but what's wrong with offering dedicated server programs that users can run themselves, making their costs back through donations and ads on their forums and MOTD screens? Is that not how many servers are run now?

 

[Tony Harrison]

It's actually more like the console players are prepared to pay more for less features. That's how it's been since day one. People can have this console centred point of view, like children making sure their siblings don't get more food, but comparing features like that is irrelevant. If it's on the PC: it's other PC games they are comparing it with.

Tony your point is valid, compared to other Shooters on PC this Mewtwo is an epic fail. Not to mention the price hike. except you fail to understand that in the end IW and Activision is in the Business of MAKING MONEY with games. Whether console games are willing to pay more or not is irrelevant. Majority Rule. If you still want games for PC you better be willing to pony up the cash or they will just not bother with it.

Except there are alternatives: from competitors who also quite like making money but who have understood PC games should be less expensive, because they cost less to publish.

 

[Nurb]

When people vote with their wallets and not buy a game, the publisher or developer will ultimately blame piracy for lackluster sales.

They will never consider they made poor decisions or should meet consumer demands, telling people to screw off if they don't like it while at the same time crying about a shrinking market.

It also looks like some people in the gaming media seem to keep telling gamers to shut up or "get used to it" too whenever a publisher gets more and more greedy and takes away something gamers have always enjoyed and/or selling it back to them for extra money on top of a full priced game. Look at what's happend in just the last 10 years:
-typical gaming releases
-pc games get expansions
-consoles go online
-console online services offer free DLC as a bonus for paying for the service and game
-post release DLC begins to cost money
-DLC begins to increase in volume and cost
-DLC comes sooner and sooner after release
-fewer pc expansion packs released
-Day-one DLC, meaning content was created and witheld to be sold for more money (sims 3 and dragon age)
-tools and options removed from PC gaming that have always been available. (Starcraft 2 and MW2)

And what do we have to look forward to based on what publishers tell us?
-no more expansions, just smaller and more frequent DLC "episodes" that end up costing more money
-centralized multiplayer that takes away choices from gamers
-shrinking singpleplayer experience in full priced retail release so DLC can be sold to "extend game life and replayability"
-subscription based releases that are not MMOs

And we're told to just deal with it? I say let the corporates crumble, we need more risk and originality in games, not titles with growing numbers on the end, snowballing corporate greed and more washed out grey/brown "realism". People will always exist that want to create games, and smaller developers can actually compete in the industry again without being forced to focus on graphics engines and "safe" moneymakers by a CEO that is more interested in share holders than the game.

 

[jamesworkshop]

I will worry about PC gaming when im not too busy playing
Borderlands
Resident evil 5
Torchlight
Dragon age
Bioshock 2
Crysis 2
Dawn of War Chaos Rising
Left 4 dead 2

 

[bjj hero]

Spoiler: You've already read this

I was raised on pc games. My first RTS being homeworld. I remember sitting around in the lobbys talking to people as we set up game after game after game. There was a huge load time and we all would sit around and "race" our loading bars. However that was 1999 and there was maybe 15 to 20 of us sitting around on a dial up connection playing a niche game.

Now we have huge masses of people playing. Dedicated servers gave people that small community feel. I hate playing on the 360 because sure you might have a good game with a handful of people but when its over you jump right back into the mass of people randomly selected for some other game where you might run into some dick that screams every 3 or decides he is the team captain and barks orders at everyone and if you dont do it they spam your name for a kick the rest of the game.

I havnt games with people in a long time and it is rather depressing. Not because I have problems talking with people but mostly because I have problems with what most multiplayer communities have turned into. They seem to mostly have become a giant mob of either people so hell bent on following rules and regulations or people so hellbent on being the most awesome shit the world has ever seen. We have lost simply playing a game because its a fun game and we want to experiance it with other people.

You may wonder where I am going with this but PC players have always had a certain air of simply enjoying a game. Not that console gamers dont have this I have had plenty of fun with a handful of people playing console games. However with this whole matchmaking thing and deathmatches on small maps with caffeine junkies and 12 year olds. There is no longer that feeling of playing a game with other people that enjoy the game. Instead it has turned into what the name of the game is; a deathmatch.

True we may have lost dedicated servers but multiplayer in itself has evolved and turned into some horrible mutant monster. I no longer enjoy it and probably never will again. Maybe it is just what people have turned into or maybe it is the fact that gaming has become more widespread and popular. Maybe that old saying "you cant teach an old dog new tricks" has more thruth to it then I originally thought.

I used to play action Quake on Quake II around 1998 on a 56k modem. There was a real community on my local server, I'd see the same people day in and day out on there.

I was pushed out of PC gaming when I stopped being a student and had real life things to buy other than a gaming rig. I'm on consoles now. The friend list is nice but its not like having your own server to call home.

I see dedicated servers as your local pubs, where you can go in any time and see familiar faces and feel at home. The console system is like city center bars where you will probably only know someone if you arrive with your mates. It can still fun but it's not the same if you're on your own or in a small group.

A bigger issue for me is microphones, there was far less trash talk as you had to stop and type your message. Now every barely literate teenager is screaming down the mic. One positive from no dedicated server is that you will no longer be kicked for doing too well on a foreign server.

 

[S_K]

The only counter I can think of for this is a messenger kind of system for PCs like Steam, but that still doesn't stop cheaters unless they keep the games updated on a regular basis. Can't say I blame game makers wanting to go mostly console based though, but I will say this much, if the tf2 community is anything to go by the IQ of an average gamer is going to drop -_-

 

[DTWolfwood]

Except there are alternatives: from competitors who also quite like making money but who have understood PC games should be less expensive, because they cost less to publish.

Competition is dictated by game play not price. Competitor will jump on board with the price, not stay low when they see people willing to folk over the dough(AAA titles are going to go up in price.)

Digitally distributed cost less. No clue whether that statement is true for hard copies. Its a standardized pricing when it comes to games. If everyone can list whatever price they want, id expect to see some variance in pricing from game to game eh.

Your alternative is to play a DIFFERENT game. You can't experience the same gameplay in a different game buddy. Thats just saying all shooters are the same. Which as a fellow PC gamer you know its not true.

But hey you feel so entitled to a lower price and are unwilling to pay thats fine, just don't be shocked when companies spend less and less time making the PC version different. o wait they are already doing that <.<

 

[DeathQuaker]

It sucks for multiplayer PC gamers, it really does, and I know that it will frustrate a number of friends of mine. I feel badly for anyone whom this does affect.

But as an exclusively single-player gamer (whether for PC or console) however, I can't help but hope it might mean more support for single-player games instead (and those you can mod out the wazoo all you like). Probably not, as I know multiplayer is generally more lucrative and they'll just hope to make peer to peer work better, but I can dream. As an aside, it irks the heck out of me to see people saying that this may be the "death" of PC gaming when it's just one kind of PC gaming. Yes, again, a lucrative kind, but not the only kind (and popular single player games sell well enough).