hux309

Yeah well that's his fault for being a clueless mong, ive always maintained that some people and technology just shouldn't be anywhere near each other.

Same can be said for cars though.

Geezer

But for the last 15 years, there was no viable alternative to PC gaming.

If you are developing a game, what would you rather do? Spend a shed load on trying to make it work with a seemingly infinite possible configurations for PC, or exploit a single platform with known parameters (ok a few platforms, but each is a known quantity).

The online element advatnage element has all but disappeared, consoles appeal as multi function media hubs attracts people who aren't just PC geeks and things like Wii have brought in people who would never have previously gamed.

The need for PC for gaming is shrinking all the time. It will become hard to justify spending the amount of money that has been previously to support a very niche market.

Geezer

bob269

Wasn't that why Direct X was developed?

Surely the games are built for the latest and best technology then simply turn off special effects etc depending on the pc spec.

Development wise i doubt theres much difference between pc and 360, whether they choose to develop a pc version would be down to profitability, Valve have proved that you can produce a great game (HL2) that runs with all the bells and whistles turned on on an average spec pc.

PeteBrant

I don;t see PC gaming as "dead" but it's certainly diminished.

First things first, PC games, on the whole, sell a tiny amount compared to thier console counter parts (obviously there are exceptions like, The Sims).
Increasingly, traditional PC developers have at least gone multi platform, and in some cases jumped ship altogether.

The real money is in console land, that's where the big sales are, and people will always go where the money is.

I see PC games moving increasingly towards persistant online worlds with a subscription based pricing structure - This way, you can sustain development costs with regular income.

Of course the same applies with the GFX manufactureres them selves - Ati and Nvidia of course have transferred the buly of their income from PC GFX cards to Consoles, and PCs have effectively become test beds for future console technology.

So, in summary I see the PC gaming being primarily online persistant worlds, and the odd advanced tech game (e.g. Crysis).

Back in the day, say 5 or 6 years ago, I would have said that if you are a gamer, you need a PC. I don't think the same necessarily rings true today.

Geezer

Although DirectX is upposed to be the 'go between', you only have to have a quick look at the boxes of games for the supported chipsets, and problems people encounter to see that it is not quite the middleware it pupports to be.

At the end of the day though, money talks, and like Pete mentions above, the real money is now in consoles.

I would be quite happy to see it go this way, as consoles generally have a longer life than PC hardware, constant upgrades to be able to run the latest games is not a good position to be in, for anyone. All I need is keyboard and mouse support for console games and I'll never have to upgrade my PC again (until it breaks.......)!

Geezer

Dream Weaver

PC gaming may be technically good, but unless you are a geek and/or singleton playing on a PC, for 90% of people, generally means sitting in a spare room on an office chair watching a 19-22" screen.

That is in no way my idea of a relaxing evenings gaming, consoles are where its at for ease and comfort, leather sofa, nice fire going and a big screen HDTV experience with no bloody messing about with graphics cards etc.

blubs

Geezer,

Stop trying to vindicate your recent purchase of 2 consoles and a shed full of games.



blubs

ps - How many times have we seen the 'I've just bought the latest console and have decided that PCs are now history' thread?

PeteBrant

Toi be fair, I don't remember the PC gaming scene being as thin as it is at the moment.

I think part of the problem is diminishing returns. The line between Consoles and PCs is now more blurred than ever.

Just what does an exceptionally powerful gaming PC give you over a PS3/360?

I say this as someone that has always championed the cause of PC gaming.

Jamz3k

have u been to Game or Gamestop and looked at the PC titles? they are always duller than dull. Thus why i like my wee Xbox360!

MJW

I remember when Playstation 1 came out and heralded the death of PC gaming, but it didn't happen. I use my PC for games and haven't bothered with the latest generation of consoles, mainly because I generally play online first person shooters and prefer the games and way things are done on the PC.
However, I can see the attraction of consoles : less hassle to set up (providing you don't have to send your console back to Microsoft a half a dozen times or so) you can play them on a bigger screen (if you can afford to buy a decent HD TV to play on that is) and now new consoles have online capability (if you don't mind stumping up the subscription cost)

finalzero

PC Graphics are pretty amazing at the moment, provided you have:

1. The Right Game (Frontline Fuels Of War etc)
2. Ageis Physics Card
3. 8800GTX / 9800GX2 / SLI combo (ati or nVidia)

Coupled with the above you need a pretty meaty PC just to be able to play the game at max graphics however PC games do simply look stunning when running at their full glory.

The advantages of a console over a PC is as someone stated, much more of a controlled environment to develop in. Consoles are blackbox technology i.e. everything hardware wise is as it will always be, there are constraints to the development however this type of environment allows a designer and developer to fully explore the capabilities of the available technology.

The problem with PC's is you have a changing landscape, to make games more compatible across the board developers have to make their games more generic and this can be at a trade off of quality.

And as any one will tell you, generally PC developers are lazy, it's easy to not try and engineer a solution when you can tell you customers to simply add more ram, diskspace, upgrade xyz item and so on.

But I think PC graphics will be here for a while and may set the benchmark again for a short period as console technology crosses over into PC graphics technology and vice-versa.

Geezer

Oh I see, when I rang you, you said you were busy, but you were just surfing SN!

Anyway, I haven't said this is the end of gaming on PCs, but that there is a shift away from the high end, graphic intensive stuff to the geeky stuff (e.g. Never Winter Nights, Blubs ) because consoles have caught up in online play and, to a degree certainly, graphically.

This has not previously been the case, certainly with online play.

So there

Geezer

hux309

You don't really have much call for a physx card now nvidia bought them out, they have even allowed ati to use the tech should they desire plus both brands can easily support it onboard but many sites have said there's no need, gpu's are now sufficiently poweful that it can easily be handled by the gpu alone.

If devs wrote in assembly as opposed to c+ we'd have maxxed out graphics or at least be very close to it by now it's only the greediness of companies that prevents them from doing so.

blubs

He He,

You have to do something during audio conference calls!

What's more laddie, I'm quite fond of my shapeshifting Druid I'll have you know, (even though he wears tights and likes changing into a badger.... ).

blubs

spectrum48k

exactly

won't be long before they miss out the API layer and run directly on the GPU, which I believe the likes of CUDA already let you do.

hux309

Oh does that make it more efficient or is it another layer of laziness?

Oh and for teh lulz.

Edit: Read up on cuda, sounds interesting, nvidia only atm though but with assembly it caters for the whole computer so gpu/cpu and even memory benefit, though i can't wait when ssd drives become mainstream, they have a nice performance hike.

spectrum48k

The more layers, the more performance and flexibility suffers - developers currently access the graphics hardware via an API eg. OpenGL or DirectX, however GPU's are evolving into more general use devices, akin to the CPU. This will remove the DirectX layer for those interested in doing so. The less layers, the closer you are to the "metal"

CUDA is only an example as a language for programming the GPU - it shows that we're reaching the stage where an API isn't necessary - instead the developer could code directly onto a general purpose GPU (or CPU), missing out the DirectX layer altogether.

DirectX will still exist, but those who use it probably won't be able to match the efficiency / performance of those that code directly to the GPU's.

In the long term, the GPU will evolve into competition for the CPU, or vice-versa. No need for both, but that's a long way off.