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Will PC Gaming Overtake Consoles

Hidden308

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It's actually becoming a heated debate on many forums as to whether or not PC gaming will eventually overtake console gaming.

I believe it will someday. Not anytime in the near future, but the PC is superior in gaming in literally all aspects ranging from graphics to the size of communities. There are more PC games and more people that play them than all consoles combined, and I think it will continue to be that way and grow.

What are your thoughts?
 

Jessi

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I don't think it will replace it entirely, no. Yes, there are a lot of PC gamers, but there are a lot of console gamers, too. I think we'll end up seeing more crossover as time goes on, though. It's already quite common to use an Xbox controller while playing at the PC, for example, because people like the use of controls more than the mouse for some games. I don't think handheld gaming is going anywhere any time soon either because you can do it on the go.
 

NewDCD

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Economically, PC gaming has already done so. Just look at Valve's reported financial growth. More people are flocking to the PC industry due to the convenience of digital distribution, the great pricing on games, the superior performance and graphical prowess on an appropiate machine, and other factors. It's also important to consider that pretty much everyone owns a PC in this day and age. PC gaming won't phase consoles out of existence any time soon (and I hope they don't, as both are a different type of experience to the other, kind of like apples and oranges), but I'm pretty sure it's already overtaken console gaming for all extents and purposes.
 

Casper001

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No, PC Gaming is more 'Elite' Gaming. Usually costing more, Consoles are great for people who don't want to setup a computer and maintain it. Consoles are essentially 'Limited Computers' or 'Multi-Media Centres'. They are computers build for gaming, except you cant do half of the things PC's can. Consoles will always remain a part for the 'Casual' Audience, But PC Gaming is slowly growing.
 

NecroWolf

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I don't think consoles ever overtook PC if you think about it. PC was first in almost everything. First in online gaming, first in talking to other players while online with a headset, first in having more than one display (consoles still can't do that), etc. I have a couple articles on my forum about it:

The Rebirth of PC Gaming - Bring on the Modders!
THE RETURN OF "REAL" GAMING

Not to take anything away from this forum, as this one is better for your gaming articles than mine.
 

jayjacinto

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Well we may have never noticed, but pc gaming already HAS overtook consoles since day one. ATARI and Nintendo NES were kings, but when PC gaming has been innovated, it spread like forest fire. consoles always try to take the crown back, but never did actually.
 

thepostman

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PC gaming is superior in my opinion and while I enjoy PC gaming more, I still enjoy playing a console. Consoles will always exist. A lot of developers don't want to mess with trying to develop for multiple hardware configurations and drivers. Consoles have fixed hardware and your game is going to work on all of them.
 

Smokey

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PC gaming is superior in my opinion and while I enjoy PC gaming more, I still enjoy playing a console. Consoles will always exist. A lot of developers don't want to mess with trying to develop for multiple hardware configurations and drivers. Consoles have fixed hardware and your game is going to work on all of them.
^ This. Plus not everyone (consumer-wise) wants to or has the means to shell out the cash for a top-notch gaming PC.
 

NecroWolf

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^ This. Plus not everyone (consumer-wise) wants to or has the means to shell out the cash for a top-notch gaming PC.

You can get a PC for about the same price as one of the consoles that will blow the consoles away. Not everyone in PC's shells out $3000 for top of the line stuff. I have a friend that does and I have no idea why. I got maybe 1/10 the money in mine that he does and I can play the same exact games he does, albeit at slower frame rates. (Do you really need 200 frames per second?) Plus at the same cost you get more recent technologies since consoles are about 7 year old tech as it is.

I think this image says it all:

PCMasterRace.jpg
 

Smokey

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Why would you wanna run a game at slower framerates then it's console counterpart though? I own both a home console and a gaming laptop and the difference betwen certain games is night and day. I play Hitman Absolution on both PS3 and PC and i found everything to just run better on PC. Maybe i'm in the minority here but, I bought my PC for a few reasons:
-PC exclusive games (MMORPGs mostly)
-cheaper games/more sales (I got Hitman Absolution PROFESSIONAL edition for $29.99 as opposed to the $69.99 PS3 version)
-every day basic use.


I'm not defending one over the other because I have and use both but that argument you posted is stupid (the pic) cuz that's basically every reason (in a PC gamers eyes) to go to PC then console....lol if you cut out all of those, what's left to a game at all? :p
 

NecroWolf

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Actually most PC games won't run slow as a console (which is 30 frames per second on standard def TV's and 60 on high def). Most of my games run 60-85 frames. I usually set the max for 85 since my flat screen only does 60 anyways. My friend runs 4 video cards (Geforce 600 series cards) and a huge monitor, so you know he's got to be getting overkill frame rates.

As for the picture I think it's meant as a joke. I found it last year somewhere and at first I thought it was stupid too, then thought it had to be a joke. :) To be honest though I have played several games on the console and PC and I just don't see how anyone could ever say the console version was better. Also, I remember a couple years ago they started making console games that could handle 64 players (I think it was) and I remember thinking that it was odd because I had played on 64 player servers for PC back in 2002-2003, basically 10 years ago when PC's were still single core machines running about 1 Ghz. Considering the current consoles are more powerful than that I would have thought they could have done it sooner. I may be missing some part of that story I don't know for sure though.
 

dagscot

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I think consoles will always lead pc gaming. Console games are easier to play. They tend to be more fun and you don't have to have an extreme rig with a $1000 budget, in order to get the best games at a good frame-rate. The only edge computers have, is that they are continually improving. New motherboards and new graphics each year but, again, that means spending a lot of money.
 

NecroWolf

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I think consoles will always lead pc gaming. Console games are easier to play. They tend to be more fun and you don't have to have an extreme rig with a $1000 budget, in order to get the best games at a good frame-rate. The only edge computers have, is that they are continually improving. New motherboards and new graphics each year but, again, that means spending a lot of money.

I don't see how consoles have ever led PC gaming or ever will. As for console games being easier to play that's crazy. Most console games are dumbed down versions of the PC version with worse controls because most consoles don't have mouse/keyboard setups. (I know the current generation consoles do support them but I've never seen anyone actually use that function.) Plus the reason you rarely see console/PC cross platform games is because PC has better and easier to use controls and PC gamers will win every time.
And really most PC games are highly adjustable graphics wise so you don't have to spend $1000 to play the latest games. You can get a $500 PC from many places that will play just about any current game at the same resolution as any console and probably even at higher resolutions than the console. I've only got about $240 in this machine I have now and I haven't found a game it won't play yet. If you know of one it might not play I would love to know so I could try it though. :)
 

Esperahol

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No. In fact I really don't think most people are gaming on their PC. To be honest the cost and necessities for such a thing aren't something most people have access to and/or want to deal with. That completely ignores all the blessed glitches you can get with PC gaming. At least with most consoles even with a thousand glitches the game is going to run and most things will function. That isn't something you're going to get with a PC. I mean sometimes you can't even get the game to open up never mind behave.

Then of course is the issue of upgrades. Upgrades for a PC gamer are much different than for a console gamer. I've had my Xbox 360 since the product launched quite a few years ago and I can still play all the new games. How? Insert game, let console take care of business, and then play game. Easy. That's what most people want - I mean the greater majority of folks don't care about being l33t. That's why there are internet cafes and gaming cafes - so folks who want to go online, but don't want the maintenance can handle it that way.

One other thing (but very important) is cost. Like I said my Xbox360 is older than my kid brother - who is a second grader. So what I paid for it may have seemed expensive at the time, but has proven to be a solid one time investment. Could the same be said for the average gaming PC? Will it be a one time investment or will you need to repeated pour more resources into it as time and progress march on? Most people don't want to do that - they want one price for their machine and then satisfaction. That's why consoles are out there and why PC gaming is unlikely to change that.
 

NecroWolf

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No. In fact I really don't think most people are gaming on their PC. To be honest the cost and necessities for such a thing aren't something most people have access to and/or want to deal with. That completely ignores all the blessed glitches you can get with PC gaming. At least with most consoles even with a thousand glitches the game is going to run and most things will function. That isn't something you're going to get with a PC. I mean sometimes you can't even get the game to open up never mind behave.

Then of course is the issue of upgrades. Upgrades for a PC gamer are much different than for a console gamer. I've had my Xbox 360 since the product launched quite a few years ago and I can still play all the new games. How? Insert game, let console take care of business, and then play game. Easy. That's what most people want - I mean the greater majority of folks don't care about being l33t. That's why there are internet cafes and gaming cafes - so folks who want to go online, but don't want the maintenance can handle it that way.

One other thing (but very important) is cost. Like I said my Xbox360 is older than my kid brother - who is a second grader. So what I paid for it may have seemed expensive at the time, but has proven to be a solid one time investment. Could the same be said for the average gaming PC? Will it be a one time investment or will you need to repeated pour more resources into it as time and progress march on? Most people don't want to do that - they want one price for their machine and then satisfaction. That's why consoles are out there and why PC gaming is unlikely to change that.

These are all extremely good points and I can't argue with most of them except for the fact that you say most people aren't gaming on their PC's. I believe they are. According to tomshardware.com there are 54 Million Enthusiast and Performance PC Gamers Globally, and who knows how many casual gamers on top of that. Yeah, consoles are less expensive (until you buy the games) and a lot easier to use but they also can't do most things a PC will do, though that has nothing to do with gaming, I know. Consoles also have some of the best programmers I have ever seen, but that's because everyone has the same exact hardware and the programmers can focus on that hardware instead of having to worry about everyone having different specs.

To be honest I think there will always be some kind of consoles for gaming on the market but there are more PC's than ever now. We have 5 PC's in our house and what's funny is most people I know either don't have a PC at all or have 3 or more. My PC is also set up to play any console available except for the most current ones. I like having one machine that does everything rather than having a stack of consoles hooked up to my display, plus it allows me to play games in full HD something consoles only do for a couple of games, and they don't do it that well. (You should see God of War 2 in HD, it looks really good.)

PC's are a pain in the ass sometimes when you can't figure out why some game won't run. I've had a few games do that but they were really old games, like 10+ years old and I have had a bit of trouble getting older games to run with Windows 7, even ones made for XP and Vista. I even had to install Direct X 9 recently because a game required it which I thought was stupid because I have Direct X 11 and as far as I knew it was backward compatible. Someone else I know had the same game and same problem, I installed Direct X 9 and it fixed hers too. That was one thing off the top of my head I found stupid.
 

SirJoe

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There has always been this debate. I think that there is space for both platforms. I know of a lot of people that will play both on consoles and on pcs. I think that the gaming experience is different but I can't say that I prefer the one over the other. When ever it looks like one platform is going to dominate the market completely the other platform will bring in something completely knew and gains a few more points.
 

Womack

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There is a real disconnect between fact and fiction on here with people understanding of computer hardware potential. The first gaming PC I ever built cost $550, had a Radeon HD 7770 gpu and an Intel i5 CPU. That was my primary gaming rig for about 3 years. While I have sense built another computer, I still have that computer, because my friends use it if we are doing a LAN party type deal. That 5 year old $90 GPU runs Battlefield 1 at high(without shadows) graphics with anywhere around 45-70 fps.
In no way is PC gaming more expensive than consoles. A 5 year old 400$ computer with a dedicated gpu can run any game that an Xbox 360 can run at the same graphics settings, if not higher. I know, I literally built half a dozen budget computers for friends back in high school. They still run new games at 60 fps medium graphics or higher(which is higher than an Xbox One runs at, because the Xbox upscales and cuts corners on certain render fields).

The only thing that consoles have over PC is that:
A.) they're easy to use. There is no debate, a console is a thousand times easier to play games on than a computer. You put the game into the console and it plays, that is all you have to do.
B.) Its an even playing field. You don't need to worry about someone with a $1k computer snipping you from outside your render distance. All the foliage and fog of war is the exact same for every player on that console.

If you care more about having 2-3 times more fps and 4k resolution and Ultra blah blah blah, then get a really expensive gaming computer.
If you just want to play a wide variety of games at 1080p 60fps, get a $350 office computer and a $100 gpu.
If you just want to play some games with your friends, spend $400 on a Console(assuming your friends also have the console).
 

overcast

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I think each to their own. Some games are build for console. And they perform better under that environment. And game developers get the freedom to run the games lot better under it. And in case of the console. you can find that some games are easy to use compared to PC. You can see that some games are made for PC and they perform better over there. So I don't think it's fair comparison in between two. It's like home made car compared with F1 Racer.
 

Mattmattics

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This is a hard question to answer. PC gaming has really put a lot of pressure on consoles. Many of the hardcore players favor PC over console, but that didn't stop Sony and Micro from making their own pro devices. The way that games are released now also puts a lot of pressure on the console. However, everybody doesn't want to build or buy a gaming PC. For this reason, I still give the edge to consoles. Getting a gaming PC is and investment and commitment to time. Until the prices get closer I think the majority of gamers will stick with the console.
 

Koyomi Araragi

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I don't think this will happen anytime soon, especially not for Nintendo. Companies are careful to have console exclusives specifically to avoid this.
 
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