Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!

[Added Poll] The Future of Gaming (PC, Console, or ?)

TheLizardbonesTheLizardbones Member CommonPosts: 10,910

The PC market is starting to tank, badly. Well, "badly" is a relative term. It's a 7.8% decline, but they are still shipping about 320 million units worldwide. This is driven by consumers not needing to replace their PCs as often.

So what kind of impact should we expect on the PC Gaming scene? It seems that PC Gaming is the sector of the PC market that isn't shrinking. People still aggressively upgrade their gaming PCs on a regular schedule, but what will that mean for development and prices? Will prices drop? What about new developments in PC hardware; will new innovations for gaming stall because the market is captive?

Or will gaming shift from full blown PCs to something like tablets as the processors and gpus get good enough?

Let's not forget consoles. Or let's do. Will there be any room in the market once tablets are easier to build and have as much power as a comparably priced console would? Heck, they are building consoles out of mobile hardware now, though the term "console" is being a big generous.

Will PC gaming become the driving force behind gaming, or will all paths merge into mobile devices that double as our gaming machines? Will we keep dedicated gaming devices around forever? What do you think?

I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.

Comments

  • EnchantedpalaceEnchantedpalace Member Posts: 4
    Cloud gaming or tablets. Technologies improves every year no wonder it will happen.
  • JimmyYOJimmyYO Member UncommonPosts: 519
    In less then ten years there will be absolutely no difference between a PC, console or tablet aside from the amount of space to fit more hardware.
  • GroovyFlowerGroovyFlower Member Posts: 1,245
    Originally posted by lizardbones

    The PC market is starting to tank, badly. Well, "badly" is a relative term. It's a 7.8% decline, but they are still shipping about 320 million units worldwide. This is driven by consumers not needing to replace their PCs as often.

    So what kind of impact should we expect on the PC Gaming scene? It seems that PC Gaming is the sector of the PC market that isn't shrinking. People still aggressively upgrade their gaming PCs on a regular schedule, but what will that mean for development and prices? Will prices drop? What about new developments in PC hardware; will new innovations for gaming stall because the market is captive?

    Or will gaming shift from full blown PCs to something like tablets as the processors and gpus get good enough?

    Let's not forget consoles. Or let's do. Will there be any room in the market once tablets are easier to build and have as much power as a comparably priced console would? Heck, they are building consoles out of mobile hardware now, though the term "console" is being a big generous.

    Will PC gaming become the driving force behind gaming, or will all paths merge into mobile devices that double as our gaming machines? Will we keep dedicated gaming devices around forever? What do you think?

    Im already starting to secure my PC collection (DRM FREE GAMESaround 40 i realy like and play in future) and my 3 rig's with spareparts and plenty of extrenal HDD

    XP rig from 2006 with intel duocore 8600e-evga 8800gt optimal condition-first win7 gen1 with dx11 intel icore7 920 ati radeon 5870 rig optimal condition and last but not last win7 gen3 icore7-amd7970 optimal condition.

    Can't immagine how i could play games without my mouse/keyboard.

  • KenFisherKenFisher Member UncommonPosts: 5,035

    I'm not sure if I expect this, but I voted merge.  10 inch tablet with a game controller, plus good games, and I'd be set.  For me that would be infinitely superior to a TV based console in a clunky box.

     

    The issue for me and tablet gaming is the touch screen.  It works fine for some games (puzzles, etc) but I find it clunky for 3D.

     

    On the other side, I'm not sure if I'd prefer this over conventional PC.  I like mouse + keyboard gaming.

     

    Sorry, I've rambled.

     


    Ken Fisher - Semi retired old fart Network Administrator, now working in Network Security.  I don't Forum PVP.  If you feel I've attacked you, it was probably by accident.  When I don't understand, I ask.  Such is not intended as criticism.
  • RasputinRasputin Member UncommonPosts: 602

    Planned Obsolecence is failing. The CPUs have reached their limit, both in absolute Mhz as well in horizontal scaling - multi-cores, as the overhead grows too big at a high numbers of cores.

    If a game company wants a big amount of customers, it cannot make bleeding edge games. WoW taught them that big-time, so also this piece in the Planned Obsolecence puzzle is vanishing.

    What there is left, is a market where the PCs last longer. Much, much longer, and of course that will hurt sales. But it does not necessarily mean, that the amount of PC owners and -gamers grows smaller.

    Which I don't know if is the case. But at least that statistic is much more interesting than sales.

  • RasputinRasputin Member UncommonPosts: 602

    Another thing is, does it really matter?

    The next XBox is going to have a  PC architecture, (and it runs on DirectX). This will make it easy for developers to make games, that run both on PC and XBox. Many laptops run Windows and thus DirectX. Together, that is a huge market for Windows+DirectX, and isn't that what is the most important to PC gamers? Or at least their platform? DirectX is the key here.

    Of course there is the risk, that everything gets consolified worse than it is now, if the amount of dedicated PC players lowers. But Im not sure that is where development will go. After all, it is the players, not their machines, that will drive the market, and if there is a demand for more complicated games, then the supply will follow. Complicated games will usually require mouse+keyboard.

  • PhryPhry Member LegendaryPosts: 11,004
    gaming might end up being more PC inclusive in the future, mostly because consoles like the xbox one and the ps4 are adopting architecture thats more compatible with PC's anyway, though with the decline in Console gaming steadily accelerating, its probably no wonder that the xbox one, is moving away from being a 'gaming machine' although i think microsofts attempt to 'unify' the whole thing is too much of a gimmick, and too light on actual substance, and the whole xbox one won't even turn on unless kinect is attached is a very dubious requirement that gives almost no functionality in gaming, and is more about increasing advertising revenues for microsoft, not something i'd personally allow in my home never mind my living room, whether console gaming survives though will probably depend on the PS4, perhaps we're about to see a huge resurgence of PC gaming, it could very easily happen, but i think the most likely scenario is that ps3's and xbox 360's won't be replaced as quickly as the respective companies would like, so probability is that games will be made for those platforms for a few more years yet, and as their not compatible with the new console platforms, there is a huge question mark over the future of console gaming as a whole. Interesting times indeed image
Sign In or Register to comment.