Plight of the PC Gamer
I’m still primarily a PC gamer. I have an Xbox, have a Wii, have played games on a PS3 many times, but the PC is where the majority of my gaming time is spent. For me, it’s a matter of the mouse + keyboard vs. the controller. Well, primarily the mouse. It’s more accurate, easier to use, more intuitive and simply navigates both the worlds and the menu structures much easier than a controller.
People have claimed PC gaming is ‘dying’ for many years now. Initially these discussions stemmed from popular games like Halo and God of War only appearing on consoles (eventually receiving PC ports). Many good games have arrived on consoles first, but because they turn into cash-cows for the publishers, they usually make it to the PC. So I don’t buy this argument regarding PC gaming being on the decline.
Enter Steam, Valve’s digital distribution platform. I’m a HUGE Steam fan, buying the majority of my games from the service. I was a little irritated that Dragon Age: Origins on Steam did not release at midnight on release day. No, on the east coast, it actually unlocked at about 3PM on release day. For some reason Modern Warfare 2 didn’t unlock on Steam until 2-3 days after its midnight release in the States. Is this the trend for the foreseeable future? Are PC gamers going to be left behind, literally, when AAA titles come out in favor of the brick-and-mortar outlets?
A decade ago, most games were developed for PC, then ported to consoles. That trend has now reversed. Again, I single out Modern Warfare 2, where the developers neglected to even change some of the language for the PC port, where users are getting messages like “Reconnect to Xbox Live” and “Press the right trigger to fire”. I ran into similar messages in Far Cry 2 on the PC. This is what we have to look forward to, PC gamers.
Finally, this weekend I decided to play through Dragon Age: Origins a second time and wanted to grab all the Downloadable Content (DLC). In an effort to give purchasers an added bonus, the game shipped with a special code you can redeem for a DLC pack that contained a new quest line as well as a new party member, Shale. I believe this was done to encourage people to buy the game new vs. used (the code is a 1-time use). When I couldn’t figure out how to redeem my pre-order information for the DLC pack, I found this on the BioWare website:
* The Stone Prisoner is available through first purchase redemption. A Rave card containing a code and download instructions will be available. The Rave card is not available with digital download copies of the game. The Stone Prisoner can be purchased seperately.
Irritated, I went to the BioWare store and found that the Stone Prisoner is a $15 download (that came FREE for PC/Xbox/PS3 pre-orders in retail stores). The other DLC pack, the Warden’s Keep, is a $7 download.
That’s $22 for DLC, nearly half the price of the game itself. You would think that sending digital customers a redemption code via email would be easier (and cheaper) vs. printing and sending a “Rave Card” with a code on it.
I’ll stop ranting now. I guess it’s time to go master the Xbox controller…
I have been running into this problem more and more lately as well. I was not as upset as most of my PC counterparts when IW came out and announced IWNet after months of saying that there would be no change to MW2’s gameplay, but I still prefer dedicated servers for all the same reasons that everyone else who complained about IWNet does (it would be pointless to list them all again).
The main things I was upset about during the MW2 release were that 1) There were no mod tools for MW2, and also that IW basically ripped off all of the good mods and added them to MW2’s multiplayer without attributing the ideas to their original creators, and 2) That all of the people who said that they were going to boycott the game just bought it anyway.
I think that the lack of modding tools along with IWNet signify that devs are changing their focus from the now waning market of the PC and are treating the PC like another console. What’s worse is that all of the PC gamers made it clear what they wanted and IW/Activision just ignored them.
Not to mention that if this trend continues there will be no use for versions of DirectX later than 9.0c, since that’s all that the PS3 and XBox 360 can handle… And I’m looking for an excuse to buy a 5870 (or 5890 if ATi decides to make one). The upside to that is that my last-gen hardware (Phenom II 940 @ 3.55, 4890 Toxic) maxes out MW2 with a minimum FPS of 72 WHILE FOLDING.
PS–I’m glad that I had you as an IST teacher while I had the chance. You will e missed in IST. Good luck at Schreyer!
Hey Seth,
Yeah, I wasn’t too upset about the MW2 dedicated server or boycott thing (who really follows through with these gaming boycotts anyway?) I still haven’t bought the game because I’m a single player fan of the series, and 60 bucs for a 7-8 hours campaign is crazy. I’ll have to wait until Steam runs a discount. Waiting for the same thing to happen with Borderlands as well.
The mod thing is irritating. The mod scene is where a ton of innovation happens (as you said, IW rolling mods into MW2), so IW is kind of shooting themselves in the foot.
Thanks for the kind words about IST, I may actually be teaching a course on game design for IST in Fall 2010 or Spring 2011. Still working on the kinks, but it looks like a possibility.