PC Gaming "In Disarray"

says Epic boss, Cliff Bleszinski.

http://news.filefront.com/epic-shifting-focus-to-consoles-due-to-disarray-in-pc-gaming/

It's hard to disagree with him. While there are still interesting games out there, they're harder and harder to find, and usually done by small teams who don't have the ability to develop for X360 and PS3. Then the teams get a bit of investment if the game does well, they take on more staff, get a few dev kits and they're off to consoleland leaving the PC scene to stagnate.

Aside from the 360-bias I'm picking up in the article, I got to say the same pretty much as well.

Where-as there's a billion PC configurations, as well as different ranges of hardware, it's just more appealing in both a programming and business situation to work on a set hardware piece that reflects the audience your after.
(which unfortunately means I get to deal with a lot of crap games on the Wii because everyone looks at it like a kiddy machine, including Cliff himself.)


Also, I'm curious as to what he's trying to insinuate with the the following quote.

I welcome the change, would make it easier for us to sell games we make if we don't have to compete with huge sweatshops ;)

Anyway, we won't be the only ones wanting to ride the wave, so huge sweatshops will always keep an eye on PC gaming to avoid losing potential money.

Who cares about this guys opinion, he's just trying to justify what he's doing.

Hmm - don't have a console, but my impression is that there's more chance of getting a game that doesn't rely on aliens/space marines/special ops/WWII/ghosts/demons/orcs/elves on the PC.

So long live the PC.

It's 75% the fault of the GPU manufacturers and a 25% the fault of game companies with overbearing protection schemes and bad products.

When I got Lego Star Wars 2, the installer would not run without crashing. I had to go online and download a new installer just to put it on my machine.

As for the GPU manufacturers, ATI especially has put out a lot of drivers that simply don't work, and the price of good GPUs is too high. The technology is ready, but the market won't move forward because of the price, so everyone is stuck on hardware that is several years old. For the price of a high-end NVidia card you can buy a whole console system.

I don't know, though. Valve is doing well, and I have never heard of them putting anything on consoles. I think there is definitely a bit of salemanship in this interview...Epic wants everyone to think the PC is not a viable platform so they can sell engine licenses.

Got to agree about the hardware\peformance\price there. I won't even upgrade anymore - I'd feel like an idiot if I did. To think once I didn't even think twice - Doh!

Nowadays instead of wasting my youth in front of a monitor I go outside and do stuff instead. Can't beat it!...almost feels unreal.

WAIT A MINUTE!!!

This guy, "Cliff Bleszinski", is talking rubbish:

He is talking about the developers themselves.



He is stating Epic's shift to console development.


So, in a nutshell, he is basically saying that he/Epic have noted a gap in the PC game market that neither he, or Epic, want to fill.

What is his point? He is talking about developers not providing a full spectrum of game variety in the PC market - He/Epic are aware of this and have decided to spout on about it, but walk away from it. WHAT IS HIS POINT?

WHAT, THE CHUFFING-NORA, IS HIS POINT?

puki, that point is not lost on the blogger:

Well there have been Valve games ported to consoles since the Dreamcast, but they did make a point of making their latest engine scalable so I guess the issues you raised affect them less anyway.

Given how indignant Epic seemed that Intel et al would dare to sell the low-end budget laptops that people want to buy, this whole story has been on the cards for a while. It's still a bit of a surprise, mind -- one million out of five and a half million is a significant chunk of business to be throwing away.

People listen to Bleszinski still? Weird.

Shocking!

It's a great game (on PS2).

I know, I have it on the Wii. But, I'm shocked to hear that from Leadwerks who has previously criticised pretty much all games that aren't realistic/FPS/adult/war/hardcore games as pointless.

Good to see he is growing up tho. :)

Lego?



Interesting.

Is there actually a game where you can build out of 3D lego blocks?

I don't want to act all sluttish here, HOWEVER:

Making a game that mimicks real lego is hardly hard to achive.

Has it been done?

This would start a new craze - computer lego sets - I mean, surely this is easy to do - you can have endless colours.

This idea is worth millions - it will start a whole new craze of bored office workers sitting their building things out of 3D computer lego bricks.

It was my idea.

EDIT:
Damn! It has already been done.

It was my idea though.

LEGO has a program you can use to build with, print instructions, and order the parts from the company and build the real thing.

Valve not putting anything on consoles? Then I must only be imagining that I own an Orange Box for the Xbox 360.

There's another good reason for studios to write for consoles only: Copy protection. It's much harder to put illegal software on a console than it is on the PC.

I think that when the next generation of consoles is released, the PC is going to be finished and the only new games made for it will be casual games that you can play on any office PC. And Indie titles, of course.