Oh and don’t forget Sam & Max.
2008: DeathSpank: Episode 1: Orphans of Justice. Console gaming just got OWNED.
-Julian
P.S.: Unless, of course, there’s a console port in the making, too.
Fixed.
Yeah, those are good ones too. In the adventure category, there was also Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened, which was quite good. Also Puzzle Quest, which I don’t count as a sloppy console port, since it was originally designed as a PC game, and even though it was released for handhelds first, the eventual PC release was tweaked to be considerably better. And there was GalCiv II: Dark Avatar. And Europa Universalis III. And Fantasy Wars, which I guess is technically an Eastern European game, but you know what: who fucking cares?
Even among the shooters and RTS games on that list, there’s a whole lot of variety. Stalker and Bioshock are really more like FPS/RPG hybrids, and I’d hardly put games like Kingdoms and EU3 in the same category with C&C3. That’s like saying that Mario Galaxy is basically the same as Halo, since they are both 3D action games.
Appearances are deceiving, but I guess it’s not too surprising that you are writing off an excellent turn-based strategy game without bothering to give it a fair shake, since you seem to be doing the same for all of PC gaming.
I was way ahead on digital purchases this past holiday season. Through Steam I bought Orange Box, Bioshock, CoD4, and STALKER (here’s the periods from that, you can put them in yourself since I hate typing them: … ).
Retail box I bought Rainbow Six Vegas and GRAW2.
I got a 360 for Christmas, but I still haven’t purchased any games or accessories for it because of all the PC games I’m playing. I should have it hooked to Live this week though, and I saw extra controllers were on sale at Circuit City (I want to get a pink one for my daughters and visiting friends to use).
I don’t see how NPD numbers are particularly relevant to the state of PC gaming. There are more Steam users than Xbox 360 owners. I bet EA does well with its online distribution method as well. That’s where I bought Crysis, Hellgate and C&C3, with all the rest on Steam. With Relic/THQ and Activision/id joining the Steam parade, I don’t even consider retail.
I actually look forward to less AAA PC games coming out and more, lower budget but creative games becoming available. A lot of these games seem to be coming from Europe and for some reason they are more likely to be a little odd, which is great.
In summary: It’s the Europeans who are going to save PC gaming. I’m ok with that, and so should you be.
PC games sales at retail will likely to continue to slide, as more space in less room is dedicated to easier-to-sell console titles.
But the amount of actual revenue made over a year from a PC game will also likely concurrently rise to balance it out.
You only buy one Mass Effect or Halo 3. Meanwhile WoW is the gift that keeps on giving :)
So it depends on who you are. If you’re a PC game developer and align with a traditional PC game publisher that focuses on brick & mortar one-time sales, it’s not good times for you and may never be again. But if not, you still have options, particularly in a world that manages to convince people to pay a monthly fee for the likes of Vanguard.
I’m not convinced that console titles are going to be that much easier to sell in the current generation. Nothing looks like it will put up PS2-type numbers.
In a growing online market, figures which don’t (and can’t) take digital distribution into account will become increasingly irrelevant in measuring PC sales. You only have to look at the rapid growth of Steam’s catalogue over the last couple of years to see that publishers obviously think there’s money to be made there and like many others here, more and more of my purchases are made via things like Steam not through the retail channel.
Waste of money, all of it. :)
Yeah, crowded with shit that no longer does anything for me.
Civ IV and Oblivion, that’s the kind of stuff I need more of, not 50 more shooters or WOW clones.
You want more stuff like Oblivion, but The Witcher is a waste of money?
(Edit: Okay, it’s not exactly like Oblivion, but it depends on how ‘near’ you need your action-RPGs to be.)
Maybe I’ll play it sometime. Meanwhile, please release another 50 shooters and RTS for me to ignore.
(I do curmudgeon real well!
Rock Band is my hot hot sex.)
As noted, it’s very hard to get a true sense of how PC gaming is doing. That said, it is very possible that actual revenue is up while share of the market it down.
I’m not sure it matters, though, because as the thread indicates a lot of people simply look at the games available as an inidicator of how things are going and don’t care about overall numbers.
Also, we’re not the bellweathers of PC gaming: We’re all hardcore enough to be members of a gaming forum and post regularly on it…on PCs. WE KNOW how to use them and what it takes to game on them. Many, many others haven’t the foggiest idea, and really don’t want to bother. So our anecdotal experiences aren’t worth much to the overall market, unless the overall market is basically a ton of dudes and dudettes like us.
Anecdote: I do not buy a PC game in the store if I can find it online. Digital Downloads are the new internet porn: Why go to the store when I don’t have to?
The two lists of games that were posted were (IMO) pretty typical of the games played by mainstream PC gamers. 70% of those games could be classified as FPS, RTS or WoW clones. I think that’s a disproportionately high number, don’t you?
Also, it’s interesting to note that appearances are deceiving, since the developer’s own website describes it as a CCG type game. Those deceitful fuckers.
Do you mean the 7th bullet point, which reads “collectible card game flavor without the expense”? You might as well focus on the fact that it has hexes and describe it as a historical wargame.
-Tom
Anecdotally, I was a very hardcore PC gamer for years and I knew/know lots of people who also were. These days I don’t know anyone who does much PC gaming other than WoW, but I still know mostly all the same people as before.
When I hear the faithful defending the health of PC gaming, I hear all sorts of echos from when the same sorts of points were trotted out to prove that the Amiga was still a viable computer game platform, post-Wing Commander. Enjoy the long, slow slide.
When I hear the opponents prophesizing (icky spelling) the fall of PC Gaming I hear the same comments that were being made 5 years ago and never came true.