If Origin didn’t forget my password every goddamn time I tell it to remember me and if uPlay didn’t ask me to turn the overlay back on every goddamn time I launch a game I’d be more amenable to using them.
While I agree I never think I wish I could get that on Origin or uPlay I also never think oh look Forza Horizon 3 is on MS store I won’t buy it because it is not on steam, my decision is driven by the game itself not the shop, exactly the same as when I go shopping elsewhere.
Also if I am shopping on GMG or another website if the price is right i’m buying the game I want regardless of Steam, uPlay, Origin especially if I really want the game.
Now my interaction with uPlay and Origin is much less than steam but even steam doesn’t get that much activity with me, as mentioned the icon for the game sits on my desktop and click to play does it. I really couldn’t tell you what games I have that aren’t on steam, in fact occasionally i look for them on steam before realising they are elsewhere.
Good point. I will say that (at least according to customers of my game) there is a chunk of folks who look at a game on Steam and wish it was on GOG for example. But yeah I have never seen anyone ask for an origin or uplay version :)
So if they were… Steam it would be great. Actually though Origin shouldn’t ask you for a password every time you log in. I wish the darn thing would not do it with major updates like it does but on a daily basis… it really shouldn’t.
Almost every game I purchase off the developer front like Steam, Origin, or etc. are just Steam keys. In that case, except for reviews, it doesn’t really matter. Amazon, GMG, Humble Bundle… in those cases it’s not really about who I am buying from but what client the game resides on.
Yeah I know there is a group that avoids steam and prefers the lifetime DRM access approach GOG provides. I just don’t know anyone who looks at the examples above and wishes more games were there… it’s usually the reverse, but for a reason.
I don’t find using Origin or Uplay to be a positive experience, but they’re not so negative I refuse to use them… if that makes any sense at all.
In my Walgreens world, all my games would be DRM free so it wouldn’t matter who I got it from but I’d have some sort of client to manage the library, the multiplayer piece, the friend’s list and also acts as a backup so I can install or recovery any of my content.
Having games spread across multiple storefronts makes gaming via Steam Link a PITA as well. (in the case of Forza Horizon 3, you need a tool called UWPHook just to add a Steam shortcut.)
makes sense. I did find Microsofts store fairly painless when I used it for Forza Horizons PC. They even take Paypal, which is good as they are never getting my credit card number ever again after I had to call to cancel Xbox live.
Rimbo! Good to see you!!!
Yeah, that was my thought as well. It’s fundamentally due to the increasing viability of digital distribution, as opposed to Steam making digital distribution “happen.” Everyone knew it was coming and somebody was going to occupy that market space.
I guess this fits here to some degree. Its mostly about next gen console game development cost not increasing and thats due to the new hardware being more like PCs. :P
"The world has changed. When we consider a console release, the PC format can be 40% or 50% now of that revenue. Ten years ago, that number was 1% or 2%. Clearly, the world is changing.
I didn’t expect the numbers to be so high for PC, I always figured the 30% pc sales numbers that floated around for years regarding multi-platform releases were pretty much the way it was always going to be.
It’s not just the hardware that’s normalizing, but the software experience as well. And I won’t necessarily say that the PC has improved substantially; just that consoles have gotten substantially worse. They’ve basically taken the worst aspects of PC gaming (installation, forced online accounts, massive patch downloads, hardware revisions) and foisted them upon an audience that wasn’t accustomed to it. They’re slowly but surely chipping away at every benefit console gaming used to enjoy.
Then there’s price. A good gaming PC is far less expensive today than it was 15-20 years ago. And while I’m not a console gamer, from what I’ve been told by friends, the game sales are nothing compared to what we have here on PC. Combine that with the (relatively) perfect backwards compatibility of the Windows platform, and I honestly believe that—in the long run—PC gaming is actually less expensive than console gaming now.
And that’s to say nothing about modding, free online services, and the keyboard and mouse combo for FPS and strategy games.
I think you’re misreading the quote. They’re not saying that PC is half the total revenue; they’re saying that the PC revenue is half of what the console revenue is. Which works to a third of the total.
I think this has everything to do with primary distribution for pc games being digital these days.
Video card prices are crazier now though
Hardware performance is not increasing at the rate it used to. On the PC you can also usually disable tons of (mostly graphical) settings to get better performance. This means more games with similar minimum specs.
I thought GPU prices were dropping again now that bitcoin miners stopped buying them all?
Top of the line is now $1000+ ($1500 CAD) which is stupid is how I’m basing it. It used to be only the Titans were and the top of the line GTX were $500-850.
Nvidia priced this generation through the roof.
And also released too many cards to dilute/confuse the market to keep prices artificially high. No markdowns on prev generation cards they just get rebadged, renamed.
Step 1: Computers were expensive and fiddly, consoles were cheap.
Step 2: Consoles got a lot more expensive, PCs got a lot cheaper.
Step 3: PC software prices cheap as dirt thanks to sales and Steam, console pricing still largely AAA.
TLDR: Well…Steam mostly. But there are some market factors at play. Consoles ramping up in price shut some people out, heck, the computer I’m using now, I bought for $350 bucks used.
I was a big fan of consoles when they were a couple hundred bucks, but 4-500 bucks? Pffft.
Add that you probably want/need a PC in the house, regardless, so the price of a gaming PC is only the difference from a barebones one.
Irrelevant to the average person. Some great budget options out there.