You can't play, for example, Call of Duty: Black Ops without Steam, as far as I'm aware. The problem is that Steam isn't just a community site or a front-end through which to play the game. Steam is pushing you to buy games [i]there[/i] every time you play that game you bought elsewhere. Steam is a big deal, and having or not having a steam sale can determine the success of games from small studios. It's sensible for other people in the marketplace to be concerned by the way Steam have leveraged their position.
And PC game sales in retail stores are probably low enough not to matter much as well.It's also a fuss over very little. Perhaps other stores are different but all the branches of Game, HMV gaming zone etc that I've went into have had a pretty minimal choice of PC games. They're basically console game stores these days.
What Nick said. GAME And Gamestation make a huge amount of money from trading used console games. So much money that HMV has got in on the act. Second hand PC games Are a minefield from a sellers point if view due to piracy and DRM.
That's the impression I'm getting that Game, etc. are abandoning the PC market. Frankly, if they're not going to carry games like Black Ops in the future, then they're cutting themselves off from profitably carrying PC games anyway.
I've seen a lot of debate over whether people were going to do a midnight shopping trip for Wow:Cataclysm, or just download it. It seems that download is the way of the future for PC games. I wonder if the next generation of Console games will follow...
Just to reiterate: the cash cow isn't PC games. It isn't console games. It's second hand games. The retailers are going to devote space to whatever is the most profitable.
No, the next generation of console games won't be entirely digitally distributed. Some will be but digitally distributing 30 gigs of bluray content isn't going to work for most people.
Not right now, but it depends when the next generation is. I downloaded Dragon Age: Origins two weeks back, and that's 24Gig. Give it a couple of years (and all of the players are saying that the next gen is at least two years away), and the bandwidth might be available enough for most people to go for.
The bandwidth might be there, but it'll require the mass market to not only have access to fast broadband but have accounts with download limits that will all them to download everything.
Example: I've got access to any amount of HD video content on xbox live. At the moment it's way more feasible for me to buy BluRays. This isn't going to change in the next couple of years.
Criswell style, I predict the PC Market being almost entirely digital download in the next couple if years. Consoles will take closer to ten.
PC games are potentially just as large as console ones - I'm not sure why the switchover would be different. Unless you think that PC owners are more likely to have high-speed broadband.
I'm curious as to why you aren't with someone like BE, who have unlimited broadband. They cover Stirling: https://www.bethere.co.uk Everyone I know who uses them loves them to bits.
You recommended me looking into Be last year. When I looked into it, their deals weren't very good away from high speed networks. Stirling is still an 8 meg max zone. Trust me, I've got the best deal I can get.
As for PC games being potentially as big as console games... thats true if you're making Peggle or Farmville but beyond that you're comparing apples and oranges. The mass market doesn't take their consoles online yet.
Aaah, so you have faster, but more limited internet? That's a tricky trade-off to make, I don't envy you!
Not sure why you're bringing up Peggle/Farmville though. You mentioned 30Gig downloads, I mentioned downloading 24Gig last week. I can't really see how tiny games come into this?
Yes, sorry: it appears that at some point I got turned about and thought we were talking about big as in popular. I blame Jim Beam.
For the next five years or so, BluRay is going to be the most effective way of games to the console mass market. I understand that you downloaded Dragon Age origins and it was 20 odd gig, but that isn't a feasible download for most people, both in terms of time and usage allowance. For most people it will be more convenient to go to the shops.
In 2009 360 sales stood at about 30 million units with 20 million Xbox Live members. A full third of users have never even bothered hooking their console up to the outside world.
And no I don't have fast broadband I have average broadband. I have what most people not living in major cities have. I have a decent download limit tho.
So 30% are downloading the minigame style things from XBLA. Doesn't really tell you how many would download the kind of games that top the charts, though.
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andrewducker) wrote2010-11-19 11:01 am
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You can't play, for example, Call of Duty: Black Ops without Steam, as far as I'm aware. The problem is that Steam isn't just a community site or a front-end through which to play the game. Steam is pushing you to buy games [i]there[/i] every time you play that game you bought elsewhere. Steam is a big deal, and having or not having a steam sale can determine the success of games from small studios. It's sensible for other people in the marketplace to be concerned by the way Steam have leveraged their position.
And PC game sales in retail stores are probably low enough not to matter much as well.It's also a fuss over very little. Perhaps other stores are different but all the branches of Game, HMV gaming zone etc that I've went into have had a pretty minimal choice of PC games. They're basically console game stores these days.
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I've seen a lot of debate over whether people were going to do a midnight shopping trip for Wow:Cataclysm, or just download it. It seems that download is the way of the future for PC games. I wonder if the next generation of Console games will follow...
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No, the next generation of console games won't be entirely digitally distributed. Some will be but digitally distributing 30 gigs of bluray content isn't going to work for most people.
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Example: I've got access to any amount of HD video content on xbox live. At the moment it's way more feasible for me to buy BluRays. This isn't going to change in the next couple of years.
Criswell style, I predict the PC Market being almost entirely digital download in the next couple if years. Consoles will take closer to ten.
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I'm curious as to why you aren't with someone like BE, who have unlimited broadband. They cover Stirling:
https://www.bethere.co.uk
Everyone I know who uses them loves them to bits.
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As for PC games being potentially as big as console games... thats true if you're making Peggle or Farmville but beyond that you're comparing apples and oranges. The mass market doesn't take their consoles online yet.
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Not sure why you're bringing up Peggle/Farmville though. You mentioned 30Gig downloads, I mentioned downloading 24Gig last week. I can't really see how tiny games come into this?
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For the next five years or so, BluRay is going to be the most effective way of games to the console mass market. I understand that you downloaded Dragon Age origins and it was 20 odd gig, but that isn't a feasible download for most people, both in terms of time and usage allowance. For most people it will be more convenient to go to the shops.
In 2009 360 sales stood at about 30 million units with 20 million Xbox Live members. A full third of users have never even bothered hooking their console up to the outside world.
And no I don't have fast broadband I have average broadband. I have what most people not living in major cities have. I have a decent download limit tho.
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http://www.1up.com/news/percent-buying-xbox-live-arcade-games
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http://andrewducker.livejournal.com/2241188.html?thread=15871908#t15871908