The PC Gaming Industry is NOT Dying

Recently, gamers, game developers and hardware manufacturers alike seem to be slowly coming to the conclusion that, sadly, the PC gaming industry is dying a slow and painful death. The fact that some of the people running the gaming industry have faith in these baseless conjectures and refuse to actually look at the facts can really make one marvel. The breakthroughs in PC gaming were wonderful last year, and if you actually take the time to see what's really going on, you'll soon realize that the industry will continue to improve in the years ahead.

I'm making a note here: Last year, Portal was one huge success out of many

Most of these rumors seem to have been started by people who compared (or attempted to compare) recent PC gaming revenue with the revenue from the Xbox 360, the Wii, and the PS3. These people, for some reason, simply looked at the retail sales for each, and thought that they proportionately represented the total sales. You would think that professional analysts would be smarter than that, but apparently not.

If a gamer goes to a store and buys an Xbox 360, some controllers, some games, and other accessories, everything he bought counts towards revenue for the Xbox 360 via retail sales. But if a gamer buys a gaming computer, a gaming keyboard, a gaming mouse, and four or five games from Steam, then nothing he bought counts towards revenue for the PC gaming industry via retail sales. Hardware isn't counted at all, regardless of where you buy it from, and software is only counted when you actually drive to a store to purchase it. Most gamers have a high-speed internet connection and a credit card, debit card, or PayPal account, and most gamers with those things prefer downloading games. I spent tons of my money on gaming-related purchases last year, and I'm pretty sure I bought nothing retail except for one or two games for the Nintendo DS. Take into account things like subscription fees for MMOs and advertising in games and game websites, and you come to the clear conclusion that, unlike with consoles, a huge portion of PC gaming revenue is not from retail sales.

Another rumor people seem to be buying is that WoW is hurting the PC gaming industry as a whole, because gamers who play it tend to not play anything else. Think about the backwards logic there for a second. WoW has over 10,000,000 players worldwide, and they each pay around $15 a month to play. That's over $150,000,000 a month going to the gaming industry. (Sure, it's all going to one company, Blizzard, but since they don't have a monopoly on the industry that's not much of a problem.) And, many people who play WoW are casual gamers, people who would otherwise not play any PC games. This means that, while WoW holds some players in and prevents them from playing other things with its addictive qualities, it introduces other players to PC gaming in general, and helps them get comfortable enough to try more hardcore titles.

It's just common sense: a popular game that generates massive revenue and introduces non-gamers to PC gaming is, believe it or not, beneficial to the industry.

Finally, we get to the issue of the cost of PC gaming to the consumer. People are under the impression that it's much cheaper to buy a console than a gaming PC. This is simply not the case. If you calculate the cost of building your own computer with system specs comparable to the PS3, and then subtract the cost of a normal non-gaming PC (because remember, you're getting a gaming machine and a personal computer in one), the price is about the same as the PS3. And upgrading your parts to meet next-gen system requirements costs about as much as trading in your old console for a new one.

People probably started to assume that PC gaming was expensive after looking at companies like Falcon Northwest and Voodoo, who charge four to five times the price of the hardware for their computers. For those who don't want to build their own PC, and don't want to go through the hell-on-earth experience that is CyberPower or iBUYPOWER, companies like Alienware and Velocity Micro offer alternatives that are expensive, but not bank-breaking. The main problem here isn't the fact that PC gaming is slightly expensive, it's the fact that many consumers are under the impression that it's unaffordable. Hopefully, that will be easily corrected once hardware prices fall.

The PC gaming industry is not dying. It's progressing just as steadily as it has been over the past couple of years, and it's not going to stop any time soon. I realized this, and so I created WASDism. This blog aims to be a breath of fresh air amidst the monotony of other PC gaming publications. I'll focus on games that are currently in development, and I'll only write about the ones that are the most exciting, groundbreaking, or just plain fun-looking, so you'll know what to look out for in the future. I'll always take an optimistic look at what's in store for PC gaming in the years ahead, because the future does indeed look good, and as gamers, we should be able to look ahead, and have fun while doing so.

Responses to Comments

First of all, if you link to your own blog in your comment and it's clearly just for self-promotion, I will not approve the comment. Don't even bother.


@james

A non-gaming computer can still run fairly hardware-intensive software such as professional video-editing programs. The PS3, on the other hand, is only good as a PC replacement if the only thing you would use a PC for is extremely basic things like word processing and email. Also, I didn't make this point before, but a modern gaming PC will naturally have good all-around system specifications, and therefore will be able to run pretty much any modern software as a bonus.

I don't debate the fact that if all you intend to do is game, maybe type some stuff up, and nothing else, consoles are the cheaper option (if you don't count additional monthly online service charges like Xbox LIVE). However, gaming PCs are really not all that expensive, and if you want to do other things besides gaming, the PC is your best choice.


@anonymous

Just to give one example out of the thousands that are floating around on the Internet: my cousin bought a PC from CyberPower that came with free liquid cooling as part of a special promotion. It broke down quickly, as most of their PCs do, and he sent it back to them for repairs. They shipped it back with the liquid cooling gone, and in its place was the cheapest fan on the market today. He called them to ask what happened, and they told him that since he never actually paid for the liquid cooling, they had the right to take it back. In a nutshell, CyberPower and iBUYPOWER build the crappiest gaming PCs on the market today, and don't hesitate to scam their customers on top of it. Their prices are insanely cheap, but they're not worth it.


@tony

I own an Alienware PC, a Wii, and a DS. My favorite genres are FPS and rhythm games, but I'll generally play anything that looks fun. The only genre I can't really get into is RTS. However, please note that when I write this blog, I'll try to be unbiased when stating objective facts, and as such, the consoles I own and the genres I play shouldn't affect the quality of my blog too much. (I'll even mention RTS games if they look excellent.)