Is This the Last Generation of Gaming consoles?

[CDN_Merlin]

Companies are killing profit by not porting games to the PC. Sony did that with their Formula 1 racing. They made only PS3 games. It alienated all racers from buying their stuff.

[Ferno]

Yes you can, Fern.

so what, you're telling me you bring over a friend or two, sit him down at a spare computer and play CS or whatever? LOL. That's not what I meant.

Personally I'd rather chuck him a controller, turn on the tube, throw in the disc and just go nuts.

[Testiculese]

You can. You can have several game controllers hooked up and use them at the same time.

...Are there any PC games built for 2 simultaneous players? That I don't know. There are some two player games where you take turns, and I also play a few games, like NFS, where we try to beat each other's lap times.

And I don't need the disk

I tried playing CS at a friends house on split screen, it's awful. The game is too, but split screen is crap, me thinks.

[fliptw]

You do realise that each console (and PC) would require essentially separate programming, right? That's the main reason games aren't released on all platforms.

Of course there are differences, and it takes some work to port a game from one platform to another.

However, they're far from "separate". Some things have to be reworked, but it's not like they have to recreate the whole game, or even the majority of it. Even without all the models, textures, level scripting, etc. (which don't have to be recreated), huge portions of the code can be left alone, or just re-compiled in the new environment.

The issue is cost, not possibility. For every system you want to sell a game on, its another order of magnitude of labour for testing at the minimum; add PC and mac as platforms and thats even more magnitudes of labour. To say that its simply just recompiling and leaving the assets alone is naive at the least. You need spend time on controls, and UI, so at very least you won't have PC gamers bitching about how its made for consoles(RE bioshock and oblivion).

[Foil]

Agreed, the cost can still be very prohibitive (for example, I'm hoping to see Halo 3 for PC someday, but I know it may not happen for quite a while).

I was simply trying to respond to the claim that it requires \"fully separate programming.\"

[Nergen-Ak1-Defender]

What i think about all of this is that you cannot upgrade a console within a 4-5 max year period. With a PC you can. The thing i hate about an Microsoft, sony or nintendo is that you have to buy a new console every five years. You cannot buy new parts for a console. With a pc you can buy parts from multiple companies without voiding a warranty.

[Sirius]

There aren't many parts of your computer you wouldn't have to replace within 5 years anyway. Even monitors don't always last that long.

[Testiculese]

What do you buy, Sirus, Acer?! BenQ?

I have monitors 9 years old that are flawless. I still run amd 800's that I built in 2000.

[Top Wop]

There aren't many parts of your computer you wouldn't have to replace within 5 years anyway. Even monitors don't always last that long.

That statement is nonsense. I have monitors that are 8+ years old and are still working like they are supposed to. I reused a power supply on a rebuild several months ago thats been around for 5 years, and I have CD drives that are older than 5 years. I use a Gravis Eliminator Aftershock gamepad thats older than 5 years (and has no support since Gravis went under a while ago for about as long). Hell, im still using a Toshiba keyboard from a Toshiba Infinia 7130 that came with the very first computer I got in 1996.

[TIGERassault]

I have a PC that's over 15 years old, and the only thing that doesn't work is the Floppy Disk Drive.

[Sirius]

I said don't always, not don't ever. I've had monitors last longer too. Please actually read what I'm saying before replying to it.

P.S. The main point of what I'm saying is related to the useful life of an item, not its service life. Monitors are some of the least-necessary components to upgrade ever, but they do eventually wear out. Keyboards are probably the longest-lived of anything, and virtually never need replacing, but by the same token I've had them start having issues within 3-4 years as well.

The problem is, as most of you will know; by the time your computer is five years old, how many new games will it be able to run any more? Will it even be able to run new operating systems? Sometimes, sure, but not always; for instance it'd be silly to install Vista on a five-year-old computer right now. Same for XP in 2001.

[Testiculese]

Yes, however, I can drop a newer proc+mobo for less than a new console, and still have all the extras a PC provides, and backwards compatibility for old games forever. When you write a console game, you're writing specific code for specific hardware, and to force backwards compatibility like PS2->1 is pretty painful. Can PS3 play PS1 games? Not really. Several places say no, several say sorta. XBox 360 doesn't support XBox, so all those games are a wasted investment, while PC's can still play Duke Nukem and Commander Keen.

[Foil]

Backwards-compatibility isn't always forever for PCs, but with the ability to use compatibility modes/patches/projects (the D1X & D2X projects, for example), it's a lot longer than you typically get for consoles.

[JMEaT]

I love consoles. I have a Wii and a PS3. The Wii is the woman's, but she got me a PS3 for my Bday. I really enjoyed UT3 on the console vs. the PC. Also have Assasin's Creed and GTA4, both games are a lot of fun.

I still use the PC for gaming, mostly online where a mouse and keyboard are sometimes needed.

I don't see consoles going anywhere. If anything I see them becoming more popular. Gaming has really opened up to a lot of people in the past 5-10 years. Consoles are a cheap way into the fun vs. someone not knowing which 1000+ dollar PC to buy for gaming.

[Sirius]

Yeah, you don't have to drop your old consoles though. That would be a problem if they eventually died and you lost access to those games, although I suppose you could just go emulate them if you really wanted to.

As Foil pointed out, there are also issues with PCs; it's pretty hard to get games from the 1980s and early 90s to run on modern computers because they used non-standard methods to access hardware that are no longer available (at least under a reliable OS!). There are, increasingly, workarounds for this issue though, such as DOSBox - but not everything is supported yet.

Basically, from my point of view the economics argument just isn't there; it's really more expensive to maintain your PC than to buy a new console every 4-5 years. (Might not apply if you buy all three, of course, but that's three platforms, not one like the PC would be.)

I don't actually own consoles myself, since it's still too much money for something I don't actually need, and kind of inconvenient in my current situation. I'd be surprised if I don't eventually buy one or two though.