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PC Gaming Alliance?
GameHat
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
From Destructoid
According to a San Jose Mecury News writer, Microsoft, Intel, Nvidia, AMD and others will be making an announcement at GDC next week that they will all be forming a "PC Gaming Alliance". The goal here is to revive the PC gaming industry and make it more competitive against the console industry, which in turn would hopefully get more developers to bring games onto the PC.
This along with the recent Ageia take over by Nvidia really shows that these companies mean serious business. Granted, Microsoft is going to win either way here. You PC gamers excited to hear that you haven't been forgotten about?
Discuss.
...I'm primarily a PC Gamer so my interest is piqued.
According to a San Jose Mecury News writer, Microsoft, Intel, Nvidia, AMD and others will be making an announcement at GDC next week that they will all be forming a "PC Gaming Alliance". The goal here is to revive the PC gaming industry and make it more competitive against the console industry, which in turn would hopefully get more developers to bring games onto the PC.
This along with the recent Ageia take over by Nvidia really shows that these companies mean serious business. Granted, Microsoft is going to win either way here. You PC gamers excited to hear that you haven't been forgotten about?
Discuss.
...I'm primarily a PC Gamer so my interest is piqued.
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Not really likely to do much unless they can get decent graphics built right into the standard motherboards, as happened with sound hardware.
Either that, or convince massive suppliers like "PC world" to stop skimping on the graphics cards.
Either way, in order for the PC to become more competative as a gaming machine, gaming has to be recognised as a standard pre-requisite of the functions that a PC is expected to fulfill. Similar to how multimedia functionality became a part of what the PC is (CD-ROM drives and Sound hardware becoming ubiquitous to the extent that suppliers couldn't feasibly ship machines without them and claim this fulfilled the functions the average home user would expect of it).
Realistically though, I don't expect the PC to compete on the same level with consoles. They've both got fundamentally different design philosophies behind them. PC's are always going to be more versatile and more expensive than owning a console, that's pretty much what they're supposed to be.
Although if they do things like streamline and simplify the whole upgrade culture as it exists now ("Dear Nvidia, your card numbering schemes confuse the heck out of 99.9% of people who don't make it their hobby to keep up with the industry), then that would at least be helpful I suppose.
But yeah, I'll wait until the actual announcement before commenting further on THAT stuff.
Probably not feasible.
I mean, computers have the best input device for a lot of games like Mass Effect or Halo or any RTS.
Maybe if they can just change the perception that PC gaming is more expensive than console gaming.
But then Microsoft HAS it's own console, so I don't know how much they really want to make PC gaming competitive again.
People pirate too much on the PC.
...um...
these companies already monopolize the gaming market
Intel/AMD account for 99.9% of the consumer level processors on the consumer market (statistic pulled out of my ass, but I suspect it's correct)
Nvidia/AMD(who owns ATI) account for 99.9% of the consumer level graphics cards (number again pulled out of my ass; I still suspect it's correct)
They'd have to implement some form of hardware DRM that can be updated through Vista.
But then people will pirate Vista you say.
But then games will come with OS validation tools as a mandatory check everytime you install or want to play.
But then pirates will just make a crack.
But then the graphics card will also have a verification scheme in it as well.
Maybe mandatory online checks too.
Of course none of this will obliterate pirating but the goal would be to make it so annoyingly tedious to get the game to work on their computer that the average consumer would just give up and buy the damn thing instead (or not, depending on whether they would actually buy the game or not).
Who knows, they made this 'Alliance' for a reason so they've gotta be checking every option.
Steam already has DRM AFAIK. Maybe I'm hopelessly out of the loop, but I don't know of a whole lot of pirating of Steam games; I'm not sure the DRM issue is as big as you think.
I know you can get the Orange Box pirated I don't know how the multiplayer games would work without Steam though or even if the pirated Orange Box works at all but they are available form the normal pirating circles.
The pc games that have done best in terms of sales are almost always the ones that buck these trends, and favor being played on midlevel machines. None of the companies involved have any incentive to accomplish this.
You know, make them buy stuff like console gamers do. Also, how big is piracy this generation? I know there's the DVD firmware for the 360 but that doesn't seem widespread/common at all and I'm not really aware what's happening on the Wii/PS3.
How bad is piracy with Steam only games? Is it widespread/common? If not, than some universal Steam equivalent (Or Steam..) needs to be used more.
Usually this type of thing doesn't slow down the pirates at all. All it does it create more opportunities for incompatibilities on the systems of legitimate users. The day they start putting hardware DRMs for games into PCs is the day I switch to consoles. The legitimate consumer pretty much always loses when it comes to anti-theft schemes.
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
Exactly. If I could, I'd play all but fighting games on PC. The controls are easier, the games tend to be cheaper, the community is infinitely more tolerable when you don't have to hear them, and the games are usually better.
The only security in a console (aside from exclusive titles, which is an argument made for either side) is that when I buy the game, I don't have to worry whether it'll run smoothly. Some of them don't, but, it's not like I have to shell $200 for another video card to make it work better - it simply just doesn't work that well and that's all I can do about it.
And these companies are in for the fight of their lives if they don't work directly on the issue of these tech arms-races. I suspect they are focusing on something quite different.
Console pirating isn't as big because you can't just download and play the pirated game you need to (as far as I know from long ago) open up the console and add hardware to it.
Although now that consoles have hard drives this may not be true anymore.
Still the idea is there is a physical limitation to pirating that makes it harder for your average schmo to get games that way.
Maybe the solution is as simple as creating standards much like consoles have for PCs in terms of hardware and software configurations.
Although I have no clue about how to even begin to get that going.
Piracy seemed rampant on the PS1/PS2/Xbox (Especially the Xbox as far as I'm concerned, more or less everyone I knew with one had one with a modchip and a bigger HDD and they'd just hire out games, copy it to the HDD and play it to their evil heart's content).
Oh well, at least it seems I can validly blame some of the PC gamers for their problems they've created, especially the 'hardcore' ones who think they're hardcore because they play excessive BF and WoW and downloaded CoD4.
For the record, I'm first and foremost a PC gamer. I started with Nibbles on DOS (Or MS-Dos, the contrast hell it was to look at).
I'm not even sure he played half of them, he was more into playing ROMs of older games actually.
But yeah that's the most I've been involved with anything console pirating in terms of knowledge of how it works.
The main issue is playing online, but the majority of pirated games won't work online. Some games have cracked servers, but most don't, or at least have a large community of them.
Honestly, a company needs to just come out with a proprietary computer. Lets say, $500, has an OS, can play PC games, etc. The main thing would be mass-producing, allowing them to cut costs. The only reason this hasn't happened before is because, unline console systems, microsoft can't really charge companies for making PC games. They don't get profit off of those sales, just from OS sales/etc.
Edit: On console pirating: Most regular users won't bother modding a system until its fairly easy, ie, softmodding is a good option. So far, there's no way(that I've heard of) to do it on next-gen consoles, to they're safe with that.
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
And dear god imagine those annoying pop-up ads with sound on a 7.1 speaker system.
"Congratulations, you have be chosen to receive two free iPod nanos!"
Does not compute. You're either talking about a version of linux or a whole new windows os here, and I just don't see it. I also don't see them agreeing on a single appliance, since most of these companies compete in hardware, and I don't see them taking a pass on it. Maybe agreeing on a single chip/card slot format or something, but I think even that's a stretch.
They kind of tried that. Basically, it went like this: a whole bunch of incompatable proprietary computer designs competed with each other, and nobody could really write software that worked on everyone's computer. Then the IBM PC design came along and was open enough for any hardware maker to make a compatable machine. Then the IBM-compatable PC crushed everything else on the market (except Apple, who somehow managed to cling to existence with like 5% marketshare).
Nobody wants to use a machine where only one company can make it and all the code for it needs to be signed.
And yes, PC protection systems pretty much always only hurt legitimate users. Look at Bioshock.
Microsoft: Game development company; Owner of operating system(Vista); Also could be the marketing machine
Intel: Produces Processors, Motherboards, and laughable on-board video
Nvidia: Video card/Motherboard chipset producers
AMD (ATI): Produces Processors and Video Card chipsets
My only guess at this point would be that all of these companies would get together and standardize a platform for PC game development. They would make a toolset that would be compatible with all of the hardware and Vista. This theory sounds good, until you ask how this benefits each individual company. Why would you buy Nvidia over ATI, if both of them are going to get the job done. In this case, we're back in the dumb hardware race again.
The solution isn't hardware related, that would spell death. Anything that would require extra hardware purchases spells death.
Either that, or MS is trying to get hardware to work better in Vista, and pushed more oldass console ports down our throats.
Honestly, this "gaming PC" could probably use a version of Vista, with limited access to a lot of functions(Vista basic basic or some such). Enter into a deal with ATI(or Nvidia) to equip it with one video card, and same thing for processor(amd, intel). I mean, my machine cost me $650 a year ago, and I play most new games at near highest settings at 1680x1050. I'm sure with large production deals, and very careful partnering of parts, they could put together a $500 computer. Fairly small HDD(60-80gb, enough for installing games, but you'll quickly run out of space if you start throwing in superfluous stuff in), no cd/dvd burner, etc etc.
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
Uh, DirectX?
DirectX is nice but in a perfect world I'd like to see the standard API for games be OpenGL, that way it would be much easier for devs to port their code to other platforms... in a perfect world, of course.
Tofu wrote: Here be Littleboots, destroyer of threads and master of drunkposting.
to Dusda: Doing something great for the platform once in ten years isn't all that much.
Every ten years?
...so we jumped straight from Dx6 to Dx10?
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
Nobody cares about OpenGL anymore, and I doubt they ever will. DirectX is the standard.
What do you mean by porting to other platforms, anyway? DirectX has been present on every major gaming platform since the beginning of this decade, so I assume you're alluding to Linux. Nobody is stopping anyone from implementing the DirectX framework in Linux, they're just too busy geeking out on projects that don't help anybody, as they always do.
It's not like these companies have to give a rats ass about PC gaming. They could just focus on consoles and be completely fine.
However, PCs are still a sizeable market and as much fun as it is to go "olol $1000 every time you want to play a new game", the fact is it's true. Sorta. PC Gaming is what pushes the industry forward. Any computer made in the last 10 years can do web browsing, word processing, email, the old staples of the PC industry. There was a time when you upgraded your computer so you could do spreadsheets. For a time after that it was multimedia, having a system with the ability to watch movies and play music. Again, that's cake for a modern PC.
PC games have been pretty much the only constantly pushing at the hardware. Demanding faster CPUs, more RAM, more hard drive space. Hell, to some extent they even promote faster networking and sound processing. PC gaming is the PC industry's killer app, and they really do need to keep it afloat if they want the industry to keep growing.
I'm not a game developer, so I don't know what it is about consoles that make developers gravitate to them vs. the PC. But quite frankly if all the major PC hardware manufactures as well as the software developer for the PCs main graphics API (DirectX) and OS (Windows) want to collude and bring back to PCs what the consoles stole, then hell, they basically have the power to make the PC a console.
Between the lot of them they have influence over every aspect of a PC right up to the part where you plop in a disc to play.
Stuff I'd expect them to do:
-Standardize game development and testing for different hardware configurations. Quite frankly it's annoying for developers to have to make a game and tweak it so that it runs just as well on nVidia as it does ATi. If they could cut this out that would be a big plus.
-Improve labeling. Make some sort of universal system so gamers can easily tell a) how good a card is, where does it stand in comparison to other cards and b) what sort of system does this game need, how will it run on older systems.
-Bring console like features to PCs. No need to install games, just plop in the disc.
(Windows Vista's treatment of games, with the Games Browser and the system ratings system is a good start. I'm fairly optimistic they can do something right.)
I don't really think the graphics API is the big issue there; it's not that difficult to separate your rendering code from the rest of the game logic, and for the most part OpenGL and DirectX don't work that differently. The reason more games don't get ported is, I suspect, due to publishers and the extra QA cost of troubleshooting games on more operating systems. And maybe a dash of laziness on the part of game programmers.
Personally, I see two things happening in the future:
One, this graphical "arms race" as it's been described in this thread will essentially come to an end, because there's only so far you can take it and see noticeable gains. The market doesn't care for minuscule changes, and looking at graphics like those in Crysis, it's hard to imagine things improving too much more. I hope that five years down the road we'll be done with the whole thing, but we'll see.
Two, casual gaming will become more and more prevalent and will eventually merge with what is now mainstream gaming. (We're already seeing this happen somewhat). This will help repopularize PC gaming--since almost everyone (in Western countries) owns a PC with Windows XP or better--while simultaneously deemphasizing high-spec hardware. I've been watching the downloadable casual PC game market grow, and it's pretty interesting to me--while it's still pretty dominated by stuff a hardcore gamer wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole, more and more titles are emerging that focus on (somewhat simplified) sim and adventure mechanics, and I think we're seeing growth towards those types of games.
Honestly, do you really think Microsoft has the PC game industry's best interests in mind after the abortion that is Games for Windows Live? After they tried to force people to upgrade to Vista to play some of their games?
PC Gaming needs:
Simpler, truer requirements. Laymen should never have to cross their fingers to see if the game they just bought will actually run in a non-frustrating way (See: Why Vista pissed so many people off)
Better handling of input devices. The two-button mouse is standard. We need a standard controller now. Some basic configuration that comes with every computer, which any game that CAN use a controller is designed to facilitate. Controllers open up options. The more input devices they can get as part of the standard package, the better they can guess how people play, and make it easier.
Integration of modern computer use. We IM. We voice chat. We check email. We switch between windows like crazy. I'm not sure if this is an issue for newer computers, but as someone running a five year old machine, 90% of my frustration in PC gaming is crashes that occur simply because someone on MSN said "hi!." Ideally, you should be able to check some major programs IN GAME. Hell, if you could do websurfing while grinding, grinding might be less boring. (Grinding still sucks though. :P)
Really, the main thing is that PC games need to not keep a PC-User from having to be uncomfortable while using their PC. Consoles are great because you know that that stuff will work every time with no further purchases. Consoles fail in that you can only use whatever options come with the game, though they now have much more in the way of options, not to mention networks.
I can see where you're coming from on your other points, but I have to respectfully disagree here. The mouse and keyboard is the standard PC controller, and it will be for the foreseeable future. And actually, it's a lot better for at least half of the common game genres than a controller would be (namely: first/third person shooters, strategy games, and RPGs).
The main trouble with the mouse and keyboard is simply that the keyboard has so many buttons, and it can be confusing finding controls if you're not accustomed to PC gaming; this is something that can be overcome, though, by adhering to standards and quickly and intuitively educating people about what buttons typically do what.
Then don't even bother posting. We don't need elitist pricks here.
3ds friend code: 2981-6032-4118
Christ people, think about it, why would you care at all about upgrading your computer? Is it because nVidia just released the brand new GeForce HOJILLION GTX Ultra and unless you buy it right away all your old games melt away and your computer explodes?
No, it's because companies like Crytek release their Crysis's, Bethesda their Oblivion's, Valve their Half-Life 2's. GAME COMPANIES make you want to upgrade your PC, and you get pissed at the hardware companies because, what? They make pretty graphics possible? Those m********kers, I was happy when everything looked like cubes and came in one color!!