Is The PC Dead For Gamers ?

Here’s a big question that has been making the rounds of late : "Is the PC dead as a gaming platform ?" It comes amidt the hype and apple sauce that typically accompany the launch of a new generation of consoles, though one cannot simply dismiss the question out of hand as simple console hysteria.

The truth of the matter is that the PC has been in decline for many years now as a gaming platform. Even Microsoft, ever loath to criticise its own mistakes, has admitted that it has been "killing" the PC as a gaming platform in recent years by concentrating on consoles.

The main problem lies with the fact that the PC is an infinitely more complicated and quantifiably more expensive piece of technology than an off-the-shelf, standardised console. For Joe Teenager, Soccer Mom or even Sam Professional, the PC requires far too much time and maintenance, which has made the simpler consoles become the platform of choice.

Throw a disc in, flip a switch and you have your game in front of you. Attach another controller to the console and stick it in your friend’s hand and you have a multiplayer game. No BIOS, no booting, no operating system, no pings, no network connections... disc goes in, console goes on, fun ensues.

But does all this mean that the PC really is a dead duck as far as gaming goes ? Hell no. As much as we’re hearing about all the wondrous, bleeding edge technological and graphical advances in consoles all is not as it seems. When I last spoke to Chris Evenden, chief PR hack of ATI, he told me that they expected to have cards on the market by Christmas 2005 that would be more powerful than some of the next-gen console offerings.

Therein lies one of the key strengths of the PC as a gaming platform, and also one of its key weaknesses : versatility. This is a weakness in that it turns off many "lite gamers," who want to be able to simply switch on the machine and get going. But for those of us who are not afraid to reach in and swap out graphics cards, this is the biggest advantage PCs have over consoles.

The "next-gen" consoles, such as the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3, will look dated compared to what the PC can pump out at the very most half way through their lifespan. For gamers who demand the very best, this makes the PC the clear cut choice. For graphics companies, it makes the PC their bread and butter for making the development of next-gen cards viable.

ATI claims that what it has put into the Xbox 360 is a ground-up innovation, but in reality, how much of the foundation of that chipset would you have seen without years of PC development ? And the chip in the PS3 is simply a modified GeForce 7800.

While the PC still remains in decline as a gaming platform, Microsoft is now close to putting out the "next-gen" of the PC : Windows Vista. As much as Valve boss Gabe Newell has been telling anyone who will listen that Vista does nothing to make developers’ lives easier, Vista’s launch may well herald resurgence in PC gaming anyways.

In the 18 months running up to the launch of Vista, Microsoft will be launching a campaign to "put the game back in Windows." This will be a full-on, sustained campaign to convince folks other than hardcore PC gamers that Windows - and thus the PC - is an excellent platform on which to play games.

This is in itself a two-pronged attack. On the one hand, Microsoft and many publishers will be sticking a big logo on their PC games entitled "Games for Microsoft Windows". This, they hope, will give PC games the same branding as is present on the boxes of console games. Alongside this there will be marketing awareness campaigns to fill in the uninformed.

The second prong is a more familiar Microsoft tactic. Since Windows XP was released, Microsoft has been trying to make PCs look easier to use. (In fact, XP has been dubbed "Fisher Price Windows" by many IT professionals, after the colourful children’s retail brand.)

Microsoft has been hiding the control panels, stuffing wires behind facades, and burying the piping deep beneath the soil of colourful themes and helpful prompts. It annoys the hell out of me every time I have to configure a new install of the OS, but I can see the value for home users who have no clue about the amount of work that occurs in simply turning the machine on.

This is very much a theme being carried through to Vista, and one which Microsoft hopes to be able to leverage in the favour of PC games. As much as possible, we will see PC games in the future being simplified in how we install, patch and play them.

I’m sure the complex server browsers and graphics options will remain buried beneath the simplistic facades which we will see offered up as standard - Microsoft still knows which side its bread is buttered on with the hardcore PC gamers, after all. But wherever possible, the reigns will be gently lifted from Joe Soap User, who will never have to worry about concepts that can seem quite daunting to somebody not in the know.

This simplification of PC games playing, as well as the PC operating system itself, alongside a healthy advertising campaign, will help bring the masses back to the PC. The truly hardcore never really went anywhere, and the ability of the PC to go leaps and bounds ahead of all other hardware in terms of versatility will ensure that the PC will always remain a gaming platform.