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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Andre" data-source="post: 3336730" data-attributes="member: 25930">//Sidetrack on//I'm going to disagree with the last statement. To my mind, piracy is only a minor reason for the dominance of console vs pc game development.1. Barrier to entry. It's a whole lot cheaper to get a console - several consoles - than one good, high-end gaming pc. Add in the hassles of upgrading hardware, updating drivers, and so on...consoles are far and away easier for the average user. And more console sales equals more potential game sales.2. Consoles are much easier to develop for. Designers *hate* designing for the open pc architecture. No matter how much testing they do, as soon as a game is released, loud cries from a minority of users bemoan that their particular rig won't play the game. Yes, pc's have a lot more options compared to consoles, but those options become minefields for developers. Consoles are standard platforms that don't change much, if at all. 3. Money. Developing a high-end pc game is very expensive. Even worse, those of us who own pc's have become used to the pricing cycle for games. Very few games sale for full price after the first 3-6 months. If you don't have to have a particular game as soon as it comes out, wait 6 months or a year and get it at discount. Or wait for the compilation. And a nice bonus: you get the patched version, while all the other suckers bought the full priced beta version. Makes it much harder to recoup development costs.4. Piracy and DRM. You know, I just don't see much piracy anymore. It used to be constant, and I'm sure it still happens, but the idea that game developers are losing their shirts primarily over piracy...I don't think so. They usually have much bigger problems, such as quality control, getting their products to potential buyers, being ripped off by distributors, and the factors I listed above. And frankly, the common response - add lots of DRM - is sometimes worse than the piracy in reducing sales. For myself, if a game has Starforce, it's a lost sale, no matter how much I want the game.Bottom line: I love pc games and haven't owned a console since the SNES days. But if I were designing games, I'd go console all the way. Fortunately, there are still some hardy souls designing for my beloved pc.//sidetrack off //</blockquote>

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