Windows licenses are still their primary source of income, yes, but don’t forget that the smashing majority of PC gamers use Windows. With such an enormous user base, it baffles me why MS wouldn’t want the extra income from having a PC gaming division as big and diverse as the Xbox division. They’re basically ignoring a gold mine that still has a lot of gold hidden in it.
@OldDirtyBastard
In my opinion there are two types of gamers:
the ones that just want to game(consoles) and the ones that one to tweak it, mod it and whatever(pc’s). None of them is better then the other, just different.
To me, it looks like you want the consoles to be for gaming and mac for everything else and anyone who doesn’t agree you disapprove and call a fanboy…
PC gamers are not the majority of PC users. I thought it was a well known fact
I honestly don’t think they are as stupid as you portray them, Maxey.
I think that it is too much hassle for them to introduce a “PC gaming program” for an unconfirmed profit increase of what, 0,5%? 1%?
I may agree with you that MS may have upset many PC gamers, but what can you do?
We kinda have an intelligent discussion here, so please do me a favor and buzz off.
If you build it, they will come.
Unfortunately, as much as we wish all entertainment was made for the art, the reality is that the entertainment industry as a whole is ran by accountants and not by artists.
The majority of the games you play now only exist because the projected sales numbers for it were positive and not because the designers wanted you to experience their creativity.
Name me at least one medium that is not like that.
TV, Movies, Music… Literature. You either accept it and move on, or continue to rant.
EDIT: Oh, and actually make some good money out of it. You should be an editor of some kind, Maxey, I told you already.
That’s why I said the entertainment industry as a whole.
Fortunately, the underground or indie gaming “scene” is stronger than ever by being, ironically enough, helped out by the same people who’re making the mainstream companies richer than ever.
My point on becoming an editor stands.
An editor? As in magazine or book editor?
You overestimate me, sir.
Just want to throw in that Microsoft does have a “gaming division” for PCs, its called Games for Windows Live. The question is, why don’t they put more resources into expanding and improving that program, and the only logical answer is that somewhere down the line of financial experts at Microsoft, a conclusion was made that it wouldn’t be worth the effort.
Your rants could sell very high with some minor retouching and formatting applied 
What, do you think editorials are any different from forum rants? Nah
EDIT:
I’ve mentioned it down the road. Problem is, it’s such a bitch to devise a succesful campaign considering doubtful benefits. However, if you have any bright ideas, go on, show them what you’ve got. Maybe they’ll even hire you. take note that I’m 100% serious, no sarcasm at all.
Ever heard of Michael Bay? (film) :3
Well, this being a discussion about gaming, I thought it was appropriate to only focus the argument on gaming, even though I had already covered my bases by mentioning that the entertainment industry as a whole is ran by numbers and not by honest creativity.
Honest creativity can only REALLY be appreciated by your closest friends and relatives.
Or by a producer.
I’m just wondering what your thoughts on this are:
Is the amount of PC gamers going down, or is the amount of console gamers going up? Or both?
IMO, the amount of console gamers are going up because more and more people have access to relatively cheap gaming, but anyone who gamed on PC before still games on PC, and the PC gaming scene is still growing, albeit not nearly as fast as consoles. But I really would like to see concrete data on this, such as Steam user counts and XBOX Live user counts.
Well, to be fair, it sometimes happen that honest creativity and positive sales numbers do overlap, but it’s quire rare these days.
There’s quite a fair number of people who stopped gaming on PC and completely converted over to consoles.
I won’t answer directly, but I do believe that steam is the last hope of PC gaming.
That’s obviously the reason I mentioned him.
It might be a good idea to point out that modding in various popular games is still the exclusive domain of PC. A good portion of Bethesda’s game replay-ability comes from its modding community. Same with NWN and NWN2. Consoles can do many things now, but the PC still has the market cornered in modding at the moment.
Kudo is obviously an idiot, and while he does have a point, I wouldn’t really say PC gaming is dying as rapidly as people believe it is. Yes, Development of FPS games for the PC is dying, but not really PC gamers themselves. Look at CoD 4 for the PC, theres over 10,000 servers for that and a ton of people still play it, and also, an example - BF BC2, i was checking the main site all through the beta, till after it came out, and they had a player count, and the player count for PC was alot more for both the Xbox and PS3, and im pretty sure BC2 did very well sales wise.
If anything, i would say Single player focused games on the PC are dying out, not MP games because there are many sufficient services that block people who pirate from playing, although i won’t be as arrogant as to say there aren’t pirates playing. SP games are dying because the SP is what makes the game worth it, if the multiplayer component which pirates can’t play isn’t worth it then of course they will pirate, but if the single player games were non-existant and the whole game was online, and multiplayer focused, I’m sure there would be a lot more sales if the games were good.
The whole set-up is brilliant:
Find an audience you can entertain for less money and effort. This allows you to make more for less in the same amount of time. Keep pushing that button because that audience will spawn more of the same type of them.
Meanwhile, the other audiences either leave or become conformed and spend money money on those lower quality products, because there’s nothing else.
Now, I know this is a very black and white scenario but this is basically how the entertainment industry works nowadays.