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Headline is a smidge misleading. “PC gaming has a larger revenue than console gaming in the US” is more accurate. It’s certainly not true in other parts of the world.
It would be interesting to see an overall data, considered many part of the world (like China) consoles like Playstation and Xbox aren't even a thing.
Places like China even gaming PCs aren't really a thing. They mostly play on mobile, because that's pretty much all they can realistically afford.
I am from China. I think your opinion is not true.
Chinese people is not rich, but take a month income to buy a console , it is affordable.
The fact is the strict scrutiny from the CCP and pervasive plundering of people’s privacy and the cognitive manipulation of people through the data algorithms of technology companies causing this.
In China, all the legal games need being approved by the CCP’s government, and the legal consoles just have about one hundred games approved .
The technology companies like tencent have almost all the internet portals or other Internet information channels. And almost all the Chinese internet companies must structure their CCP branch, serving for the CCP’s power, and must provide the authority delete, block, and review any information to the CCP.
In China, any information the Chinese people have received must serve the benefits of the Chinese Communist Party, let alone go against it.
That’s why Chinese people are addicted in the mobile games. Almost every console game is legally banned and the console games have only a small amount of exposure and traffic.
the console gamer in China face tough technical difficulties from the CCP to buy and download/transport. Mobile games have huge propaganda. Even the former Shanghai Municipal Party Committee Secretary/Current Prime Minister of the State Council of China Li Qiang stand up for mobile games “genshin impact“.
To be brief, in China, console game cannot bring benefits to the CCP, it provided the culture anti CCP’s values. That’s what the CCP opposes.
Thanks for the context here! This was super interesting.
My pleasure.
Gaming cafes equipped with gaming PCs is a pretty big market in China. Even if they can't afford to own one personally, lots of Chinese people game on PC.
It’s not exact.
In fact, gaming cafe is relatively rare in China, especially the blockade and control during the COVID-19 struck it hard.
The Chinese people mostly use the PC at home. It’s cheaper than go to the gaming cafe. It’s because the house prices and rent in China is very high, cause by the CCP monopolized all the land trade in the market. They called that “socialist public ownership”, it means all resources in China legally belong to the CCP, includes the lands.
The very important reason Chinese people game on the PC is that the CCP needs the PCs to “help building a great country”. So it can’t be banned. Then lots of people pretend to buy it for work, but actually use it for gaming or other entertainment most of the time…
That’s why the Biden government banned the AI using by China. The CCP will definitely use it to enhance its military capabilities and international influence.
Yes but theyre nowhere near the prevalence of mobile phones. They might game a bit on PC but the money they might be spending on PC is dwarfed by mobile phone. Thats not to mention the time limits they have on gaming due to law. Additionally, most cafe PCs have preinstalled games and people in general don't buy games to install on cafe PCs.
But now compare it to places where consoles literally don't exist or are in such minor numbers? Fuck it. Take China alone.
... almost everyone already has a computer, often for school/work. A console is a separate instrument though.
This is kinda like saying there's more tablespoons than ladles in American kitchens.
It's not the PC industry, it's the PC gaming industry.
ie: almost exclusively games sold for PC platform/Windows.
Right. Just saying that when the size of the PC industry is so much bigger, is it any surprise whatsoever that PC gaming also dominates? I would have expected no other result.
It's not surprising at all but that's not why. More people use laptops or office PCs for daily driving and work. Those are not going to work for a ton of games like a console will.
To the contrary, the vast majority of all games that exist do not require a robust system. Especially given the rise of microtransactions.
Don't lose sight of what games in the world are actually the most popular. It's not high-end stuff. It's Candy Crush and shit.
Don't lose sight of what games in the world are actually the most popular. It's not high-end stuff. It's Candy Crush and shit.
You're right, those games are popular and very profitable and you don't need a PC to play them. You're just going to play them on mobile. You know what you're not going to play on mobile? PC games.
Liiiike, League of Legends? Point stands.
You're just cherry-picking an example. No, I mean like the thousands of games that are released every year that won't run or aren't available on the most powerful of mobile devices. Not to mention the ones that just suck on a small display.
What are you even doing? Are you really trying to make the point that there's zero delineation between mobile and PC games?
No, I'm expressing my point that the main reason PC gaming is so much bigger than console gaming is because the number of available machines is many times higher. Someone replied that most PCs are not specced to play games. I countered by saying most games don't require strong specs, because the most popular games are almost always garbage.
League of Legends is my current example since apparently Candy Crush didn't adequately communicate my point. There are plenty of other examples I could come up with if my point is still not understood.
Why is this so bothersome?
It's bothersome that you refuse to acknowledge that the vast majority of popular/profitable PC games are not playable on cheap, office-grade, low-end hardware. And that you insist on cherry-picking a handful of examples that do as representative of the majority.
There are certainly a wide variety of popular/profitable mobile games that you can't/don't play on PC either for compatibility or because they're unavailable, or because they're tailored to touchscreen devices.
The vast majority? That's just not true. Probably 10%. The issue here is you seem to think the good games are the popular/most profitable ones. I'm pretty sure that's incorrect. VNs, MMOs, gambling games, etc. All that shit exists, is profitable, and is popular. Yet your focus seems to be on high end stuff for some reason. I am not the one cherry picking.
I played many on shitty office hardware back in the day.
Mobile games being different I'll grant.
edit: I think I get it, this is just a "PC master race" thing, isn't it? People are upset I'm not doing the circlejerk thing and pumping their egos for them. I'm too old for that bullshit.
Do you remember farmville?
Also, most of those high end games? Also available on console. It's the weird, not-high-end stuff that is usually unique to PC, with a few exceptions.
The issue here is you seem to think the good games are the popular/most profitable ones.
I didn't interject my personal opinions anywhere. You're the one doing that.
I am not the one cherry picking.
You are though. I haven't picked anything at all. The list is too long.
Also, most of those high end games? Also available on console.
PC vs. console is an entirely different discussion. The point is that they're not on mobile.
This post is about PC gaming having a larger market share than all consoles combined. And my list is 10x the size of yours, easily. High end games are not even close to most of them, and also are subject to financial failure.
And this comment thread started with your statement that "Everything is going to converge on mobile device gaming."
Ah. That was someone else.
as @Spuddlesv2 noted, this is about the market in terms of money made in the US and specifically in the sphere of gaming; not the single units delivered.
Still, we can extend skepticism on this data considering that most of the money is, probably, made in microtransactions: all consoles driven by their own monopolistic entity (Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo) are in disadvantaged because they demands cuts while on PC, as Epic Store with Fortnite and Steam with CS:GO, those who publish on PC are free to take the 100% of their cuts without have to split with the platform holder (Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo). The appeal for GaaS, unfortunately, is vastly huge on both Mobile and PC (as open platforms) than consoles (which are closed).
What is a tablespoon in the US then? In the UK a tablespoon is probably not that much more common than a ladle, it's much bigger than anything you'd use to eat with and generally is used as a serving spoon or a measurement when cooking/baking.
Our "common" spoon which is mouth sized is called a dessert spoon.
It's like comparing car (PC) vs bicycle (Steam Deck) vs train locomotive (Xbox/PS).
Car can get you almost anywhere in the world, bycicle mostly in the same city, but you can go hard and get into another country. And train locomotive? From point A to B. That's it.
It’s like comparing car (PC) vs bicycle (Steam Deck) vs train locomotive (Xbox/PS).
Following this logic, where do you place Sony paying Rockstar for GTA VI not be available on PC?
There’s no technical reason why GTAVI can’t be on PC, only “Sony corp.” reasons.
Isn't this the usual Rockstar strategy? GTA V and RDR2 both came on consoles first and later on PC.
Ya but that situation doesn't really fit into this comparison of another issue very well. The closest thing I could think of would be comparing it to, say, oil companies doing something like that to give one of the others summer kind of disadvantage
The point is that differences between PC and Console are exclusively artificially built on the console side. A mere Raspberry PI 5 can fit in the PC sphere (minus hardware modularity as GPU (...even if eGPU...)) in every aspect: anything USB, including printing or complicated CAD hardware are fully compliant with Linux.
The hardware in the console are even X86 (PS4 can run Linux with some tweaks).... but you can't run a working browser on the PS5: this limitation is artificially built by Sony because otherwise you could play free web videogames. There's nothing technical in these limitations, the console are just PC hardware capped to the platformed holder (Sony or Microsoft), and the difference is just made by axed functionality and billions spent in advertising propaganda.
Gaming is dead to me since multiplayer is a dick measuring contest of who's mom can afford the best Russian hacks
Thanks for the update Gary.
this post was submitted on 02 Jan 2024
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