Why PC gaming is the future-and why Valve is leading the pack

http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=160866

Very interesting article from Eurogamer, heres a snippet.

"Valve sees 200 per cent growth in these alternative channels - not just Steam, but including the likes of cyber-cafes as well - versus less than 10 per cent in bricks-and-mortar shop sales. Steam has a 15 million-strong player-base with 1.25 million peak concurrent users, and 191 per cent annual growth; none too far off a console platform in itself. The PC casual games market, driven by the likes of PopCap, has gone from next to nothing to USD 1.5 billion dollar industry in under ten years, and has doubled in size in just three. Perhaps most surprisingly, Valve has found that digital distribution doesn't cannibalise retail sales - in fact, a free Day of Defeat weekend on Steam created more new retail sales than online ones."

go valve...stick it to the man :D. nice to see someone do it besides MSs "yeah PC is great..buy a 360" tactic (not a direct quote but a summary really).

PC remains out on the rickity edge as usual....the industry just hasnt realised that its out of date :P.

I hate the fact that you need the internet in order to install single player games from Valve. The internet should be seen as an option in order to take advantage of online play, not as a requirement just to get it installed. Falconoffury

I used to feel that way too and if you are on dial-up steam is a disaster but now I have changed my mind. Steam is a pretty easy to use program that keeps my games neatly organized. If I unistall a game I can reinstall it easily. There isn't obtrusive anti-piracy stuff since steam is the anti-piracy system, I can buy new games quickly and easily, and it works great for multiplayer games. So yes it is a little irritating that I have to play half-life 2 on the internet even though its a single player game but with broadband I am on the internet 24/7 anyway

Digital distribution through services like Steam is the future.

As usual, the consoles are several years behind the times.

Digital distribution through services like Steam is the future.

As usual, the consoles are several years behind the times.

cmdrmonkey

Yeah lol

I hate the fact that you need the internet in order to install single player games from Valve. The internet should be seen as an option in order to take advantage of online play, not as a requirement just to get it installed. Falconoffury

I hate the fact that I have to stick a CD in the drive on my non Steam games. DRM is not likely to go away so might as well have the least obtrusive and somewhat effective version.

I wonder how much the sales actually are? They seem to have been pretty shy about tossing out actual numbers versus saying 'percent improvements' or 'very successful'... they've been completely mum about that stuff. :(Makari

Enough to keep making the games they want to make at the pace they want and maintaining their standards of quality. Valve is privately held and like most privately held companies have no legal requirement to share books and so don't. Let's keep our fingers crossed that Valve stays private forever. Publicly owned companies tend to make decisions to please the stock market in short term, instead of decisions to please their customers over the long term. Example: Electronic Arts.

[QUOTE="cmdrmonkey"]

Digital distribution through services like Steam is the future.

As usual, the consoles are several years behind the times.

Lidve

Yeah lol

especially wii fans wetting there pants over the propect of online play :lol:

Steam is okay...as long as you have broadband. If you don't, you're out of luck, and broadband is not as widespread as some people like to believe. So a lot of gamers simply can't take advantage of Steam.

Personally, I've only bought a few games through the Steam service, because I still prefer to have the game disks. Also, I'm leary of online activation servers, and how long those servers will be available. What if I want to play a Steam game ten years from now? Would they release a patch enabling me to do so if the servers were no longer in place (or stopped supporting that particular title)?

They also seriously need to address their pricing policy across all regions. I thought the whole point of Steam was to lower costs of distribution - yet in some regions (like Australia) people are paying much higher prices for the same games. How can that possibly be fair, considering the fact that the game is being downloaded over a wire wherever you happen to be in the world? It's not costing any more to provide a download to Australia, so why the higher price?

Putting that aside for the moment, in the UK I've also found retail boxed copies cheaper in some online stores than via Steam, which makes Steam a less attractive option. Again, why would a digitally distributed game with no material production/distribution costs be higher priced (or the same price) as a retail boxed version? It doesn't make sense.

So the Steam service still has quite a long way to go before it becomes a viable replacement for boxed copies, imo. Even so, it cannot cater to every PC gamer's needs.

[QUOTE="Makari"]I wonder how much the sales actually are? They seem to have been pretty shy about tossing out actual numbers versus saying 'percent improvements' or 'very successful'... they've been completely mum about that stuff. :(giantraddish

Enough to keep making the games they want to make at the pace they want and maintaining their standards of quality. Valve is privately held and like most privately held companies have no legal requirement to share books and so don't. Let's keep our fingers crossed that Valve stays private forever. Publicly owned companies tend to make decisions to please the stock market in short term, instead of decisions to please their customers over the long term. Example: Electronic Arts.

If Valve and Steam rule PC gaming I'm going console =(ZuluEcho14

And nothing of value will be lost.

I hate the fact that you need the internet in order to install single player games from Valve. The internet should be seen as an option in order to take advantage of online play, not as a requirement just to get it installed. Falconoffury

It's a negative point towards Steam, but it's always a progressive step that hopefully pushes PC gaming further.