In the future, is mobile going to be PC's "spiritual successor" for gaming?

I just saw this youtube compilation of mmorpgs for mobile and was said that the growth for it is rapid for mobile:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRnf-Oij9GA

Not in near future, performance aint there.

Years from now who knows

Custom holodeck programs, most likely pornographic.

As a PC gamer, I absolutely cannot stand mobile games. I am yet to play a mobile game that isn't boring and repetitive, centred around microtransactions and tap, tap tapping! I doubt that I am alone after the reaction to Diablo mobile and Godus. These examples have shown me that many PC gamers dont want any of it.

I think if mobile replaces anything it will be replacing consoles with the aid of play anywhere game streaming services.

I really hate Mobile games with a passion!!!

No. Mobile is going to die. Smartphones will be ancient relics in 20 years. The idea of a phone will be dumb and like how cassette players are to us today.

The PC, the choice for the most customisable options and the largest collection of backward compatibility in games is going to be replaced by the mobile?

Sounds unlikely.

But you didn't say 'replaced', you said 'spiritual successor'. What does that mean here?

Mobile is trash, always was and always will be.

Good question. I have no clue, but I'm sure it's either yes or no in about 20 years.

How can something be a spiritual successor if they have existed along-side one another for 15-20 years? I remember playing mobile games that were actually quality experiences on my Palm Pilot in the early 2000's. Rayman Palm OS, 2002

It's more likely that services like Stadia will become the dominant way to game on mobile - and if you're streaming from a server, you're not really playing on your mobile device.

I think the mobile and core markets are about as separated as TV and gaming. In other words, not any time soon. I don't believe that mobile gamers are transitioning into PC gaming. There are people who just start playing on PC one day, and they maybe happen to be mobile gamers.

The markets are a very different size. So I do expect mobile gaming to get more attention than PC gaming. I just don't see one replacing the other in the near future because they serve such different needs.

Definitely not, the future of gaming is the subscription based streaming services. Meaning you'll be able to play pretty much anything on pretty much anything with a capable screen and a viable control method. Even PC will eventually fall but traditional consoles will disappear long before that.

Right now though mobile gaming revenue is almost half of the entire global games market revenue. This is a fairly in depth look at the industry right now and here's a pie chart :)

Currently, both Fortnite and PUBG have more players on mobile than on PC. The Tencent mobile MOBA game Arena of Valor has more players than LoL does on PC. The biggest PC genres are being downscaled for mobiles.

But PC will still be around. And so will consoles. It's not a zero-sum game. As mobile grows, PC and console will probably stagnate, but not decline. They'll likely still be healthy markets, but will be dwarfed by mobile games, as they are now

@GarGx1: I doubt the subscription model will hurt the F2P model, which is far more lucrative. But the subscription model could probably hurt the traditional sales model.

Not at first, just like F2P business models it'll take time to grow but I honestly believe that eventually it'll be way the majority of games are accessed. The convenience of being able to have a low cost monthly sub and be able to select from an expansive library of games that you can play and continue the same game on anything from your phone to your TV will be very attractive to a lot of people and will undoubtedly gain traction very quickly.

I'm an old school PC gamer and letting go of my monster rig will not come quickly nor easily to me. Unfortunately having watched the gaming industry grow and change over the course of my life (I'm 49 at the end of this month and started video gaming at 5), I can see that this change is inevitable. My major hope is that is not as divided as gaming currently is but I think it will be and just like F2P business models and past console companies, some will rise and some will fall until before it all settles down.

Great point. Hope it comes sooner and reasonably priced.

@GarGx1 said:

Definitely not, the future of gaming is the subscription based streaming services. Meaning you'll be able to play pretty much anything on pretty much anything with a capable screen and a viable control method. Even PC will eventually fall but traditional consoles will disappear long before that.

Right now though mobile gaming revenue is almost half of the entire global games market revenue. This is a fairly in depth look at the industry right now and here's a pie chart :)

Thanks. So still mobile at the end of the day as it will be the most owned device in the future but not just because of how mobile is inheriting more of the PC's soul than consoles, but more on streaming.

IMO, PC's soul of games is still mmorpg, f2ps rather than games like Dark Souls and CoD.

Transition will look interesting but I think streaming will be more for later after mobile has gotten even more grounds.

I have a feeling that f2ps with the semblance of older pc games (mobas, mmos, other f2ps), will still have a stronger monetary contribution than "console games via cloud gaming" on mobile.

@rzxv04 said:

@GarGx1 said:

Definitely not, the future of gaming is the subscription based streaming services. Meaning you'll be able to play pretty much anything on pretty much anything with a capable screen and a viable control method. Even PC will eventually fall but traditional consoles will disappear long before that.

Right now though mobile gaming revenue is almost half of the entire global games market revenue. This is a fairly in depth look at the industry right now and here's a pie chart :)

Thanks. So still mobile at the end of the day as it will be the most owned device in the future but not just because of how mobile is inheriting more of the PC's soul than consoles, but more on streaming.

IMO, PC's soul of games is still mmorpg, f2ps rather than games like Dark Souls and CoD.

Transition will look interesting but I think streaming will be more for later after mobile has gotten even more grounds.

I have a feeling that f2ps with the semblance of older pc games (mobas, mmos, other f2ps), will still have a stronger monetary contribution than "console games via cloud gaming" on mobile.

Mobile gaming actually lost ground to console gaming from 2017 to 2018, stats from this time last year had mobile gaming had ~51% of the market share. I'm also happy with a slight change in PC gaming revenue, browser gaming suffered a small decline over the same period. :)

Over all, every game platform has increased in revenue. Which is great news for all of us.

@GarGx1 said:

@rzxv04 said:

@GarGx1 said:

Definitely not, the future of gaming is the subscription based streaming services. Meaning you'll be able to play pretty much anything on pretty much anything with a capable screen and a viable control method. Even PC will eventually fall but traditional consoles will disappear long before that.

Right now though mobile gaming revenue is almost half of the entire global games market revenue. This is a fairly in depth look at the industry right now and here's a pie chart :)

Thanks. So still mobile at the end of the day as it will be the most owned device in the future but not just because of how mobile is inheriting more of the PC's soul than consoles, but more on streaming.

IMO, PC's soul of games is still mmorpg, f2ps rather than games like Dark Souls and CoD.

Transition will look interesting but I think streaming will be more for later after mobile has gotten even more grounds.

I have a feeling that f2ps with the semblance of older pc games (mobas, mmos, other f2ps), will still have a stronger monetary contribution than "console games via cloud gaming" on mobile.

Mobile gaming actually lost ground to console gaming from 2017 to 2018, stats from this time last year had mobile gaming had ~51% of the market share. I'm also happy with a slight change in PC gaming revenue, browser gaming suffered a small decline over the same period. :)

Over all, every game platform has increased in revenue. Which is great news for all of us.

That's true.

I'll check more stuff about mobile later, so far:

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2019-04-12-epic-games-hires-jason-west

https://www.wepc.com/news/video-game-statistics/#mobile-gaming

Seems like f2p still rule everything.

I do wonder if GTA V will release on mobile.

I'm also interested in seeing revenue if there's a fifa mobile version vs paid versions on pc and console.

Didn't know pubg wasn't f2p. Woops.

@rzxv04 said:

@GarGx1 said:

@rzxv04 said:

@GarGx1 said:

Definitely not, the future of gaming is the subscription based streaming services. Meaning you'll be able to play pretty much anything on pretty much anything with a capable screen and a viable control method. Even PC will eventually fall but traditional consoles will disappear long before that.

Right now though mobile gaming revenue is almost half of the entire global games market revenue. This is a fairly in depth look at the industry right now and here's a pie chart :)

Thanks. So still mobile at the end of the day as it will be the most owned device in the future but not just because of how mobile is inheriting more of the PC's soul than consoles, but more on streaming.

IMO, PC's soul of games is still mmorpg, f2ps rather than games like Dark Souls and CoD.

Transition will look interesting but I think streaming will be more for later after mobile has gotten even more grounds.

I have a feeling that f2ps with the semblance of older pc games (mobas, mmos, other f2ps), will still have a stronger monetary contribution than "console games via cloud gaming" on mobile.

Mobile gaming actually lost ground to console gaming from 2017 to 2018, stats from this time last year had mobile gaming had ~51% of the market share. I'm also happy with a slight change in PC gaming revenue, browser gaming suffered a small decline over the same period. :)

Over all, every game platform has increased in revenue. Which is great news for all of us.

That's true.

I'll check more stuff about mobile later, so far:

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2019-04-12-epic-games-hires-jason-west

https://www.wepc.com/news/video-game-statistics/#mobile-gaming

Seems like f2p still rule everything.

I do wonder if GTA V will release on mobile.

I'm also interested in seeing revenue if there's a fifa mobile version vs paid versions on pc and console.

Didn't know pubg wasn't f2p. Woops.

Consoles are more likely to fall before PC. As you can see in Asia both mobile and PC are pushing consoles out. Japan which is pretty much the last bastion of console gaming on the continent is already developing a large PC playerbase and indie gaming scene. Japan already has been focusing more on mobile than consoles and it doesn't help that Sony have been censoring games even if they only stay in Japan which is turning more core gamers over to PC. PC gaming can more easily coexist with mobile gaming than console gaming can. People in Asia don't even have to buy PCs as they can just go to cafes and play for hours at dirt cheap prices till they die (literally). I'm seeing some mobile games get PC ports and not just the other way around.

To be fair the MMORPG genre isn't really the soul of PCs games nowadays. The MMO bubble has popped a long time ago, especially in the Western region. You can't just crap out a half assed MMO or F2P game these days and expect money to roll in. From what I'm seeing Asia they may not be making as many PC MMO/F2P games as they are for mobile but they're investing more quality/production values into fewer MMO/F2P games on PC than just crapping out a bunch of low tier games and hope to see what sticks.

Then there is there is also the fact Steam has been getting a lot of growth in Asia especially in China, South Korea and Japan the most wealthiest gaming markets in Asia and in the world aside from the USA. This means even more growth for PC gaming on the premium gaming side meaning China and Korea will play a bigger role in PC gaming outside of F2P games. There is already a indie gaming scene in China, Chinese developers making AA-AAA games for PC and Korea are starting to make indie games, single player games, porting mobile games to PC and making B2P PC titles.

I think laptops/tablets are the ones who replace desktop gaming.

@NoodleFighter said:

@rzxv04 said:

@GarGx1 said:

@rzxv04 said:

@GarGx1 said:

Definitely not, the future of gaming is the subscription based streaming services. Meaning you'll be able to play pretty much anything on pretty much anything with a capable screen and a viable control method. Even PC will eventually fall but traditional consoles will disappear long before that.

Right now though mobile gaming revenue is almost half of the entire global games market revenue. This is a fairly in depth look at the industry right now and here's a pie chart :)

Thanks. So still mobile at the end of the day as it will be the most owned device in the future but not just because of how mobile is inheriting more of the PC's soul than consoles, but more on streaming.

IMO, PC's soul of games is still mmorpg, f2ps rather than games like Dark Souls and CoD.

Transition will look interesting but I think streaming will be more for later after mobile has gotten even more grounds.

I have a feeling that f2ps with the semblance of older pc games (mobas, mmos, other f2ps), will still have a stronger monetary contribution than "console games via cloud gaming" on mobile.

Mobile gaming actually lost ground to console gaming from 2017 to 2018, stats from this time last year had mobile gaming had ~51% of the market share. I'm also happy with a slight change in PC gaming revenue, browser gaming suffered a small decline over the same period. :)

Over all, every game platform has increased in revenue. Which is great news for all of us.

That's true.

I'll check more stuff about mobile later, so far:

https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2019-04-12-epic-games-hires-jason-west

https://www.wepc.com/news/video-game-statistics/#mobile-gaming

Seems like f2p still rule everything.

I do wonder if GTA V will release on mobile.

I'm also interested in seeing revenue if there's a fifa mobile version vs paid versions on pc and console.

Didn't know pubg wasn't f2p. Woops.

Consoles are more likely to fall before PC. As you can see in Asia both mobile and PC are pushing consoles out. Japan which is pretty much the last bastion of console gaming on the continent is already developing a large PC playerbase and indie gaming scene. Japan already has been focusing more on mobile than consoles and it doesn't help that Sony have been censoring games even if they only stay in Japan which is turning more core gamers over to PC. PC gaming can more easily coexist with mobile gaming than console gaming can. People in Asia don't even have to buy PCs as they can just go to cafes and play for hours at dirt cheap prices till they die (literally). I'm seeing some mobile games get PC ports and not just the other way around.

To be fair the MMORPG genre isn't really the soul of PCs games nowadays. The MMO bubble has popped a long time ago, especially in the Western region. You can't just crap out a half assed MMO or F2P game these days and expect money to roll in. From what I'm seeing Asia they may not be making as many PC MMO/F2P games as they are for mobile but they're investing more quality/production values into fewer MMO/F2P games on PC than just crapping out a bunch of low tier games and hope to see what sticks.

Then there is there is also the fact Steam has been getting a lot of growth in Asia especially in China, South Korea and Japan the most wealthiest gaming markets in Asia and in the world aside from the USA. This means even more growth for PC gaming on the premium gaming side meaning China and Korea will play a bigger role in PC gaming outside of F2P games. There is already a indie gaming scene in China, Chinese developers making AA-AAA games for PC and Korea are starting to make indie games, single player games, porting mobile games to PC and making B2P PC titles.

It'd be interesting to see but I do agree that consoles are likely to have the least growth in the future due to streaming or soon having no true exclusives.

I still think the mobile will eventually absorb most of the pc base which are currently f2ps. Maybe a little more than 10 years from now when base mobile hardware have been quite leveraged.

mmorpgs, to me, is still a large defining part of pc gaming which probably is a giant compared to console mmos. MMOs seem closest the the amalgamation of video games, pvp, economy, social, graphics, updates, mastery ceilings, etc. I sometimes think that being build for m/k makes a lot of the mmos really unique.

Thanks for sharing PC growth rising in Asia. I'm interested in seeing how it's pacing with mobile there.

Future evolved versions of mobiles or whatever they will be called - definitely. Having said that they will kill consoles long before PC's.

If anything will be, it will be open-platform cloud based gaming solutions.

If companies like Microsoft/Google offer environments where you have control over the server (or at least, relevant mod support control, or dedicated server owning) then THAT will be the PC of the future.

Majority in this thread are looking at it the wrong way, mobility won't kill a PC.... even if these devices accept any inputs and cn plug into screens, the TINY form factors limited the power, the storage... everything.

That is not what PC gaming is about. a £1000 phone can't compete with a £200 console let alone a £500+ PC. in MANY ways. Want to increase your phone storage ? pay £100 for 16gb more .... you can get a 1TB SSD drive almost for that now.

Cloud gaming is the biggest threat to current PC gaming, and I don't mean threat in a bad way... depends how its "controlled"... which never seems to favour the consumor.

tldr - Form-Factors MATTER for physical devices, a tiny phone will never catch a standard ATX case PC, nor a mini-HTPC console.... this hasn't changed in decades. The bigger the hardware, the more powerful it will be. Cloud has ALL the advantages of convenience, power and can be accessed on any device. THAT is the real threat to all forms of gaming.