Battleangel

Because not everything is about "piracy" you know. Here is more insight into why the market is failing.

ANYBODY wondering why PC gaming is being slapped around by the console market need only look to the release notes for the latest AMD Catalyst drivers, version 8.4, released merely moments ago.

The driver adds very little in terms of features: hardcore gamers will surely be disappointed to see that the headline revision is better support for Folding@Home.

Meanwhile, AMD is still cranking out fixes for driver bugs for games that are almost four years old.

It’s been like that for quite some time. Meanwhile games on the PC have been rushed to gold, sometimes with serious bugs that seemingly aren’t being taken seriously by the developers. The end result being that PC gaming could soon be a thing of the past. At least when it comes to any serious releases. And that would be a problem for everyone. PC gaming has been the driving force behind game development for over a decade now. It has set a standard for gaming, hacking, modding and tweaking that we are about to lose. Look no further than console hybrids or ports like Unreal Tournament 3 and Assassin’s Creed.

Kevin Unangst, senior global director for Windows Gaming at Microsoft recently defended Games for Windows, Vista and DirectX 10 saying that the perception of a problem is the problem, plus

the most widely publicized picture of the PC game space isn’t the whole picture — it doesn’t capture the growth of web-based casual games, WoW’s millions of monthly subscribers, Valve’s healthy Steam sales and other digital distribution, or the microtransactions revenue of PC products like Gaia Online or Nexon’s MapleStory, both of which also have hefty userbases.