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| [Feb 19, 2013, 09:40 am ET] - Share - Viewing Comments |
Follow-ups to to this. Thanks Joao.
Ars Technica - Sorry to say it, but keyboard and mouse are losing the FPS market.
Let's start with the current best-selling franchise in all of gaming: Call of Duty. The best console-specific data I could find for the series of late was first-month sales statistics for Black Ops released by NPD back in 2010. Apparently the game sold 8 million copies on the PS3 and Xbox 360 combined and less than 400,000 on the PC. Even if the unreported digital sales on the PC were ten times as strong as those at retail, and assuming that PC piracy added another 50 percent on top of legitimate downloads, that would still mean there were roughly four console players using a controller for every three playing the PC version in the game's first month. That adds up to a deficit of millions of people for the mouse-and-keyboard crowd, and one that's likely compounded by other Call of Duty games.
Rock, Paper, Shotgun - Mouse & Keyboard Still A Major Player In FPS Market.
Obviously Orland’s maths here is entirely fictional. But let’s play long with it. It’s critical to understand that the stated 400,000 really is just those sold at retail, into a PC market in the US and UK that’s strongly dominated by online sales (either by design or necessity, since finding a PC copy of a game in a shop is quite the trial). It’s reasonable to imagine it represents just a fraction of the real sales, so let’s go along with the guesses. Without piracy, we’ve got the PC representing, er, half the sales of the consoles combined. So that would be a roughly even split, a third each. (I’m sure that’s not realistic, but hey, these are the numbers being used to prove the PC is irrelevant to shooters!) Tack on our piracy and we’ve now got a huge majority of FPS players choosing the PC over either the 360 or the PS3. Even allow the two consoles to be added together, to truly get a representation of the methods of controls, and the estimate here is that 3 out of every 7 players is on mouse/keyboard. 43%. Almost half. And that’s despite everything mentioned above regarding the mainstream explosion of the console. Good grief, the PC is a massive force in FPS, and the Bungie comments couldn’t be more wrong! I’d say with this information, it’s pretty damned hard not to argue with Jones.
Gamasutra - What are video game previews for?
Preview culture is of dubious merit to the games industry, too. These events are expensive. Publishers pay for venues, travel, accommodation, food, fancy USB keys full of assets, pens, messenger bags, swag. I don't believe the common complaint that this stuff sways writers -- we often get so much of it that we don't care to have any more, have been doing this long enough that a branded squeak toy isn't going to make us feel unduly positive.
But is all that cost worthwhile to the publisher as budgets skyrocket and staff cuts are everywhere? Is the lost time worthwhile, for devs who are tasked with frantically cobbling together stable pockets of preview build, pre-rendered trailers, media rehearsal, when they might rather be making their game?
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Re: More Big Picture Details |
Feb 19, 2013, 16:04 |
Beamer |
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Mashiki Amiketo wrote on Feb 19, 2013, 15:26:
Beamer wrote on Feb 19, 2013, 11:26: and even just 1 person on a server using a mouse against everyone else using a pad will ruin the fun for everyone. Wait, so because everyone is dumbed down to the point where they need the game to autoaim for them, no one should get their feelings hurt when PC master race comes along with a mouse and wtfpwns them using fine control. Gotcha. Really? This is your argument? And you say it so smarmily.
How is it so hard for you to figure out you are not their consumer. You sit around whining about "dumbed down" and feeling superior. You are not their consumer.
They make games for their consumers! They make games that people who buy their games will enjoy. Making a change that makes you happy will make them unhappy. If you own a restaurant that doesn't allow smoking and one patron requests to smoke, do you let him? No, because then the patrons that don't like smoking will go to a different restaurant that doesn't allow smoking. In making 1 person happy you cost yourself dozens. |
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