Will Sony's PC Push Hurt their Console Business in the Mid to Longterm?

[Swolf712]

As an interesting tangent to this topic, was anyone else surprised to learn that a lot of games historically seen as PlayStation exclusives actually did have PC ports?

Like I had no idea that Final Fantasy VII had a PC port all the way back in 1998 until I saw someone's boxed copy.

 

[DynamiteCop]

As an interesting tangent to this topic, was anyone else surprised to learn that a lot of games historically seen as PlayStation exclusives actually did have PC ports?

Like I had no idea that Final Fantasy VII had a PC port all the way back in 1998 until I saw someone's boxed copy.

A lot of people didn't know about these things because back then PC was the 'out of mainstream' platform if you know what I mean. PC hasn't been a mainstream thing really until the 2010's rolled around.

 

[Muddasar]

A lot of people didn't know about these things because back then PC was the 'out of mainstream' platform if you know what I mean. PC hasn't been a mainstream thing really until the 2010's rolled around.

Pretty mainstream even in 2000 if you ask me.

Anyone still remember the Trapezium FF7 big box.

 

[DynamiteCop]

Pretty mainstream even in 2000 if you ask me.

Anyone still remember the Trapezium FF7 big box.

PC was largely a subset community until the 2010's, there were millions of users without a doubt but it was a scattered fringe demographic in the purview of normal society still attached to a nerdy image etc.

I've tracked Steam accounts since its inception and up until 2010 there were about 45 million accounts, that's in 7 years. From the 12 years on since then there are now almost a billion accounts.

 

[Penny Royal]

NO bc the use case for buying a console & buying a gaming PC are completely different.

I use a console over a PC for the convenience, which is something that won’t change anytime soon.

 

[Bodycount611]

PC's user numbers are inflated due to 3rd world countries and emerging markets having no choice. these guys are playing on potato PCs and the games they play are all sub-games that console users don't care for. take a look at the steam top 10. aside from a few of the console pity ports surfacing some time, it's usually the same old games.

antiquated and defunct counterstrike game from decades ago, little RTS point and click games, and freeware.

christ. Break out the platform shoes fellas, we've entered a time warp.

The glorious Mustard race!

 

[Darth Vader]

antiquated and defunct counterstrike game from decades ago, little RTS point and click games, and freeware.

Counter Strike go is not from decades ago, fyi.

 

[DynamiteCop]

PC's user numbers are inflated due to 3rd world countries and emerging markets having no choice. these guys are playing on potato PCs and the games they play are all sub-games that console users don't care for. take a look at the steam top 10. aside from a few of the console pity ports surfacing some time, it's usually the same old games.

antiquated and defunct counterstrike game from decades ago, little RTS point and click games, and freeware.

christ. Break out the platform shoes fellas, we've entered a time warp.

The glorious Mustard race!

Imagine actually having games you want to play for years instead of a quarterly fart in the wind no one cares about two months down the line.

 

[Darth Vader]

Imagine actually having games you want to play for years instead of a quarterly fart in the wind no one cares about two months down the line.

Imagine people preferring different things. I know, controversial.

 

[nominedomine]

It didn't seem to hurt MS console business that much and at this point there is almost no risk for Sony.

With all the stock problems it actually helps Sony as they would rather have a PS5 console in the hands of someone more committed to playing on the platform than on the hands of some PC player that bought it just for a few exclusives.

It's clear that Sony is already 100% committed to PC and there is pretty much no going back. What I find curious and unexpected is how them of any company decided to not have their own store to leverage crossbuy and didn't even bother with Denuvo. Single player games with basic DRM are going to get wildly pirated on PC as can easily be seen in the case of God of War.

 

[Umar]

It didn't seem to hurt MS console business that much and at this point there is almost no risk for Sony.

With all the stock problems it actually helps Sony as they would rather have a PS5 console in the hands of someone more committed to playing on the platform than on the hands of some PC player that bought it just for a few exclusives.

It's clear that Sony is already 100% committed to PC and there is pretty much no going back. What I find curious and unexpected is how them of any company decided to not have their own store to leverage crossbuy and didn't even bother with Denuvo. Single player games with basic DRM are going to get wildly pirated on PC as can easily be seen in the case of God of War.

I am sure it did hurt them to an extent

 

[nominedomine]

PC's user numbers are inflated due to 3rd world countries and emerging markets having no choice. these guys are playing on potato PCs and the games they play are all sub-games that console users don't care for. take a look at the steam top 10. aside from a few of the console pity ports surfacing some time, it's usually the same old games.

antiquated and defunct counterstrike game from decades ago, little RTS point and click games, and freeware.

christ. Break out the platform shoes fellas, we've entered a time warp.

The glorious Mustard race!

I don't agree with you trying to frame PC games as lesser games, they are just going for completely different things. Competitive gaming on console is nothing compared to what it is on PC. Dota2 and CS are great at what they are trying to do, there is nothing like that on consoles.

They are different demographics and PC still has a massive piracy problem that almost exclusively affects single player games. It's not a coincidence that just as Sony started to invest on PC they also decided that they need to invest a lot more on GaaS. The fact that PC gaming consolidated around multiplayer is not a coincidence, it's the natural answer to rampant piracy.

But yea, the idea of master race is completely unrealistic, it takes years and years for the average dedicated GPU being used to be better than the current gen of consoles. Not to mention that the PC building culture doesn't direct correlate with people actually buying and playing games.

I am sure it did hurt them to an extent

How?

 

[Bodycount611]

the entire list could run on a potato. like i said, 3rd world gaming.

It didn't seem to hurt MS console business that much and at this point there is almost no risk for Sony.

With all the stock problems it actually helps Sony as they would rather have a PS5 console in the hands of someone more committed to playing on the platform than on the hands of some PC player that bought it just for a few exclusives.

It's clear that Sony is already 100% committed to PC and there is pretty much no going back. What I find curious and unexpected is how them of any company decided to not have their own store to leverage crossbuy and didn't even bother with Denuvo. Single player games with basic DRM are going to get wildly pirated on PC as can easily be seen in the case of God of War.

xbox has nothing for 2022 and hasn't had anything even for years before that. Xbox is a laughing stock on forums, twitter, and in general. Xbox's E3 showcases actually have the nerve to include PC exclusives but none for the lowly xbox peasants of course. It's DISGUSTING and needs to stop.

so yes, it absolutely HAS hurt xbox and everyone can see it, plain as day.

 

[Umar]

I don't agree with you trying to frame PC games as lesser games, they are just going for completely different things. Competitive gaming on console is nothing compared to what it is on PC. Dota2 and CS are great at what they are trying to do, there is nothing like that on consoles.

They are different demographics and PC still has a massive piracy problem that almost exclusively affects single player games. It's not a coincidence that just as Sony started to invest on PC they also decided that they need to invest a lot more on GaaS. The fact that PC gaming consolidated around multiplayer is not a coincidence, it's the natural answer to rampant piracy.

But yea, the idea of master race is completely unrealistic, it takes years and years for the average dedicated GPU being used to be better than the current gen of consoles. Not to mention that the PC building culture doesn't direct correlate with people actually buying and playing games.


How?

Putting their games on steam and pc day one are both big negatives. One of them makes the Xbox console somewhat useless to the hardcore gamer since they are able to get the same game on their pc day one not to mention they can get it for free or at a discount before the game comes out. Secondly putting it on steam means no one will even consider using microsoft at all now since everyone prefers steam over the ms store

 

[Bodycount611]

Putting their games on steam and pc day one are both big negatives. One of them makes the Xbox console somewhat useless to the hardcore gamer since they are able to get the same game on their pc day one not to mention they can get it for free or at a discount before the game comes out. Secondly putting it on steam means no one will even consider using microsoft at all now since everyone prefers steam over the ms store

i couldn't even imagine buying an xbox today.

why would i spend that kind of money to be treated like a second class piece of trash by Microsoft? They obviously prefer PC, they give it exclusives after all. the Xbox is the retarded little brother that they can bully and shit on, right? Why would anyone think Xbox should get exclusives? It's perfectly fine to ripoff and belittle those customers and then turn around and do Age of Empires on PC only, feature PC gamepass exclusives, and just shit on the entire Xbox console legacy by raping and pillaging every single exclusive it ever had and handing it to PC on a silver platter.

It's clear Phil Spencer and his cronies don't like consoles. And this piece of garbage wants MY money?

Over my dead body.

 

[Fahdi]

I think some of you are looking at this wrong. As affordability for PC's is coming back to normal and Cloud gaming is on the rise on PC as well. I would say having games on PC is just adding to options for people to enjoy it on another platform. It has nothing to do with the Consoles losing out, infact it just gives the IP more exposure to the mass market. Besides, Sony is not releasing anything on Day 1. I really appreciate Microsoft's approach, plus I am a full proponent of Platform Agnosticism.

 

[nominedomine]

the entire list could run on a potato. like i said, 3rd world gaming.

xbox has nothing for 2022 and hasn't had anything even for years before that. Xbox is a laughing stock on forums, twitter, and in general. Xbox's E3 showcases actually have the nerve to include PC exclusives but none for the lowly xbox peasants of course. It's DISGUSTING and needs to stop.

so yes, it absolutely HAS hurt xbox and everyone can see it, plain as day.

How do you know if it wasn't going to be like that anyway if they were releasing just games for Xbox. The terrible output of Xbox games greatly pre-dates their PC releases and if anything it's tied to when Phil was put in charge of Xbox Studios.

 

[Bodycount611]

and here's the worst part: Because Xbox fans are such weak, cuckolded losers who have allowed this to happen, and still buy Xbox even without exclusives (WHAT?), this has opened up a window in the industry where these gaming companies think PC is separate and won't affect sales, and that it's OK to port to PC.

So now we have sony porting to PC, and now even nintendo might give PC their mobile scraps... all because MS was brave enough to launch a console with no exclusives. I refuse to let this be the new normal, i refuse to let MS and PC terrorists dictate what we consume or do as an industry.

No exclusives is anti consumer. shout it out. if you bought a videogames platform that does not have exclusive software you have been conned and ripped off, plain and simple.

NO EXCLUSIVES IS ANTI CONSUMER.

 

[nominedomine]

and here's the worst part: Because Xbox fans are such weak, cuckolded losers who have allowed this to happen, and still buy Xbox even without exclusives (WHAT?), this has opened up a window in the industry where these gaming companies think PC is separate and won't affect sales, and that it's OK to port to PC.

So now we have sony porting to PC, and now even nintendo might give PC their mobile scraps... all because MS was brave enough to launch a console with no exclusives. I refuse to let this be the new normal, i refuse to let MS and PC terrorists dictate what we consume or do as an industry.

No exclusives is anti consumer. shout it out. if you bought a videogames platform that does not have exclusive software you have been conned and ripped off, plain and simple.

NO EXCLUSIVES IS ANTI CONSUMER.

So what are you going to do? Not buy PlayStation anymore because their games are releasing on PC?

Or are you going to buy them anyway like Xbox people did?

The ship has long sailed, PS games on PC day one is only a matter of time (even if it ends up being just the GaaS) and the market won't react poorly to it because we already saw what happens with the Xbox. The truth it most people that play on consoles don't care about PC and to Sony a PC gamer that just buy their consoles for exclusive is hardly who they are trying to attract to their platform. The people that are most bothered by this are hard core PlayStation fans the last people that will abandon the platform just because of this.

If you are ok playing on PC and you are fine with possibly having to waiting for Sony and other console only games to make their way to PC get a PC. If you prefer to play on console get a PlayStation.

Putting their games on steam and pc day one are both big negatives. One of them makes the Xbox console somewhat useless to the hardcore gamer since they are able to get the same game on their pc day one not to mention they can get it for free or at a discount before the game comes out. Secondly putting it on steam means no one will even consider using microsoft at all now since everyone prefers steam over the ms store

Yet there is still pretty much the same amount of people that are still buying the Xbox Series consoles when compared to the Xbox One, if not more. That is regardless of their terrible output of games.

To Sony is a simple calculation does the money they get out of PC sales offset the money they lose because some PC players were buying their console just to play exclusives? Does the risk of getting into PC is greater than the risk of not entering that space as a gaming company?

 

[Bodycount611]

So what are you going to do? Not buy PlayStation anymore because their games are releasing on PC?

Or are you going to buy them anyway like Xbox people did?

The ship has long sailed, PS games on PC day one is only a matter of time (even if it ends up being just the GaaS) and the market won't react poorly to it because we already saw what happens with the Xbox. The truth it most people that play on consoles don't care about PC and to Sony a PC gamer that just buy their consoles for exclusive is hardly who they are trying to attract to their platform. The people that are most bothered by this are hard core PlayStation fans the last people that will abandon the platform just because of this.

i keep hearing that PS will launch day and date on PC but it still hasn't happened. we'll see when it does.

I'll keep being vocal and letting everyone know that it isn't right and it isn't fair. PC isn't just going to walk away with everyones games for free, nope. Won't stand for it.

I, and many others will let these companies know. you pull this anti-consumer bullshit and we will leave. we can all stop this if we actually speak up. Nobody owes PC or PC gamers anything.