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PC vs. Console: Difference between revisions
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Naturally, this results in many a [[Flame War]] on the web, not to mention high levels of [[Fan Dumb]]. To PC gamers, console gamers are either twelve year olds screaming obscenities into the microphone or a bunch of skill-less, obnoxious, and unintelligent frat boy dirty peasants, who couldn't even type their own name into a computer, both of which completely unwilling to play any game not [[Rated "M" for Money]]. According to console gamers, PC gamers are elitist, stuck-up geeks with no life that consider themselves the glorious master race and who live in their [[Basement Dweller|mom's basement.]] Unfortunately, magazines only reinforce these stereotypes, making gamers who play both or even exclusively one to yell "[[Stop Being Stereotypical]]" every time they read the next issue of their gaming magazines.
One thing that's almost never mentioned is the developer's point of view. Consoles are easier to develop for because every single version of that console has (or should have; hard drive size will vary) the exact same hardware and firmware; it's much easier to tailor the game to the platform, and to push the platform to its limits. Meanwhile, the PC world doesn't ''have'' standardized hardware; you might be running one of three operating systems<ref>Windows, Mac OS or Linux. For a long time, Windows was pretty much the default gaming OS, but this is starting to break down now that more publishers and developers are serving Mac OS and Linux as well.</ref>, two manufacturers' style of graphics cards<ref>AMD Radeon vs Nvidia</ref>, two manufacturers' style of ''CPU''<ref>Intel vs AMD</ref>, and God only knows what amount of hard drive space and RAM. And to be popular, your game needs to be accessible to as many of these options as possible. Part of the reason that games like ''[[Trespasser]]'' and ''[[Ultima IX]]'' flopped was because most computers then available could not run them without melting down; likewise, part of the charm of games like ''[[League of Legends]]'', ''[[World of Warcraft]]'', and pretty much all indie games in general is that you ''don't'' have to upgrade your computer to run them -- you could run them on lower-to-mid-end computers. It was part of what pushed ''[[Sins of a Solar Empire]]'' up, because they targeted the ''low'' end of the spectrum. (And yes, there is ''[[Crysis (
Until it became more common than not to have a console almost always connected to the Internet, PC games had the advantage and disadvantage of patching. Patches for PC games can often add new content and fix [[Game Breaking Bug|game breaking bugs]], as well as fix other issues that slipped past the beta testing. The disadvantage of patching is that, for some reason, developers seem to use patches as an excuse to release games [[Obvious Beta|half-completed]], using the consumers as testers to find issues for them to patch. By no means is this exclusive to the PC platform; it's become pretty much a standard for games to require a couple of patches because they're rarely without a couple [[Game Breaking Bug|game breaking bugs]] fresh out of the box. (Unless there's an [[Updated Rerelease]], like a "Game of the Year" edition, Blizzard's Battle Chests, bundle games, etc.) Currently, there are plenty of clients that automatically patch the game for you, making this better. Bottom line, if you buy a PC game on release, most of the time you can expect to have purchased a late beta.
It should also be noted that some genres just naturally fit onto certain platforms better. [[Real Time Strategy]] and other [[Real Time]] simulations are accepted by most people to be PC-only territory, due to the complex nature of their interface (''[[Starcraft]]'' is ''the'' most-played RTS in history, but its Nintendo64 port was a wipe), and trying to do a [[MMORPG]] on a console is probably suicidal (''[[Final Fantasy XI]]'' makes it work, but it's more or less the exception). Meanwhile, [[Fighting Game|fighting games]] belong in Console Country, since those games are designed for local multiplayer, which video arcades have been offering since the '80s but which PCs only managed around 2006 once HDTV sets became affordable.<ref>Individual PC games have attempted to make multiplayer using the same system, except that this really does ''not'' work as a PC is designed for ''one'' person to use</ref> Today, the major battleground is the shooter genres (be it [[First-Person Shooter|first]] or [[Third-Person Shooter|third]]); wars have been fought, only some of them digital, over whether a game's console version or PC version was better. Initially, PCs had the edge, due to the awkwardness of gamepad controls in a shooting environment and the lack of Internet multiplayer, but then ''[[
Nowadays, consoles and PCs are both powerful gaming machines, capable of online gaming and vibrant effects. It is starting to be unusual to see games exclusive to a platform; releasing a game on not only the PC but multiple consoles is typically where the money is at. This brings us to yet another set of pitfalls: "porting" a game from one system to another. Simply put, it's so easy to do this badly that we have an entire trope for it: the "[[Porting Disaster]]."
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* 1992-2002: With the port-it-on-everything phase dying off, both sides pretty much kept to themselves, using the strengths of their platforms to produce games suitable for themselves and mostly not paying too much attention to each other.
* [[Turn of the Millennium]]: The mainstream success (and profits) of the console market led to PC game developers going multiplatform, while some go exclusive for consoles.
** [[Epic Games]], the makers of acclaimed PC hits ''[[
** Koei, in the past the makers of many highly complicated strategy games, today are mostly known for ''[[Dynasty Warriors]]'' and its many spin-offs. Only the ''[[Romance of the Three Kingdoms]]'' and ''Nobunaga's Ambition'' strategy series remain, and to a lesser extent ''[[
** Some time later, the attempt to port some console games to the PC have mostly resulted in bad ports, most notably ''[[Halo 2]]'', the first two ''[[Assassin's Creed]]'' games, ''[[Star Wars]]: [[The Force Unleashed]]'', ''[[Resident Evil 4]]'', and ''[[Grand Theft Auto IV]]''.
** ''[[Modern Warfare]] 2'' was a major front on the console vs. PC debate. Developers of the aforementioned game removed modding tools, developers console, dedicated servers, among other things from the game, making its multiplayer similar to that of the console. In addition, its price tag was $60, which was a console-exclusive markup as far as AAA games go at the time.<ref>The cost exists to pay for licensing fees to Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo, which are naturally non-existent for a PC game.</ref> Many big PC games are now sold at this price. Naturally, this [[Internet Backdraft|didn't go over so well with the PC crowd.]]
*** The backlash from this was so bad that [[Battlefield (
*** Every ''[[Call of Duty]]'' game after ''MW2'' has had dedicated servers, due to this fiasco.
** ''[[Shadowrun]]'' allows players on the 360 and PC to engage in competitive multiplayer. The massive imbalance caused by the control differences causes plans for including this feature in future games to be halted.
** ''[[Counter-Strike
** ''[[Minecraft]]'', a once PC exclusive game, was announced by Notch (head developer of the game) that the game would also be released to the Xbox360 with Kinect controls. PC players ''exploded'' with fury at the news, saying that ''Minecraft'' would now be ruined by retarded ''Halo''/''Call of Duty'' fans who would muck up the ''Minecraft'' community with their trollish attitudes and would demand the game to have guns or other things, or were worried that the game would now have even less updates because of how split the development team would be between PC and the Xbox360. This is after Notch has stated that A) a separate team would be working on the console port while he and his team would focus on the PC version, B) a standard controller would be an option to use should Xbox owners opt to not use Kinect controls, and C) updates were still coming regardless.
** The gaming industry outside of the United States and Japan (particularly in Russia, Europe, Australia, China, Korea, and even Canada) is still massively weighted towards the PC, with many commercial titles being released for the platform regularly. Most of the ''advertising'' tends to be for console or [[Multi Platform]] titles due to to the larger potential markets, so now -- as always -- countless major and minor PC titles come and go without appearing on the English-or-Nihongo-speaking radar.
** ''[[
** ''[[Rage (
** ''[[Left 4 Dead 2]]'' already had its share of console version vs. PC version flame wars, but it rose to a new level for the Cold Stream DLC. The DLC was released to the PC players in beta in March 2011 and over time, Valve released ports of the ''[[Left 4 Dead]]'' campaigns for the DLC in beta as well so players could give feedback on what needs to be fixed. 2012 rolls around and Valve announced in their blog that the DLC is in certification process by Microsoft to which the DLC will be released to the PC and Xbox360 after it is done along with last minute bug testing. An entire year had passed since the DLC was released in beta and no word has been shown for a release date (due to Valve Time). The long wait has caused PC gamers to blame Xbox owners for holding the DLC back (due to the certification process) while Xbox players flame PC gamers because they feel the PC version is taking so long to test that it's holding the DLC back. It's basically a flame war over which side gets content the quickest.
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