PC gaming more expensive then consoles?

[Morgul]

I found this pretty interesting..

http://pc.ign.com/articles/121/1214544p1.html

[Purge]

The offset is trading PC games vs Console Games.

Online sales perhaps, but most places (where I live) don't take any PC games, but with consoles they do.

[Razgon]

If you buy through digital services like steam, there is also pretty often huge discounts in the holiday sales to be gotten. This is one area where the consoles doesn't have any likeminded outlets yet.

[kronovan]

That article fails in so many places its laughable - barely worth commenting on. Talking about consoles in a 3 year time frame is ridiculous, unless of course you're talking about the non-slim 360 and it's pathetic failure rate. The shortest life cycle we've seen for a console -other than the ill fated Dreamcast- is the Xbox at 4 years. 5 years is more the norm and this gen its being streched even further; 6+ so far for the 360 and 5+ for the PS3 and counting. Even the hardware-challeged-from-the-get-go Wii will have a run of more than 5 years. Meanwhile there's no way even a bleeding edge PC isn't sucking wind after 3 years and barely capable of even running casual PC games after 5.

The markets are very different - console players are content to keep playing with the graphics and audio fidelity they had day 1, while PC players expect to be fed a constant meal of bleeding edge. If you don't take that into account in any comparison, you've failed out of the gate.

[Victoria Raverna]

Also the comparison should include the following scenarios:

PC gamers need a PC for non gaming purpose, so the cost of PC gaming is only whatever parts that PC gamers need to buy to be able to play games on his PC. So maybe only include cost of graphic cards and some extra RAM, plus the cost of games.

Console gamers have TV for non gaming purpose, so the cost of console gaming is really just the cost of the console itself plus cost of games.

[kratz]

Meanwhile there's no way even a bleeding edge PC isn't sucking wind after 3 years and barely capable of even running casual PC games after 5.

This is simply not true anymore.  I bought my computer in January of 2008, so it's 4 years old, and it was certainly not bleeding edge at the time - it was decent, but nothing too fancy (a Dell, to boot).

It's going strong.  I've put a couple bucks into some extra RAM, but I'm running BF3 without having to touch a setting to get it to run, and I'm playing Skyrim on High without a single hiccup.  tiktokman bought a very similar PC at about the same time, and he's running Skyrim on modified Ultra (I just haven't messed with it).

Games are getting much better at running well on most hardware - lessons perhaps learned from console development?  I don't know.

I'll easily get 5 years + out of this computer.  I might buy a video card in another year or something... we'll see.

Also, I didn't read the article, so I don't know what it asserts.

[TiLT]

That article fails in so many places its laughable - barely worth commenting on. Talking about consoles in a 3 year time frame is ridiculous, unless of course you're talking about the non-slim 360 and it's pathetic failure rate. The shortest life cycle we've seen for a console -other than the ill fated Dreamcast- is the Xbox at 4 years. 5 years is more the norm and this gen its being streched even further; 6+ so far for the 360 and 5+ for the PS3 and counting. Even the hardware-challeged-from-the-get-go Wii will have a run of more than 5 years.

And what does that have to do with the content of the article? By all means, I don't agree with all of it, but the console life cycle has no impact on it. In fact, it could be used against consoles at this point since the current generation is unlikely to be in the lead for 3 more years before something new and shiny comes in and takes over.

It's not an article about how historically viable it is to purchase a PC over a console. It's an article about how viable it is now.

[The Rocketman]

Meanwhile there's no way even a bleeding edge PC isn't sucking wind after 3 years and barely capable of even running casual PC games after 5.

This is simply not true anymore.  I bought my computer in January of 2008, so it's 4 years old, and it was certainly not bleeding edge at the time - it was decent, but nothing too fancy (a Dell, to boot).

It's going strong.  I've put a couple bucks into some extra RAM, but I'm running BF3 without having to touch a setting to get it to run, and I'm playing Skyrim on High without a single hiccup.  tiktokman bought a very similar PC at about the same time, and he's running Skyrim on modified Ultra (I just haven't messed with it).

Games are getting much better at running well on most hardware - lessons perhaps learned from console development?  I don't know.

I'll easily get 5 years + out of this computer.  I might buy a video card in another year or something... we'll see.

Also, I didn't read the article, so I don't know what it asserts.

Just wanted to chime in to say that my pc is about 5 years old, and still happily runs Crysis 2, Battlefield Bad Company 2 and Skyrim (at high resolutions, no choppiness). I did have to buy a new video card last month because the old one died, but all in all the speed at which a pc ages seems to have slowed down quite a lot.

[EngineNo9]

I can't take this topic seriously when I am still waiting to hear what comes after "then consoles...".  Then consoles did what?  Then WHAT??!   

[jersoc]

right away the article is a failure. pc gaming is not mega expensive. be fucking smart about it. pc i put together 4 years ago plays skyrim on ultra along with some HD texture mods. the only original piece i changed is a GPU and it's about 2 gens behind current gens, plus that was 200 bucks on sale, cheaper the original gpu i bought.

TOTAL FOR BUILDING AND RUNNING A GAMING PC OVER THREE YEARS: £1194.65

wtf is this? 3 years? does he just throw away his computer and start over? This goes back to be fucking smart. jesus christ IGN is awful. I could upgrade my pc every year if i wanted to, but why? No games take advantage of 64bits, no games take advantage(or very little do) of 4 gigs of ram, and barely any games will utilize the current and upcoming gen of GPUs. Why are you upgrading every 3 years for something that won't come?
My conclusion, this guy is a fucking hack.

Ok, why are you including tv and monitor cost? odds are you have those, probably multiples of one. i got a 42 last year for 400 bucks. those have to be 200 by now. if you don't have a tv you aren't gaming because you can't afford it. unless you suddenly appear in the world at 18 years old, you have a tv before a console, same with a monitor.
my god.
who fucking buys extra controllers? if you have friends coming over to play MP odds are they have a console and their own. most people aren't going to just buy extra controllers right away.

no one pays MSRP for games 

once again IGN proves how fucking retarded they are with no research. I could write a better and longer article than(see, that's used correctly) this hack.

also

Whilst building

ITS FUCKING WHILE, WHILE. whilst doesn't make you sound smarter. it makes you sound like a douche that i would punch on the road just for seeing your stupid douche face.

[TiLT]

Whilst building

ITS FUCKING WHILE, WHILE. whilst doesn't make you sound smarter. it makes you sound like a douche that i would punch on the road just for seeing your stupid douche face.

It's a perfectly valid word in the UK, which is where the article was written. Or do you expect Brits to write American English?

[Purge]

I can't take this topic seriously when I am still waiting to hear what comes after "then consoles...".  Then consoles did what?  Then WHAT??!   

[Morgul]

Here hit this, relax..   

[Purge]

Whilst building

ITS FUCKING WHILE, WHILE. whilst doesn't make you sound smarter. it makes you sound like a douche that i would punch on the road just for seeing your stupid douche face.

It's a perfectly valid word in the UK, which is where the article was written. Or do you expect Brits to write American English?

Whilst reading this, I found myself wondering how bad a blowout jersoc would have.

Jersoc, I think the article is a step in the right direction.

Problem is, the market seems to be drifting from desktop to laptops and, god forbid, tablets. You say people don't pay MSRP? *WE* don't pay that, but since Walmart is a juggernaut when it comes to game sales, I'm wondering why you think the large (in both senses ) unwashed masses don't, as a general rule, pay that sticker price. Sure, it might not be MRSP 59.99, but 59.88? that 11 cents doesn't begin to count unless you're buying 10 games at a time.

I totally agree about the point you're making in terms of TV / monitor purchase, but think about it this way:

What do you NEED, as a bare minimum, when you get divorced and she takes everything? Cost of entry is everything, including a new case, hard drives and the like. I'm glad he didn't get into 5.1+ sound (for either system). I think he found the safe path to walk and while there are so many places where I'd have a different take on it, I'm not about to rewrite an IGN article.

[CeeKay]

I can't take this topic seriously when I am still waiting to hear what comes after "then consoles...".  Then consoles did what?  Then WHAT??!   

they did this'.

[Morgul]

they did this'.

Exactly.  Ceekay understands.   

[Canuck]

Hard to know which is cheaper. A console's life is definitely longer than 3 years (unless you're talking about the 360 ) and it seems to be easier to stretch a PC these days than before.  For example, on my PC, Mass Effect 2 runs much smoother than Mass Effect and Fallout 3 plays much smoother than Oblivion (and I'm hoping that Skyrim will as well).
Almost everybody these days has a nice big TV so including that in the cost of the console is pretty ridiculous.  Also thanks to Steam I pay a hell of a lot less for 20 PC games than I would for 20 PS3 games.  If I'm lucky I might find a decent used game at Gamestop for $24.99 or maybe $19.99 two years after release.  On Steam I can pick up a less than year old game for $5 during any of the seasonal sales. 

[EddieA]

Almost everybody these days has a nice big TV so including that in the cost of the console is pretty ridiculous.  Also thanks to Steam I pay a hell of a lot less for 20 PC games than I would for 20 PS3 games.  If I'm lucky I might find a decent used game at Gamestop for $24.99 or maybe $19.99 two years after release.  On Steam I can pick up a less than year old game for $5 during any of the seasonal sales. 

Prices of used console games are falling as well.  In a recent Gamefly sale, you could pick up used copies of LA Noire, Alice : Madness Returns, Dragon Age 2, Portal 2, Dungeon Siege III, and Killzone 3 for $15 or less.  As long as you don't buy games right at release, there are tons of bargains to be had on both PC and console games, although PC games still have the edge in discounts.