Richard Lewis looks at whether console gaming has the edge over PC gaming.

This column is the sole opinion of the author and does not represent the opinion of Heaven Media Ltd or the opinion of any affiliates.

On April 15th the final online servers for the original Xbox consoles were shut down. The most profoundly affected remaining community were those still playing Halo 2. In terms of how much it pioneered online console gaming since 2004, Halo 2’s importance to the world of gaming cannot be downplayed, yet after six good years it was over. Like a farm dog, too old to even bark convincingly anymore, it was took out back for last slow game of fetch and then mercifully shot in the head. Yet while Halo 2’s status as the “Old Yeller” of console games might now be secured, the fans wiped away a manly tear and got to the business of paying tribute to their game in fine style. The game’s creators, Bungie, joined in to, selecting some of their favourite montages from the game in remembrance. They even changed the “Did You Know?” Box, usually used for in-game tips and tricks, into a place for jokes, amusing in game references and some friendly put-downs. One, in a genuine show of affection for the resolute community, even said "Thanks for playing. Seriously? More than five years after launch? You're awesome.”

One of the selected montages from Bungie... Watch and weep Halo 2 fans.

But all good things come to an end in console world and at least the players had something else to look forward to. Not only have their been several Halo games since Halo 2 that they are now free to discover in their own time, they also know that there will be plenty more where that came from. Bungie’s Halo: Reach, if forecasts are correct, will be the largest online beta ever with 3million players expected to be online during day one. There is a future for them if they want it and, perhaps more importantly, the past is no longer there to wallow in.

The world of PC gaming could really take a leaf out of the console book in this regards. Think on it… If the PC games developers were as regimented as their console counterparts, where would be in terms of e-sports titles? Imagine how very different the Counter-Strike landscape, for one, would look if it had been the case that after a good run all 1.6 servers were shut down, the ability to hose them removed so the game could only be played against or via LAN. We’d still be talking about it for certain, but how many people exactly would be playing it? The likelihood is it would have given more players that incentive to move to CS:S and with more numbers and the fact that it is now the flagship – read “supported” – game, there would be more pressure on the developers to do things such as update it. Or you know, just fix it so it works like it’s supposed to.

Alas with PC gaming such brutal culling is near impossible. It allows those who refuse to move with the times some sort of refuge from what is out there and it continually divides the attention and resources of those that really need to unify to help progress the idea of mainstream competitive gaming. The hands of the leagues are tied, because they are a hostage to numbers and have to operate purely in self interest. As long as enough people want to play a game, to whatever standard, then they will cater to it and who can blame them? Even though they themselves could shape the future of competitive gaming at least, it would pose some significant difficulties in the short term and perhaps see them no longer around to see exactly what kind of future they had shaped.


Would Counter-Strike 1.6 still be the premier e-sports title if PC gaming was more like consoles?

This is not the only advantage that console gaming has over that of its supposedly more grown up counter-part. With the potential customisation of the home computer it creates an imbalanced playing environment and not just in terms of those who can afford more will be able to perform better in games reliant on frames-per-second. With a host of glitches and bugs that always crop up even long after many patches to resolve technical issues, there will always be some set-ups that confer more advantages than others. Yet the console is what it is… A self contained box of tricks that no-one tampers with, unless of course we include those who are happy to dabble in a bit of illegal activity such as copyright theft. Everyone’s game looks the same, handles the same and in-game reactions are consistent across the board. This might not make console gamers scream “bullshit” at the screen any less, but it does make the context within which they do it wholly different to the likes of you or I.

The games themselves are often presented in a way that prevents any form of customisation that may alter the way the game behaves. Any competitive PC gamer becomes a mini-coder, with a raft of commands at their disposal that can be used to exploit the game mechanics to their advantage, in exactly the same way that someone with a pair of contact lenses will turn their bathroom into something resembling a mad scientist’s laboratory. It just comes with the territory. In fact, knowing such commands is usually what separates those at the top from those nipping at their heels. As such, you will see the number of complaints from competitive PC gamers when a title, such as Modern Warfare 2, does away with things such as a developer console.

Richard Lewis looks at whether console gaming has the edge over PC gaming.

This column is the sole opinion of the author and does not represent the opinion of Heaven Media Ltd or the opinion of any affiliates.

There is an argument to suggest that such commands are there to cater to the huge amounts of variables that personal computers can throw into a users face, things to tweak performance or to eradicate certain in-game issues. Yet, is it also so bold to suggest that if your machine can’t handle the game “as is” then perhaps it isn’t a title you should really be playing in the first place? Not that anyone in the games industry would come out and say it of course because to do so would likely shave a few million sales off the final total. Let’s instead keep the “minimum requirements” as low as possible, even if it results in a thoroughly unpleasant gaming experice. Whatever shifts units.


With PC Gaming those who refuse to move with the times can keep games on life support for years

PC games developers don’t even seem to really think about their titles in the same way anymore. Gone is looking at the ways in which a PC title can be advantageous over their console cousins, but instead they want their games to be more console like on the whole. Many cross platform releases are developed for console and then ported across, which begs the question “why?” – what’s wrong with embracing the differences instead of going with a bizarre exercise in uniformity? Well, to answer that, it seems that it is either too difficult to do so, or to do so would actually be counter-productive to the gaming experience.

Of course there are many good points that PC gaming brings to the table, especially in terms of e-sports. For example, a new PC game that placed some sort of demand on a PC, perhaps to the point where an upgrade was necessary… Well, isn’t that the sort of game all the big hardware developers want to get behind? How weird is it to see a sponsor such as Intel, a company that pride themselves on being at the cutting edge of technology, sponsoring ten year old games that quite frankly doesn’t even challenge the most dated of rigs. Isn’t this all a missed opportunity? Yet, if harnessed correctly this is the kind of thing that could put competitive gaming titles on the PC far ahead of the curve. You get the feeling that the people sponsoring the games are just as collectively disappointed as we are deep down inside. The lack of something new that is as appealing in e-sports terms, yet breathtaking on the eye, is almost remarkable in itself given how many years people have had to think about it.

There are also certain titles that have never flourished on consoles, limited by their functionality. Along with MMORPG PvP, Real-Time Strategy titles is a genre that hasn’t hit the heights it has on PC. The requirement for a keyboard and a mouse for optimum performance and gaming experience has been the factor behind this, but that isn’t to say it could change. Indeed, many of the people behind the consoles themselves have always been of the mindset that including such hardware in a console set-up is against the point of a console almost entirely. Clearly that is changing though and more and more the intuitive technology that will radically alter the way we play games in the future is being developed for consoles. Who needs a mouse and keyboard if you could move units around with your hand and scroll around a map with a flick of your eyes? If it sounds far-fetched, then you’ve not been keeping up with what has been going on lately.


The Sony Move - some of the technology changing gaming and possibly console e-sports in the future

If you think that people aren’t receptive to the idea of console-esque games, you’d only have to look at the roaring success of Modern Warfare 2 to be proved wrong. Even with the proposed PC boycott the game went on to break every sales record going and that wasn’t just down to console sales. Quite simply, they’d tapped into something that we probably knew all along but just hadn’t really wanted to admit; consoles can do the who online gaming experience a lot better than PCs when they really put their mind to it. Hell, even Starcraft 2 is going to be more console like in its nature… No LAN support meaning all match ups have to go through their match-making system and be played through online servers sounds familiar doesn’t it. It’s a growing trend.

And just in case this hasn’t been baiting angry responses enough, published as it is on a competitive PC gaming website, let’s go one further and say let’s thank our lucky stars for Valve. They may have left some of you behind, but where they are channelling their energy now is into making exciting online PC games with a broad appeal and a constant flow of updates that make them always worth revisiting. Again, DLC isn’t something new, but the importance of having it regularly and it having a significant impact on a game’s dynamic – rather than just a few skins, or a new map – is something they have pioneered. The bigger names in the business seem to be paying attention. Electronic Arts are certainly having a field day with Battlefield: Bad Company 2 right now. However, if you want to see the benchmarks of what online PC gaming can be like you look no further than the Left 4 Dead series and Team Fortress 2. Again, if the titles that we cling to so desperately would welcome just a fraction of their invention and charm, I think that there’d be a lot more attention paid to them and more people playing them. That can only lead to big things for e-sports as a whole, regardless of what you think of the titles selected.

Already many people are starting to mutter that the future of e-sports and competitive gaming lies with consoles, especially as they become increasingly sophisticated. For now at least many of the premier titles remain on PC and there’s no reason for that to change if people start to adjust their way of thinking. Certainly though, resistance seems to be not only counter-productive, it also seems to be futile. Maybe the people forcing these changes upon us do know best after all.

Do you agree or disagree? Voice your opinions below.