Consoles have outpaced PC, says Epic man
Many computers too expensive, fancy.
Epic co-founder and technology brain Tim Sweeney has said consoles have outpaced PCs when it comes to gaming.
The problem is the range of desktop machines on the market, he believes, which leads to an immense performance difference between top and bottom-end systems. Sweeney reckons catering for all of these is no longer possible.
"There are many overpriced computers out there. It's like sports cars. They are everywhere, everybody writes about them, but there are only a few who can afford them," Sweeney told TG Daily. "It is very important not to leave the masses behind.
"This is unfortunate, because PCs are more popular than ever. Everyone has a PC. Even those who did not have a PC in the past are now able to afford one and they use it for Facebook, MySpace, pirating music or whatever.
"Yesterday's PCs were for people that were working and later playing games, even if those games were lower-end ones. There will always be a market for casual games and online games like World of Warcraft. But at the end of the day, consoles have definitely left PC games behind," he added.
Sweeney picked out Maple Story as an example of a game designed for low-end systems, citing it as a "USD 100 million a year business".
His comments also echo recent moves by id Software to develop Quake Live and EA to create Battlefield Heroes, both of which will be offered on the Internet, be supported by adverts, and be playable on the vast majority of PCs.
For reference, Sweeney himself works on a a dual quad-core CPU machine that has 16 GB of memory. He probably has a sports car, too.
Seems like there are some conflicting views about PC gaming at Epic these days. Cliff Bleszinski recently declared it's in "disarray" and said Epic will focus on consoles. Just days later, vice president Mark Rein announced Epic's membership of the newly formed PC Gaming Alliance and reaffirmed the studio's commitment to the platform.