Microsoft's plans for the future of PC gaming...facepalm will ensue

How I interpret this is to tie in an XBOX Live like service to Windows. Granted, Games for Windows was a flop. I personally don't see an issue if we let Microsoft fully explain their intentions. However, I am of course concerned about it being too casual.

Also, guys, do remember that these companies of course throw their weight in a closed-environment system, think about how much they can charge when they are able to corner the market. Microsoft primary marketing scheme since their inception is ruthlessly corner the market and establish a monopolistic foothold. It's been like that before and will continue, it's Microsoft we're talking about.

Microsoft no longer sees a huge value in the PC gaming scene because they can't tie you down so that you're forced to spend cash through their system, they can't milk their PC gamers like they can with console gamers. This is true with Sony as well.

Steam creating SteamOS, I can see that happen, but not until they port their games to Linux and then write some sort of interface so that it's unique to "SteamOS". Heck, they can even base it off FreeBSD. It'll be safer, more lightweight (this is for sure since the kernel and subsystems are more lightweight than Windows itself). I know NVIDIA has been a long time supporter of UNIX-like OSes for a long time by creating drivers for Linux and FreeBSD.

deltatux

deltatux

 

gamers are tied to their OS. that's how its always been for the most part since DX6/7. They never "milked" PC gamers in any other way through any kind of "system" whatever that's suppose to be.

the "games for windows" was a half arsed attempt at giving developers a certification program and a standard to use...like retail box size and shape, 360 gamepad support, easy install option, support for windows game explorer along with online services (via GFL which standards include,gamer tags,scores, status...etc) x64 compatability, widescreen resolutions, parental controls, supporting launch from Windows media center and the idea of "tray n play"....many of that later became a standard that developers stuck to regardless of GFW or GFL. Before that stuff began, PC games had no standard anything, from large to small boxes, no gamepad support, no updating system...devs did whatever they want which they still do but a standard helps keep all the game experiences in a similar field.

it was a way to keep developers focused, easier for consumers so they'll buy more PC games and most of all, keep them all on Windows. They never really had a cash milking system the same way Steam has

 

A Steam OS isn't too far fetched btw. I'm sure it's been considered at least once even if jokingly at Valve.

I've expressed this idea before, but seriously.

Steam OS running ontop of Unix? That is very ****ing doable and very tasty.

IMO something along those lines is exactly what we need to fix PC gaming. A dedicated Game OS that isn't tacked with extra bull**** that can go wrong. Just core hardware driver libraries, graphics drivers, peripheral drivers, sound drivers, and that is ****ing it.

No archaic registry, no buildup of temp bull****, no event logging and tracking, no weird background stuff that isn't necessary.

Just a hardcore fast as **** Open GL operating system that is basically just a super version of steam. It'd just be a browser desktop, with menus for your libraries, including music, games, video and tools/apps.

Get the hardware guys onboard, making prebuilt systems sort of like alienware or Macs, very tightly designed, slick PC's, but with mobo and case designs that allow for easy hardware ugprades. As in, you can just slide the graphics card out the back, the hard drives out the front, ram sticks functioning like internal usb sticks you can slide out etc.

Think how the expansion pack for the N64 worked, something like that, albeit far more current and size efficient.

Of course, that's for the lazy. Every other gamer would just do as we do now, build our own, for the love.

With no background bull**** running all the time, and a very streamlined driver and hardware pipeline, gaming performance would improve hugely.

Bugs would almost cease to exist as well.

Support for older titles than the os could be a hickup, but come on, the future guys. Who keeps around an oldyellow brick machine just to play those classics like Ultima, when we have our current rigs? Only people with the space I guess.

Same goes for the future. We'd look back on our beast computers crippled by ****ty Windows in disgust.

 

There was a reason why Microsoft pursued the console market, they wanted to have a presence in the living room, they felt threatened by Sony with its dominance of the Playstation brand, apparently developers were being fished by Sony to develop on their platform and spend less time on Windows and they wanted to ensure that DirectX stays relevant by ensuring that even if PC gaming dies, they still got the console market.

The biggest reason, to milk people. Like I said earlier, if you can entice people to be locked to you (basically be their bitch), then you can completely milk them. Look at how Microsoft is doing with the amount of microtransactions, XBOX Live subscriptions, movie rentals, movie purchases, full game purchases and a lot more in the XBOX Live Marketplace.

That's where the money's at, and with the XBOX 360, you cannot rely on another service to offer any of this. Hence, this is a closed system.

The only reason why Microsoft got popular was because it was already used everywhere in the business world. Once, business people saw the power of the computer, they wanted one in their home. This was especially true during the Internet boom during the mid to late 1990s. Little do most gamers know, Macintosh was more of a gaming platform than the PC when the computer industry was fledging. It was because there were more Macintoshes than IBM PC clones out there before IBM and Microsoft dominated the market and in fighting within Apple cause the dramatic shift towards the PC. Since Windows was synonymous with the IBM PC clones (and still is to this day), for the average consumer, if they want a PC, you're locked to Windows, and that's the way it was. Smaller vendors were quickly snuffed out by Microsoft by many of their various tactics in the past.

With the console market, they're doing the same to Sony by attempting to weaken the juggernaut that is Sony and dominate the market. Microsoft knows that they have a powerful branding for the general public, even more so than Sony it seems.

Personally, unless Microsoft can find a way to lock us in to a service they provide with no alternatives, Microsoft doesn't really care about PC gaming. At the end of the day they just wanna grab our wallets filled with cash and run with it. Until that happens, Microsoft will focus on consoles for the most part.

deltatux

 

GOD... NOOOOOO!!!! I hope Microsoft fired the idiot who made this presentation. This is truly garbage! After seeing this I hope Microsoft dies and Steam makes the next OS.

What if Microsoft included this crap with Windows 8?

 

ROFL, that doesnt sound like a console to you? Cuz that is what a console is.

Stick a keyboard and a mouse to a PS3 and bam! The pc of your dreams

A closed environment like a specific game OS from a specific company would make us pc gamers, paraphrasing deltatux, someones bitches.

Pc market its pretty almost one sided already. Only one mainstream api for 3d graphics, DirectX (if you're generous, OpenGL too), only one OS for games, Windows, only two proccessor companies to choose from, Intel and AMD, only two vga companies to choose from, AMD and nVidia, dont even mentioning sound card market, everything tracks back to Creative.

Closing even more the posibilities isnt going to help. They're pretty closed right now. Not even mentioning that the differences between main competitors are abysmal, Intel its far more big than AMD, so its nVidia to AMD vga division. Also DirectX over OpenGL usage too (at least in PC gaming territory, the one that we're talking bout).

We are bitches to a very few ammount of companies already (Microsoft, AMD, Intel and nVidia, all gaming related things tracks back to one of those companies, and as i said, none of those companies are present on all of the levels of choises, so its reduced to even less posibilities), its just that we are a little higher grade of bitches than console gamers, who cant even have that kind of options that pc gamers have.

 

I've said it before...

If MS really cared about PC gaming we would have Halo 3, Gears of War 2+3, Project Gotham Racing, etc etc by now.

Sadly, we're no longer getting any of those games, not even a year later due to XBOX360!

So, next time you're going to jump-in and buy the next MS os (W8 ahem) better think twice. You're unlikely to get any games from MS anymore on Windows. Only "3rd party" stuff.

Sad fact is; there is NO MS support for PC gaming besides making Windows and directx. Therefore; there is NO REASON to buy next windows.

Plus, I highly doubt we'll get dedicated gaming OS due to the huge number of possible hardware combinations. Would be awesome if it happened though.

 

I actually dont really care for those games, at least the halos and gows. Maybe i'd care for Forza for example, but i dunno. I dont play those kind of games.

But what you can say is that if MS did really cared for PC, they would have released those games and also adapted them to the methodology of PC for playing games. Wich could make them more atractive to pc gamers. As they are now, i really wouldnt want them on pc.

 

When smart people won't buy the crappy games MS wants them to buy, they don't make better games, they just sell games to stupider people :")

 

Dont like GFWL games either dont buy them or set em free with a tool, whats the problem?

 

Well, I'd still like to see them on PC. I would also like to see Fight Night, Marvel vs Capcom 3 and SF vs Tekken. Could do with some more fighting games.

 

If Valve did what Samsung did with their Bada OS, it could totally work.

Take some Unix system as a base, give infinite number of typewriters to greater or equal number of monkeys, and you might just end up with Steam OS, which in Valve's naming convention would probably be called Water, Piston or PumpOS.

 

Could work but then Valve would need to come up with something like DirectX. Do you know how long it took to get to DirectX 9? Gfx drivers, game controller drivers, sound, net drivers?

Now i'm not an expert but i guess by the time Valve has PumpsX 9 out, we'll play games in our brains via Direct Nerve Plugin [tm], no more need for PCs.

 

I don't know about you, but I'm not letting M$ nowhere near my brain.

It would probably state somewhere in the EULA, that they will upload information about your hardware (or software, if you have problems) information to M$ to enhance your experience with their product.

And if PumpOS would be subjected to so-called "Valve timeline" like their games are then yeah, you're probably right.

PS: I have to patent those, PumpOS and PumpX sound f'ing cool :nerd:

 

Yeah, we'll call it the dirty OS

 

Sorry guys, but I doubt if Steam makes it own OS. That mean companies would have to make game for windows and for Steam OS? You think Steam will convert Windows Games for their OS? Think about Multi-player? You have Win 7 and I have Steam OS.......

 

Well, Steam OS will probably never happen, but multiplayer would work regardless, I mean, Mac users can play TF2 with PC users without problem, and there are a handful of free multiplayer games that work on both Linux and Windows.

Hell, playing with Xbox players would be possible as Microsoft actually tested something like that in the past but it didn't quite work as even the most average PC players with a mouse and keyboard could dominate the best of console players (at least in FPS, I don't think they tested any other genre?).