You get what you pay for.

[Abel]

Profit margins are better per unit on console games than on PC games, according to Warren Spector on the decision to develop Deus Ex 2 and Thief 3 for the X-Box as well as the PC.

You only seem to talk about the X-Box though, whose sales revenues are not much bigger then the PC even with all the money M$ is throwing at it.

[sinij]

Which means fuckall to the DEVELOPER, who is making money on the deal and thus can make more good new games. Whereas there is no such guarantee on the PC, thus you see many traditionally PC dev companies making X-Box games, either exclusively or in conjunction with a PC version. Jade Empire is a good example.

What this means is that when MS decides it is time to make money on X-box sales it will ether cost quite a bit more or will be a lot more dated when compared to PCs. This in turn will ether affect popularity of the console due to affordability or popularity of it due to quality of titles. I think MS will milk consumers with 'hidden fees' and hardware-booster packs in order to make money, making only upfront cost smaller and ongoing price a lot more than PC.

Hardware-wise PCs are best bang for the buck, especially if you know how to put your own together, are not after having freshly released shiny and purchase with some component reusing in mind.

[HaemishM]

Profit margins are better per unit on console games than on PC games, according to Warren Spector on the decision to develop Deus Ex 2 and Thief 3 for the X-Box as well as the PC.

You only seem to talk about the X-Box though, whose sales revenues are not much bigger then the PC even with all the money M$ is throwing at it.

That's the box that is easiest for a PC game developer to transition to, since it's nothing but a PC in a box anyway. Once you have them producing for the X-Box, all that phat console cash should convince them to do more console stuff.

As for MS deciding to make money on the X-Box sales, that's a misguided approach. They just want the X-Box (and the 360) out there. The money isn't just going to be in selling the games for the system. The money will be in all that X-Box Live stuff. Think about it. They are touting the X-Box Live Marketplace as one of the main features of the 360, which means they are going to be selling a lot of addons on Live, and making cash off of each transaction. It's not even a large leap of logic to see them start to sell digital rights managed content like movies, TV shows and music over Live. Of the 3 consoles, they already have the best online service available, and nothing about the other two upcoming competiting systems has looked to be even comparable, other than the Revolution's mythical and unexplained old library downloads.

Sure, a PC has the "best bang for the buck," or to be said better, you can do more things with the PC than a console. But that only matters if you WANT to do more things, or want to take the effort to learn how to do more things. Most people do not care.

[Hoax]

Why do "most people" suck so much?

For example, I watched live the reaction from the guys over at NASA after the blew a big chunk out of a comet late on the 3rd/4th.  Its so crazy to see scientist types be barely able to articulate their thoughts due to the excitement of events like this.  Meanwhile 99% of America is much more interested in what Tom/Katie are up to or what party Paris Hilton was at and what color her thong was...

Fuck most people.

[Shockeye]

I'd rather know what Tom is doing than something hitting a comet.

[Merusk]

"most people" suck so much, by those definitions, because it's something they can relate to.  Even though they can't be a part of Tom & Katie's exploits, or fuck Paris while she's going down on their sig. other, they can at least put themselves or someone else they know in that situation and imagine their own reactions.  Plowing a multi-million dollar paper airplane into a giant snowball? Who can relate to that?  Not the masses of people whose everyday lives revolve around,what? Oh right, other people.  It's the same reason reality shows, talk show tripe and Crime/ Justice dramas have done so well for as long as they've exsisted.  It doesn't matter how great an achievement something is if you can't relate to it.

[Arnold]

Shit, I'd throw it all away for good sprite-based SNES gaming. I dislike photorealism and polygons. Half-Life 2 can suck me; Super Punch-Out was more fun and didn't cost me $300 to play (thanks, Nvidia!).

 I don't dislike polygons and photorealism, but I will take a sprite-based, SNES (fuck, even NES) style game with awesome play over some realistic looking, piece of crap where 99% of the budget was spent on teh shiney and marketing, instead of FUN.

[Pococurante]

Its so crazy to see scientist types be barely able to articulate their thoughts due to the excitement of events like this.

I thought it was pretty cool too in a Ballistics Math Chart sort of way but I was bemused the NASA guys were carrying on like they'd blown up a mailbox with an m80.  Funsies but not high science.  I get the science angle, just commenting on the people.

[Hoax]

http://www.gamespy.com/articles/632/632178p1.html

Ok it made me laugh, I know Gamespy sucks and all but anything to increase awareness of the whole outer space thing is a good deed in my book.   

[Shockeye]

Funny.

"The pwnage of comet Tempel 1 represents an enormous and important milestone in our efforts to understand -- and ultimately to completely cream -- the known universe," JPL Director Charles "sl@md@ddy" Elachi explained in a press conference immediately after the impact. "Lollerz!!!!!" he added.