Current Events > How/Why is PC gaming so popular?

(+) Yeah! (+)

So many games out on PC, but not everyone with a PC strong enough to handle such high-demand games (that are getting better each year).

It seems unlikely that there are as many people with high-end gaming PCs as there are people with a PS5 or Xbox. Especially in poorer East Asian countries, India etc.

You dont need that strong of a PC to play games and PC gaming has always been cheaper in the long run than consoles so people play on PC to save money and have a better experience

You don't need a high end gaming PC to game on PC. A lot of the most played games aren't the big new releases either, it's stuff like CS:GO and DOTA. That's to say nothing of the decades of games that just run natively.

Because you don't need to play on Ultra Settings.

It's about as popular as one would expect, no more no less. Also I thought this topic was more about the physical mechanics of pc gaming being bizarrely popular, i.e. having your arm outstretched for an extended period of time holding a mouse and keyboard. My wrist hurts from just half an hour working at a pc. I can't fathom how people find this enjoyable to do in their precious spare time. It's ridiculously uncomfortable yet this is somehow deemed intuitive for gaming rather than just a controller that you have resting on your lap when playing. Shrugs oh well.

A mid-to-low-end gaming PC is still significantly more powerful than Nintendo's current hardware at any given time, meaning it's enough to play most games on low settings. And a high-end one will be more powerful than Playstation or Xbox and let you max out any game during that generation. And continue to play games on medium settings for at least half of the following generation.

I do a lot of work on my pc, if I'm spending to buy a pc it might as well be my entertainment system too.

People always forget that you can do more than gaming on it when talking about the platform's cost.

Sure, not everyone needs to work using their home computer or needs a computer at all but it's my reasoning for not bothering with consoles.

You only need high end stuff to run relatively few games from the past few years at max settings. Most games can fit quite comfortably in the lower range.

saspa posted...

It's about as popular as one would expect, no more no less. Also I thought this topic was more about the physical mechanics of pc gaming being bizarrely popular, i.e. having your arm outstretched for an extended period of time holding a mouse and keyboard. My wrist hurts from just half an hour working at a pc. I can't fathom how people find this enjoyable to do in their precious spare time. It's ridiculously uncomfortable yet this is somehow deemed intuitive for gaming rather than just a controller that you have resting on your lap when playing. Shrugs oh well.

You might have particular damage. I do, too, but I have a long and wide desk specifically so I can keep my arms outstretched, which prevents any issues for me.

I've probably had my current gaming PC for 8 or 9 years now. Investing in a good CPU will last you a really long time these days. I've upgraded the GPU twice which is a bit expensive but not as much as buying a whole new computer. I've also put in a new hard drive which is not that expensive anymore.

Roblox, minecraft, rocket league, fortnite, csgo, gmod, terraria, dota, LoL, etc..

Lots of pc players only play a few lower req games for years on end and never touch the latest aaa titles

saspa posted...

My wrist hurts from just half an hour working at a pc.

I used to do a lot of office jobs and now my wrist hurts almost immediately from using a mouse. I wear a wrist brace and it's completely comfortable. I prefer playing games with a controller when I can, but strategy games like Total War games or XCOM really need mouse and keyboard usage.

sfcalimari posted...

I used to do a lot of office jobs and now my wrist hurts almost immediately from using a mouse. I wear a wrist brace and it's completely comfortable. I prefer playing games with a controller when I can, but strategy games like Total War games or XCOM really need mouse and keyboard usage.

I really need to get a wrist brace, a pc gamer friend wears one and swears by it, just need to see where to get one.

saspa posted...

It's about as popular as one would expect, no more no less. Also I thought this topic was more about the physical mechanics of pc gaming being bizarrely popular, i.e. having your arm outstretched for an extended period of time holding a mouse and keyboard. My wrist hurts from just half an hour working at a pc. I can't fathom how people find this enjoyable to do in their precious spare time. It's ridiculously uncomfortable yet this is somehow deemed intuitive for gaming rather than just a controller that you have resting on your lap when playing. Shrugs oh well.

I don't mean this as an attack, but that really sounds like a you problem. You shouldn't be experiencing pain from just half an hour of PC use, that's not normal. If you say you're having to have your arms outstretched, that sounds like you're either too far away from your KB/M or they're not at the right height. I'm not trying to convert you to PC gaming, but if you need to use a computer as part of your work then you should sort your setup before you harm yourself.

As a side note, you can use controllers on PC too. I use my PS5 controller for a lot of third person action games or anything where I'm controlling a vehicle. KB/M is more for shooters, RPGs and strategy games.

Guide posted...

You might have particular damage. I do, too, but I have a long and wide desk specifically so I can keep my arms outstretched, which prevents any issues for me.

I must have, last checkup I had from pain it was inflammation on the wrist and tendonitis or tenosynovitis or whatever was written on the medical report.

Ratchetrockon posted...

Roblox, minecraft, rocket league, fortnite, csgo, gmod, terraria, dota, LoL, etc..

Lots of pc players only play a few lower req games for years on end and never touch the latest aaa titles

Yet many AAA games also release on PC, implying that there's a market. I doubt that your average gamer who can't afford a 1500-5000 euro gaming laptop would have the specs to comfortably play Mortal Kombat 1 without any lag or fear that it might fry their computer.

PC games have scalable graphics settings to allow lower-end machines to run them as long as they're within a reasonable range. Also unless a game is REALLY poorly made, it's not going to fry anyone's computer. Modern PCs automatically throttle the CPU/GPU to avoid overheating if a program is too demanding for it to handle.

Kurumiee posted...

I doubt that your average gamer who can't afford a 1500-5000 euro gaming laptop would have the specs to comfortably play Mortal Kombat 1 without any lag or fear that it might fry their computer.

your doubts are misplaced

Rika_Furude posted...

You dont need that strong of a PC to play games and PC gaming has always been cheaper in the long run than consoles so people play on PC to save money and have a better experience

This. I play on a low-end gaming rig I got 8 years ago (only upgraded memory and added SSD) and it still plays just about any new game. No console is going to give you that kind of longevity.

Kurumiee posted...

I doubt that your average gamer who can't afford a 1500-5000 euro gaming laptop would have the specs to comfortably play Mortal Kombat 1 without any lag or fear that it might fry their computer.

Why would it take a 1500 euro pc to run something that can run on a 400 euro console

A PC can play almost any video game ever made, be it natively or through an emulator.
Cannot forget game mods either, which range from absolutely vital bug fixes for games that run like crap, to new levels and maps, weapons, vehicles, quests, QoL improvements etc. to total conversions that changes a game's genre from, say, an FPS to an an arcade racer.

Not many PC gamers are using high end stuff(you can check Steam surveys for what's most common), and there's a subset of PC gamers who are running games about as badly as consoles do since they favor graphics over gameplay/FPS. Oh and playing on a lower resolution makes things easier on your compute. 1080p still seems to be the most popular resolution for gamers(on Steam at least).

1) Infinitely huge library of games, all the way from the early days.
2) Free online outside of individual subscription-based titles.
3) Way more genres.
4) More customization to game performance.
5) More customization to games period if they support modding.

saspa posted...

I can't fathom how people find this enjoyable to do in their precious spare time.

Not everyone experiences what you're experiencing.

emulation, mods, free games, variety of digital stores (Steam, Epic Games Store, GOG, etc), various customization options...

with all these factors in consideration, its not hard to see why PC gaming is so popular. lol

Backwards compatibility, honestly. You can play damn near anything you want regardless of how old it is.

Also you can get PS5 pro performance(a little better due to the pros awful CPU) about at-cost, probably slightly more, and you get something that can not only play games but also make them and help you with basically any work related tasks you need.

reincarnator07 posted...

I don't mean this as an attack, but that really sounds like a you problem. You shouldn't be experiencing pain from just half an hour of PC use, that's not normal. If you say you're having to have your arms outstretched, that sounds like you're either too far away from your KB/M or they're not at the right height. I'm not trying to convert you to PC gaming, but if you need to use a computer as part of your work then you should sort your setup before you harm yourself.

As a side note, you can use controllers on PC too. I use my PS5 controller for a lot of third person action games or anything where I'm controlling a vehicle. KB/M is more for shooters, RPGs and strategy games.

They're probable not. My work office desk is low enough so that I'm level with the mouse and keyboard, but my home desk is pretty... tall and no chair is high enough to make it so that my hand is level with the desk for mouse and keyboard.

But it's a combination of factors, like not having the right chair, having to look at a monitor, and the aforementioned mouse/keyboard setup. I now finally have found the ideal chair for me, a big comfy leather chair, as well as the herman miller chair (which I'm not a fan of but the marketing calls it the best chair in the world) so at least on the sitting front I'm finally good.

And like sure I could connect the pc to a TV, so that I can sit on my comfy lazyboy, and use a controller connected through maybe bluetooth... but I may as well just use a console at this point. Since with a console I use it just for gaming and/or watching stuff. While a pc I use for business related matters and watching stuff, but not gaming where I'm required to use my hands and sit upright (so definitely can't be sitting on the couch for that). For work I have to be alert and sitting upright when typing with my keyboard in front of me, while for relaxing like most normal people I view relaxing as laying back, have my head resting and casually watching or playing something with a controller that's not huge and cumbersome like a keyboard/mouse.

You can spend $800-1000 on a pc that will still play modern games for the next 8 years. Then after that its only like $400 to upgrade to a mid tier gpu that is going to last you two console gens. Its really not that expensive.

Not needing to pay for online play

Mods are a big reason as well.

PC gaming is popular because it's easier to pirate games on the platform.

Like others have said the most popular PC games that is played you don't need anything super fancy for that.

As for myself I'm still rocking a desktop PC I bought back in february 2016. Swapped in a radeon RX 6600 XT GPU at some point but this alongside my older i7 6700K CPU is still good enough to play every single indie and lower requirement game that I actually care about.

Majority of my gaming is still done on consoles and so with the most recent games like upcoming monster hunter wilds I'm doing it there. If all you care about is playing those steam-only (or PC only games in general. Sometimes they can be of the jiggly adult variety.......>.>.....<.<........yep) releases that can't be got anywhere else or just emulators for retro gaming you can use some PCs even older than mine for that.

If you're experiencing pain from using your computer you need to adjust your set up ASAP. I spent my entire life until earlier this year wondering how people were hurting from extended computer usage, then I had to move all my stuff because work was being done and I decided to just do everything on the floor.

Took maybe a few days for the pain to become apparent, I endured it for a while then set up a new desk and found a comfortable chair and now it's painless like usual. I highly recommend having your keyboard and monitor high enough you have to look/reach up a bit to see them, the real killer for me was constantly looking and reaching down.

Complete and total freedom. Playing on a console, to me, seems fine but I just have a feeling of being trapped in no a cage while doing so. It is just so restrictive.

I switched to PC after PS3, and it was simply because I was tired of having to find more space/ports for consoles. I have 10 hooked up right now, and I finally decided enough was enough.

saspa posted...

It's about as popular as one would expect, no more no less. Also I thought this topic was more about the physical mechanics of pc gaming being bizarrely popular, i.e. having your arm outstretched for an extended period of time holding a mouse and keyboard. My wrist hurts from just half an hour working at a pc. I can't fathom how people find this enjoyable to do in their precious spare time. It's ridiculously uncomfortable yet this is somehow deemed intuitive for gaming rather than just a controller that you have resting on your lap when playing. Shrugs oh well.

So for one, I mostly use a controller on PC anyway, unless it's a first-person perspective. For another, a char with armrests helps a lot with this.

Kurumiee posted...

So many games out on PC, but not everyone with a PC strong enough to handle such high-demand games (that are getting better each year).

It seems unlikely that there are as many people with high-end gaming PCs as there are people with a PS5 or Xbox. Especially in poorer East Asian countries, India etc.

I dunno, I built a mid-tier PC in 2020 and most games are fine on whatever the default settings are. I'll deactivate a few things or change the resolution to 1080 if it's stuttery.

Hell, I deactivate that depth of field garbage anyway. I cannot fathom why anyone ever thought that was a good idea or why anyone likes it.

ReturnOfDevsman posted...

I dunno, I built a mid-tier PC in 2020 and most games are fine on whatever the default settings are. I'll deactivate a few things or change the resolution to 1080 if it's stuttery.

Hell, I deactivate that depth of field garbage anyway. I cannot fathom why anyone ever thought that was a good idea or why anyone likes it.

Built a new PC strictly for MH Wilds, but my Nearly 8 year old RX580 PC was still playing damn near everything perfectly on 1080p, and some things pretty well on 1440p.

people who have never gamed on PC tend to vastly overestimate how expensive and complicated it is.

Its an open platform that doesnt nickel and dime you, its cheaper in the long run as games are much cheaper and free games are given out all the time in various ways, you can use any controller ever, you can emulate any console ever, there are no concerns about generations or backwards compatibility, its by far the most moddable platform, and if you invest in high-end hardware it will run circles around any console to boot. Plus, you can actually do work with it.

A newer development is that any Xbox exclusive is on PC day 1, GamePass is on PC, so theres no reason to own an Xbox other than backwards compatibility with a handful of older exclusives (which you could just emulate on PC).

Sony is now porting their exclusives to PC, usually after 6 months to 2 years, giving less of a reason to own a PlayStation.

Why wouldnt it be popular?

PC gaming seems to have the momentum of a runaway freight train!

I use my pc for work, to stream, and to play games. There's soo much utility I can use it for that it ends up being well worth the cost...especially when many of the parts I bought was for the fraction of the cost because I'm patient enough to wait for black friday deals for them.

Console gaming really only have 3 things going for it, exclusives (which is really only a Nintendo thing at this point), the price (because every company loses money making a console, but makes all of it back in games sales), and it being "user friendly" of just popping in a game and immediately playing it without having to worry about configurations.

However, with the way PC gaming has evolved over the years, exclusive and being user friendly are slowly going away as "pros" for console gaming.

saspa posted...

They're probable not. My work office desk is low enough so that I'm level with the mouse and keyboard, but my home desk is pretty... tall and no chair is high enough to make it so that my hand is level with the desk for mouse and keyboard.

But it's a combination of factors, like not having the right chair, having to look at a monitor, and the aforementioned mouse/keyboard setup. I now finally have found the ideal chair for me, a big comfy leather chair, as well as the herman miller chair (which I'm not a fan of but the marketing calls it the best chair in the world) so at least on the sitting front I'm finally good.

And like sure I could connect the pc to a TV, so that I can sit on my comfy lazyboy, and use a controller connected through maybe bluetooth... but I may as well just use a console at this point. Since with a console I use it just for gaming and/or watching stuff. While a pc I use for business related matters and watching stuff, but not gaming where I'm required to use my hands and sit upright (so definitely can't be sitting on the couch for that). For work I have to be alert and sitting upright when typing with my keyboard in front of me, while for relaxing like most normal people I view relaxing as laying back, have my head resting and casually watching or playing something with a controller that's not huge and cumbersome like a keyboard/mouse.

Even just for professional use I'd see if your setup can be made more ergonomic. My manager and another one of my friends have had some real long term issues stemming from their setups being inadequate. They're not permanent, but they take time to heal, sometimes also requiring physio.

For me, the 2 biggest improvements were from a chair actually made for someone of my height and having a comfy wrist rest for my keyboard. Absolutely worth their weight in gold, as I'm sure you'll agree with your chair!

I enjoy using mods for some games and you can't really do that on console.

It's just an overall better experience in just about every way. Every seeming "advantage" that consoles used to have has gone away given how consoles now are just proprietary, weak pcs anyways. Plug and play? Not without 50gb worth of day one updates you're not at 2mb per second speeds at best. Playing with a controller on the couch? Good job, except pc can do that just as well with the added benefit of playing with whatever controller you please. Physical media? Pretty much gone on both sides. Exclusives? Likely coming to pc at some point.

Honestly, do consoles do anything decently nowadays that make it worth it?

Yup, you have access to an absolutely huge library and most games really don't need all that great of a computer to play. The constant sales also really help, and it's easier than ever to buy a computer or build your own.

Xatrion posted...

Exclusives? Likely coming to pc at some point.

You let me know when we get that PC release of Kirby and the Forgotten Land.

ReturnOfDevsman posted...

You let me know when we get that PC release of Kirby and the Forgotten Land.

Native or not, PC can run it better than the Switch can lol.

PraetorXyn posted...

Native or not, PC can run it better than the Switch can lol.

That doesn't count as a release.

ReturnOfDevsman posted...

That doesn't count as a release.

No, but Nintendo is basically the holdout at this point. Xbox exclusives are on PC day 1, Sony is porting PS exclusives going forward after 6 to 24 months. There are very few PS5 exclusives that arent either on PC or slated for a PC release (Spider-Man 2 is coming in January, for instance).

Even then, Switch is 720p <=30 FPS, PC is 1440p 60+ FPS, though you need a FPS unlocker mod, and on the first run it will chug a bit until shaders are compiled.

I have an old GTX 1070 backup PC that can still play all the newest games. It's an HP Omen prebuilt you can get off ebay now for like $150.