Consoles have been PCs for a while now, just locked down, so I'm not sure what this will really mean. Will they try to lock down PCs even further, with more devious rootkits now that Windows 10 is dead and TPM2.0 is mandatory? Or will they embrace Linux and follow Valve's lead by giving players the freedom to actually play the games they paid for? I'm not sure this guy has the answers, but I guess we'll see.

Did the master race disappear when I wasn't looking?

What data backs up this notion? PC's in the home are becoming even more rare, not more likely, especially not ones that can run AAA games. I definitely don't see it here. The only thing I can ascertain is if he's using "PC" as a way to reference valve's ecosystem without explicitly saying Valve. Is that possibly what he means?

Perhaps this is because consoles are luxuries, and with the economy not looking so good, people are not really willing to spend the big bucks, and rather use what they have until things get better.

It will be interesting to see how MS's next gen console, which doubles as a PC will do. Done right, it may be a money maker.

You'll have to pry my controller from my cold dead hands.

There's no way some people will be using PCs to game. There are people who just want something convenient. They want to be guaranteed that these accessories and these games will work on this console because you see the branding and compatibility there. They want to know they can go to one company to get support, and not random companies for this part or that driver or some piece of software and trawl forums looking for the right direction on who to contact. They don't want choice paralysis when choosing wha

This is a detail many PC fanbois tend to overlook. And it's the reason consoles are so successful.

Point in case: I ditched hardcore PC gaming 25 years ago because it was becoming ridiculous with the constant hardware upgrades, fiddling with drivers and the mess that is M$ W1ndows. And I at one time had the most performant gaming PC available that costed roughly 5000$. I'm a computer expert but when even AMD went from one socket type to something like 5 different (Intel was already at roughly 10 different socket types back then) I got tired of keeping track, said f*ck it and left PC gaming alltogether. I just stopped the hardware upgrades, installed Linux for programming and the occasional Linux-native Unreal Tournament and Tribes 2 session and left it at that. This was in the late 90ies. I don't have the kind of space, time and attention anymore that PC gaming needs.

Roughly 15 years later I had some cash left and was curious about the new games such as the Deus Ex reboot and some discounted FarCry title and got an XBox 360, the last iteration just at the end of that generation that could run on a regular monitor without hassle. With all kinks fixed and a large cheap library of budget-priced games as GOTY premium editions and an affordable box that I knew would run those games with zero config fuss I was all set.

I've been with XBox ever since, always lagging 1-2 generations for price and stability reasons. I'm still using a Xbox One X as my main gaming rigg and it's totally fine. Yeah, I do miss mouse and keyboard occasionally, but I also enjoy being prolific with the controller by now and just leaning back on the sofa doing Open World Looter-Shooters, (A)RPGs or the occasional Spaceflight game. Every once in a while I ponder getting back into PC gaming but when I l then look at the prices, the science involded and remember the hassle of dealing with shitty operating systems, drivers, flaky software, etc. I quickly drop that notion again.

I might look into that new Steam Box thing, but I still have 82 games for XBox One alone, not counting my 360 titles. Most of these games I haven't played yet, so I'm not too much in a hurry. I also love the fact that the XBox is backwards compatible, which is a huge plus, Kudos to M$ for doing this. M$ W1ndows sucks, but with XBox they're still the global underdog and behave accordingly. And have me, a prime-time Linux user for 25+ years, as a paying customer, believe it or not.

While also getting that sweet sweet 30% like Valve does.

I kind of see gaming rapidly becoming unaffordable though. Back in the day it was affordable in America because you would see steep steep discounts on last generation hardware but I'm not really seeing that the same way anymore. I guess games do still get discounted so there is that but when you're looking at having to drop anywhere from $700 to $1,000 for a game console that you're expected to buy again every 5 years that gets tough.

The develo

But now that I work in front of a PC most of my day, every day, I'd rather sit comfortably on a sofa and feel like I'm not at work. I need an escape.

Consoles used to be significantly cheaper than PCs but prices have crept up whilst PCs stay relatively static. Eg consoles were probably a quarter of the price of a gaming laptop and now they're maybe half. And console games are all online now - gone are the days of squeezing multiple people onto the same screen, sharing the same sofa!

I'm hoping this statement means the next GTA will be available for PC at the same time as the console game release. Previous PC releases always trailed a year or two behind the console release because both Microsoft and Sony would pay Rockstar to make them the first exclusive platforms for the game.