It is known that I'm first and foremost an Xbox player; I've had a blast playing on the Wii, Ps3 and PC, but I love the 360 a lot. I think that it is a damn great console, despite not being as powerful as the Ps3, or not having stellar iconic franchises like Wii had outside Halo and Forza (PGR, where are you??). Even if I don't agree with the company behind it and its latest decisions regarding hardware and software (especially those concerning 360's last years lifespawn), I still think that this is one hell of a machine.

I can't, though, overlook some of its flaws (there's always room for improvement, right?). But I'm not here to discuss if Xbox Live should have been free, if MS should have stepped up their first-party content or why they didn't copy some of their competition's bussiness model, like PS+ for example. No, I'm here to ask a simple question: did PC damage the 360's value?

Like most of you know, 360's had its share of timed-exclusive games, in order to compete with their primary antagonist: Sony. They tried taking advantage by offering some juicy titles before anyone, like Star Ocean, Eternal Sonata, Ninja Gaiden and, to some extent, games like Mass Effect (This is more to blame for not securing the IP and letting EA make it multiplatform). Those entries, obviously, don't count to 360's value because you can find them on the competition's console of choice. (The only game that made it exclusive was Vesperia, unless you know Japanese and can import a copy from Japan).

But yet, there's another devilish enemy that suddenly clawed onto the 360's library of games: PC. Now, I like gaming on PC as well (Who doesn't?), but I've always wondered if PC actually damaged overall 360's value, or not. Some 360's exclusives, eventually reached PC (and I don't consider that an exclusive, but that's my definition, of course), like Alan Wake, Condemned, Fable 3, or the awesome XBLA offering, like Dust: an Elysian Tail, Battleblock Theater or State of Decay. While it is true that someone who doesn't game on PC is still missing those, essencially the value of the 360 decreased a lot. To put it bluntly: it is far more easy to pirate a PC and download those games than to pirate the 360. And if you don't like my "pirating" explanation because you don't condone such act, let me remind you that PC gaming is, in most cases, cheaper than console's.

So, what do you think? Did PC damage the 360's value, or by the time those games hit PC it didn't matter anymore?

Definitely damaged it. PC is the only way a Playstation fanboy can enjoy MS games without feeling dirty.
I enjoyed most of Xbox console exclusive games on PC which is the reason why I never saw any value in an Xbox 360.

Of course it was just one of the smaller factors but it still counts.

Agree.

Awesome OP. Xbox 360 had lots of cool exclusive games. Later it had lesser exclusives but they were awesome. But many of them came to PC. They destroyed the true "exclusive" value. Plus everyone has a PC and I bet most of them are quite decent enough to play game. So the feeling of exclusive waters down.

Problem is microsoft is still in dilemma. PC (windows) is their platform and so do xbox brand. But for a (third party) xbox game they get $5/game where in PC its nil. They should have become "steam" and did their part for pc gamers without being involved in console business. They neglected pc gamers with GFWL and also neglected console games with xbox + pc version of a game.

Indeed, more or less every console exclusive game on 360 that I'm somewhat interested in is available on PC. I have a PC, therefore I don't need a 360. In the 7th generation, if you were only going to have 2 platforms and you wanted the widest selection of HD games to choose from then PC/PS4 combination was a no brainer.

And the theme has continued through to the 8th generation with none other than Titanfall. It seems to be a compromise that MS has to live with to get console exclusivity from 3rd parties. 3rd parties might be willing to ditch PS and WiiU as platforms, but they won't ditch PC as well.

I have seen many PC gamers to get ps3 for only exclusives. Because when they see SCEA (Sony computer entertainment) logo they know it will not be in PC. But for many xbox games they do wait and sometimes get rewarded with pc port. So they dont bother with xbox system. Microsoft needs to setup their strategy for xbox brand.

It was mostly fanboy war ammo that was lost. The real problem was that X360 didn't have that many appealing console exclusives to begin with, besides maybe Kinect stuff.

Very True OP I enjoyed the 360 a whole lot at the beginning of the last generation and it was the first Console i got for that Gen, thoug after gears 2 came out my 360 broke and I had a lot of trouble getting it fixed and replaced and by that time i had moved on with an upgraded PC and a PS3 so I was all set. So now that I have a Great PC that runs better then the current Gen consoles I really don't see a point in getting the new Xbox because most of their (exclusive) games will be on PC i.e. Project Spark, TitanFall, & Plants vs. Zombies: GW, which I will be able to run much better then what the xbox could offer and with the added perk of having MOD's and not having to pay for multiplayer.
So in short MS kinda cannibalized itself with having Xbox exclusives on PC (which isn't a true exclusive).
I really don't know if MS really should have ever made the xbox and entered the console market as they were a software company to begin with and that fact showed with the failure rates of the 360 (though they have gotten much better), not my place to judge but I think they should have just stuck to software as the xbox is kinda the only piece of hardware MS has had any real success with, they make great software though XD.

Hell yeah it did. Though, I can't say I cared about 95% of them to begin with, and I don't care now either.

As a pc gamer I don't see any damage at all.