PC Gamers: Second Class Citizens??

[Scisca]

Tachikoma said:

Scisca said:

"Especially" doesn't mean that we're talking exclusively about this gen. 

Now you're really stretching.

The "elephant in the room" is talk of piracy, since piracy-talk is usually avoided.
The OP's primary focus is on recent events, and specifically states "this generation".
Now, more than ever, game development cost are at a all time high with failures costing the closure of studios, even for titles that have not even been finished.

With the costs and risks so high, availability of pirated versions poses a serious issue, and even if you want to ignore the generation and timeframe specified by op and bring up past consoles, piracy on console is still significantly lower, even with all console platforms combined, than piracy on PC where even the people that DO buy their games, op in large numbers, to do so from key-sites and services that circumvent local vat and pricing rules by purchasing software keys originating from russia, undercutting the standard software pricing by a considerable margin.

Don't patronise me by trying to tell me how studios and publishers handle the issue of piracy, i've sat in enough studio and publisher meetings discussing such issues over the years to have a pretty strong understanding of the average publishers priotitizing when it comes to maximizing profits over loss through distribution risk assessment.

What? I'm stretching? Seriously, if you want to talk about a certain process that started in the past and claim that something is a given way "especially" now, it's absurd to say that we shouldn't compare the current situation to what was in the previous time frame. In fact such a discussion is absolutely pointless and impossible from the logical point of view. Moreover, you are doing it yourself with your argument about dev costs being higher than in the past, so why are you denying it to me?

I understand the costs are growing. Cool. I know that. But the bottom line is - has this influenced the situation of PC gamers? Has the release of secure consoles dealt a blow to the PC market? Was this a sudden gamechanger? The answer is NO. The situation you described hasn't changed a thing for the worse thus far. I see absolutely no negative impact that the 3 new secure consoles have dealt to the PC market. Previous consoles were cracked, current ones are secure and what? And nothing! That's what I'm pointing at. I can't see a significant number of games suddenly skipping PC, there is no sudden exodus. Conina already proved that DLCs are released on schedule. So what has the fact that current consoles are secure changed? Please don't tell me some sad stories from a dev's life, but give examples how this managed to change the market, cause I can see none. That is why I believe your whole rant is unfortunately pointless in this case, sorry. If a change doesn't have any real consequence, it doesn't deserve to be called "the elephant in the room" - all I'm saying.