i edited my last post too.

BUT.

No you do not have to do any "fair usage" bs. You can host servers off you PCs that thousands of people around the world use, and if you want to give your ISP a massive finger and say enjoy the massive bandwidth increase. These servers are not that craptastic matchmakming shit, its a full server that is constantly running, people leaving in and out from. Max players for BF2 was 64 players, going in and out constantly for hours. I ran a server off my old alienware laptop. Ran it for weeks. ISP didn't complain, and I really don't care if they did. They don't charge me by the GB of data, its by speed not amount that I pay. I had a 20mbps internet at the time of that server so it was wonderfully fast so I was one of the more popular servers.

I really want to ask you, do you even know the difference between a dedicated server and a P2P server?

You can do that on consoles as well...

@OP: while current gen console graphics are still enough for me, I quite agree with all the other points.

You know, it'd help if you both put some links to back up your arguments. You're both arguing over data without actually presenting any.

Also, technically, PC actually has the most software support. Third-parties haven't stopped releasing on PC just because they're releasing on consoles as well and there are a lot of smaller middle-small indie teams exclusively releasing on PC.

@cory.ok: Please stop, you obviously don't have the slightest idea about what you're talking about. Just about everything you've said about 'servers' and anything related is so wrong on every possible level; for more detailed explanation, see ssj12's posts.

Consoles are actually good for PCs, if it were not for their underpowered graphics cards and processors, people like me with low powered Intel based GMAs would not be able to run any modern games at all!

This person is obviously not a computer person so we should just educate him instead of trying to slam dunk his ass into the ground.

For example, I run a dedicated murmur server which is for VoIP for the client mumble that can sustain about 100 people from home, I can also run an e-mail server from my server machine, or a web server, as a matter of fact I run multiple FTP servers all across the network and can be accessed from the outside, these are all dedicated servers. It's the same idea with games, I can run a service or a multiude of services in the background that handles whatever games I want to host and never turn them off and it'd be a dedicated servers for many different games if I so wished. It's really a question of how much bandwidth you have. A dedicated server machine is always on, it's never off, and it's always ready for connection, and it can be run anywhere for as long as there is enough bandwidth to handle the traffic.

You don't have to pay shit for any licensing if it's open and free for people to use unless the publishers say otherwise, in which case, I wouldn't play that shitty game anyways. The strength of computing in a non console environment is that it's much more open and people don't need to deal with retarded dumb shit for the most part, it's good for the consumers but not so good for money grubbing corps.

Whie whine, moan moan. Fact is if making PC only games was viable then there'd be a shit ton on PC only games utilising the up to date hardware profiles of the best gaming rigs. And the PC/console multiplats would be few and insignificant to the PC gamer.

Why complain about porst of game franchises that began on console (GTA / RE/Assassin's Creed)? that's just ridiculous.

There's also the small fact that a lot of people who like PC gaming don't get the hugely expensive gaming rigs. Like me. Next PC I get will probably be a 4Gig RAM, 512Meg graphics card, ~3Ghz PC. That means I'll only be playing PC games that can run on those, now, low specs. So even though maximum PC specs are way ahead the vast majority of PCs out int he wild do not have those specs.

 Piracy and used games are a factor with consoles as well. So no it's not that simple since even if you stop piracy this  does not equal more sales by a large amount.  HD consoles has taken away a lot of the money from PC gaming ... you know "paying" consumers.  When Sony first release PSone they sales in music fallen because of it's success. When people more in one area they spend less in others.

 Who would deny Wii success has change the direction HD consoles have taken?

  P.S Another factor that has really hurt PC gaming are laptops.

So when you said that consoles weren't plaged by an API you meant that they didn't have to use high level APIs like Direct X and Open GL? Ok, but that is not what the words you wrote portrayed. And I thought I made clear that consoles do use APIs Xbox uses Direct X and PS3 can use Open GL etc and that is just graphics APIs.

ANd as for PC APIs being more limiting I would say that static hardware, needing a publisher for just about any game (with a few exeptions) and platform specific licensing conditions are far more limiting to developers than APIs are and the diference in flexability in PC APIs are mitigated by the ability to chose between multiple APIs and the fact that the APIs are upgraded for added functionality as time and hardware advances. Just about anything you can do on consoles in terms of graphics you can do on modern PC hardware but there are many features that were added to graphics hardware in the last 5 years that you just can't do on consoles. And as I have pointed out the rapidly advancing hardware on PC mitigates the performance penalty unless you are targeting 5 year old PCs.

So no Direct X is not more limiting than the PS3.

So a game like World of Warcraft that is at the same time the most lucrative and expensive game of all time is only possible because of consoles? How about AAA titles like the Witcher 2, Starcraft 2 etc? I mean yes there is more money in multiplatform titles than exclusives and for most games that is the logical choice unless you are getting payed by a platform holder, but to say that that is what is driving gaming forword I would say is wrong. What do you think is driving gaming forword more the inovative smaller ralitively low budget console games like Wii sports, borderlands, Minecraft, Portal, Braid, Mount & blade, Flower, Limbo etc etc or mega budget mass market block busters like Call of Duty? If anything I would say having to cater to the mass market and the massive risks involved in big budget game development is what is loding gaming back whatever the platform. 

And by the way if you count all the people playing web bassed games like farmville and flash games I would say there are far more than 200 million PCs used for gaming, and if you include mineswaeper etc there are probably over a billion. Not that it matters there are also 150 million PS2 out there but I don't see any massive big budget games for that anymore...