Is the video game industry Apple’s next victim?

Games Yahoo ^ | Mon, Mar 19, 2012 3:58 PM EDT | By Chris Morris

[Keith in Iowa]

>>>The console though is safe until iOS devices become commonplace in the living room.

There are games that take advantage of Apple’s AirPlay feature that will take an AppleTV connected to your home TV and make it a bigger version of what you’re playing on the iPad, or - a supplemental screen - where the iPad becomes the “controller”... and your TV the game screen...

[rmlew]

I just priced a 8 CPU PC with 8Bg of RAM with a Radeon 550 card for less than $1k.
Huh? Do you mean an 8 core PC with 8GB of Ram and a Radeon HD 7750,6450, 6570 or such?

[jeffc]

My wife and kids play quite a few games, but I don't really consider myself a "gamer", I'm more of a "sim-er". I pretty much stick to RACE 07, a made-for-PC game, and stay away from the made-for-console-and-gamepad-games (that are then ported over to PC to make a few extra $$ for the game maker). I have a 28 inch monitor and 5.1 surround sound an a headset for communication. I'm saving up for 2 more monitors for triple wide, surround gaming. I can't see doing my kind of racing on a phone. The guys I race are just too good. After an hour of our kind of racing, you need to walk off the adrenalin and take a cool shower.

I also play SWAT 4, a first person shooter that doesn't throw a 100 bad guys at you, and there are no health power-ups. one shot, one kill is possible. Other than that, I don't play other games. no Sims 3 for this guy!

But, like I always say, each to his own. It's just that my kind of "gaming" isn't for an Apple, a phone or today's console. We all game in our own way. My point was that Apple will not be able to take over the serious gaming (simming) world.

[rmlew]

Consoles now have graphics approaching PC games (F1 2011). All they really need to do is cater a bit more to those who think racing with a gamepad is like trying to drive a real car with one: stupid. FPS's, though, are already better on console than PC. Using a handheld gamepad is much easier and better than the old mouse and KB.
What are you talking about? The PS3 and XBox360 are 6-7 years old. The PS3's graphics chip is a 550 MHz NVIDIA/SCEI RSX 'Reality Synthesizer', which is essentially a NVIDIA 7800 from 2006. Do you have any idea how much faster 2011 chips like the mid-end GTX 560 is compared to that? Putting aside technologies like 3rd and DirectX 9 vs DirectX11, it is a slaughter on the scale of comparing an Athlon 64x2 from 2005 to a current Bulldozer or a Pentium 4 HT compared to a current Sandybridge. It's a complete slaughter.

If a PC game and console game look alike, it is because lazy devlopers did a crummy port from console to PC. If you want an apples to apples comparisons look at Battlefield 3.

[jeffc]

I said "approaching", not "exactly like". I meant they are making great improvements. Probably mostly due to HD TV's. Codemasters F1 2010 and F1 2011 have phenomenal graphics, but I think the whole game was designed just for that purpose, to try to have PC-style graphics.

Test Drive Unlimited 2's (TDU2) graphics are better than TDU1's, yet both run fine on a 360 from 2006, but a PC from '06 will struggle to run TDU2.

I agree with you about crummy console port-to-PC. I will never pre-order a game and will wait until it's been out for a while before I buy it. I, and many others, greatly anticipate Simbin's newest game since 2008, GTR3. But I will wait until it's been out for a month to see what people think of it before buying. Simbin has made a console game, but they don't port to PC, they write game on and for PC.

[Peter from Rutland]

Yes 8 core. http://www.cyberpowerpc.com

[AFreeBird]

Here’s a thought for you.

Apple has been rumored to be working on a TV. Now if it’s just an HDTV to compete with the likes of Samsung, Sony, Sharp et al, I don’t see it. And I don’t think Apple would either.

Apple TV. It really didn’t get all that big a boost this spring. It’s still under powered compared to the new iPad.

Now consider: A 52” Retina class Apple TV. (with all the modern TV apps... Netflix etc.), With multi-core CPU/GPU’s lots of RAM and lots of Flash storage, WiFi capable, running iOS, and the ability of your iPhone/iPad to become a wireless game controller....

I could see them doing something like that. Rent or buy games via iTunes store them in the game directory.....

Yea, that’ll blow the game makers and console makers minds.

[dirtboy]

Sure PC is expensive but not as much as in the past.

Point to ponder. In late 1986, I had placed upon my work desktop one of the very first Compaq 386 PCs, absolutely top-end at the time.

16 mhz. 40 meg hard drive. 1 meg ram. Tape drive. EGA monitor. Laser printer.

Seven grand for that setup in mid-eighties dollars.

Now I go to the library and they will sell you a 2 gig stick drive to back up your work for seven bucks. I still remember the first time I heard the term 'gig' and thinking, man, that's a lot of storage.

I marvel at what has become. I never thought I'd see the day when computers became household appliances.

[flintsilver7]

I consider the “Retina” display to be little more than hype. For images, it’s an amazing display. For other actually graphically intensive applications, it’s actually worse. If the new tablet’s display is 2048x1536, that doesn’t really accomplish anything unless the game or application is rendered at that resolution. No game designer is going to do that unless they’re playing on a super high-end gaming rig (which any tablet is not). Also, by the understood definition of “retina,” all modern televisions fall into that category since you can’t discern individual pixels. The viewing distance pretty much ensures that.

I wouldn’t put such a scenario past Apple, and I certainly wouldn’t be surprised if a substantial step backwards like that was a huge moneymaker for them. What you’re describing is basically a $4000 (or more) combination of overpriced television and gaming PC with a poor substitute for a controller. No games available on iTunes are going to be worth running at 3 megapixel resolution (nor would they even be designed to be that way). I simply can’t see anything like that actually working as either a television or a gaming device.

[MinnyMan1]

Point to ponder. In late 1986, I had placed upon my work desktop one of the very first Compaq 386 PCs, absolutely top-end at the time.

Man, you were an early adopter! My 1986 setup :