From: pdb059@ipl.jpl.nasa.gov (Paul Bartholomew)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: Games on consoles
Date: 28 Jul 92 12:59:36 GMT
Distribution: world
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Image Processing Lab

In article <1992Jul25.082255.10980@utstat.uucp>, philip@utstat.uucp (Philip McDunnough) writes:
> In article <1992Jul24.100110.390@cheshire.oxy.edu> leavitt@cheshire.oxy.edu (Thomas VanNess Leavitt) writes:
>>Ummm... I was wondering why people shelled out the money to buy game
>>consoles instead of computers, when they could get all the advantages of
>>a fully functional home computer for only a few dollars more, in the long
>>run... when I saw the suggested retail price of some games...

> The maintenace, original cost, etc...are all lower than on a computer. It is
> not obvious to me that computers do much for most people.

Well, I'm not equipped to speak for "most people" (neither, I suspect, are
you), but my computer most definitely does a lot for me (details provided
on request).  I certainly use it for more than a game-playing platform.

If you're saying that many people don't use a computer productively, I can't
argue with that.  But if you're saying that computers really don't/can't do
much for people, I can and will argue with that.

> I'd rather see
> CDTV/CD-I than the game consoles, but these are still expensive. The retail
> cost of video games is very high, although the game quality is far  better
> than games found on most computer platforms (exclusing the Amiga, etc../but
> certainly the PC and Mac rarely have good games).

This is a tired old cliche that is no longer true.  When was the last time
you purchased a PC game?  When was the last time you really investigated the
current state of the art in PC games?  The new PC games in nearly every cate-
gory are equal or superior to games on every other platform.  The one excep-
tion is arcade-style games where game consoles and the Amiga still have the
edge.

If all a user wants to do is play games, then a game console is a good choice.
On the other hand, a computer, be it Amiga, Macintosh, or IBM clone, can
give you access to DTP, word processing, home finances management, etc., 
while still providing you access to terrific games.

> Don't forget you can buy 
> used video games, trade them, etc...The cost is not much higher than the
> outrageous prices charhed by computer game distributors in most cases. Of
> course, few people actually pay for computer games which is why they own 
> computers in the first place. This will change rapidly over the next few 
> years.

"Few people actually pay for computer games"?  And that's "why they own com-
puters in the first place"?  What nonsense.  If that were the case, nobody
would be in the computer game business and companies like Electronic Arts,
Lucas, Sierra, etc. would be going out of business instead of thriving.

You've stated before that you thought that games would move off the computer
platforms over the next couple of years, but you've declined to state your
reasoning and declined to post any evidence.

>>It makes a console attractive.
> 
> For developers, yes which is why they are moving off the pirate ridden PC
> and Amiga platforms. The basic fact is that few people pay for software.
> And those that do get saddled with copy protected junk.

Forgive me for saying this, but I think you are out of touch with reality.
Either that, or the computer market in Canada differs markedly from the com-
puter market in the US.  "Few people pay for software"?  Can you provide any
evidence to back up this startling claim?  As for copy protection, that has
all but disappeared from productivity software on the IBM platform and has
disappeared from many games as well.  For example, many of the latest
releases from Sierra are not copy protected.

Finally, "junk"?  How much software have you investigated/purchased in the
past year?  Give me some evidence; provide some examples, please.

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Paul Bartholomew          |   "The time has come, the walrus said, to talk of
                          |    many things..."                  Lewis Carroll
pdb059@ipl.jpl.nasa.gov   |   Disclaimer:  Opinions?  What opinions?
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