this post was submitted on 22 Apr 2024
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Sony also built up momentum during the second half of the PS3's lifespan by focusing on what's most important for a games console: games. And they made the PS3 more affordable and therefore accessible with a great, focused PS3 redesign in form of the PS3 Slim, saving costs while only cutting features that weren't really important to most potential customers (PS2 backwards compatibility).
They took that momentum, watched Microsoft fail and made a home run with the PS4 based on the perfect storm that was created.
The PS5 was simply a continuation of their good form, and Microsoft has just been going along with their Xbox brand and consoles, seemingly not knowing where to go, buying studios left and right which then proceed to release mediocre titles. They also tried something with their subscription service, but it turns out most people just buy the games they want to play instead of picking from a selection of games of which they wouldn't have chosen most of them if they weren't included in a subscription.
After being away from consoles for a long time now, they really have little appeal beyond their easy setup and cheaper hardware. The exclusives on any console are not worth buying a whole new console to play. There's so much more value in PC gaming, the intial barrier of entry and possible technical problems just put people off.
I really think Steam Machines could make a major comeback now, the deck has proved the software side, SteamOS is much more mature.
Oh I agree with that and I'm a PC gamer 99 % of the time (well, like 95 % desktop PC, 4.5 % Steam Deck, 0.5 % consoles). I mainly use my PS5 for playing BluRay nowadays. I don't fancy paying more for games, a subscription for online gaming and getting a worse experience (in terms of graphics/performance and things like modding but also voice chat options etc.).
I couldn't agree more. Back during the initial pitches of the Steam Machines, I was a supporter of the concept and was looking forward to the release. In my market, they took a long time to release and ended up being stupidly expensive. To give an idea, in my market an i3-powered unit was expensive as an i7-powered one in the US despite not having that problem with PC components or even prebuilts. Eventually I spent the money on a parts to build my own rig that was significantly more capable than what the Steam Machine of equal cost would have been. I found little ways to make being a couch PC gamer viable without breaking the bank on horribly expensive niche products like lapboards and it's enabled me to become a PC gamer despite having been a console boy for so long. It's a shame because I think Steam Machines would make PC gaming so much more approachable to the average consumer (which I was at the time) and I hope they still manage to in the future.