• It’s still less expensive than a PC hobby

    just with the sales and free online/cloudsaves PCs are cheaper in the long run

    And mods are an added value, we can even include fanmade patches that fix what developers don’t into that added value

    Consumers don’t have much say in what these companies do or how they operate.

    Yes, they do. Microsoft tried to incorporate Xbox live onto PC and it was a failure because PC consumers didn’t bought it

    The same goes with paid mods, Valve and Bethesda tried to make people buy mods and it was rejected by the consumer so the have to backtrack.

    Consumers have all the power in their wallet they decide what course the companies take. If a company does something that goes against your interests as consumer is as easy as stop giving them money, if you hurt them economically, they’ll have to go back to the business model that gave them profits (this works only if the average consumer is intelligent enough to protect their own interest/rights)

    • Used or loaned games (provided you have libraries offering them in your area) are still a huge benefit for (most, ie physical media “enabled”) consoles.

      The subscription model is broken by default, regardless of Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo, and is only good and cheap until it isn’t anymore.

      Agreed that consumers have a say, to some extent, however some are too far “into the ecosystem” to either care or be willing to boycott or make a change that would inconvenience them, so they’d rather give in.

      • 100% agree with that, but even then the sharing of physical media seems like it’s being slowly replaced with sharing digital libraries. PS4 allows a hokey way of sharing libraries between two people, and Steam does offer a similar janky way of sharing libraries between multiple people. With GOG, you should be able to download a standalone installer on a USB and then give that to a friend (which now I think about it, is the PC equivalent of lending your friend the disc lol).

        Wondering how long it will be until people go “remember when we used to share discs with each other?”

        • Oh absolutely, I know I’m already part of a minority when I favour physical over digital media.
          We’re likely seeing the last (or, more realistically, second to last?) generation of consoles with physical media as an option and that’s a bummer…
          GOG is great on the PC side of things, but as someone with a Steam Deck as their only PC, it isn’t always the best option (some games have been giving me a headache or end up straight up not working - eg I’ve had to rebuy Gris because the GOG version would show a white screen with any version of Proton I tried, while the Steam version was perfectly fine).

    • just with the sales and free online/cloudsaves PCs are cheaper in the long run

      This may be true, but then i think this is just annother example of how it is more expensive to be poor. Even if PCs are cheaper in the long run, it’s hard to scrounge up the $1000+ upfront to buy a worthwhile PC if you’re living paycheck-to-paycheck. Over 60% of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck. If you are living that way, it’s much easier to come up with the $300-500 for a console (in the US, that’s an average tax refund amount), and then the $15 a month for gamepass/PS plus. And don’t tell me you can buy a lowend PC for that price - any PC you buy for $500 is gonna play games worse than the comparable console.

      In cases where our only power is in our wallet, people with bigger wallets will be the only ones with actual power.