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We don't advocate real-world violence, but if you catch someone claiming PC gaming is dead, feel free to give them a wedgie, especially if he's quoting numbers that don't include online game sales. Take Steam for example. The ultra popular online PC (and Mac) gaming platform increased its year-over-year sales by 100 percent in 2011, and lest anyone chalk that up as an anomaly based on a rash of hit titles, this is the seventh straight year Steam has doubled its sales figures.
Steam is now serving more than 40 million user accounts and offers over 1,800 games. During the 2011 Holiday Sale, more than 5 million Steam users were signed on at the same time.
"Steam and Steamworks continues to evolve to keep up with customer and developer demands for new services and content," said Gabe Newell, co-founder and president of Valve. "Support for in-game item trading prompted the exchange of over 19 million items. Support for Free to Play (FTP) games, launched in June, has spurred the launch of 18 FTP titles on Steam, with more coming in 2012. Looking forward, we are preparing for the launch of the Big Picture UI mode, which will allow gamers to experience Steam on large displays and in more rooms of the house."
It takes a robust infrastructure to do what Steam's doing, which doubled the amount of content delivered to gamers in 2011 versus 2010 to over 780 petabytes of data. To handle the increased load, Steam said it more than doubled is service capacity and deployed a new content delivery architecture to improve download rates.
PC gaming isn't dead folks, it's evolving.
Comments are closed on this article
btdog
January 07, 2012 at 5:16pm
I'm rapidly approaching 4 decades, so I'm from an older generation - one that relies on tangible, physical media. I don't trust electronic data files, I trust my ability to maintain CDs/DVDs. And then you have companies (like Apple's iTunes) that say, "if you lose your song, we'll happilly replace - with the second copy you purchase." So for these reasons (not too mention all my precious data out on the interwebs), I resisted Steam for several year; to the point that if the game said I needed to install Steam, I would pass on purchasing it.
But Steam was becoming a juggernaut in the industry, so I couldn't ignore it forever. I finally brokedown and read how Steam operated...and I was impressed. I could use any computer (I could even have the game installed on 2 computers at once!)? I didn't have to buy it again? They would house a record of my library indefinitely? Allow me unlimited downloads? Well, it was almost too good to be true - many of my hesitations no longer applied. So about 2 years ago I started using Steam...slowly at first (buying only a handful of games). As the old saying goes, "if it's too good to be true, then it probably isn't."
But so far, it's been wonderful. I ran up a huge bill over the holidays because I finally succumbed to their siren call. And I'm very happy I did.
I say all this because other internet based companies can learn a valuable lesson from their service. I still buy CDs for music and DVDs for movies because I still don't trust electronic media AND I don't want to have to buy it again if I lose my HDD (and I ultimately buy less because I have the cost and storage of the media to consider). But I've spent several hundreds with Steam - often buying items I normally wouldn't because of the price; BUT most importantly, because when I finally do get around to playing it (no matter what computer I'm using now or how many times I've lost data) Steam will let me play with the game I purchased - a right I think I've earned.
Roll Tide
January 06, 2012 at 12:18pm
The best part about the incredible deals and games available on steam is that it encourages "giftiness". I have given DLC and indie games as well as games like Portal to others.
In a side note ROLL TIDE! January 9th.
Marthian
January 06, 2012 at 10:48am
While I'll chock this up as great news, I don't think Steam has 1800+ games. 1400+ games sure, but I believe it would be 1800+ when you include DLC, 90 of that is for one game.
unsunghero225
January 06, 2012 at 10:45am
hut how many of those accounts are unique??
I personally have had 2-3.... usually due to forgetting passwords, and paying next to nothing for the game again
i know several people in similar situations..... although i guess 3 accounts is still 3 accounts
bling581
January 06, 2012 at 10:46am
Overall Steam has performed well and I haven't had any issues with most games I own. One or two like to crash once in a while to the desktop, like Torchlight, but I can't prove if it's the game or Steam client. Skyrim has been a major pain but I think most if not all the blame goes to Bethesda. I haven't played it since they added 4GB RAM support so hopefully that fixed a lot.
Steam sales are excellent and I've saved a lot of money buying games at 50%-75% off. I was a bit angry that I didn't wait to buy Arkham City.
I haven't even had a chance to play it yet but I pre-ordered it because they were giving $10 if you owned Arkham Asylum. Then they go and sell it for 50% off over Christmas! /end rant
Note to devs: Without Steam I don't think I would've heard of half the games that have caught my interest, especially indie titles. There are quite a few games that just don't get a ton of promos but are excellent. One good reason why you should sell games with Steam.
JohnP
January 06, 2012 at 12:18pm
Gawd, that Steam sale over the holidays was TERRIFIC! I too got burned on $120 worth of a couple of copies of Deus EX Human Revolution that was on sale for as low as $16.10. But I also was scarfing up games that were the best in class for as low as $2.49! I limited myself to $100 worth of games and spent about $80 but got a ton of games for me and my sons and a friend. I was pretty much devastated when I could no longer go at 1PM and scope out what was for sale that day. It was exciting as hell and at these prices, even just watching the game's intro was worth the entire price of the game. I know I had two friends sign up for a couple of games that I scremed for them to BUY THIS!
The indie games have been great. It is really the best way for indie companies to get their games published.
I expect great things from Steam and I have got them. Long live Steam!
someuid
January 06, 2012 at 2:09pm
"The indie games have been great."
Agreed. Before Steam, finding idie games was tough. I'd say about 1/3rd of my steam purchases have been for indie games.
AI War has consumed a lot of my game time.
TommM
January 06, 2012 at 10:42am
And I think I have about 1,650 of those games due to their damn sales. :p
someuid
January 06, 2012 at 2:08pm
My wife saw my library page listing all the games I'd bought and said o.0 wtf husband?
