Secure PC gaming could bring prices down - Taylor

Gas Powered Games' boss Chris Taylor believes that secure PC gaming will keep the format alive and relevant, while old PC gaming business models continue to die out.

While Epic's Cliffy B has said the current state of PC gaming is in "disarray" and Lionhead's Peter Molyneux sees it in a "tragic" state, Taylor says it's time to embrace new business models such as server-based and online-authenticated gaming.

"PC gaming isn't dead. PC gaming — the old model — probably is. Secure PC gaming is the future — it's going to thrive and we've all got to get on that," said Taylor during the Game Developers Conference last week.

While traditional PC gaming has been decimated by rampant online piracy, only a handful of titles such as World of Warcraft and The Sims are seen as successes in the PC market.

The casual market has grown rapidly over the past couple of years, with Flash-based games also threatening to catch up to standards set by traditional PC games — first-person shooters, real-time strategy titles and role-playing games.

But the Supreme Commander developer sees a future where the user understands the reasons behind secure gaming — titles accessed from a central server rather than a home PC — and once the content is secure, prices could be brought down to entice more players back to their PCs.

"It's all got to be secure, we can't afford to make this stuff and give it away for free," he said. "I don't think we should be sending the message to anybody that PC gaming is dead."

"We're going to secure it and our customers have to know why we are securing it. They have to appreciate why we're protecting it.

"It inconveniences a little but now they know why. And then we can get the economics back in line and maybe we can actually start offering it up at a lower price point in the future. So it will come around full circle," he said.

Expressing his passion for PC gaming, Taylor joked: "I'm a PC guy, I'm doing stuff on console, but I love what the PC can do. I'm super excited by quad core. I've got a quad core machine with a big 30 inch monitor, I got liquid cooling — Peggle is awesome on that!

"It's a wonderful thing, I don't want to see it go away," he said.