Levine opines over troubled PC gaming platform

via Games Industry


2K Boston's Ken Levine, of BioShock fame, has called out for the industry to work on making the PC platform "more broadly successful."

Telling Forbes that he was most at home when playing games behind a keyboard and mouse, Levine detailed the barriers behind consumers adopting the platform.

"I wish the industry could find a way to make PC gaming more broadly successful," he explained. "There are so many challenges for PC gaming - the complications from systems specifications to the drivers - most people look at PC games and say, 'What are you talking about?'"

"It's a shame because as a gamer, I am never more comfortable than I am sitting with a mouse and keyboard two inches away from my monitor."

Levine went on to talk about the benefits digital distribution will bring to the industry as a whole by opening up new ways of delivering a product.

"One of the biggest problems we face as an industry is the notion that we really only have one channel to deliver product," Levine commented. "A game comes out and it has three weeks where it either hits or it fails. When you look at movies, they have the theatrical release, they have pay per view, and it is on airplanes, in hotels and DVDs. We don't have that. We need to provide different levels of investment."

"With [downloadable content], Rock Band being the best example, DLC makes it so you can be invested in a way you've never been invested before."

I like this guy. Now if only he worked for a major game company. Maybe he can switch to EA and have them do away with their horrible digital distribution.