FEB. 21, 2008 • Attempting to standardize hardware requirements for PC games, as well as promote the platform, has led Acer, Activision, AMD, Dell, Epic Games, Intel, Microsoft and Nvidia to create the PC Gaming Alliance. The group hopes to improve PC Game sales by promoting innovation, and improving the game experience for consumers through joint software and hardware standards.
Impact: A major problem with the PC game industry has been the lack of leadership. In the console game market companies like Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony spend billions of dollars developing, distributing and marketing their respective platforms. This creates an ecosystem where publishers can ride the success of the platform with their third party games. The PC is the largest gaming platform in terms of users, but it has suffered from a lack of standardization that has led to a fragmented market. Having such powerful companies form an organization like the PC Gaming Alliance could really help the PC continue to blossom as a leading platform for games.
