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A pioneer in the field of action PC games believes the platform has been superseded by consoles.
John Carmack, co-founder of Id Software and an architect of the tech behind historic PC games Doom and Quake, said today his studio “does not see the PC as the leading platform for games".
“That statement will enrage some people, but it is hard to characterise it otherwise,” Carmack said in an interview with Kotaku.
His claims come in the wake of the disastrous PC launch for Id Software’s latest title, Rage, which for many had been rendered unplayable due to a multitude of driver issues.
Id Software has released various patches in a bid to resolve the issue, but Carmack’s relationship with the platform seems to have suffered from the driver problems.
He said both console versions of Rage (Xbox 360, PS3) would have larger audiences than the PC version.
“A high-end PC is nearly ten times as powerful as a console, and we could unquestionably provide a better experience if we chose that as our design point and we were able to expend the same amount of resources on it,” he said.
"Nowadays most of the quality of a game comes from the development effort put into it, not the technology it runs on.”
Carmack’s comments come in conflict with many indie games developers who, research has shown, are pouring more resources into PC game development.
Id Software’s old rival, Epic Games, recently claimed it would refocus on PC games development.
