Your Gaming, Your Choice - Today’s Gaming Platforms

Gaming has had a rich history. Spanning across merely a few decades, gaming tech has leapfrogged from its humble dot-based beginnings to a behemoth market where anything and everything is seemingly possible.

As we reach the midpoint of 2022, we can safely say that it’s never been a better time to be a gamer, with the most important theme being gamer choice. With so many platforms, it no longer matters what type of gamer you are, there’s a place for you to enjoy this pastime your way.

Console Gaming Today

Historically, game consoles have been the backbone of video games. These slick-looking boxes have sat snuggly under TV sets, bringing the magic of interactive entertainment to households everywhere.

While they’ve come a long way since the age of dots and bits, their functional concept remains pretty much the same. Today, we’re enjoying the ninth generation of consoles which gave us a significant technological leap forward. From 4K resolutions to lightning-fast loading times, current-gen consoles are a true testament to our hardware development know-how.

However, there’s a key difference from past generations. Typically, as each new shiny console made its way onto the market, its predecessor would slowly be sunsetted, leaving very little room for overlap of games and peripherals. Between the 8th and 9th gen, though, the lines have blurred.

They both can run most of the same titles and are designed to support the same peripherals, albeit with some restrictions. More importantly, manufacturers have sought to give developers the tools to make their games cross-generational, meaning that gamers don’t necessarily need to ditch their 8th gen investment immediately.

So, as it stands, we’ve begun looking at consoles not as individual devices but as device families, with each family adopting entirely different strategies.

Sony’s Playstation family consists of the PS4 (and its various iterations) and the PS5. While the former is still a solid powerhouse, its successor ups the technical ante by orders of magnitude. Resolutions jump from 1080p to up to 4K with frames-per-second reaching 120 depending on the title. The lion’s share of the PS4’s library can also be played on the PS5, with some titles offering free next-gen upgrades. PS5’s most critical advancement has got to be its custom SSD, a nifty drive that makes loading times feel near-non-existent.

Over in the west, Microsoft has a console family of its own. While the Xbox One is succeeded by the Xbox Series S and X, the tech titan has adopted a far more flexible strategy. To MS, it doesn’t matter whether you’ve stuck with your 8th gen Xbox or made the jump to the current gen. You’re able to enjoy all of the benefits the platform has to offer simply because all games have seamless overlap thanks to a system called Smart Delivery, which detects the console you’re using and adapts your game to take advantage of its specs. More significantly, Microsoft has hedged its bets on Game Pass, a revolutionary subscription system with hundreds of games offered under one affordable monthly payment.

Then we have Nintendo, the company that always favors creativity over competing against its rivals. And why would they do otherwise when they give us technological marvels like the Switch? The hybrid console was a revolutionary concept when it launched in 2017 and remains relevant to this day. Offering seamless transition from playing on the big screen to gaming on the go, the Switch is an impressive piece of kit despite its lower specs.

But then another unexpected combatant enters the arena and is looking to shake things up further. Valve, the dominant force in the PC digital storefront space, dropped a bombshell when they revealed the Steam Deck. A portable gaming PC, this beastly device promises to support a significant portion of the platform’s library for on-the-go gaming, but it goes way beyond that. The Gabe Newell-founded company has chosen to make it an open device that’s highly repairable. They’ve even gone as far as to release 3D CAD files of the Deck’s outer shell for 3D printing.

So, this is where we’re at in 2022 with consoles. There are a lot of exciting developments in the space but PC is no slouch either.

PC Gaming Today

The term PC Master Race has been a prevailing one for the past few console generations and for good reason. Pretty much every game under the sun eventually makes its way to computers and that’s because building a rig has never been easier.

In the past, the greatest barriers to PC gaming have been price, component confusion, and repeated upgrades. Since the launch of Nvidia’s GTX9 and 10 series, coupled with AMD’s equivalent products, GPUs have been far easier for consumers to understand. Furthermore, higher-tier cards have the potential to last for as much as a typical game console life cycle. For instance, the GTX 1070 is still considered a powerhouse that can run the latest AAA titles, albeit with some graphical compromises.

Today’s GPUs, the RTX 30 series and RX 6000 series, deliver performance that’s a leapfrog ahead of their respective predecessors. Ray tracing and DLSS are two technologies that come as a standard with these cards, providing unparalleled performance consistency as well as superior lighting and detail for game visuals.

In terms of title distribution, PC gamers are also spoilt for choice. Steam continues to be the top platform with the most robust discovery and community features. More importantly, Steam discounts continue to be a cornerstone even among gamers, with price slashing being deeper than ever. Then we have the Epic Games Store, a new kid on the block that’s taking advantage of Epic’s large coffers to provide free monthly games and better revenue split with developers.

Despite the 2022 chip shortage, being a PC gamer has never been better and that’s also thanks to another new piece of technology.

Cloud Gaming Today

If you would have told any gamer in the past that video games would one day require no downloads and no specific device to play them on, they would have laughed. However, cloud gaming technology is real and it’s slowly proving to be a significant threat, particularly in the casual gamer space.

Where cloud gaming sees the potential in taking a bite out of the console market’s lunch is through one key advantage: it’s device agnostic. Whether you’re on a mobile phone, an underpowered Chromebook, or even a smart TV, as long as you’ve got access to a browser or a dedicated app, you’re golden. The content delivery servers will do the heavy lifting, providing you with a near-next-gen console experience, albeit with a few caveats.

For one, your internet connection will determine the level of graphical fidelity you receive and how consistent your game’s performance will be. Naturally, the data load is also a factor that currently limits some of the technology’s reach as plenty of homes across the globe have data caps. The most significant limitation, though, is input delay, a hurdle that may never fully be overcome. Since your game is run by a server instead of your local machine, it takes more time for commands to register. While this may mean that cloud gaming will likely never be the platform of choice for esports, it still has potential for single-player experiences, which is the casual market’s default.

Google attempted to lead the cloud gaming revolution with its Stadia platform. In a grandiose event, they touted promises of 4K resolutions, smooth performance, reduced input delay, and a ton of integrations with YouTube that would result in a seamless, no-download gamer experience. However, business model decisions on the big G’s part have resulted in lackluster market uptick, placing the platform’s fate in a state of flux.

Where real promise seems to lie for cloud gaming is through Microsoft with their Game Pass Cloud platform and Nvidia with Geforce Now. The former is a baked-in service with the Ultimate tier of their highly praised gaming subscription while the latter hopes to simply provide the cloud services and servers while the gamers use their existing Steam libraries. What’s key to note here is that both companies have been less bombastic about their cloud initiatives, compared to Google. They’ve chosen to let the technology mature before making big promises so it’s likely that these two will come out on top and take cloud gaming tech to the finish line.

Cloud gaming is also a significant puzzle piece for mobile gaming, which is another major landscape that’s currently making a play for the core gamer market.

Mobile Gaming Today

The mobile gaming market was the actor that got laughed out of the room during their opening act. Gamers dismissed the space as nothing but a non-gamer’s cheap knockoff toy that would never be worthy of being taken seriously.

To a degree, they weren’t entirely wrong at first, given that the mobile market is rife with quick cheaply-made cash grabs that are riddled with microtransactions, loot boxes, and other money-sucking initiatives. But that’s slowly changing.

With major games like Fortnite and Apex Legends being given mobile ports, and megahits like Genshin Impact being developed for smartphones first, the market is finally showing its real potential. And given that phone specs are reaching insane power levels for their size, it’s more likely than ever that any one person could have a gaming-capable device right in their pocket.

Apple has attempted to cash in further through their subscription service called Apple Arcade. With a huge library of games, some of which launched on the platform first, the measly monthly fee is a pretty sweet deal almost equivalent to MS’s Game Pass.

Google and Android aren’t that far behind with the Play subscription also being just as solid, albeit without the exclusive titles. However, Android has a much wider selection of titles within certain genres such as the gacha space. Apple still dominates, though, given that most developers find iOS to be an easier platform to develop for.

The Next Big Frontier?

Suffice to say that gaming platforms exist aplenty, meaning there’s never been a better time to be a gamer of any caliber or creed. But the iceberg still has plenty of depth to show. The question is, where does the next frontier lie?

Meta - formerly Facebook - has made significant pushes in the immersive gaming space with the Oculus VR platform. Games are coming out by the boatload with the Quest 2 being the most affordable way to dive into the virtual action. PC VR has also had a pretty big uptick, as well as console VR through Sony’s initiatives.

On the other hand, browser gaming is also still a vibrant space, giving casual gamers an extra avenue to game alongside their mobile devices. Cloud technology seems to have a fair bit of overlap here so it’s quite likely that we’ll see browser-exclusive titles boasting visuals and gameplay elements that are near console equivalent.

The bottom line is that gaming platforms have come a long way, offering tons of choices for the consumer. As the space expands, so will the number of ways we can engage with our favorite pastime while cloud tech and cross-platform initiatives pave the way for gaming that brings down the walled gardens even further.