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Microsoft: No Alan Wake On PC, Xbox 360 'The Right Platform'
by Leigh Alexander [PC, Console/PC]
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February 16, 2010
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Microsoft confirmed it will not publish a PC version of Remedy's upcoming Alan Wake, claiming the Xbox 360 is "the most compelling way to experience" the psychological thriller.
"Some games are more suited for the intimacy of the PC, and others are best played from the couch in front of a larger TV screen," Microsoft told consumer website CVG.
"We ultimately realized that the most compelling way to experience Alan Wake was on the Xbox 360 platform, so we focused on making it an Xbox 360 exclusive," the company added.
The spokesperson asserted the strong background in PC game development of both Microsoft and Remedy, stressing that "this decision was about matching this specific game to the right platform."
Billed as a psychological thriller that takes its cues from crime and horror novels, Alan Wake was first announced in 2005, and has been under relatively quiet development since then.
The title resurfaced at E3 2009 as part of Microsoft's press show, and Alan Wake is now slated to launch in May, although further info on the PC version had lapsed over the past few months.
In summer 2009, Remedy reportedly said it "would love to see a PC version available to its PC followers, ultimately however this decision lies with our publisher."
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Poppycock! I say as I type this on my PC connected to my 37" Sharp while reclined on my couch.
We all know what this is about. Microsoft is hoping that the PC owners will put the benjamins to buy a slop box in order to play this game.
Well, I already own a 360. So let me play it on my PC with better graphics and access to my keyboard.
They're kind of burning bridges with this comment though. What if they want to release a PC version in six months, after the console sales cycle is mostly over?
I think the phrase you are looking for is "the days of any PC game from MS has already come to an end."
Axing the Ensamble and Flight Sim team pretty much proved that.
I'll get it anyway just to see if they ever lived up to the hype, but the thought that they can't release it on PC because of a lack of immersion or "experience" is ridiculous. For me, playing on my PC means I can dedicate time to the game and I get left in peace to do it; in the living-room on the 360 I have to deal with the girlfriend and the dog, I don't have a HDTV so I can't read the tiny text on the screen, and I have to fit in shorter time sessions to work around the TV schedule. My 360 also makes far more noise than my PC does, but hey...
Getting "Alan Wake" to run on the PC would impose two kinds of cost: 1) the hard dollars required to tweak the code, the UI, and the controls for the PC, as well as any additional licensing fees for third-party libraries, etc., and 2) some amount of lost 360 sales due to people buying the PC version. On the other side are the benefits: 1) some number of people buying the PC version of the game instead of the 360 version, and 2) some number of people buying the PC version who otherwise would not have bought it at all.
So the question is, for this highly-anticipated game, do you believe that the likely costs would outweigh the likely benefits?
Or to put it another way, what is Microsoft counting as a cost that we aren't?
You can call what microsoft said "excuses" or whatever but the truth is the PC platform its not profitable because of piracy, period.
There is a HUGE number of these consoles out there. Piracy was not what made them decide not to put this game on the PC.