‘Forget the charts; PC gaming is in great shape’

Manufacturer Nvidia has blasted claims that PC gaming is dying, insisting that ChartTrack and NPD data fail to provide a full account of the strength of the format.

Roy Taylor, VP of content & developer relations at Nvidia said that the charts don’t take into account the changing nature of the market. PC gaming is in really, really good shape, but traditional retail sales data measured by ChartTrack and NPD is lacklustre, there’s no question about it.”

Taylor pointed to the continuing success of other revenue generators for PC.

By and large, PC games don’t go into stores. If you look at the success of Steam it’s clear that many PC gamers prefer to download.

"PC gaming is also very successful in terms of subscriptions. World of Warcraft is the most notable success, but there are at least half a dozen other MMOs that are very successful.

On top of that we have online advertising, and if you add all these revenue streams you can see that PC retail is extremely healthy. If you were only to read NPD or ChartTrack you would not get that impression.