Zoals je laatst kon lezen had iemand van de Daily Radar geschreven dat HL slecht voor de PC markt is. Dit vanwege de levensduur van de game en de trouwe community. En dat HL spelers geen pu y's zijn blijkt wel uit de e-mail lawine die de schrijver over zich heen kreeg.Holy Crap, I should have called the Pope a bastard or something a la Sinead O'Connor. I probably would have gotten le of a response. Thanks for the mail, even if we disagree on the topic. It's good to know there are so many people out there that care enough about this industry to write in about itredominantly it seems the readers don't like the points I made in my last piece. I can deal with that. I didn't think it would be a popular opinion. Most readers/consumers aren't concerned with whether or not the industry as a whole continues to expand or shrink but whether they get their money's worth on games and have a good time playing. Point taken. What I'm trying to do in these columns is look at the industry as a whole. Not just the consumers, nor just the developers, retailers, publishers, communities, etc., but the entire PC market, because in my opinion, it's facing its greatest challenge. Why? Because the PC market is shrinking. Sales figures from the organizations that keep tabs on that type of information universally show a drop in sales from '98 to '99, with the top 12 publishers taking about 90% of all the sales. The argument I made can be boiled down to this. Games like Half-Life, which have long-term replayability and loyal communities, can have a chilling effect on the sales of other games for a period of time that is detrimental to the overall health of the PC market. This doesn't take into consideration the wants of the players or the wants of a specific developer. In fact, as I said before, it's a win-win situation for the players and developers. Any developer that can monopolize your attention has been succe ful, and any game that allows ma ive amounts of replayability gives the player more for their money. But in the long run, every one of you that is playing hours and hours of Team Fortre or Counter Strike now, some two years after release, isn't spending that time playing something else. Some of you suggested that meant I was supporting crappy games. That's not the point. I'm saying many of you get so loyal to your community you'll stick to one game and not try another that's as good in the same genre. You want an example? Quake III and Unreal Tournament both have these vehement audiences that lash out at each other, each claiming the other game is sh*t. In reality, they are both great games, but there are people that swear by one or the other and wouldn't think of owning/playing the other. Who suffers? Unreal Tournament in this case. Its sales are half that of Quake III. Okay, enough of what I think, let's see what you wrote -- on to the letters. Wat moet je er nu van vinden. Aan de ene kant wil je value for money. Een spel waar je 90,- voor betaald en na een week saai/uitgespeeld of onderzetter-ready is, is zonde. Maar als iedereen maar een spel koopt en daarna voortleeft op Mods is ook niet echt fijn voor de PC markt...Wat de Daily Radar lezers te zeggen hadden.