PC will stay the dominant platform for the next couple of years based on the latest research from Open Gaming Alliance (OGA) and DFC Intelligence. It is expected to be worth $35 billion in 2018. The report covers the 2014 year-end and covers all aspect of the PC gaming industry worldwide through 2018. The PC market is expected to grow from $26 billion in 2014 to $35 billion in 2018.
DFC analyst David Cole, explained that growth is driven by demographics, and the core group of PC gamers keeps increasing in buying power:
“Much of the growth is driven by pure demographics. We continue to identify a core group of consumers for whom playing on the PC is a major pastime. This is, in fact, a fairly new demographic that skews highly male and is only increasing in buying power.”
OGA board member, Matt Ployhar, clarified that a major reason for PC's dominance is its accessibility to all markets, more choices and freedom, and its more sociable nature:
“The recipe that keeps PC gaming on top is simple: the platform is accessible to all markets, and especially so with the free-to-play and freemium content; the hardware continues to evolve with gamers’ lifestyles, offering more choice and freedom; and, due to the ubiquity of PC’s globally, it’s easier to share, communicate and be more sociable with friends and family. These same factors, in part, also help explain the meteoric rise of eSports.”
In closing David Cole, concluded that the platform's adoption in Asia has had a major impact, as well as the expansive spending on expensive hardware equipment:
“In past years much of the growth in PC games has been due to adoption of the platform in Asia. Now we are estimating a potential 86 million PC gamers outside Asia that we have targeted as market growth drivers. These are the consumers that are driving spending not just on software, but also on PC hardware, as they buy expensive equipment to play, view and record games.”
PC dominance over consoles can be observed in the following graph, provided by OGA
Source: DSOGaming
