Lorne Lanning, creator of the classic PSone Oddworld games, has criticised consoles for making game development too expensive.
"Personally, I think the consoles are a problem," he said in an interview with GameDaily. "Years ago I was excited about consoles, but anything that makes development more expensive rather than better, faster, cheaper, I think is a step backwards. When I look at what’s happening, it’s a bit disappointing because the consoles are running into a place where affordable games are having a rough time getting out there."
Lorne spoke glowingly of the relatively low financial entry threshold on PC. "I’m more excited about what I see happening on PC because I see it allowing for more smaller games to be sold that can be delivered to anyone who’s connected at much lower price points."
"PC games also allow people to build their game as they chose," he went on. "There’s a big difference between spending $50 or $60 on a game and hoping I love it and buying a game for $5 and then buying additional content for that game, so by the time I have invested $50 in it I really love it and I’ve personalized it a lot more to what I’m interested in. And I’m sharing this experience with a global, connected audience."
Of course, some would argue that Sony and Microsoft now offer such personalised, inexpensive gaming experiences in the form of Live Arcade and PlayStation Store releases and downloadable content. Let us know your thoughts in the comments threads.