Best of 2006 Lists - Part 1

Its that time of year again, when site reviewers are publishing their best of 2006 lists, and that means time to look at the numbers and see how the PC fairs in a "next generation" market. To start this series, I'm going to begin with something a bit non traditional. The Gamespy Gamers Choice Awards.

Gamespy has completed its tally of 2006 readers choice games of the year. The format Gamespy used was to break down the votes by console type. These numbers are by no means scientific. Although Gamespy required voters to be registered and cold only vote once, they also needed to be fluent in English as that’s the language used for the site. But regardless, it must be accurate enough for Gamespy to publish on, and fun enough for me to play with the numbers. So here they are; the number of voters per group:

GBA - 1512
PSP – 1636
PS3 – 1701
NDS – 1995
Xbox – 2078
GC – 2094
PS2 – 2343
Wii – 2365
PC Sports – 2713
PC adventure – 2768
X360 – 2969
PC RTS – 4044
PC RPG – 4158
PC action – 4373
PC Non-RTS – 5018

First its no surprise the portable systems are at the bottom of the list. Next, given the amount of available PS3 in the market, it’s no surprise the PS3 is also low on the list. The other day, Gamershell did a Podcast on the death of the Xbox. The showing Xbox had, does indeed show that Xbox is near death, along with the Game Cube. What did surprise me was how high people responded to the Wii. Considering it came out after the PS3, it scored one of the highest for consoles. Nintendo definitely gets credit for shipping in a reasonable pace, unlike snobby “we meant it this way” Sony PS3.

What really over shines everything else, is how high many people responded to the PC, with an overall 5018. That’s double the Wii or PS2! The PC voting group was so big, it had to be split into genres. And to think 2006 was supposed to be a bad year for PC gamers. No surprise that the Adventure and Sporting genera were the lowest, but still outscoring everything console but the X360; Wow. The biggest surprise for me was how high the response was for non RTS strategy gaming scores, at 5018. That’s almost 1000 more then the number 2 PC action group. My thoughts behind this must be that 25% over 40 group. People like my dad, that can appreciate video gaming, but like to go at their own pace. These type of games generally tend to be the most intellectually challenging.

If I learned anything from these numbers, its how much money there is waiting to be tapped in the PC market. So, get to it developers.