Data shows Windows 8 hasn't stimulated PC gaming as anticipated

While I partially agree with your sentiments... Microsoft has a big hand in what is going on, and has potentially weakened PC gaming in general. You think PC games now are all lame ports from consoles? MS has invested heavily in a tablet-ized, touch-friendly app loving ecosystem, which could basically make the gaming pool even shallower. If the "game app" trend catches on with W8 as well, then MS will see "PC gaming" market share increase, their Windows Store revenues will increase, but our games will become dumbed down versions of what they are now - maybe a step up from the current Android/iOS gaming levels, but probably only roughly on-par with current consoles. This W8 ecosystem will not encourage taking risks, pushing the envelope, and leveraging the PC power for superior PC games... It will likely have the opposite effect, and we'll lose what few superior PC titles we currently get, all replaced with very meh-ish direct console ports. If you want a sign of that prophecy, just look at the push for integrating Xbox Live directly into Windows 8, and the porting going on there... Scary.

"The recently-released operating system was expected to be the savior for desktop computer"

Are they serious?

Exactly my point, If devs like Rockstar keep poo pooing the platform, nothing will change.

If you want games for PC, quit buying into consoles.

With desktop dieing, you will soon only have tablets for computing and consoles for gaming. That is unless you need a server class machine for some special case.

"to be the savior for desktop computer"

DFUQ? wasn't 8 develop for tablets? why would it save desktops? besides Windows 7 WAS the savior of desktops. Also desktops alive != desktop sales, im amazed how stupid people are to compare "alive" whit the number of sales.

I've got three major concerns with this article.

Now, who expected Windows 8 to stimulate PC gaming? Not only those who game, but also major games companies have said Windows 8 will be problematic for gaming. Did I miss their comments in amongst the flood of "I hate the Metro UI" posts?

Who, if anyone said that Windows 8 was to be the saviour of the desktop? The desktop doesn't need 'saving'. It'll be fine for quite a while, even with the surge in tablet computing. Wasn't Windows 8 supposed to be Microsofts big break into tablet computing and a unifier between systems?

And thirdly, has there really been enough time since its' release to attain any meaningful answers as to the impact of Windows 8, other than it being a rather polarizing issue amongst PC users? Surely, it's better to wait till around February - March time to get some statistics, that way not only have the early adopters settled into Microsofts new bells and whistle OS, but also the vast amount who will have had it pre-loaded onto the laptops and tablets they'll have gotten for Christmas.

"The recently-released operating system was expected to be the savior for desktop computer..."

How can that be when it's clear that (at least the UI) was specifically designed for portable devices?

And the "savior" for desktop computers? They don't need a savior, they're doing fine. People are buying tablets and notebooks as accessories. Not to replace their desktops.

"Microsoft and a number of partners had high hopes for Windows 8. The recently-released operating system was expected to be the savior for desktop computer"

I wonder who thought that and why? W8 was optimized for credit-card sized touch screen devices and deliberately made to NOT work on conventional laptop and desktop PCs, you know, those devices which are used by the information producers to MAKE the information consumed by the information consumers on their cute little pads.

I don't get why we're talking about this either... Gamers aren't switching because Win 7 is fine. And we shouldn't be talking about gamers, we should be talking about users with multiple monitors, which probably includes any serious gamer. Win 8 doesn't work well on multiple monitors.

TS seems to love any negative news about MS even if it's barely news. An operating system isn't the same as a new game or new smartphone. Give it time. It seems a little premature to discuss low sales on ANYTHING on Dec 6th when the world has a lot of Christmas shopping left to do.

Microsoft should stop trying to compete with consoles with a console and instead beat them with a low cost PC type setup.

Hahahaha no. just no.

Win 8 isn't bad for anyone that uses mulitple monitors... its bad for anyone that likes to run programs in windows... if MS is going to really go hardcore on this metro thing they need to drop the 's' from the OS's name and call it 'Microsoft Window' instead. Its not a new paradigm Its like DOS with a task switcher (start screen).

^"Microsoft should stop trying to compete with consoles and instead beat them with a low cost PC type setup."

That would be an equivalent to a modified Xbox 360 with homebrew enabled. I doubt they would do this.

if you have a half-a-brain then you can't certainly know whether a product flops or not.

(I agree that the techspot captcha words are often unreadable; fortunately, techspot registration is easy, as long as you pass the captcha )

I didn't anticipate Windows 8 stimulating anything, I'm just glad I imaged my drive so I could roll back to Windows 7 easily!

WHO...?

Who thought that Window8 would stimulate PC gaming? This is NOT news, it is only horribly bad predictions. I have been a PC gamer, since before there were PC's.

My first real "OMG.. I can't put this down game" was Wizardry.. & not once have I ever went out and bought an OS, to play a game. Nor, do I know anyone, or had heard of anyone who has ever done this. Now.. I know people who upgraded from Windows98... to WindowsXP to play games. But that wasn't immediate.

Secondly, kids are dumb today and most cannot even handle an OS install. Microsoft is extremely dumb, if they themselves predicted that Windows8 would do anything for Gamers.

I am a hardcore gamer (30h+ week)... my new rig sitting on the floor has WIndows7 waiting to install. Bcuz Win8 does not serve me.

I'm waiting for the release of Steam for Linux to stimulate game sales on the Linux platform. I don't think new OS's stimulate game sales, I think new quality games stimulate game sales.

Cough...cough.. BULLSHIT.. cough

it was "impossible" the same as M$ claimed no more than 640K was possible in DOS.. but I did it w/o them. I had mine running with 64MB flat memory model on boot many years before anything M$ did even similar.

It's not impossible.. it's morons in marketing artificially limiting options in an attempt to gouge more $.

Oh and I've been in IT for over 35 years now. Unlike winbloze kiddies hanging on M$ to do everything for them.

Maybe devs will stop being lazy and learn to OpenGL so we can have some Mac/Linux games coming down the pipe. MS hasn't done jack **** for gamedevs in a while

Double posts here?

Personally, I don't see that there is any real reason TO upgrade. Aside from some performance improvements, there is nothing really spectacular in 8, and this requires that many will have to learn how to effectively use the new UI schema. Not everyone likes to tinker; some people actually like to get things accomplished when they sit at their computer, and 8 will set things back at least a month in that respect - IMHO.

So its been about a month, now, and from the tone of this article, it sounds as if M$ was expecting that the whole world would switch in that time frame? IMHO, yet another indication of M$ megalomania.

Why would game sales increase just because of a new O$ release? It is already well-know that 8 was not designed with games in mind, and it follows that gamers would shy away from it. 8 was M$ foolish attempt to unify the O$ across platforms and reduce their own costs because if that was successful, it would require that only one code base is maintained.

Finally, the business world will not upgrade. It is not cost effective since the business world just finished upgrading to 7. Without the business world on board, as I see it, 8 is doomed to be the next Me/Vista.