Mark Rein clarifies Epic’s stance on PC gaming

Speaking to Tom’s Games, Mark Rein, Epic Games vice president, has said he understands why CliffyB made recent comments regarding the state of PC gaming, pointing out that he is a console game developer.

“Oh he’s an idiot,” laughed Rein. “No, he’s a great guy. Cliff makes console games though, right? He’s on a console team that makes what is primarily a console game.”

Earlier this month CliffyB told MTV Multiplayer that he felt PC gaming is in “disarray”.

Rein is much more upbeat on the future of PC gaming though and made particular note of the disappointing NPD sales figures for Unreal Tournament 3 on PC.

“NPD numbers are an estimate. We don’t know what they are exactly but if you sell 80,000 a month for 10 months that’s a multi-million seller worldwide. Who’s going to complain about that?” said Rein. “It’s funny, after that I spent a lot of time going through long-term NPD numbers. I actually went and looked all the way back to 1995 and I dissected all the shooters. The path we’re on right now isn’t going to make it the fastest selling game but PC games have a potentially much longer tail than console games. There’s a good chance to sell that game for a much longer period of time than the more hit-oriented console games.”

Rein’s comments came following an announcement regarding the PC Gaming Alliance, a group set up by industry giants to help ensure PC gaming does not fall into disarray. Epic Games, along with Microsoft, Intel, AMD and Nvidia are among the most high profile companies who form the alliance.

“The PC is certainly an area that has no one defender and if we can join a group that all gets together to defend and help make the PC market flourish I think that’s a noble goal and we should do our best,” explained Rein.