Supreme Commander and Demigod developer Gas Powered Games is among the latest to join the PC Gaming Alliance, a distinction that also applies to BFG Technologies, Bigfoot Networks, Flextronics, GameTap, Howie's Game Shack and InstantAction.

The non-profit consortium, which strives to "drive worldwide growth of PC gaming," announced the new members today and highlighted the recent addition of GameStop.

"I've spent most of my career fully immersed in the world of PC gaming. It's where many of the world's biggest gaming franchises were born and where much of the industry's innovation continues to this day," said Gas Powered Games CEO Chris Taylor. "Gas Powered Games hopes to make contributions that keep PC gaming at the forefront of the industry, help it to overcome its challenges, and continue to fulfill its amazing potential."

The PC Gaming Alliance has lost two of its founding members, as Activision Blizzard, the company behind such major PC titles as World of Warcraft and Call of Duty, and hardware manufacturer Acer have left due to membership costs.

PCGA president Randy Stude confirmed the cost-related leaves with Big Download, explaining to Edge Online that "a few members cannot justify the budget (membership and staff) required to maintain an active role in the PC Gaming Alliance at this time."

"Membership turnover is a fact of life in any industry consortium particularly so in the current economy," he added. "The PC Gaming Alliance is an industry consortium that relies on membership dues to achieve its' mission."

Despite the departures, Stude asserted that the non-profit organization, dedicated to improving PC gaming, has seen a "net [membership] gain for 2009," with recent joins including retailer GameStop and Sony DADC, maker of the oft-derided SecuROM DRM.

The ranks of the PC Gaming Alliance's board of directors grew by two today, as it announced the addition of representatives from Capcom and The Guildhall .

Based in Japan, Capcom is best known as the developer and publisher behind the Street Fighter, Resident Evil and Mega Man series, among others. Meanwhile, The Guildhall, located at Southern Methodist University, teaches game-making.

The PC Gaming Alliance, its stated goal to "drive worldwide growth of PC gaming," noted that the move broadens its knowledge of the "PC gaming issues and requirements" faced by publishers and educational communities.

"Capcom believes strongly in the value and strength of the PC gaming market as a global platform for our entertainment brands," said Capcom VP Christian Svensson, adding that Capcom's past PCGA participation "has greatly improved our understanding of the market....and allowed us to participate in improving the field of PC gaming."

"We're pleased to have a representative on the board in order to directly help shape the future of the PC gaming environment," concluded Svensson.

In the future, PCs will be able to officially play console games with the full blessing and support of major console manufacturers Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo, believes PC Gaming Alliance president Randy Stude.

"I predict that all of the console makers over time will recognize that it's too expensive to develop the proprietary solution and recognize the value of collapsing back on the PC as a ubiquitous platform," he told GamePolitics in a recent interview.

Stude, also the director of Intel's gaming program office, explained that "the guts of every console should tell you that the capability is there for the PC to act as the central point for all the consoles," asking why a PC powerful enough to emulate the PlayStation 4, for example, shouldn't be able to run games specifically developed for that platform.

"[Sony is] certainly not making any money on the hardware," he ... Read more

Randy Stude, the outspoken president of the PC Gaming Alliance, has arrived at some conclusions about game piracy after turning his attention to the issue in October.

"I don't think it's getting worse, as much as it's getting easier," said the consortium head to Ars Technica. He offered file-sharing trail-blazer Napster as an example to show that pirates strike all forms of media and are not unique to the games industry.

While Stude represents a collective of hardware makers and game publishers, he surprisingly took the side of enraged gamers who took to the Internet with complaints about Spore's DRM limitations. "I think gamers wanted to make their voices known; it was the equivalent of the Boston tea party," he remarked.

Stude asserted his understanding that PC gamers are a unique and diverse bunch, and as such don't do well with limitations. "[PC gamers] don't buy one machine, stick it in the corner, hook it up to the TV, and play it forever. We play on multitudes of machines, and we want the same rights an Xbox 360 purchaser has, to... Read more

PC Gaming Alliance president Randy Stude has decided to turn his industry consortium's attention toward piracy after months of DRM controversy and PC release delays getting attributed to gamers getting their fix by way of a digital five-finger discount.

"At some point next year, we expect to be able to quantify the potential impact of piracy on the industry," promised Stude to Gamasutra, echoing detractors in the piracy debate who warn that most piracy-related statistics available today are inaccurate.

Stude was pushed into the issue by his constituency--a collection of hardware makers, PC vendors and game publishers including Microsoft, Dell, Activision, and Epic Games. "There's a far more urgent imperative [game companies] want to see discussion and debate going on around, which is piracy," he said.

The Alliance president reiterated the most frequently mentioned solutions to the piracy problem, such as digital distribution and taking games online, but he also had a novel idea for what to do before the day that markets go entirely digital.

"Let's monetize every one of those pirates, and let's advertise the hell out of them," Stude asserted. "Serving, for example, six times the number of in-game ads on unauthenticated game versions would be a piracy deterrent that also provides revenues to the developer," wrote Gamasutra of Stude's idea.

The recently formed PC Gaming Alliance industry consortium today unveiled the initial results from its first Horizons Report, highlighting what PCGA president Randy Stude refers to as "incredible growth in online PC Gaming."

According to the report, PC gaming was a $10.7 billion industry in 2007, with sales from digital distribution nearing $2 billion and in-game and web advertising bringing in $800 million. Online PC gaming brought in $4.8 billion, almost double that of retail PC sales.

"Our analysis clearly shows incredible growth in online PC gaming, proof that this industry is far stronger than anyone has reported," explained Stude. "Today's consumers shop where they live--online."

Overall, the study found that growth was driven by online revenue from Asia, which accounted for almost half of the total worldwide sales, and noted that revenues are expected to grow as developers embrace online distribution and other opportunities.

"By pioneering new business models, the PC has quietly remained the single leading platform for games, not only in terms of consumer usage, but revenue generation," commented DFC Intelligence analyst David Cole. "The most fascinating thing about PC gaming is its ability to attract such a diverse audience, both demographically and geographically."

PC Gaming Alliance president and Intel gaming program director Randy Stude offered commentary on the health of the PC gaming industry, expressing amusement at sales tracking firm NPD's recent move to track MMO subscription sales.

"I chuckle when I read through the articles or opinion that say that PC gaming is in a decline and they continue to quote NPD's North American retail sales figures as the reason why they believe they're in decline," Stude told Crave.

He added, "NPD decided in the first quarter of 2008 to attempt to quantify North American MMO subscription revenues. And lo and behold, after just a quarter of research, they found—under a rock that they hadn't looked at before—a billion dollars."

The director elaborated upon the goals of the PCGA, a consortium aimed at providing a forum for developers to collaborate on the marketing, production, and ... Read more

There is still room for improvement in the marketing and management of the Games for Windows platform, Microsoft Games for Windows director Kevin Unangst has said.

Unangst addressed complaints that Games for Windows Live doesn't offer enough incentive for those who pay for the service, noting that many gamers were confused that Games for Windows Live-branded titles required paid subscriptions for online play.

"Going out of the gate, we weren't as clear as we should have been that Games for Windows Live on the PC is free," Unangst told Eurogamer. "If you want to play cross-platform games, that's when you need a Gold subscription. Our challenge is to be clear on the message we're not charging for Games for Windows Live.

"People assumed we were trying to bring the Xbox model over to the PC, which we were not," Unangst added.

When asked for comment on the PC Gaming Alliance—a consortium of PC gaming developers in which Microsoft is a key figure—Unangst reaffirmed... Read more

Epic Games founder Mark Rein and designer Cliff Bleszinski voiced their support of the recently founded PC Gaming Alliance, suggesting that the consortium would help unite and revitalize the platform.

"Right now, if you have a laptop with integrated graphics and try to play our game, it doesn't play...So you just lose your interest in that. We don't want that," Rein told MTV Multiplayer. "We want all these people buying laptops and reasonably priced PCs, to at least be able to be exposed to gaming. They can go out later and upgrade to something better, but let’s at least give them a baseline experience."

Added Bleszinski, "I think everybody coming together in that kind of way will essentially kind of help re-glue things back together and kind of help fix the market."

Officially formed at last week's Game Developers Conference, the PCGA hopes to serve as a forum for developers to collaborate on the marketing, production, and analyzation of the PC market. The body will act as an advisory board, with a... Read more

A consortium of corporate giants ranging from Microsoft to Intel joined hands in an effort to advance the PC gaming platform today, officially announcing the PC Gaming Alliance (PCGA) at this year's Game Developers Conference in San Francisco.

The stated goal of the PCGA is to serve as a forum for developers to collaborate on the marketing, production, and analyzation of the PC market. The body will act as an advisory board, with the focus on providing a single "voice" for the PC gaming industry.

"PCGA members believe that we are stronger and more effective together than any member company is alone, and that our shared vision and group effort will improve PC gaming worldwide," said Intel's Randy Stude. "Industry forums have proven to foster competition and innovation among member companies and grow markets while improving user experiences."

The full list of PCGA members is composed of Acer/Gateway, Activision, AMD, Dell/Alienware, Epic Games, Intel, Microsoft, Nvidia. and Razer.

"There's no one source that says 'hey this is where the PC market is going'," said Stude according to Develop. "Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft are always calling their market share--we're going to call our market through this group."

"What we intend to do is look at what's out there and tell developers what consumers have and understand what audiences exist," added Microsoft Games for Windows chief Kevin Unagast. "The role of the PCGA is providing guidance to developers when they are making a game, explain how they can achieve consistency."

Several marquee companies are teaming up to keep the PC gaming platform alive, according to the Mercury News.

Dubbed the PC Gaming Alliance, the group is made up of several companies with an interest in sustaining PC gaming, including Intel, Microsoft, Nvidia and AMD. The alliance aims to keep PCs competitive with consoles in drawing game developers to the platform.

The consortium hopes to expand the efforts of Microsoft's Games for Windows program, which sought to standardize the platform and improve consumer experience. The PC Gaming Alliance is expected to be formally announced in advance of next week's Game Developers Conference in San Francisco.