Can the history of the PC as a gaming platform be divided into distinct periods...

Can the history of the PC as a gaming platform be divided into distinct periods, somewhat similiar to how consoles have hardware-based generations?

You can pretty much label, categorize and divide anything up any way you want as long as you can form opinions on it.

Yes user but in regard to my question, is there a system that people can collectively agree on?

>people collectively agreeing on anything

People can probably agree on the pre and post steam era

Well pc gaming wasn't a thing until the early 2000 so I'd say that's a good place to start the timeline

>80s IBM years
>80s-90s MS-DOS glory years
>Windows 95 and CD-ROM years
>Steam and digital downloading years

Just follow console generations. It would be stupid for a multiplat game to release on the PC and consoles at the same time and call it a seventh gen console game but a ninth gen PC game or whatever.

>Well pc gaming wasn't a thing until the early 2000
you wot m8

Yes, by CPU transistor shrink cycles

Every Windows release

>16 colors
>256 colors
>fucking bits
>modern PC gaming
>moderner PC gaming
>mustard master gaming
I personally recognize only two eras:
Inferior and superior to Amiga.

pre-PC amiga/commodore generation
2d shareware generation
3d/windows 95 generation
steam generation

You could split the 3D generation into early 3D and 3dfx.

>superior to Amiga
No such thing.

I also like to pretend it's 1992 forever.

>2d shareware generation
>steam generation

I thought you said '2D shovelware generation' and was gonna say: you listed the same thing twice in your post, weird

3dfx WAS early 3d

Obvious graphic accelerators generations.

You are either underage or growing senile.

Mostly this, but I'd also add the early 00's as its own distinct era. By then technology had made giant leaps when compared to the last decade and internet started to play a bigger part year by year, but it still was far cry from the digital distribution revolution and rise of indies. I dunno what I'd call it, DVD era sounds kinda shit.

before quake and the development of 3d cards, software 3d games like that were rare, they certainly weren't an era

ADSL era perhaps? I remember ditching consoles once my parents got ADSL to our household. It was all PC gaming online multiplayer after that.

Friendly reminder

>pc gaming wasn't a thing until the early 2000
t. underage consolecuck

Throwing shit out there. Something like this.
>1977-1990s
Apple, Commodore, Tandy in the DOS Era, other proprietary systems like those from Sinclair.
>1992
Windows 3.1, slowly waning from DOS, but still mostly DOS, beginning of OpenGL.
>1995
Windows 95, rise of the commercial Hardware accelerated 3D graphics cards, DirectX and CD media.
>1998-2003
DirectX 7 through 9, the turning point when it came to the evolution of 3D graphics and the start of the adoption of the DVD. Often seen as the golden years for video game releases on both PC and console. The first Broadband Boom and original rise of digital distribution in 2003, the "Big 3" MMOs in 98-99.
>2005
World of Warcraft dooms millions of people.
>2007
The second Broadband Boom, Valve kills PC on physical shelves with their aggressive pushing of Steam.
>2011-
The boom of self-published indie developers following Minecraft. Digital Distribution at an all time high.

Or broken down into slightly more general ages:
1977-1995 DOS
1995-1998 Windows and start of 3D cards
1998-2005 3D Cards and MMOs get big
2005-2011 Big Online
2011-2017 Independent self-publishing

Well put.

>tfw you will never go back to that '98-> era

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