In fairness, I stopped gaming only this generation after becoming completely and utterly bored with the repetitive nature of the industry these days.
Console gaming has surpassed PC gaming, there's no denying that. The sales figures for console gaming continue to grow at an alarming rate annually, surpassing the movie industry regardless of whatever Blockbuster is released.
That's the facts.
PC gaming has retained it's "underground" appeal, where gamers with eyes only for the PC continue to strive for the greatest "rig" to showcase the latest games. However, consoles like the PlayStation 3 are now beginning to kick into their stride after a slow start, with Killzone 2 and Uncharted 2 in particular bringing a new level of graphical splendor to the platform, surpassing anything done on the system previously.
You mentioned being untethered from the television with PC gaming, by which I presume you're referring to a gaming laptop. While the Alienware and Dell gaming laptops (now one and the same right enough) offer great performance, the real performance in Windows gaming comes from a dedicated tower system utilising larger and more powerful GPU cards.
As I said though, it's a more underground culture these days, populated by gamers who simply refuse to touch a console controller despite the consoles becoming more and more powerful with each generation. Yes you can run Call of Duty 4 at ridiculous resolutions on the PC, but when you sit it side by side with a PS3 running at 1080p on a 51" Samsung, the PC version tends to lose out. Gaming has become an entertainment medium, not a bedroom hobby.
Me personally, I got bored after owning all three of the current generation. My Xbox 360 was replaced no less than 6 times, no matter how well I took care of the thing or how well ventilated I kept it, but the games now are the same ones that were fresh on the original PlayStation because we'd never seen them before on a console or in the home.
In 1995 we'd never had Arcade quality visuals or games like Tekken or Ridge Racer in the home. We'd never had a fully 3D environment to explore like we were introduced to in Tomb Raider, and we'd never raced futuristic hovercrafts in weapon-fueled races like we did in WipEout.
Today we're looking at Tekken 6, Ridge Racer 8, Tomb Raider ?, WipEout 4, Resident Evil 5, etc. It's all the same games but with flashier graphics and some online play added along with HD visuals.
Nowadays I'm more focused on Web Design than gaming, but while I believe I've seen it, done it, and worn the t-shirt ... younger gamers are quite rightly lapping the current generation up.
