Take-Two CEO Says Gaming is Moving Towards PCs, But Consoles Aren't Going Away - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 18 November 2025 / 2,101 Views
Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick in an interview with CNBC states that video game industry is moving towards PC and being a more open business, however, video game consoles are not going away.
"I think it’s moving towards PC and business is moving towards open rather than closed," said Zelnick.
"But if you define console as the property, not the system, then the notion of a very rich game that you engage in for many hours that you play on a big screen — that’s never going away."
Zelnick added the split between consoles and mobile is about even, but mobile is growing faster than consoles.
Microsoft now releases all Xbox games day one on PC, while Sony has been releasing most PlayStation games within a year or two of release on PC. Nintendo has yet to start releasing games on PC.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can follow the author on Bluesky.
More Articles
Considering Valve is launching a pc/console hybrid, Xbox will be doing the same, PlayStation seems to be eyeing a pc launcher...
Yeah, it very much seems like this is true
yeah this is true. Heck tomorrow I'm getting a Windows PC for the first time in many many years, specifically for gaming, and it's been about 25 years since I last got a computer game other than the two cheap Steam games I own.
I can't imagine a reason to own an Xbox at this point, and even for Playstation there doesn't seem to be much point since most games come out on PC. Nintendo still has a reason to be owned, since they make some of the best games money can buy and they'll never be on PC, but they've also abandoned affordability and consumer friendly practices this year, so suddenly playing computer games for the first time in about 25 years feels like a good idea.
And unlike 25 years ago when I last played computer games, the two markets (console games and computer games) are no longer entirely separate. As this article points out, most games come to PC and many, especially small indies, are PC-first. The console form factor, and especially the Switch's TV-plus-portable form factor is still nice to have, but with Steam making console-like devices these days, and the way the market is these days, consoles feel a lot less necessary these days other than if you can't live without Nintendo games. And honestly, if Nintendo weren't so conservative, they'd realize their business could benefit a huge amount by putting their games on PC, as they would rack up millions of extra sales for every game that would far outweigh any loss of hardware sales, especially given that software sales drive way more profit than hardware does.
For this current/next console gen I think my Switch backlog and buying the occasional game on Steam for my Windows machine is all I need.
When did Nintendo ever employ consumer friendly practices? They've been about the least consumer-friendly of any of the big video gaming companies for the entirety of their existence, as near as I can tell.
As long as the ecosystem and exclusives are good enough.... I don't think they will go anywhere.
I guess that depends on your baseline (specs) of what is considered a gaming PC. Someone at Valve recently stated the steam machine is faster than 70% of all systems that use steam.
https://www.techpowerup.com/342970/valve-claims-steam-machine-outperforms-70-of-current-gaming-pcs
However, considering the spec jumps in requirements these days and definitely considering the vastly expensive components then I think these comments are far from true.
Since the Steam Machine seems to be just below the base PS5 in terms of power, this would mean that the more powerful consoles outperform 70% of gaming PCs as well. Surprising, I guess. Or is it?
Probably, a lot of steam users use IGPU to play games.
Not me-As long Sony & Nintendo continue to make consoles I’ll be there day one to purchase them.
Gaming he's talking about is moving toward Steam, and Steam is moving toward...well, everything. Given that there's native SteamOS now on ARM, and by the next year we'll be seeing ARM SoCs with hardware TSO (Total Store Order) memory support that will mitigate CPU translation penalty that currently x86/64 to ARM code has, Steam will be everywhere, from classic PCs, Steam Machine, XBOX "PC", ARM PC's, AMD/Intel Handhelds and ARM handhelds.
One library, many devices.
Console prevalence is tough to predict. Consoles could largely be irrelevant in markets by 2040, or they could still be successful in 2075.
PC offers a lot more freedom but can be inconvenient for many. And Nintendo fans need Nintendo hardware to play the games. I think even Nintendo will eventually put some games on PC but not during this generation.
Well, yeah, that couldn't be more obvious.
