You could say more polygons wouldn't bring anything new, but the ideas of games would change. Imagine what rpg's like oblivion would be like if there are an incredible amount of polygons, meaning the worlds are increasingly larger, and vastly more vivid bringing you into the game a lot more. Still is not directly related to consoles holding back, but if more powerful hardware, or smarter code design could be used. But since consoles are the prime market for gaming, you need to sell it on consoles and not only on pc to truly make the money. Since a small portion will be on pc, they tend to forget the power and concentrate on consoles. Then slapping on a sloppy port over to pc, with somewhat the same limitations in the game.
While this is factually true, in actual practice, given a game like Skyrim (to use your example), I don't think anything was held back in its design by the lack of polygons or for being designed with consoles in mind. Sure, you'll get a visual bump on a quality PC over either the 360 or PS3 versions, but the game is essentially the same. While this causes the PC interface to suffer a bit, again, to me that's a different issue and one that could easily be addressed by remapping the control scheme (and agree that it's something Bethesda should have already allowed for).
The bottom line is is that a game of Skyrim's achievement in scope (supposedly unlimited quests, vast world, ability to create items and potions, localized effects, a clockwork world, etc.) probably NEEDS the larger console buying market to get completed. The costs associated with making such a massive game available for JUST the PC (or in a world where only the PC existed) would probably have been prohibitive, so PC gamers should probably THANK their console cousins for the game's existence at all.
As for the Skyrim game itself, I can't imagine anything that they could have done to make it any better given a fair comparison to everything else out there, meaning they have established the state-of-the-present-art-in-scope. It's a "maxed out" game, with little I can imagine that could have been changed with a PC only target, even if such a targeting was even possible.
You could say more polygons wouldn't bring anything new, but the ideas of games would change. Imagine what rpg's like oblivion would be like if there are an incredible amount of polygons, meaning the worlds are increasingly larger, and vastly more vivid bringing you into the game a lot more. Still is not directly related to consoles holding back, but if more powerful hardware, or smarter code design could be used. But since consoles are the prime market for gaming, you need to sell it on consoles and not only on pc to truly make the money. Since a small portion will be on pc, they tend to forget the power and concentrate on consoles. Then slapping on a sloppy port over to pc, with somewhat the same limitations in the game.
While this is factually true, in actual practice, given a game like Skyrim (to use your example), I don't think anything was held back in its design by the lack of polygons or for being designed with consoles in mind. Sure, you'll get a visual bump on a quality PC over either the 360 or PS3 versions, but the game is essentially the same. While this causes the PC interface to suffer a bit, again, to me that's a different issue and one that could easily be addressed by remapping the control scheme (and agree that it's something Bethesda should have already allowed for).
The bottom line is is that a game of Skyrim's achievement in scope (supposedly unlimited quests, vast world, ability to create items and potions, localized effects, a clockwork world, etc.) probably NEEDS the larger console buying market to get completed. The costs associated with making such a massive game available for JUST the PC (or in a world where only the PC existed) would probably have been prohibitive, so PC gamers should probably THANK their console cousins for the game's existence at all.
As for the Skyrim game itself, I can't imagine anything that they could have done to make it any better given a fair comparison to everything else out there, meaning they have established the state-of-the-present-art-in-scope. It's a "maxed out" game, with little I can imagine that could have been changed with a PC only target, even if such a targeting was even possible.