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While traditional entertainment media such as radio, recorded music, and magazines continue to see their yearly revenues decline, one sector that has continued to outpace the rest of this market in growth is the video game industry.

PC and console games sell by the millions, rivalling the popularity and hype surrounding new film releases or tech gadgets.

Gamers are largely considered one of the most loyal and discerning customer bases, with fans paying close attention to gameplay developments and hardware specs to ensure they get the best gaming experience possible.

Several years ago, the market was dominated by PC games, but the rise of consoles such as the PlayStation, Wii and Xbox began to steal the limelight away from PC gaming systems.

Many wrote off PC gaming as a soon-to-be extinct segment of video gaming, but recent purchasing trends among gamers indicate that the PC game is making a comeback.

What makes PC gaming still a popular choice among diehards? For one, PC game systems still deliver much better performance as far as processing power and graphics.

The Wii has a processing power of 250 MHz, while the PS3 and Xbox 360 clock in at 550 MHz and 500 MHz, respectively. Compare that with a PC’s average GPU of 1GHz, and it is easy to see why gamers who appreciate high definition graphics tend to favor the PC.

As far as cost goes, a $300 average price for a console may be hard to negate, but the price of a good-quality PC gaming system is not sky-high either.

On the other hand, you will find more game titles for PC, as well as valuable online resources and game distribution networks such as the Steam. Huge discounts on PC titles are also more common because of the  mostly digital distribution these days.

With these in mind, PC gaming looks like it’s not going anywhere anytime soon.