I've been as guilty as any doom and gloomer over the noticeable downtrend of the PC gaming market in the past few years, but there's no doubt to me that PC games are about to make a comeback.

Hello Spore, Left4Dead and Dragon Age. There are significant PC games on the horizon. The MMORPG market has exploded, thanks to WoW's high subscriber rate and I believe WAR will hit big and expand this even further. Plus digital distribution is finally poised to push brick-and-mortars into irrelevance.

The question is how much Microsoft will continue to botch it up and will Apple grow some PC gaming balls to take advantage of the missteps of Vista + DirectX 10?

Apple's PC marketshare is on the rise again. They've got some gaming fanbois despite themselves, thanks to Blizzard's stubbornness to give triple-A quality to their treasured platform. If they just tried a little, they could capitalize on the discomfort PC gamers are feeling from Microsoft's squeeze to push Windows Live.

Apple needs to do what Microsoft did once-upon-a-time and support PC game developers in a big way, flat out cater to them. This isn't Apple's strong suit, I think they like absolute control even more than the Redmond giant, but if they're going to do it, they should skip their usual tendencies and wrest the steering wheel away now before Microsoft realizes what they've screwed up.

They just need to convince one man really: Gabe Newell. He may not like Apple much, but he's an opportunist too. Partner with Valve, let them take the reins of a new gaming initiative for the Mac. If Apple was smart they'd realize these are the PC gaming savvy guys, they're the ones that get stuff done.

If Apple doesn't clue in quick, they'll still trickle in more marketshare, but they'll be missing out on an opportunity to grab the whole shebang while it's sitting right on the table being neglected.