Fun is subjective - for some people, fun is comfort of the couch and gamepad, and for others it's accuracy and so on. Different folks, strokes etc.

Mouse and keyboard provide a freedom of movement that i could never get outta gamepad, fps and most third person shooting games always felt right with mouse and keyboard but platforming and fighting games is meant for gamepads, especially the bloody quicktimes

eh. "better" and "fun" are rather different concepts really.

Sure i played Tie-Fighter through with mouse (and broke it while doing so) - but i did then go and buy good ol' Gravis Analog joystick and enjoyed X-Wing with it.

So yeah, ofcourse you can have whole lot of fun despite having say too old computer or only semiworking gamepad on console - but if you put mouse-kb player vs gamepad player, i would dare to say its pretty clear who has the advantage there.

Then again, there is matter of taste to autoaiming for example, so no point in going too deeply into it.

Anyways, as long as one is having fun, its stilly to take these things to "puritist level...BUT i personally feel pc has simply the advantage here that pc games can be developed to be more complex and customizable, because there is no need for them to be solely working on gamepad alone - as is the case with console games.

Sure you got joysticks and wheels on consoles, but outside Steel Batallion consoles just dont offer too much for "enthusiast" like myself ;)

Just want to point out, usually (at least in the ones I've played), you can at least turn aim assist off. I always do.

Whether a large proportion of people do that or not, I don't know (to be honest I doubt many people even go into the options, but who am I to tell them how to play).

I'd like to see a bunch of console gamers play Quake 3 Arena on a pad against PC gamers on KBM.

Easy, consoles are more affordable for the masses and putting FPS games on them is a no brainer in terms of making money. I do not have problem with console shooters personally, I mean I freaking LOVE Perfect Dark, the Timesplitters series, Metroid Prime, the original Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and I can't forget The Darkness. My problem is how quite a bit of console gamers are quick to shrug off an FPS classic if it does not work well with, or even at all with a controller. A personal story related to this involves a close relative of mine wanting to play Deus Ex: Invisible War on his laptop after playing it on the original Xbox years ago. The game, as far as I am aware, does not support game pads and he eventually gave up on playing it on his PC since he does not want to give in to using a mouse and keyboard setup.

Actually, I would kill to see a console gamer try to play any of the ArmA games with a controller, not impossible, but considering the accuracy needed for those games, it would be an insane challenge in my eyes.

Consoles appeal more to most consumers due to convenience and ease of use. Halo proved that while not as good as mouse and keyboard a pad could do FPS games well enough.

It's not complicated, really.

I first played FPS 20 years ago, and I agree that keyboard+mouse combo is a lot better than any pad controller, I have to admit that the FPS I loved the most is a console one... Exhumed (or Powerslave in the US) console port - especially the Saturn version - was better than the PC version, IMHO.
But it is the exception ;-)

For the same reason why mobile games thrive even with their silly touch interface: much more users.

So maybe FPS games will also be primarily played on tablets in near future, no matter how much we shake our heads. :)

It is still kinda funny in a way, as I recall in the "good old times" how the consensus among console-only players seemed to be that FPS games are quite uninteresting, and online multiplayer games even less so. One argument against e.g. online gaming I heard quite often was e.g. "playing Tekken 5 or Virtua Fighter 8 online would suck, because you need to react in a fraction of a millisecond" etc.

How times have changed, now console gamers are happy to play FPS games online. :) I guess the success of XBox and Halo series are quite much to blame for that, even though there certainly were Medal of Honor and Call of Duty games on consoles (or Goldeneye and Turok series on N64), even without Halo.

I quite liked Halo and Halo 2!

On PC, that is. I hated Halo 2 on XBox, the controls were atrocious. Not being able to jump and aim at the same time, what the heck? No such limitation on the PC version.

I still have them both installed in case I get an urge to replay them (especially the ending race of the first Halo, it is oddly both exciting and relaxing at the same time).

I thought the first 3 Halo's were fun. ODST was for people who wanted extra challenge and Reach for people that wanted more powers and multiplayer options. I remember Mass Effect had kind of bad menu/UI system for PC. The menu was the same on console but worked way better with a controller. It's stuff like that that sets the genre back, but you could make that argument for any gamepad vs keyboard/mouse game.

Easy. Laziness.

It's so easy to put an FPS on a console, take most of the control out of the players hands with excessive aim assistance and linear, hand holding level design.

It pays off immensely for anyone who wants to turn off their brains, flop on a couch and lazily blast through a movielike experience, it also grabs a lot of attention-span deprived younger gamers, they get big, explosive spectacle and are tricked into thinking they are good at something considered "hardcore".

It's amusing to me that people treat COD as "hardcore" when in reality it's the most "casual" FPS on the market.

It'd turn out much like Goldeneye for the Wii where you have a choice of dual analog or pointer controls, and the average, skilled pointer player will completely kurb somp the analog player.

Probably the genre devolved with that. What is sad is that they specifically make the shooters today accommodate the console infrastructure witch introduced many gimmicks like regenerating health, press X to JUMP (cutscene...), tap A as fast as you can to avoid B, crapload of quicktime events, corridor linearity, lack of freedom of movement, lack of button usage (restricted to controller)

What's more sad is the "Put up or shut up" mentality they try to impose on the PC gamer... we can be clad there are still devs out there that don't support that mentality, otherwise games like quake, doom, half-life, painkiller, serious sam, stalker to name a few, could become nothing but forgotten relics...

Fortunately there are thousands of user made levels, many of good quality, to choose from for Doom 1-2, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake 1-2, Unreal, Unreal Tournaments, Half-Life, plus many more.
The consoletards can keep their linear cinematic cover shooters.

As for the widespread 'Console FPS games are so much less complex than those on PC hurr durr!', that's bullshit. Rage showed us control scheme which actually allowed for great complexity, including inventory items, their use, full range of weaponry, just everything. FPS games in general are more complex today than they ever were in the past - they do require less skill, but that's due to evolution of market and due to popular demand, not because they're 'on consoles'

Most of the games you have named can be mapped and played on a controller without any real issues you know, 'lack of buttons' is a terrible argument, especially when it comes to FPS.

Like Bioshock, Bioshock Infinite, Rage, Shadow Warrior, Far Cry 2, Far Cry 3... Oh, wait, they all worked perfectly fine on a controller and were less or just as linear as most FPS ever made for PC.

Oh right, and they didn't use cover mechanics, aside from Far Cry 3 which had buttons to peek over whatever constrained your vision