Slashdot Mirror
When Consoles Lose, Everyone Wins
Ground Glass writes "Does the traditional knowledge that 'history is written by the winners' hold true with consoles? Perhaps, but there's more to it than that. Sometimes, systems that fail do so because their most salient concept was one no one was ready for - these provide future 'innovations'. Sometimes their loudest message was one only a niche group would ever want to listen to - they provide much needed perspective. In an early medium, the failures are the ones questioning what a game should be. It's no wonder the winners keep writing their ideas back in."
...and why should she get a Dreamcast?
From the more cryptic than usual subtitle up through the ambiguous main title (I thought at first glance this was going to be one of those PC vs. Console flamewar threads), right down into the body of the summary, this whole thing is incomprehensible.
Ever since that whole "Carnival of Games" debacle I have upheld that Zonk posts certain stories because he's either lost a bet or is banging the submitter. Even the blatant slashvertisements manage to slide through here with a lower WTF-quotient then some of these in-bred gamer-blog linkages.
Sure, I'm off-topic and I should be modded as such, but please, guys, take a little bit of this to heart and start taking the time to re-read these game section submissions not as professional game reviewers who are "in the club" but as a human might read them.
The big problem I have with the TFA is that it states that the purpose of niche products is to drive innovation among the market leaders. From a whole-market perspective, that may be the role they end up fulfilling, but that is not their purpose at all... their purpose is to make money for their producers. Failure to enter the market strongly is still failure.
In any established industry (as the videogame industry has become) there are market leaders with enough 'mindshare', and enough resources, to adapt innovations for their next release. As large companies, and given the nature of consoles, they are not likely to take a big risk with a major release (as stated in the article). Other, small, companies take those risks, and the next generation of major consoles will incorporate some of those innovations. This is just like a lot of industries -- look at the airline industry and how most of the large airlines now have regional affiliates modeled on JetBlue's pricing and service.
What's important to note, though, is that the Wii (which, in the end, is the focus of the article) doesn't fit the bill as well as the author would like. Nintendo is not a new, small company taking a risk by innovating. Nintendo is a former giant that that still commands a loyal following, yet is now more agile than its main competitors. What Nintendo has recognized is that there is no room for three 'major' consoles. So instead they opt to compete at a different level.
Not to knock on the Wii, but it really reminds me of Go-Bots... transformers for people who don't want to spend as much cash. The differences are that they have a following that will continue to love them despite the inferiority of their machine, they have a gimmick to promote interest in the new console (the controller), and the game franchise history they've established will sell consoles and games.
In the end, I think the Wii will be successful -- not because of any innovation, but because of pricing and because Nintendo will stick with the tried-and-true focus on games for kids.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Nintendo and Microsoft aren't really taking any risk, Sony is. Microsoft has lost so much money on their console business that throwing the XBOX 360 out there as quickly as possible made sense - it gave them all of the customers who didn't want to wait for Nintendo and Sony. Nintendo is releasing by far the cheapest machine that, except for the controller, is full of very solid technology. Very little risk there since the controller is a great gimmick and they can always change and they will always have their own games to rely on.
Sony, on other hand, doesn't even want to admit its box is "a mere console" and it is completely full of expensive new technology that gives it a huge price tag. Worse, it's hard to develop for and its price tag has to be making developers nervous. This probably means more expensive games for a more expensive console.
Sony and Microsoft seem to want to turn the console industry into something else while Nintendo is very happy making boatloads of money doing what it knows best. I don't know about you guys, but I am not in the market for a media center or another PC. Personally, I think the concept of a media center is some sort of corporate attempt to make me pay for a bunch of crap I don't need and won't use. And I definitely do not need another PC, especially one made by Microsoft. If I wanted to play PC games I'd play them on the several thousand dollar computer I already have, not a few hundred dollar console.
Here's my question: if the PS3 flops where will Sony's followers turn? Microsoft? Nintendo? Or will they abandon consoles entirely? I'd like to say they will turn to Nintendo, but I'm not so sure. I'm certain the Wii will do well, but I seriously doubt it can steal Sony's market share back. My fear is that certain developers will turn to developing solely on the XBOX and Nintendo / games / console will become the next Apple / OS X / Mac situation.
Of course, the PS3 is not here so this is all theoretical. Only time will tell if Sony's big investment will pay off, but if it fails I sincerely hope Microsoft does not get put in a position to dominate the console industry the same way it has dominated the OS industry or non-PC games are doomed.
Haiku for you!
Yes, I'm sure piracy was a HUGE factor, just like it was in bringing down the recording industry when cassettes became standard and everyone could copy songs freely. I'm so sick of people immeditately blaming piracy for the downfall of this or that product just because it's become fashionable with the RIAA and the MPAA -- there's no evidence that piracy has truly ever hurt any market. I think if it did MS wouldn't be a powerful corporation because Windows was pirated a great deal even before 3.1 days and their target market was much smaller. So consider that: if piracy hurts businesses so much, how did Microsoft survive when Windows and Office were pirated so much and their target market was much, much smaller in those days?
From what I've heard over the years one of the problems the Dreamcast had is that it was made by Sega, and developing games for it was too costly because they got too greedy. I don't know for sure because I wasn't there but I've heard it too many times from different sources to just ignore it. Sucks, because I wanted one. I wish it hadn't been like that because I think console tech would be at a higher level now than it is, but of course, this is a matter of speculation.
I dream of a better world... one in which chickens can cross roads without their motives being questioned.
There is a huge differnace wtih software piracy vs. music piracy. With bigger bands they receive royalties from radio play and all bands make money playing shows. With software/games you have only the sale. That is it.
Computers allow humans to make mistakes at the fastest speeds known, with the possible exception of tequila and handguns
I seem to recall Dreamcast did not require a modchip to play pirated games. You only needed a special boot disk of some kind which makes pirating way easier.
Oh, no no, it wasn't that hard. All you have to do is burn a CD. That's all. Granted, the format is *slightly* unusual, but you can burn a working DC disc using cdrecord quite easily. This is one of the reasons why it's such a fantastic homebrew platform (I picked up a used one just for that reason).
However, the DC also supported a weird hybrid CD which had a low density component and a high density component. These can't be burned using regular CD burners, AFAIK. OTOH, most games could be fit on a single regular CD.