Microsoft Confirms Work Begun on Next Xbox

Via 1up, an interview with Chris Lewis, head of Xbox Development in Europe. Along with some interesting discussion of X06 and aiming games at European markets, Lewis confirms what most people could reasonably expect: Microsoft is already hard at work on the next Xbox system. From the 1up article: "'You can't sit back on your laurels in this business - the consumer won't let you, the developers certainly won't let us. So that's happening right now,' ... In order to remain competitive, hardware manufacturers have to start thinking about the next cycle the moment work finishes on the current one. Ideas for the following generation were likely generated during the development of Xbox 360, and you can surely bet the same situations cropped up in the R&D rooms of Sony and Nintendo while working on PlayStation 3 and Wii."

Comments

Ideas for next-generation system

[cgenman]

Hardware HDR. Just give us a really broad palette to work with, and handle the HDR on-chip.

Profile login on a Sim card in the controller. The Xbox 1 had the right idea, but they milked the memory card price too much. Register your controller on the network by popping in a tiny / cheap sim card.

Network Storage. My web host offers 400 GB of storage and a ridiculous amount of bandwidth for not much more than a Live Gold account. Drop the hassle of memory cards, jump to Sim cards, and store the basic game info remotely.

Pad-based controller recharging.

Game Modding and user-created content. I don't know how this would happen, but it needs to happen.

Physics co-processor. There is enough particles bouncing these days that we should have some special purpose iron to help with the load.

Did Sega do the same?

[pluke]

Sega must have done the same when they were finishing the Dreamcast. I wonder at what stage the abandoned the plan and what they were planning to release?

Re:Good ole monopolistic competition.

[twistedsymphony]

according to TFA the 360 wont be replaced until sometime after 2010, so NO not 3 years. more like 5 or 6

I think the thing people don't realize is that the Xbox 360 didn't come early... the Xbox 1 came late.. the 360 was pretty much right on time. The Dreamcast kicked off the last gen in 1999 and The Xbox wasn't released until more then 3 years later, Sony had planned to release the following spring but was delayed, Nintendo almost always launches late (so they can have competitive tech at a lower price). The fact that Sony is launching the same time as Nintendo shows that they're late in this genreation. The fact that MS launched the same time as Nintendo last time showed that they were late to the last generation.