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Video Game Consoles Are 'Fundamentally Doomed,' Says Lord British
zacharye writes "Microsoft sold nearly one million Xbox 360s last week alone, but we're nearing the end of the road for video game consoles according to one industry visionary. Richard Garriott, known for having created the fantasy role-playing franchise Ultima, says converged devices such as computers, smartphones and tablets will soon render dedicated game consoles obsolete: '... the power that you can carry with you in a portable is really swamping what we've thought of as a console.'"
He doesn't really talk about consoles being doomed per se. He talks about how tablets and smart phones are soon so powerful that they can render the same quality graphics that consoles can, and people can just plugin their smartphones to TV to play. He also says the technical limitations again push people to make fun and interesting games instead of just going for the graphics. He then mentions how Facebook games are an interesting platform and they're fundamentally very same to MMO games which sell users items, just that they are played on Facebook. He also said that mobile phone games have given him much more fun than computer or console games. As far as computers go, he didn't say computers are going to render game consoles obsolote - just that people are going to play on Facebook, or their service, using them.
;-).
And I agree with him. The technical limitations does make developers concentrate on the fun side of things. But that is also true for indie titles. Indie developers don't have the budget to make the best looking games, so they have to concentrate on making them fun. But I have to admit, large companies have started to notice too. They do have their big name franchises like Call of Duty and Battlefield, which are very fun in their own ways, but you have to admit that even large companies have put out very fun games lately.
Of course, Valve was again one of the first western companies who saw this and did it right with Team Fortress 2. They put out the game for free and let people buy weapons and miscelannelous items from the store. Yet, the weapons people can buy are not overpowered and can be got via drops, trading or crafting too. In some cases the stock weapons new players get are actually the best ones. The other ones only vary your gameplay style, so it's up to you which you use, but none is really better than another. And the game is absolutely fun and hilarious online, as it has great comedic aspect too.
As much as Slashdotters hate everything-Facebook, I do like some games there. It's getting really really better lately, and is only going to do so as companies are starting to fight to gain users. This is only good, as it means better quality games which aren't out there just to make quick cash. They have to put out quality to get any new players. The social aspect in Facebook games is great. I have several South Korean girls I play Sims Social with and have had interesting chats with them on the side (and they're cute too, ofc
I also played Civilization World, which is Facebook version of Civilization series. You get assigned to some server with up to 200 players (if some of your friend is already playing, you usually end up on same). If you don't join others you're independant nation, but if you do and it's recommended, you're one city of the civilization you join. You improve your own city, take battles by assigning your troops along with other players troops from your civ, and just work together. Even if it was still a little bit buggy, I had a late fun night playing with some US guy when all others had already went to sleep and we had to defend our civilization together. As the battles take time (so that players have time to come put more troops even if they're not in the game all the time), it got hectic and a gamble of which weather (and effects) we would get to defend against much larger nation.
So yes, game consoles might be going away, but not the way it's implied.
As a PC gamer I can't wait for consoles to finally die, fewer crap console ports and PC exclusives tend to be better anyway.
To offset political mods, replace Flamebait with Insightful.
... is master of none
Weren't PCs going obsolete a couple of years ago because the new gaming platforms (360, PS3, Wii) could also stream media?
I don't see the game console going away.. It's just going to evolve into more of multimedia device. Really it already has..
My game consoles spend more time streaming Netflix then playing games these days.
If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur. --Red Adair
The console war is over. The next war will be the STORE WAR: Steam vs Origin vs PSN vs Live vs...
your smartphone is a bit more difficult to pile a bunch of buddies on a couch and have a fuckton of fun for hours on end, and a touch screen is a bitch for complicated controls.
now go back to whatever cave you crawled out of lord brittish
I GET IT!
There's a spot in User Info for World of Warcraft account names? Really?
We have come to a point where most of the computing elements are way more powerful than what the human eye demands in graphics even to the extent of photorealism. See, i ran the hell out of star wars the old republic with my 6950 radeon gpu and amd phenom ii 965 cpu in its beta - and in 5040x1080 3 monitor eyefinity resolution. it played overly smooth in 40 fps minimum. Granted, swtor is not a photorealistic 3d rendered game, however, it is very taxing when you factor in the fact that it is a mmo with endless differently textured toons (clothing, armor, face differences) converging on small spaces like coruscant. So, my phenom ii 965 cpu, which is not even a top tier offering in current cpu generation, not only ran the game perfectly, but also stayed so idle that i didnt even hear the cpu fan increase speed at all -> i use a 12 cm fan, and its already VERY silent too. if you go into games like crysis 2 et al, you will find that these games run on consoles very well, and on pc they run even faster.
so, we can easily say that cpus are already over a point where we could consider them a limiting factor for good looking games. the only remaining factor becomes, gpu.
granted, my 6950 is a last generation, top offering card. and even if cpu power had become way too much over the needs of games and graphics cards to become irrelevant after a certain tier, its not possible to play down the mandatory element, the graphics card yet.
but, there are already major strides in this area - amd has already succeeded in fusing cpu and gpu in the form of 'apu', and these apus do low power usage and provide good performance in entry-mid level laptop and netbook market. granted, they are not enough to provide top performance as we see it in pcs yet, but more apus will be coming. this means, we are moving towards a future in which the two indispensable elements of gaming, the cpu and gpu, will be both merged in one unit with top grade components. (next gen apus are to come with 7xxx cores)
so then, indeed lord british is right. you already merged, and optimized cpus and gpus in a form that it will be possible to game in a notebook. the only thing you need for this to become a reality in smartphones, is only more miniaturization and increased efficiency of this concept. and it is, as you know, a given in tech world. and im not even talking about the processors that are developing from the mobile computing vector.
there are already versions of 3d games that play on smartphones. in future, we will indeed be able to plug a device to tv or a monitor and just play.
Read radical news here
We have to tell a bunch of geeks now who Richard Garriott is?
Anyway, he's right: mobile devices are going to kill consoles, and probably PCs too. Mobile convergence is the future: wireless connections to your screen and keyboard when you need it from a device that fits in your shirt pocket and has a modern GL-ES GPU on board for gaming needs.
By this definition of consoles, they died out five years ago. The current generation are already going very far out of their way to be multipurpose devices. They all have Netfllix, which is an ENORMOUS draw, and probably drives most Wii purchases these days. Two o them have browsers, they can all play music and display your photos, two of them can initiate voice/video chat over the internet. They can all send messages.
They're locked down, yes, but so is the iPad. It's so locked down, and its base software is so limited that I'd say the only difference between it an a current-gen console is online store policy. If Xbox LIVE allowed third parties to sell utilities and productivity tools, the two platforms would be conceptually identical.
Man who built his fortune and reputation on one platform declares the competition to be obsolete, overrated.
I'm sure this isn't an opinion he's had since the 1980's or so...
Phones today are capable but when the latest gen of consoles were released the phones were much more primitive. Certainly whatever you can pack into a phone, you can then pack 10x the power into something 10x bigger that a phone. I don't see this fundamentally changing soon?!
Apple are dumbing down the Mac, moving it away from being a high end professional computer, turning it into an overgrown iPad. Microsoft are turning Windows into an oversized Windows Phone OS. PCs are turning into consoles, and it is the serious personal computer that is threatened with extinction.
-- The Grand Teddy Bear has Spoken: "Windows 8 Source Code Available NOW! more disgusting than your pr..."
As long as people like me exist who want to play games on the big TV in the living room with an actual controller, consoles will not die. What is going away is the console that can only play a game, which is being replaced by devices that have apps as well as games. This is already happening in the current generation of consoles.
When the hell did a computer become a 'converged device'?
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
If you can get people to pay as much for console games as for tablet/mobile games, maybe, otherwise you're just not getting the return to make 'blockbuster' titles like GTA/GoW/Uncharted etc. (or is that already considered 'hardcore gaming'?)
Technology is not the issue here, it's just cash. If a game costs millions to produce, you're not gambling on a market where you need sell 100M but on a market where 1M units will make you break even. Consoles are not technological wonders, they are content platforms.
The GameBoy/GameGear/Lynx would have killed the industry some 20+ years ago. PSP has been around for years. Remember the Nokia N-gage? Gaming rig and phone all in one, and (ignoring its shortfalls) akin to a modern smart phone in many ways.
Statements predicting doom and gloom for the console industry seem to surface every now and then, i'll believe it when I see it. And don't get me started on the PC industry killing the console industry, I've heard that one before too.
A 7"/10" tablet or a 4" phone screen will NEVER replace a gaming console. There are many many factors that make this an insane and retarded statement.
1) Game controller. Yes the kinect is interesting. Yes gyros can provide an intersting experience as well. But can you do a 16 hour gaming session waving your arms around like that (both kinect style or wii style with a large tablet). The standard game controller is a perfect interface for most games, and an OK stand in for others (FPS games should be with a mouse).
2) As mentioned above: Screen size.
3) Social gaming (in close physical proximity). A big screen is ideal for this. Tablets (or worse phones) are just too small to share.
4) Touch screens suck for the vast majority of stuff. Motion control is just behind it in usability. With touch screens a large number of games are not playable because your hand is blocking critical space on the screen.
There are more.. but there's beer in the NOC and I'm thirsty.
That's what some in the industry would love to happen, no doubt. They can have my desktop machine (with its desktop interface) when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
the Smart TV industry will kill the PC industry, because you can now do things like surf the net and Skype? In that case, the PC industry better hurry up killing the console industry, they've been working on that one for two decades.
I lost me sig.
Yes, he gave us the Ultima series and Ultima online. He also failed to get the sequel done, and gave us...Tabula Rasa. This is the game he changed genres on in midstream, put out an unfinished game, then, as the game danced on the edge of oblivion, decided to play Major Tom. Yeah, a prophet he is not.
Tablets killed the console killed the desktop killed the video killed the radio...
Check your premises.
They don't have to. They can just not sell you a new one when it breaks. They can just not allow "non-trusted devices" on the internet.
You'll bend to their will. Wait and see.
man its so hard to buy a gamepad
Actually, it is hard. First, most game controllers sold for use with PCs are either Microsoft, Logitech, or Gravis, and those brands have had decidedly subpar directional pads over the years compared to, say, Nintendo or Sony.
and hook your tv to the computer these days
Actually, it is hard. Most major-label PC games are not made with modes designed for PCs connected to televisions because apart from a tiny market of HTPC geeks, nobody wants to connect a PC connected to a television. (See previous comments: 1 2 3 4 5) A lot of gamers have trouble even connecting a DVD player to a TV, let alone a PC. (6 7) Furthermore, the major PC game publishers think they can make more money by selling a separate copy of the game per player vs. per household, as Cracked columnist David Wong has pointed out.
Has become a bitter vet... I guess when you get bought out by EA whose idea of innovation is gobbling up studios and churning out Football manager 2008^H2009^H2010^H2011^H2012 ad nauseam, I guess you think that gaming has no future. I've heard this all before - wait, Chris Roberts used to say this 20 years ago. Ah, Chris Roberts also worked at Origin. I see a connection...
The future is always different, but always bet against the guy who says there is no future.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
So let me get this straight, I've got these nice controllers, I've got this motion sensor/mic combo, so in order to play a game, I'm to hook up some random piece of hardware from random manufacturers with random capabilities up to the TV, pair it with the controllers, probably plug it in because the battery life isn't going to be good, and not use it as my phone while I'm doing so?
How about this. I press a button on a box (one that cost me less than my phone did) then pull out my phone to ask my friend to come over and play Gears with me.
Yeah I'm totally sold on that first scenario...
I suppose I could instead buy a separate machine for my TV. Doing that I could even design/get it specifically designed for a livingroom environment. Hey- wait a minute.
The difference between such a PC and a console is that a living room PC would have solo productions like Bob's Game and indie games developed by a 2- or 3-man family business. But then next to nobody wants to play a game developed by a micro-ISV in a small city; instead, as CronoCloud has pointed out in a previous comment, they want to play games developed by people who have had to move to a different state for their video game development apprenticeship.
Just because Adobe is abandoning Flash-in-the-web-browser doesn't mean it isn't pushing a Flash-in-a-separate-app environment that it calls AIR.
You say that like the major consoles don't have marketplaces. From my understanding it is not terribly expensive to develop an indie game for xbox. With the current popularity of app stores I would be blown away if the next generation of consoles did not have Android/iPhone style marketplaces. (Also pretty disappointed.)
Mobile phones are just another platform to experience gaming. Mobile platforms are becoming more like gaming consoles. With technologies like wireless display (WiDi), etc you may be able to run a virtual xbox 360 straight from a mobile device on to the display of your choice. Good times!
I didn't like spending the equivalent of a new console every year or two on a video card.
The first of the three current-generation video game consoles, the Xbox 360, was first sold six years ago. This means if you own all three consoles, you've already been spending the equivalent of a new console every two years since 2005, plus the extra $10 or more per game that a lot of developers charge for their game to cover the console maker's fee. Are PC games nowadays really so demanding that you can't run them on a couple-years-old video card even if you turn the detail down?
Every phone so far that has attempted to be a gaming console has been a failure. And frankly, I don't want a phone to do that any ways. I want my game console to be connected to my TV, and have a controller that works well for the game. Any game that is significantly more complicated than Tetris isn't worth playing on any phone that I would want to own.
... what's the word ... talk on our phones. And a dead battery from too much Call of Duty Twelve doesn't help that.
And on top of that, phones are doing so many things now that battery life is starting to fall again. If we throw more games at them, battery life will only get worse. Some of us want to
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
From my perspective, consoles just got good. I grew up with both video game consoles and computer gaming, and they both offered something different. It is true what they are saying that console gaming is becoming more and more like PC gaming, but the result for me isn't that consoles are being eliminated or made redundant/obsolete, but rather consoles have simply gotten better. I have both a gaming computer and a PS3; I'd rather play games on the PS3. Console games today have robust networking and data storage, offer easy software updates, good graphics, good control schemes, and are a natural part of a home theater system.
Well, there goes the 'sell below cost and recoup the money on game licensing fees' business model.
Hence the requirement for a valid $60 per year subscription to Xbox Live Gold to use Netflix on an Xbox 360.
The current generation of consoles are old and nowhere near the capability of a modern PC.
Yet a lot of console games still support two, and in some cases four, players per machine while most PC games (with a handful of exceptions) support only one despite the fact that PC-compatible TVs have been affordable for the past half decade. Part of this capability comes from a mental set among gamers against connecting a PC to an HDTV, and part comes from publishers wanting to sell multiple copies to a single household.
The main difference between the various PC and console platforms is the controls. If you back at the 1990s you can see fundamental differences in game design between consoles (played with one or more gamepads on a sofa) and PCs (played with a keyboard, mouse, and possibly joystick at a desk). Unfortunately, you can't really design for one set of controls if you're making a cross-platform game. It used to be that PCs and console had totally different genres. Now we're adding smartphones to the mix. I wonder what compromises will be made to support touchscreens?
Visit the
[Consoles like Wii are] locked down, yes, but so is the iPad.
There's a difference. Nintendo requires each developer to have a dedicated secure office and a track record on another platform, and it also requires all games to be rated by ESRB (minimum $800 per title) instead of self-assessed. For a micro-ISV, these requirements alone dwarf the circa $1600 entry fee (Mac+iPad+first year of iOS Developer Program) for iPad software development.
Computers are far more powerful and should be able to demolish consoles in performance but they don't. With all the mobile technology advancements consoles now have the oppertunity to really rival desktop performance since consoles seem to be so much more efficient in playing games. As long as the console developers compete on price the average person will likely prefer to just buy one of the three main consoles at a few hundred dollars than look through the thousands of "gaming computers" available ranging from the same price as a console to up and over a thousand dollars.
The mouse and keyboard keep many gamers on the computer but developers could easily start supporting mouse and keyboard for consoles. At this point it seems like if Steam wasn't around the PC game market would be anywhere near as large as it is now.
From my understanding it is not terribly expensive to develop an indie game for xbox.
Xbox Live Indie Games overhead is comparable to that of iPhone or iPad, and in fact Apple appears to have copied the iOS Developer Program's price structure from that of XNA Creators Club (now App Hub). But Nintendo's overhead costs are much higher than that, and I can provide citations if you want.
He says, mobile devices will become so powerful that, we will be able to plug them into monitors or tvs and play games. therefore removing the need for pcs and consoles for games.
Read radical news here
Microsoft [gamepads] have had decidedly subpar directional pads
The wired Xbox 360 gamepad can be hooked up directly to most any modern PC.
I know. I have one. I have used it with a Windows PC and a Linux PC. And its D-pad sucks on the PC just as much as it does on the 360.
The PlayStation 3 pad is only marginally more difficult to set up. Even the Wii remote can be made to work with a Bluetooth connection and only a minimal bit of jiggery-pokery.
I have four questions about this:
Origin, 20 years ago, was an independent company, and gave use Wing Commander, Privateer, Ultima Online.... Don't compare the EA ransomed POS that Origin has been gimmicked into now, to the one that wasn't EA, 20 years ago.
Most LCDTVs today have a dedicated VGA port and and audio in that make the process neigh idiotic to accomplish.
I understand this. You understand this. Most people reading this comment understand this. In fact, for a while, I was using an HDTV as my primary computer monitor. But outside of geeks like us, almost nobody is willing to carry a PC tower into the living room and then carry it back to the computer desk once finished playing the game.
Most new video cards of moderate power have the ability to output through HDMI or s-video, either through adapter or dedicated port.
I am aware of this, and I own such an adapter. But these adapters are sold only online, not in stores, and most people don't know they exist.
Using your PC as a console today is far easier than it was just 5 years ago.
I know this. You know this. Yet after five years, HTPCs are still a rounding error compared to the console market.
and as a bonus, I can still play my entire game collection over the last 25 years, on one box, which also does many more functions.
Twenty-five years? That reaches back to 1986 and includes 1992-1995, the days of 16-bit games designed for Windows 3.1. I'm aware that DOSBox runs a lot of games designed for MS-DOS and games designed for DOS extenders (DOS4GW and then CWSDPMI), and Windows 7 can run a lot of games designed for Windows 95 and later. But that still leaves Windows 3.1, whose apps don't work in 64-bit Windows. How do you ordinarily run games designed for Windows 3.1? And you mentioned owning a PlayStation 2; which PS2 emulator for PC do you recommend?
Maybe the PC as in x86-still-compatible-with-the-IBM-5150-running-Windows-and-all-its-malware PC will die (good riddance, honestly), but between the hobbyist urge that created the first home computers in the first place, and Linux, a PC-like device will never die. It will just return to it's proper caretakers: true geeks.
"A friendly reminder that a keyboard and mouse is the controller setup that brings the most enjoyment of games to those who care about optimizing their game-playing performance. Thanks!"
Good luck plugging four mice and four keyboards into one PC for a 4-player fragfest like people used to do with N64 gamepads in the Goldeneye 007 days.
I don't think so..
There will always be demand for more realistic games, better graphics and more powerful gaming systems with more memory etc, for cheaper.
Sure, pretty soon we'll see PS3 graphics on a cell phone, but imagine putting that kind of today's tech in the console form factor so that the clock rate and number of cores can be ramped up.. Now you have even even better graphics and more immersive games in the living room. It doesn't matter how far the handheld tech gets, the stationary form factor can take it further just by the amount of watts and cooling power available.
Not when everyone has a smartphone
But as of the fourth quarter of 2011, not everyone does. Let me know when smartphones reach 75% of gamers including children. Until then, good luck affording $240 a month for four cell phone lines so that you can all play video games together every other weekend, especially if one of the players is a dumbphone-carrying skinflint like me who pays $7 a month to Virgin Mobile USA for those few calls that can't wait for a land line. And as Osgeld mentioned, good luck finding games that support iPhone vs. Android vs. BlackBerry vs. Symbian multiplayer.
If only geeks buy home computers, how will geeks ever have a market for what they make with those home computers?
I own none of the modern consoles, and bought a ps2 back in 2001 when it came out as a naive youngster who didn't know how horrible the closed system of consoles is.
But the economics of consoles make sense, for both developer and publisher, and that is why I don't see them dying off. Fundamentally, subsidizing hardware through self manufacture or using your push in the tech industry to get insanely low cost hardware made, and then after that selling it at a loss to get more initial purchases, just to make it up on a title fee for the next half decade makes great sense.
It's also the reason free to play games with cash shops are booming. If you can lower the barrier to entry you will almost always get more net return. You reach a divide when it comes to general purpose computers and gaming in the console-esque way, because there are two forces going against one another in the general market - the hardware manufacturer needs to maximize the profit made off the units, and that raises the barrier of entry to gaming hardware. That, and the best graphics will only be had on high end hardware specialized for gaming (which is just gpus in general now).
Consoles are so weak right now because the current generation is almost a decade old. Their tech specs are being bumped up against by Nvidias next couple Tegra iterations. When the Xbox 720 and PS4 come out on hardware that would cost an average joe $900 to buy but is brought down to $300 through M$ / Sony manufacture and retail deals thats where the idea of consoles works.
The reason it works also has to factor in the iron grip the price market for games is at. There are basically three tiers of purchased games (not free to plays, etc) - the app store $1 game, the indie $10 game, and the big studio $60 game, and outside of Steam sales there is no price variability. Gabe Newell realized this. The magic sweet spot of maximal profit is well below $60 in a digital distribution system, because the cost to reproduce is near 0, and if Steam integrated some peer to peer downloading client for the games it sells it would be practically 0. The only costs to developers is getting on widely used distribution platforms, but that isnt really necessary, you could just sell the game from the corporate website and cloud host the distribution. Much cheaper than either the Steam cut or physical retail but also requires some work. If the game price became as organic as it needs to become through digital distribution, games with high demand would have their price rise and games with low demand would drop their price to find a demand point. The point is to find the individual threshold they will pay for a given game - that is why piracy is so rampant. No one is at the personal purchase threshold they like the most when it comes to most titles.
You don't, you network two or more of them wirelessly. That's even better: everyone has their own view.
Which means you have to buy extra tablets of the correct platform and extra copies of each game for each person who comes to visit but does not own his own tablet and his own copy of the same game. A $649 Mac mini used as a media center PC is far cheaper than extra iPads for players 2, 3, and 4.
Games will adapt to the controls just like they adapted to console's lack of a keyboard/mouse combo.
At one time, I was a big fan of a certain fan-made Tetris clone, averaging 90 tetrominoes per minute in 40-line runs using a USB gamepad. That's the same as completing 40 lines in 1:07. Then I tried Tetris for the iPhone, and the control scheme was pure frustration. I don't see how I'd ever reach even half of 90 TPM in any purely touch-based control scheme. And how would you make touch control for a game like, say, Street Fighter?
He must be talking about the next Apple TV or the generation after that. The duh factor is too much to ignore on this one. Eventually, every Apple product will run off iOS thus expanding the gaming market to the TV too.
Life is not for the lazy.
*Everyone* is "Fundamentally Doomed."
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Extra Credits, a regular lecture on game industry topics with funny pictures hosted by Penny Arcade addressed this issue a while back. I found it very illuminating.
http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/consoles-are-the-new-coin-op
That is why the X-Box has been moving away from that for YEARS.....the X-Box 360 is pretty converged as an entertainment center device that also plays games. The next version will be even more so.
Game consoles did not arise because they were better. Game consoles arose because it was easier to implement DRM on console games than it was on PC games. They will remain around for much the same reason (although the gap is narrower than it was at the beginning).
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
If you want a computer spscificly built as a media center, you're going to spend more for less just for the fancy case.
Except a fancy case has a much better spouse acceptance factor than a big, loud tower. What's the most cost-effective way to address media center PC aesthetics?
Singular is playing a single player game, plural if playing a multi player game.
Provided the game even supports multiple controllers. Console games are historically much more likely to support this sort of multiplayer than major-label PC games. Otherwise, no matter how many controllers I have plugged into a hub, the game is going to see only one and expect the other players to be using their own computers and their own copies of the game.
The thing about consoles is that you don't have to worry about upgrading or compatibility, or anything like that. You buy your console, and have 10 years of assured gaming ahead of you, (nevermind those of us who love to dig out old consoles and play).
Speaking of, another nice thing about consoles is that all of the games made for it STILL PLAY. Almost none of my PC games play on my PC anymore because of everything being forcibly upgraded, if for no other reason then to be compatible with everything else that was forcibly upgraded. Super Mario Brothers still plays, Super Mario World still plays, Super Mario 64 still plays, Shadow of the Colossus still plays, and all of my PS3 games will still play long after I've upgraded to the PS4, (unless sony insists on continuing the idiotic naming system crowned with Vita, which looks exactly like a PSP, say... a PSP2... nah... that's just silly...).
Consoles are the level playing field of video games, whereas PC's require massive upgrading to survive 10 years, and a thousand smart phones pop up every year. Designing for consoles doesn't require millions of not billions of compatibility combinations that will likely be replaced by a billion more in a few years time. Not to mention that I do everything with my PS3 now, (dvd's, blu-ray's, games, netflix), why would I replace it with a crappy handheld that will probably break after the 10th drop? Sure, there's going to be competition, but there are too many reasons to keep consoles, if not expand them, (like they are right now).
You will be hard pressed to find a new TV or a new computer that do not use HDMI.
I would also be hard-pressed to find a household in which all TVs are new.
When I was a kid I lost a year of my life to Ultima IV. I remember holding down the space bar for 15mins at a time waiting for nightshade or mandrake root to appear. Graphics nothing compared to the games of today, but it was very fun to play. Since then I have never really been a gamer.
Got the app for my Samsung phone to talk to my Samsung Smart TV. It was a fun novelty, but after a while I put it back down and went to the PS3.
I think consoles will still be around, but the need for content distributed only on game disk will end. It's already ending with all the downloadable goodies on the Playstation store - including a ton of great older games I thought I'd never get to play again because their platforms (SNES...) are long since dead. I could never purchase another physical game in my life and be content with what I can get off PSN. The wise console makers will continue this course of converged services, providing a vast library of games in a platform specific store as well as the hardware necessary to drive them.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
PCs have had enough power (including GPU power) to compete with game consoles for a long time. Why didn't they?
Phones and tablets are beginning to approach the level of power of a PC. But they won't replace game consoles either. Why? Because, as with PC's, it's not about the processor or GPU power.
The game console has some strategic advantages over PC's and tablets: 1) it's cheaper than a PC or tablet, 2) it is specifically made for playing games, and 3) it sits next to the TV, permanently connected and ready to play. Just turn it on and go. No need to set up a connection each time you want to play. No need to go fetch the tablet to hook it up to the TV. It's already there.
Simply put, a multi-purpose device will never be quite as good at gaming as a dedicated gaming device.
Doomed? Like every game Richard Garriott has been involved with since 1998?
http://xkcd.com/484/
And I agree, I may have a fast PC to Crysis or whatever, but if I can, for example, play a Nintendo DS game on it's larger screen via an emulator, and if it's entertaining enough for me, why look else where?
I am an ACCA student. Got a query on Accountancy/Finance? Maybe I can help!
I thought at one time PC Games would take over, due to the high graphics, and over better play. The Amiga games from the early 90's late 80's were ahead of there time. Games like GTA Vice City finally looked like they had caught up, over 10 years later.
Ever tried playing a FPS on a tablet or mobile ?
I don't think consoles and PCs are doomed. Thanks to the mobile gaming all the cheap casual crap (nice alliteration actually, btw) will move there, and we can enjoy less, but better games that are acceptable to pay for.
Since the advent of the economic disasters, the last 2 years have shown that pc component quality is dropping. With the perpetual and persistent information erosion occuring on the web you may only occassionaly catch a whiff of the crap. These products are quickly dropped as a new version is released to hide the excessive failure rates. Everything from google to wikless (scoff) is merely an advertisment and meant to obscure facts.
After severe problems with both that uselss peice of crap windows7 (all idiots that think it is useful obviously was not doing too much with their OS years ago when the rest of us did not need their dumbed up solutions.) and video cards, motherboards, powersupplies and the like on the last few machines I have built, I'll be recommending consoles to many clients now considering the cost of videocards alone is more than a console.
(waggles hacker fingers)
This is not the device you don't want to trust...
My machine is my machine. If that's illegal, I'll break the law.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Or all the old games made with Klik & Play/The Games Factory. Or a lot of the puzzle games that were popular in the early 1990s, if you don't happen to own the console versions.
It just seems to me that most of the multi local player games are for kids
And a lot of households that have to worry about "spouse acceptance factor" have kids. What's the alternative to Super Smash Bros. series on PC? The difference between Super Smash Bros. and a PC game like Street Fighter IV is that Super Smash Bros. is what's called a "platform fighting" game: the arenas are larger and include varied terrain, and fighting tactics include jockeying for control of terrain.
The trend now seems to be network gaming
I tried playing a fighting game over the Internet. The control lag inserted to make netplay causal became unbearable.
something where they can siphon even more money out of the players wallet with monthly or yearly fees.
Or even just siphon more money out of the players' wallets by requiring four copies of the game per household, and diverting even more money toward the publisher's GPU maker strategic partners by requiring four gaming PCs as opposed to one gaming PC and three office PCs whose Intel graphics are good enough for homework and Facebook.
A media pc isn't viable because you can't watch sports on it (doubtful) and you'd only save (at worst) 5$ a month? I'll bet you that 5$ doesn't include a sports package and dvr.
The $5 does include ABC's cable sports channel ESPN, which shows Monday Night Football. If a game's on ESPN, it's probably blacked out on the league's online service.
Linking to your site's rants isn't helping. It takes A vs B and only lists cons for the one you don't like. Wouldn't you say there are many things you could access on your media_pc+tv that would be impossible with the best cable tv plan?
But they're things that non-geeks don't demand just yet. My aunt's husband, who is a school teacher by day and football and hockey fan by night, told me that if money were tight and he had to choose between cable TV + dial-up and cable Internet + Netflix, he'd go back to dial-up because he wants sports more than all the online programming he's aware of put together.
A lot of pc games don't allow multiple controllers? A lot of console games don't allow multiple controllers too.
It's not an absolute but a statistical tendency. Console games are more likely to allow multiple controllers than PC games, in large part due to most PCs' inability to display video on large monitors more than five years old without a $30 adapter cable sold only online.
If you only enjoy playing multiplayer games locally with 2-4 people and sharing a screen, then console is obviously what you'd want.
The trouble is that if a small family business were to develop a video game focusing on local multiplayer, they wouldn't be able to sell it at all. They wouldn't be able to sell it on PC because the PC demographic prefers games in genres not suited to local multiplayer, and they wouldn't be able to sell it on console because a home business does not meet the organizational qualifications of console makers. Or to put it another way: Let me know when Humble Bundles come to a platform that is also designed for such local multiplayer.
Computers with their better graphics cards and processors made consoles obsolete years ago but that didn't prompt a mass exodus to PC's. People like gaming on a big screen (who wouldn't) and I seriously doubt that will change any time soon. I just can't see a console with a 40-50 inch flat screen being replaced by a cell phone or tablet with almost no screen.
"We are just a war away from Amerikastan. When god vs god the undoing of man." Dave Mustaine
the deal with consoles is, you buy one, and for the next x years every game you buy will run on it and will have been optimized for that one hardware. Maybe future consoles will have an optional Android system or Linux system, the PS2/3 did that already... but it will still be a console, a frozen piece of hardware without upgrades.
Apple aren't dumbing down the mac. Nothing has been removed. They've added a couple of OPTIONAL components, and thats it. And after running lion for a bit, i've actually found a use for launchpad. I was skeptical at first, but if you set it up properly it means you can quickly flick to your application selection (when using a trackpad) without having to aim for anything or navigate your FS, or type into spotlight. Lion is clearly developed with trackpads in mind (which makes sense given most macs sold these days are notebooks) - if you use it with a trackpad for a while it makes sense.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
having created the fantasy role-playing franchise Ultima
Sorry, that's not much of a credential. That game has been nearly derelict for the better part of a decade.
As for the console's fate, I really like being able to go home and just hit the remote to play my latest favorite. No booting a PC, no software load times, no need for Anti-Virus or bloatware overhead. Just plug and play.
It's also nice to have something that is dedicated hardware for gaming, with pretty great specs. I don't know about the slashdot crew, but I don't think many people's home computer had a triple-core 3GHz processor with a serious graphics card when the 360 came out. It IS getting on time for a new version, though, as the general PC specs catch up.
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
Ultima VII had cool features like pixel-exact manipulation of objects, which wasn't a standard far until the advent of games that were done exclusively in 3D.
The dialogs were pretty extensive, and also depended on a basic questing system that remembered stuff.
You could stack stuff (z-axis) and walk on it, I loved stacking my gold bars on my flying carpet, although it looked weird because it's z-offset was too high.
Features like that may have been present in some other games before, but not in this combination. It felt more like a sandbox than a linear RPG, and as far as I'm concerned in this it was unmatched until the Fallout series.
Regarding Tabula Rasa, I played it a bit after they opened it up for all because they knew they would discard it, and things like the alien symbols were obviously designed to support a huge game-world.
So I think it may have been killed because the company expected short-term profits.
But I agree it would have been better for the game to spend less money on Richard Gariott and more on the game; on the other hand, I don't know exact numbers.
Hey don't blame me, IANAB
The truth is that consoles are evolving into the home media server. They were the original locked platforms, way before the iTunes and the iPhone. By having a game platform they have a market of customers ready for software makers and media. The platform is already DRM managed. The market is already established. Developers will want to build apps for it. The consoles are so powerful they can be used to transcode and store media for all your devices.
Eventually there will be versions of the console that aren't designed for fancy video games but are more generic media servers for those that don't play games because by then then people will have already bought into the locked apps and media and maybe they want to use another console for games but don't want to give up their apps. Also maybe the game platform locks up and they want to move the apps to an isolated and more stable box. All your email and files are stored on this media device. It becomes the home server. All your electronic devices coordinate with it.
The game console itself will evolve into a background network computing device. Becoming your cloud in the home. It merely broadcasts video streams over the home network rather than generating video signals directly. You connect to a virtual desktop computer though any video monitor connected to the home network. Add a wireless keyboard and mouse... and voila, desktop computer...
The HDTV video standard will become a thing of the past since the media will be compressed to video files that can more easily be transcoded to any number of resolutions and formats. Combo fiber optic/low voltage power cables will be installed through the home up to wall plates with routers built into them. Flexible copper wire will still be used to plug into them but given shorter distances of say 10 meters they will be able to handle unbelievable throughput.
Counter-point: World of Goo, an award-winning indie game developed by two people, got on WiiWare.
That said, just because you develop a game doesn't mean it should get published. If he acted like a baby about it then I honestly don't see why I'd want his game to be published. We don't know why he was denied an SDK; maybe he was just as rude and immature as he acted during the protest when he wanted an SDK.
"Our country is not nearly so overrun with the bigoted as it is overrun with the broadminded." -Archbishop Fulton Sheen
Graphics are not the roadblock anymore. Or, at least, they won't be soon. It is true that we are maxing out the graphics, but to imply that gaming doesn't need MORE POWER!!111!! is simply wrong. We are so far below "maxing out" games that it isn't even funny.
Consider for a moment the much loved Skyrim. The graphics are pretty (especially on a computer). They are not exactly 'maxed out', but they are reasonably close enough where going the last mile or two is not much of a selling point. What does that game lack though? It lacks a world that acts like a world unless we suspend disbelief in a very serious way. When you fling a fireball into the side of a snow covered mountain, nothing happens. At best, it leaves a little burn mark texture. When you open the door to a house, the game has to load the house. Hit a tree with your two handed sword, and it clangs off like you hit a piece of metal. Ice won't melt. Water won't freeze. Weather means nothings. Hit one of your fellow humans and you get a little blood squirt effect and their armor remains shiny and without a dent. Hell, just jump in a fast moving stream and notice that it doesn't freaking move you. Your actions against the Empire or Stormcloacks has no impact outside of the quest line. NPCs behave stupidly and don't run for help when a destruction magic wielding war god tears through their ranks. The list is basically endless.
The world doesn't need to be "realistic", but it does need to follow rules and make sense before we have declared that we have maxed out. Skyrim is about as good as it gets today (and take this as no disrespect to Skyrim, that game is fantastic), but it is leagues away from REALLY being as good as it gets. Maxing out on graphics doesn't mean that we are done. Graphics were just the low hanging fruit. Now it is time to go after physics and AI behavior. What we need is clear, MORE POWER!
If there is anything that PC gamers should be cursing console gamers for, it is for the fact that PCs have the power to kick gaming to the next level and start working these challenges, while consoles are weak and worthless machines that front load what paltry power they have into graphics (which are still not as good as on a PC). PC gamers and console gamers should collectively strangle the shit out anyone who suggests that phones with their even more flimsily specs are the next big things.
There is a certain amount of irony in this though. As a PC gamer, I will get a little sadistic joy out of seeing console gamers cry that portable devices are under powered crap with poor controls...
On the second page of the interview, Garriott talks about recent games that he has liked and mentions one called Spider.
Anyone know what game this is and can provide a link?
Ultimately people buy games for pleasure. Sure there are an awfully large number of people who buy a game to prove some sick, sadistic point that their sad little lives mean something, but for the majority games are a short excursion into fantasy and nothing more. When people buy games they want the games to work instantly. They do not want to buy a game and then spend endless hours upgrading their computers to run it at something close to promised specs, nor do they want to buy a new machine for each new version of a game. For most people the gaming path is:
Buy game --> Play game --> Get on with life
If what this gentleman is saying is that games for phones will replace games for consoles I agree. If he is saying that games for consoles will go away because the experience on PCs is far superior, then I call bullshit. In the end the majority of casual gamers do not care.
1. Sure mobile devices are becoming more and more powerful, but game consoles are also NOT standing still! When the next gen's arrive, they'll be WAY ahead of what mobiles & tablets can offer - but that is EXPECTED when you take the price and form-factor into account!
2. Even if a mobile/tablet could match the power of a dedicated gaming console .... I don't know about others, but I WANT a big screen to game on!
I want to play games on an 80 inch LCD TV. Unless they build game playing capabilities directly into my TV then I guess a "console" of some sort is required, whether that "console" is an attached PC, Tablet, or Smart Phone who cares. Console, by definition, is "something that attaches to your TV to play a game". I don't care what that console actually IS, just give me the ability to play in my comfortably in my living room. I agree that it may be the end of the road for "traditional" consoles from Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo but the game "console" will always exist as long as TV's exist.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
My 70" Plasma is very sure that consoles will continue to stick around. It begs to be used to play skyrim, battlefield, or the next great game.
I do security
Based on this page, I was under the impression that XNA required at least Shader Model 2.0, and I'm not sure what shader model the Intel GMA in the cheapest piece of dung Dell supports.
PCs and consoles are gradually becoming the same device, with one big exception: Interoperability. You can plug your phone or tablet into a PC. You can't even plug a keyboard into an XBox (and expect it to work). The funny thing is that Microsoft really is the front runner in both categories. I expect that a future XBox will run a Windows variant and will finally start using standardized I/O stuff. And MS will be in a strange Apple-like position of selling the software AND the hardware.
So we'll never see either the console or the PC die first, because MS will morph them together.