Will we ever have a death of the "console system"?

Some people have been referring to another "crash" in the video game market. Personally, I think that video games won't crash, consoles will.

With the Play Station and Xbox lines becoming increasingly similar to one another since their inception, maybe it's time for the Console Wars and their exclusivity BS to burn out and for all other hardware companies to make their own consoles around a single, unified architecture (firmware if anything) sharing all of the same features and all having one gaming library of both big physical and small digital games. It would be like a mix of Android and Blu-Ray players, sharing one firmware and allowing you to either play games via disc or download them and store on the console.

Of course, there's Nintendo. They've sworn that they will simply die if they will exit the console market. However, they still hold a LOT of brand-name power for them to simply let the market go to its natural progression.

...No idea what the point of that would be.

What reason would anyone have to buy (their console) instead of (other companies' console) or vice versa?

And if anything is going to make it die it's smartphones.

What reasons do people have to purchase one brand of television or computer or other kind of hardware over another?

The other ones suck. Just like how the Xbox is weaker and more expensive compared to the PS 4.

Really consoles aren't going away anytime soon, I see no reason why they would.

Alright, you've given me a point there.

This also means, however, a far larger number of different machines(the number of different televisions, monitors, computers, printers, keyboards, mice, headphones, phones, WHATEVER, is significantly greater than game consoles), significantly less ease in choosing which one(because there are so many variations of something that does the same thing), all for gamers that aren't really as reliable for money anymore anyway/there are far better markets to spend that effort in. It seems like a business suicide in comparison to what they were able to get away with before.

For the record, though, I don't know shit about all the different kinds of brands for other machines, because they sell too much stuff, which I usually can't check first-hand. It was hell looking for a monitor with the color accuracy I wanted out of it, and turns out, that one bricked. And earlier one of my friends was bitching about a certain flash drive manufacturing company scamming their newer costumers with an inferior product, which I don't remember at all because of how that's just an accessory for a small function.

Another one of my friends spent two months talking about all the research they were doing on what makes a computer good for his purposes too. And all of it totally read to me as effectively jargon in a sci-fi novel. I can spend two days looking at the board of a game console to find out what kind of people it tries to market to or what problems it has. This is because of limited variation, and as a result, more of the same product is sold instead of having to come up with all kinds of little reasons to get people to want your product instead of someone else's, which many may not even know how to understand (this is why advertising is designed to be far more general in its approach and manipulative instead of giving you all sorts of details, it's just way easier for people to take in.)

edited 4th Nov '14 4:29:24 PM by YuukiAsuna

Is there anyone who actually has an incentive to develop an open console?

Technically that is what the Steambox is.

• looks up Steambox*

ok forget everything I just said

I have absolutely no idea why that thing exists

I'd sooner expect televisions that offer PC compatibility (in fact do those already exist?)

Mine can sync up with my PC. Haven't figured out how to do that but it can.

The reason I go console over PC is because it's cheaper.

I doubt it would die. In the East, perhaps somewhat, but that's not the only region. Consoles are pretty popular in various parts of the world. Whether it's for a wired controller, a bigger screen, or just HD in general(now). Some even because it uses regular CD's(exceptions aside like the PSP or Gamecube).

I doubt Smartphones will kill handheld gaming too. I think there's more of a limit of what you can put on a phone(than bigger handhelds, currently. Like the 3DS or Vita), but I may be wrong on this.

There are apparently machines with buttons designed to play smartphone games. Which sounds totally backwards to me but it's a thing.

Is there anyone else who is willing to make another home console? The PS 4 shows that consoles can still sell for the moment, but entering the market is extremely expensive, and brand loyalty is strong enough that it would take a lot to get people to buy it. Someone like Amazon could probably do it, but I'm not sure they have any incentive to do so. Maybe Valve, but Steam is already doing well for them.

There are two things I can see killing consoles in the foreseeable future. The first is becoming too niche due to targeting only a specific demographic. 7th gen hardware sold stupidly well because there were two consoles targeting the 18-35 male demographic and one selling itself as a family friendly system. Then the 360 added Kinect to appeal to the family crowd as well, which helped rejuvenate it later in its life. But now the Nintendo lost the Wii audience and MS abandoned the Kinect, meaning an entire targeted audience is gone. So while one audience is selling one console well and one okay, it's probably not sustainable unless someone tries to expand the market again.

The other is all 3 players bowing out of the console race for different reasons. MS has the least incentive to be in the business, as I believe Xbox isn't too profitable for them. I never quite understood why they entered, or rather I do (dominate the living room), but that's not going to happen. So they may bow out due to not having a reason to be in and just sell games on PC.

Playstation is one of Sony's better performing divisions right now, so they won't drop it. But Sony itself isn't exactly in good shape, and if things go south for them who knows what will happen to Playstation. Either it gets spun off as its own thing or sold off to someone like Google/Amazon. Too many variables to figure out what would happen them.

Ironically, Nintendo is the least likely to drop out at the moment. They'll definitely put out a successor to the Wii U at least, but if that doesn't improve eventually they'll have no choice but to stop making consoles. Basically, they need another Wii. Obviously. Of course they'll pull out something wacky again, and it's impossible to predict what they're going to do. So they're the biggest wild card in the what, even though the if is a yes at the moment.

I don't see consoles dying out right now, but things aren't exactly rosy for the industry at the moment. All 3 seem dedicated to staying in, but that could easily change soon. Personally, I think it needs another shake-up, whether it be from the big 3 or not. It's likely we'll have to expand our definition of a console next gen.

I was too young to realize that the second generation Console War was occurring. However, I was definitely an active fan during the third and fourth generation (8-bit / 16-bit era). Since then, there have been at least two consoles actively competing. How long can this go on? I don't know.

During the '90s, it seemed like all computers were expensive, and that computer games were only distributed in a few stores. Some of my first PC game experiences were frustratingly tough adventure or edutainment games. I didn't care much for the fragile 3.5 inch or 5.25 inch discs. I would occasionally hear about system or monitor requirements and not understand a thing. Reading the PC Vs Console article reminded me that a few things have changed since then.

As of this writing, is it reasonable to consider computer games as a whole to be popular? If not, are they still growing? Is it fair to invoke Mainstream Obscurity even for relatively well known games?

consoles have been getting more PC-like with every generation. next gen they're probably going to be literally pre-built PC boxes without keyboards. This gen they're just slightly-modified P Cs already. We'll see if they manage to match P Cs on price/performance... they barely managed to do that on release for the XB One and PS 4.

Developers demanded an x86 platform for easier porting between platforms, and that's what they got this generation. It'll basically be Steamboxes and their Sony/Microsoft equivalents competing.

I didn't say that consoles in general should die, just the "console system", where a few hardware companies (and one dedicated console company) are in control of consoles and fighting over exclusivity BS. It really should be time for it to burn out.

You see, I really don't know. PS 4 and the Xbone both had weak launch titles, and not much in actual uprades of the predecessors and they sold like gangbusters at launch.

Gamers still get fooled into picking sides with these format wars even though reality is there is lack of difference between the PS 4 and Xbone. I mean do you like Uncharted or Halo more because 98% of the rest of the titles will be exactly the same. The Wii U is the only console that actually distinguished itself and yet gamers and Third-Party Devs have given it the cold shoulder.

I don't think the Console System will ever fully disappear because as long as people can still be suckered into choosing a side in a format war (Mac vs PC, Xbox vs PS, Android vs. iOS) consoles can continue pumping out their machines.

edited 5th Nov '14 7:11:19 AM by Lionheart0