Crazy Prediction: People Will Buy Videogame Consoles to Play Videogames
I’m going to go out on a limb here and make a wild and crazy pediction: people will buy video game console to play videogames. Despite any attempt by Sony or Microsoft to cast videogame machines as much more than videogame machines, you and everyone you know will continue to use them as videogame machines.
This means you probably won’t use your PS3 to order prints of your photos or buy music for your MP3 player and you won’t use your Xbox 360 to watch streaming video off of your Media Center PC in the other room. Instead you’ll use it to play Grand Theft Auto: Alpha Centari. Sure, you might play with these extra features a few times, but that’s pretty much all you’ll do with them and then you’ll forget about them as you pop in the latest Halo game.
There are two things to ponder here if you agree with me.
- If either Microsoft or Sony are seriously depending on this non-game revenue to make their business models work, then it spells serious trouble for them.
- Microsoft and Nintendo may playing the safe route with devices that aren’t seriously overloaded with non-game ports and features while Sony packs a ridiculous amount of technology in a very expensive box.
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I love that you put a picture of an Intellivision controller in this article. Intellivision was inexpensive, the games were inexpensive, and there were plenty of them. I wish this were the case with one of the 3 big game companies. It might explain why I haven’t purchased a consul since N64. I miss cartridges.
As far as features go, I think online multiplay is definitely a good idea. And it doesn’t seem like they need to do anything additional to have the system play CDs or DVDs, so I’d keep that. It’d be nice actually if you could play a music CD while you play your game, like if it had an additional drive, or MP3 RAM or something.
I remember when I was a teenager I had a corner in my room with a small TV, a computer monitor, and a radio so that I could watch TV, while playing video games, while listening to the radio, with a book in my lap.
Ritalin? Bah!
Really I think the feature that would sell the most consuls would be a built in girlfriend. If Sony can’t do that then instead of another USB port they should add a wet hole.
The next GTA definitely needs to be released on a consul with a wet hole.