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170°

Is The Next Generation Closer Than We Think?

MasonicGamer.com - DmC: Devil May Cry has just been delayed. Originally due to hit shelves this holiday season, we’re now being told that Dante’s latest adventure won’t reach us until the beginning of next year. DmC joins the ever-growing list of titles that won’t be entertaining us this Christmas – titles such as Bioshock Infinite, Aliens: Colonial Marines, and the new Tomb Raider game. Could this sudden glut of delays be indicative of a new console generation just around the corner?

Both Microsoft and Sony have denounced the possibility of showing new hardware at E3 2012. However, any poker player will tell you that letting others know what’s in your hand is the worst thing to do before you make your play – there’s a strong possibility that one of these companies is bluffing and hoping the other won’t call them on it. People always seem to rate the major console makers based on their keynote presentations, so a surprise console announcement would surely be the biggest news at t...

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masonicgamer.com
mushroomwig5144d ago

The Last Of Us will be incredible but it's not a "next" generation game, it's a current gen game.

Ck1x5144d ago

This would totally kill the sales of both the ps3 or 360, so why would either company do something like this right now or at e3?

mushroomwig5144d ago

That's like saying announcing the PS3 and 360 would kill sales for the PS2 and Xbox. It's got to happen at some point.

Ck1x5144d ago

@mushroomwig: but you don't announce new systems when the current ones are still selling extremely well though! That's a bad business practice doing something that crazy.

DA_SHREDDER5144d ago

it wouldn't be counter productive if they dropped the price to ps3's, and launching a new system at $299. I'm not buying anything over that price point. Including games and warranty, you're looking at $400 bucks easy

DwightOwen5144d ago

Have fun waiting until 2017 if that's as much as you're willing to spend. Sony and Microsoft can't afford to sell their next consoles at a loss the way they have been for the past decade.

Nintendo wisely attended to the non-traditional gamer market until the price of hardware came down to a point where they now stand to make immediate profits on the Wii U, and will showcase the most powerful home console for the next 3-4 years. That's how long it going to be until consoles capable of doing what my PC can (Battlefield 3 maxed @ 1080p running 50-60 FPS) make it to your price bracket.

Why else do you think this generation of consoles has gone on longer than any other? The hardware is too damn expensive!

CouldHaveYelledUiiW5143d ago

That's one reason why consoles have to forge their own way. They can't keep-up with PCs.

And a reason it's dangerous that gamers demand them to be mini PCs, and thwart every attempt for consoles to differentiate themselves from the Powerhouse PCs around them.

They got to bring something new or something good, cause the graphics can't beat PC.

WeskerChildReborned5144d ago

It would slow down the sales but i think they will still be selling cause they would be cheaper than PS4 or Xbox 8.

fllysurfer5144d ago

I have the impression that the next generation will be a stepping stone... not a full jump but rather an interim mark. Producing a full blown powerhouse was Sonys last mistake, Xbox wont risk it... and we know what the Wii U is... meh... not very excited.

DwightOwen5144d ago

It will be, and its going to cost AT LEAST $600.00 this time to buy in, and the graphical improvements will only be noticeable to the trained eye.

The arms race of selling hardware at a loss between Sony and Microsoft has to end at some point.

PygmelionHunter5143d ago

Next generation is such a lame pair of words, specially after the last console bunch we got, what with all the controversy about the Wii being significantly less powerful than its competitors, I felt nothing next-genish in other consoles aside from overpriced DLC, if anything, the Wii was kind of a fresh idea, just pushed a bit too much into its limit with lots of games to which motion controllers were unnecessary.

Now fanboys all over the internet will deny any evidence there is that would make the Wii U a next gen console, while in reality which seems like a far, distant place from fanboy land, consoles are no match and will never match what a PC can do in terms of raw power.

Next gen is certainly a crappy choice of words.

BattleAxe5143d ago

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70°

Xbox boss: Memory crisis could impact next-gen hardware pricing

Xbox boss Asha Sharma has discussed how component shortages will impact the company's plans for Project Helix.

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gamedeveloper.com
Eonjay55d ago

When does this end? Its killing everyone. Consoles and PC. And for what? AI? The benefits of AI are completely outweighed by the negatives. And the government should have never allowed one company to buy up all the RAM.

Lexreborn256d ago

This kind of proves this is an after thought product, most products like this are in r&d 5 years before they start mass producing. So they typically have the cost of components and things worked out long before assembly starts.

This is an assumption still, but I wouldn’t be surprised if project helix is similar to Scalebound,perfect dark and sod3. They had an idea but no actual execution other than concept stage. Being impacted by the ram shortage likely would also put this device 3-4 years out.

I’m not even sure MS has that endurance with Xbox yet

Fishy Fingers55d ago (Edited 55d ago )

I mean.... what?

We're at a point that Samsung wont even provide their own phone department ram because they can sell it at higher prices to 3rd parties (AI). Its more profitable to sell the ram than make their own devices with it.

You think because R&D starts 5 years ago the 3rd party component manufacturers will honour that price? They'll sell it to whomever is paying the most today, not some gentlemens agreement they made years ago. AI farms will buy more volume at higher prices than any console manufacturer will. It'll be the same for Playstation.

Lexreborn255d ago

Contractual agreements are not the same as “gentlemen” agreements. If you think that they work with their distributors a month before production then their entire business model is trash. They work with companies like nvidia constantly for building the graphics cards they need. They work with companies that build motherboards years in advance. This is what proper business planning does.

They are not buying components on a whim like a consumer. So again, considering the ram isn’t a singular module and is integrated into the motherboard I highly doubt they wouldn’t have a final schematic that they are supposed to be building around.

If they are delaying production another 3 years then it’s obvious again this is an after though project and is just trying to be responsive to their bad execution they had the last 14 years.

It also isn’t far fetched to use their failure to produce first party titles the last 7 years including the highly anticipated games I mentioned all being cancelled. That they would continue to you know… lie

Sitdown55d ago

You don't really know how this works huh?

Profchaos55d ago (Edited 55d ago )

Helix is going to be stupidly expensive

Instead of leaning into smarter upscaling techniques they're brute forcing hardware that will cost them dearly and it remains to be seen if it's genuinely going to provide a meaningful differential

I know in the oc.doace people like to brag about not using frame gen or dlss to get to high on a game but for the majority of players they happily use those technologies without a second thought

That's going to be ps6 vs Helix

Eonjay55d ago

Yeah with FSR 5 they should be able to offer a much cheaper version of Helix.

Eonjay55d ago

While this does seem to be the case, I am encouraged by the statement from Microsoft about wanting to provide affordable options. If this means a Series S style Helix, at least there will be something affordable being offered.

XBManiac55d ago

Series S is what has killed Xbox Series so... Will they dare?

blacktiger55d ago

It's called systematic inflationary. Yes we get it Microsoft, keep raising in the name ofall kinds of stuffs

pwnmaster300055d ago

Honestly if there was thing I learned from this generation is that new consoles arnt day one anymore.
I can wait 1-3 years.

DarXyde55d ago

Another important lesson from this generation: while Nintendo showed us that prices don't necessarily need to ever drop, we've now learned that waiting 1-3 years does carry some risk that prices increase. This generation is just bizarre in all the wrong ways.

LucasRuinedChildhood55d ago (Edited 55d ago )

The factors are largely external. Covid and Russia-Ukraine war causing inflation led to the first price increase in 2022.

Then we get Trump's tariffs increasing hardware prices, AI boom causing a RAM crisis, war on Iran causing a worldwide fuel crisis which impacts the cost of everything.

Gaming doesn't exist in a vacuum. The last few years have been a shitshow and lot of it was definitely avoidable.

DarXyde55d ago

LucasRuinedChildhood,

For sure. No disagreement on the external factors doing a lot of this. Where I have to gently push back however is on two fronts:

1. The pandemic definitely caused some issues: asynchronous development was a big issue and really complicated timelines and affected game quality. At the same time, when it comes to price hikes, it's really difficult to know what was genuine necessity and what was taking consumers for a ride. The pandemic brought about "stag-flation" which was increasing prices and stagnant wages, which was a problem caused by supply chain constraints. There was also "Greed-flation", where companies that were slightly affected or had no issues took advantage of the situation and squeezed everyone citing supply chain issues when there were none.

2. It's definitely true that the tariffs, AI boom, and RAM crisis were all things enabled by tech broligarchs throwing money at this caricature of a world leader, one of them being Satya Nadella. I don't think Sony and Nintendo have contributed much to this problem if at all, but Microsoft's Nadella I feel was instrumental in causing every one of those issues. Microsoft as a company contributed to both candidates (though they gave Harris 4x as much if I recall), but Nadella was all in on letting AI run wild. He paid for unregulated AI, and got a war that's not a war (even though Trump called it that at least five times on television) that screwed up helium access. So for me, I feel that one of the players in the gaming industry is a key architect of these issues, and for that reason I struggle a bit to think of it as "external".

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40°

Pixels in the Blood: The Journey of Rob Hewson

The name "Hewson" carries a special weight for anyone who grew up during the golden age of British computing. As the son of Andrew Hewson—the man behind legendary publisher Hewson Consultants—Rob Hewson didn't just grow up playing video games; he learned to spell his name from their title screens. However, Rob didn't just rest on his family's 8-bit laurels. From leading major LEGO franchises at TT Games to tackling the high-stakes world of technical porting at Huey Games, Rob has carved out a unique path in an ever-evolving industry. In this candid interview Rob to discussed the burden and beauty of a family legacy, the technical "scar tissue" left by the ambitious Hydrophobia, and why porting a masterpiece like Inscryption to consoles is far more than a simple copy-paste job.

50°

The top 10 best Super Mario games ranked

NE: "We rank the 10 best main series Super Mario games in celebration of the recent MAR10 Day with 2D and 3D included."

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nintendoeverything.com
Agent7584d ago

Best 2D, Mario World, best 3D, Mario 64. Can't say there's been a bad one, although Mario World 2 wasn't a true sequel. The Mario Land games were good (not the first one) and also Wario Land. I thought after Mario 64, Mario 3D World was excellent.