DeShaun Zollicoffer of Geek Revolt writes:
"This console generation has been surprising—it’s the opposite of the previous one, with Nintendo having the highest selling console, and Microsoft and Sony having a tug of war for second place (Microsoft currently has the edge). Things could change by the time the PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii are replaced, but it’s a good chance it’ll stay the same. The real shake up will happen during the next generation, and here’s why we could be headed back to the 6th generation."
Square Enix launches Final Fantasy X 25th anniversary site, revealing new Nomura art, books, music releases, and merchandise.
Look I know VIII has its issues and all that but how on earth can the do big anniversary events with new artwork and merchandise for VII, IX and X yet VIII got sweet f*** all.
They could have given it something during its 25th anniversary yet all it got was a single Happy Anniversary post on their social media.
they should know that we are OG fans of VIII as it sold truckload as well. not as much as VII or X. I personally didn't like IX but X and VI are my personal fav.
Shadow Hearts 2 covenant is another game I love. I hope one day someone can make remake, I would be delighted
Final Fantasy VIII is great and you are always the first to defend it in the comments
Xbox boss Asha Sharma has discussed how component shortages will impact the company's plans for Project Helix.
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.
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
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.
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
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
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.
It's called systematic inflationary. Yes we get it Microsoft, keep raising in the name ofall kinds of stuffs
Honestly if there was thing I learned from this generation is that new consoles arnt day one anymore.
I can wait 1-3 years.
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.
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.
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".
These classics need to make a return.
Pre-ordered mine a few days ago. Love this concept and hope there are more games announced. I can’t justify paying the prices for games that collectors are asking for. It’s the primary reason I own almost every console except the Neo Geo.
I've pre ordered one here in the UK, no games though, as I'll move it on for a higher price. The white model looks awesome, but as expected, the price is too high. We'll probably see more of those all in one cartridges from China containing every AES game. In the UK, AES+ game at £70 ($95) is better than eye watering prices for the originals, but these games are so old and I can honestly say SNK didn't release many classics. The Metal Slug series is the only series I rate, there were just too many Street Fighter clones and not enough scrolling fighting games. Overall, the Neo Geo was poor for all genres apart from one on one fighters. Videos on YouTube asking for games from that console generation to be ported to the AES+, but who'd want to pay £70 for Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter 2? There's a lot of SNK collections out there, the best being Metal Slug Anthology on the PlayStation 2. The Street Fighter Anniversary Collection on the Switch contains 12 games for around £30, instead of £840 if released on the AES+. For collectors, the AES+ is the best news since sliced bread. Are there enough SNK fans out there? Nowhere near. Those £70 cartridges will soon start creeping up in price and it'll be a re-run of the original console.
I always wanted one in the 90's but couldn't afford it. Now i can but i think if i get one it will be collecting dust fast. It's a nostalgia thing i guess.
Great article. I thought it was gone to be a fanboy rant but it wasn't. I agree with everything he says. I think Sony realized it mistakes and will focus on creating a simple console that will gain them profits on every console sold.
This generation is pretty lousy despite the fact that there are some rather great games. Simply there isn't enough innovation for other genres, which is a problem. This generation is filled with mostly shooters as opposed to last gen where genres were more balanced. I only hope that Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo encourage more third parties to work on different genres.
well I can't imagine how much more powerful consoles can get anyways? There really isn't much to do besides improve on consoles UI and adding more RAM to the systems. 2 gigs should be plenty enough though adding 3 or 4 would be overkill, but plenty enough. Sony has the most they can do with their next system, just by adding ps2 games on the psn will add 2000+ games to their library, all while making the Vita a possible controller for the ps3 and ps4 rendering the WiiU's controller obsolete due to the lack of horsepower inside the WiiU's controller compared to the Vita's two quad cores.
But one thing is for sure, despite the success that was the Wii, I really miss playing Nintendo games with a regular controller. So I'm looking forward to playing games the way I used to play them, despite the lack of gamecube compatibility, they can just add GC games to their virtual console. Also, if Nintendo adds a good UI for their online, It's almost impossible for them to not sell third party games like COD and Battlefield by the millions. Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, Donkey Kong, all in HD and 3-D plus sick 3rd party games using the WiiU's controller is definitely a formula for success. That is if they implement everything the right way.
As for the new xbox, Microsoft knows that the future is online, so who knows, they could buy Onlive for 1 billion dollars just like they did skype and start next gen now, but the question I have is, what would happen to the xbox if they lost most of their third party support? EA has already started their own steam type of service, and what would happen if Activision makes their own micro console to play COD with a subscription? They don't own Epic games, not that they couldn't acquire them, but seriously, without some good first party support, all the new xbox is gonna be is a beast of a machine that pretty much plays everything that the competition already has. Sure they got Kinect, but that doesn't even scratch the surface of the console market pie. I'm not saying that the xbox is gonna flop, but they need to do more than depend on third parties to stay relevant. Especially when Nintendo, Activisoin, and Apple together already own 75% of the gaming market
Whatever happens, I hope that these consoles don't come out at $400 bucks a piece cause I already own 2 ps3's , a 360, and a 3DS so I'm definitely ready to wait it out for a couple of years until a major price drop comes. Even at $300 bucks, their has to be more than a small leap in graphics and communication. It should also be about cutting out the middle man and making games cheaper, and making games complete without having to patch things up days after a release. There's alot more problems with gaming than the benefits these days, maybe publishers will start doing the right thing next gen? Only time will tell.
Good article but missing a huge piece which is onlive i know right now its not 100% ready but next gen or the one after that its what are console's will be like. Next gen we will have full drm with 6gb ram and gtx460's on our disc console but if you haven't yet tried onive fire it up that is the future as much as i hate disc less crap i can see it being a dev's/company's dream you can't pirate or cheat on onlive and the only way to access it is with a account. Face it onlive has started the future early also they have a micrconsole and the pc requirements are very low. 3mb connection and you can play any game 30min for free.
the future :(
http://www.onlive.com/go/si...
the game console free if you preorder batman ac
http://www.onlive.com/servi...