Defining Victory (Can a Fanboy Ever Win?)

With all the fanboys vying for a console to come out the victor, I want to ask, what is a victory?

Is a victory when your console has made a profit for its mother company? If so, can’t all consoles be “victors”? Perhaps you’re only the victor if your consoles’ company makes more profit than the competition? But then I would ask, why do you care? Certainly from a company standpoint this would be the way to decide a winner, but we’re not part of these companies, and profits are simply a measure of how much they've overcharged us for their services. Is a victory decided simply by which console has sold the most? Again, why do you care as a consumer? From a single player perspective, my console may have sold 1 piece of hardware, or it may have sold 300 million, it’s all the same to me in my isolated, single player world. When it comes to online gaming, things are different; for an online gamer, a “loss” would mean he is limited to only a few million others with which he can share his online experience. Again, why do I care?

Is a victory when your console has crushed the competition, and pushed them out of the business? Look at most any fanboy comment, and you’ll get the impression he’d be happy if the rival console and company left the business. Will he consider this a victory when he buys Xbox 720, which fails on him after 2 weeks, and is not covered under warranty? Is it a victory if you’ve paid $1,500 for a PS4? In both cases the alternative would be to buy an equivalent computer for around $6,000; perhaps this is a better option? Fanboys seem to forget that their supposed rival plays a primary role in the quality of their own console. Being a PS3 owner, I recall when we received DVD up scaling, no doubt in response to the XBox having this ability prior. Why do you think XBox added HDMI support? Why was it added only after the PS3 offered it? If crushing the competition is the condition for victory, then bland, unreliable, and overpriced service is the prize.

Is a victory when you have fun with whatever console you happen to own; when you get your moneys worth in entertainment? Don’t be naïve; this is the gaming industry.