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Talk of PS3, Gamecube and Xbox 2s and the like has been on the go for some time now.
On top of general 'want', there's the speculation as to what these machines will actually do.
Sony are talking about harnessing the power of 100 PCs, and links to Blu-Ray technology (disks with massive storage capacity) are easily asserted.
Consoles have, of course, always advanced in processing power, internal architecture and all round performance capabilities, and the step up between generations of consoles seems to be ever increasing. Mega drive showed up the Master system in terms of graphic capabilities, Playstation put 3D capabilities to good use, and PS2, Gamecube and Xbox blow the last generation of consoles out of the water in terms of graphics and depth of gameplay.
And if you're willing to include the Panasonic Q, they all bring DVD capabilities and online play to the table.
So what can we expect of the next generation of consoles?
Better graphics and deeper games seem obvious, and there's undoubtedly the technology to make what we play now seem prehistoric.
But how much of this power can we really harness?
Games developers are, for the most part, finding the booming industry increasingly profitable. Surely current design techniques could be better funded to the ends of producing more detailed graphics with higher polygon counts, larger worlds and quicker loading times.
But would this be a particularly efficient way to use a significant portion of new machines' huge capabilities? I doubt it. The law of diminishing returns states that eventually putting more and more resources into something will give lesser and lesser actual benefits.
Fear not though, technology could again provide us with the answers.
If you've been keeping your eyes open, you'll probably be well aware of lazer scanning technology that can be used to build 3D models of physical objects. Wrap photo images to the model and you have an easy lifelike cyber replication of your initial object.
Meanwhile photo images could be used for textures for any 3D model.
Hey presto, with large enough capacity, we have 3D models consisting of thousands, even millions of polygons and photo-realistic textures, all with ridiculously little effort. All of a sudden we can actually use the power of 100 PCs.
So, online play. You may remember SR reporting a news item about an online console, the Phantom.
If not you can take a look here:
http://special.reserve.co.uk/news/story.php?id=2373
Could this be a way forward? Well, I expect that will largely depend on how the public take to online gaming on our current consoles. In fact, with Xbox and PS2 offering hard drives and the Gamecube's SD memory cards also offering huge RAM memory, downloadable games of fairly decent quality could be given an airing sooner than you might expect.
But of course, it will depend on how the public take to it...
DVD players? It'd be a surprise to see future consoles turn their backs on DVD media, at least without a successor to support. And will we see a successor to dvds any time soon? Blu-Ray again springs to mind, and when DVD Audio and SACD formats nudge past standard CDs to offer higher sound quality (using more sound channels, for more (6) speakers), there's no reason why Blu-Ray, or some other new data storage format, shoudln't do the same for films.
So what other new features could be incorporated? If I knew that I wouldn't be wasting my time bringing the ideas to you guys. Blue-Tooth technology seems like a possibility, maybe even allowing you to access and control various appliances around your house (and beyond?) from your games console, but even with my mystic predictive powers I'm feeling out of my depth with this kind of speculation.
But what can we expect? Same old stuff, just with better graphics and smoother gameplay? Or something really groundbreaking and fresh?
I guess we'll have to wait and see.
On top of general 'want', there's the speculation as to what these machines will actually do.
Sony are talking about harnessing the power of 100 PCs, and links to Blu-Ray technology (disks with massive storage capacity) are easily asserted.
Consoles have, of course, always advanced in processing power, internal architecture and all round performance capabilities, and the step up between generations of consoles seems to be ever increasing. Mega drive showed up the Master system in terms of graphic capabilities, Playstation put 3D capabilities to good use, and PS2, Gamecube and Xbox blow the last generation of consoles out of the water in terms of graphics and depth of gameplay.
And if you're willing to include the Panasonic Q, they all bring DVD capabilities and online play to the table.
So what can we expect of the next generation of consoles?
Better graphics and deeper games seem obvious, and there's undoubtedly the technology to make what we play now seem prehistoric.
But how much of this power can we really harness?
Games developers are, for the most part, finding the booming industry increasingly profitable. Surely current design techniques could be better funded to the ends of producing more detailed graphics with higher polygon counts, larger worlds and quicker loading times.
But would this be a particularly efficient way to use a significant portion of new machines' huge capabilities? I doubt it. The law of diminishing returns states that eventually putting more and more resources into something will give lesser and lesser actual benefits.
Fear not though, technology could again provide us with the answers.
If you've been keeping your eyes open, you'll probably be well aware of lazer scanning technology that can be used to build 3D models of physical objects. Wrap photo images to the model and you have an easy lifelike cyber replication of your initial object.
Meanwhile photo images could be used for textures for any 3D model.
Hey presto, with large enough capacity, we have 3D models consisting of thousands, even millions of polygons and photo-realistic textures, all with ridiculously little effort. All of a sudden we can actually use the power of 100 PCs.
So, online play. You may remember SR reporting a news item about an online console, the Phantom.
If not you can take a look here:
http://special.reserve.co.uk/news/story.php?id=2373
Could this be a way forward? Well, I expect that will largely depend on how the public take to online gaming on our current consoles. In fact, with Xbox and PS2 offering hard drives and the Gamecube's SD memory cards also offering huge RAM memory, downloadable games of fairly decent quality could be given an airing sooner than you might expect.
But of course, it will depend on how the public take to it...
DVD players? It'd be a surprise to see future consoles turn their backs on DVD media, at least without a successor to support. And will we see a successor to dvds any time soon? Blu-Ray again springs to mind, and when DVD Audio and SACD formats nudge past standard CDs to offer higher sound quality (using more sound channels, for more (6) speakers), there's no reason why Blu-Ray, or some other new data storage format, shoudln't do the same for films.
So what other new features could be incorporated? If I knew that I wouldn't be wasting my time bringing the ideas to you guys. Blue-Tooth technology seems like a possibility, maybe even allowing you to access and control various appliances around your house (and beyond?) from your games console, but even with my mystic predictive powers I'm feeling out of my depth with this kind of speculation.
But what can we expect? Same old stuff, just with better graphics and smoother gameplay? Or something really groundbreaking and fresh?
I guess we'll have to wait and see.
Where's the fun in that?
:^)
:^)
I don't bother speculating. Whatever the future holds for gaming will happen despite our knowledge and assumptions, so I just go with the flow and accept new technology when it becomes available.
I think games will become more and more relient on good graphics instead of solid gameplay.
Talk of PS3, Gamecube and Xbox 2s and the like has been on the go for some time now.
On top of general 'want', there's the speculation as to what these machines will actually do.
Sony are talking about harnessing the power of 100 PCs, and links to Blu-Ray technology (disks with massive storage capacity) are easily asserted.
Consoles have, of course, always advanced in processing power, internal architecture and all round performance capabilities, and the step up between generations of consoles seems to be ever increasing. Mega drive showed up the Master system in terms of graphic capabilities, Playstation put 3D capabilities to good use, and PS2, Gamecube and Xbox blow the last generation of consoles out of the water in terms of graphics and depth of gameplay.
And if you're willing to include the Panasonic Q, they all bring DVD capabilities and online play to the table.
So what can we expect of the next generation of consoles?
Better graphics and deeper games seem obvious, and there's undoubtedly the technology to make what we play now seem prehistoric.
But how much of this power can we really harness?
Games developers are, for the most part, finding the booming industry increasingly profitable. Surely current design techniques could be better funded to the ends of producing more detailed graphics with higher polygon counts, larger worlds and quicker loading times.
But would this be a particularly efficient way to use a significant portion of new machines' huge capabilities? I doubt it. The law of diminishing returns states that eventually putting more and more resources into something will give lesser and lesser actual benefits.
Fear not though, technology could again provide us with the answers.
If you've been keeping your eyes open, you'll probably be well aware of lazer scanning technology that can be used to build 3D models of physical objects. Wrap photo images to the model and you have an easy lifelike cyber replication of your initial object.
Meanwhile photo images could be used for textures for any 3D model.
Hey presto, with large enough capacity, we have 3D models consisting of thousands, even millions of polygons and photo-realistic textures, all with ridiculously little effort. All of a sudden we can actually use the power of 100 PCs.
So, online play. You may remember SR reporting a news item about an online console, the Phantom.
If not you can take a look here:
http://special.reserve.co.uk/news/story.php?id=2373
Could this be a way forward? Well, I expect that will largely depend on how the public take to online gaming on our current consoles. In fact, with Xbox and PS2 offering hard drives and the Gamecube's SD memory cards also offering huge RAM memory, downloadable games of fairly decent quality could be given an airing sooner than you might expect.
But of course, it will depend on how the public take to it...
DVD players? It'd be a surprise to see future consoles turn their backs on DVD media, at least without a successor to support. And will we see a successor to dvds any time soon? Blu-Ray again springs to mind, and when DVD Audio and SACD formats nudge past standard CDs to offer higher sound quality (using more sound channels, for more (6) speakers), there's no reason why Blu-Ray, or some other new data storage format, shoudln't do the same for films.
So what other new features could be incorporated? If I knew that I wouldn't be wasting my time bringing the ideas to you guys. Blue-Tooth technology seems like a possibility, maybe even allowing you to access and control various appliances around your house (and beyond?) from your games console, but even with my mystic predictive powers I'm feeling out of my depth with this kind of speculation.
But what can we expect? Same old stuff, just with better graphics and smoother gameplay? Or something really groundbreaking and fresh?
I guess we'll have to wait and see.
On top of general 'want', there's the speculation as to what these machines will actually do.
Sony are talking about harnessing the power of 100 PCs, and links to Blu-Ray technology (disks with massive storage capacity) are easily asserted.
Consoles have, of course, always advanced in processing power, internal architecture and all round performance capabilities, and the step up between generations of consoles seems to be ever increasing. Mega drive showed up the Master system in terms of graphic capabilities, Playstation put 3D capabilities to good use, and PS2, Gamecube and Xbox blow the last generation of consoles out of the water in terms of graphics and depth of gameplay.
And if you're willing to include the Panasonic Q, they all bring DVD capabilities and online play to the table.
So what can we expect of the next generation of consoles?
Better graphics and deeper games seem obvious, and there's undoubtedly the technology to make what we play now seem prehistoric.
But how much of this power can we really harness?
Games developers are, for the most part, finding the booming industry increasingly profitable. Surely current design techniques could be better funded to the ends of producing more detailed graphics with higher polygon counts, larger worlds and quicker loading times.
But would this be a particularly efficient way to use a significant portion of new machines' huge capabilities? I doubt it. The law of diminishing returns states that eventually putting more and more resources into something will give lesser and lesser actual benefits.
Fear not though, technology could again provide us with the answers.
If you've been keeping your eyes open, you'll probably be well aware of lazer scanning technology that can be used to build 3D models of physical objects. Wrap photo images to the model and you have an easy lifelike cyber replication of your initial object.
Meanwhile photo images could be used for textures for any 3D model.
Hey presto, with large enough capacity, we have 3D models consisting of thousands, even millions of polygons and photo-realistic textures, all with ridiculously little effort. All of a sudden we can actually use the power of 100 PCs.
So, online play. You may remember SR reporting a news item about an online console, the Phantom.
If not you can take a look here:
http://special.reserve.co.uk/news/story.php?id=2373
Could this be a way forward? Well, I expect that will largely depend on how the public take to online gaming on our current consoles. In fact, with Xbox and PS2 offering hard drives and the Gamecube's SD memory cards also offering huge RAM memory, downloadable games of fairly decent quality could be given an airing sooner than you might expect.
But of course, it will depend on how the public take to it...
DVD players? It'd be a surprise to see future consoles turn their backs on DVD media, at least without a successor to support. And will we see a successor to dvds any time soon? Blu-Ray again springs to mind, and when DVD Audio and SACD formats nudge past standard CDs to offer higher sound quality (using more sound channels, for more (6) speakers), there's no reason why Blu-Ray, or some other new data storage format, shoudln't do the same for films.
So what other new features could be incorporated? If I knew that I wouldn't be wasting my time bringing the ideas to you guys. Blue-Tooth technology seems like a possibility, maybe even allowing you to access and control various appliances around your house (and beyond?) from your games console, but even with my mystic predictive powers I'm feeling out of my depth with this kind of speculation.
But what can we expect? Same old stuff, just with better graphics and smoother gameplay? Or something really groundbreaking and fresh?
I guess we'll have to wait and see.