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Last night I was listening to the radio at 11:30 (Classic FM actually as it helps me relax before going to sleep[bet you all wanted to know that didnt you])and a programme started called .com, on which they were discussing the PS2 (among other things).
Once I had recovered from the sheer surrealism of hearing the presenter discussing the PS2 in between pieces by Strauss, Rachmaninov etc, I began to listen to what was being said.
The programme was aiming at parents as it was more of a 'what is the PS2?, Should parents buy their kids one for Christmas?' sort of discussion but it was interesting to hear the 'experts opinion'. The guest gaming expert made it clear that you had about as much chance of getting one this Christmas as you did of convincing your wife/girlfriend that you dont play DOA2 to look at the scantily clad women. He even went as far as to suggest that if your children must have a console this christmas then buy them a Dreamcast.
When quizzed on the X-box and GameCube he rightly pointed out that they wont be out until the end of next year at the earliest and at present the games that will appear are an unknown quantity.
Anyway enough introduction. The point I am building up too is that by the end of next year there will be four consoles fighting it out for supremacy. What I am wondering is not who will be the market leader but rather how many of these consoles will survive?
Is it possible for the market to sustain four different machines or will it come down to a two horse race again as it has so often in the past?
I am not sure where I stand on this question but I would be interested to hear other peoples opinions. It seems to me that with the so called 'hardcore' gamers making up a much smaller proportion of the fan base than they used too, advertising and hype could play a much greater part in which machines sell than it has in the past. Also from what I have seen on the forums opinion seems to be divided on what console is the next big thing.
Is it possible that each console could have its own proportion of the gaming fans, rather than one taking over? or will the sheep mentality lead to a clear leader appearing?
I will stop now and hold back further questions until I have some replies.
Once I had recovered from the sheer surrealism of hearing the presenter discussing the PS2 in between pieces by Strauss, Rachmaninov etc, I began to listen to what was being said.
The programme was aiming at parents as it was more of a 'what is the PS2?, Should parents buy their kids one for Christmas?' sort of discussion but it was interesting to hear the 'experts opinion'. The guest gaming expert made it clear that you had about as much chance of getting one this Christmas as you did of convincing your wife/girlfriend that you dont play DOA2 to look at the scantily clad women. He even went as far as to suggest that if your children must have a console this christmas then buy them a Dreamcast.
When quizzed on the X-box and GameCube he rightly pointed out that they wont be out until the end of next year at the earliest and at present the games that will appear are an unknown quantity.
Anyway enough introduction. The point I am building up too is that by the end of next year there will be four consoles fighting it out for supremacy. What I am wondering is not who will be the market leader but rather how many of these consoles will survive?
Is it possible for the market to sustain four different machines or will it come down to a two horse race again as it has so often in the past?
I am not sure where I stand on this question but I would be interested to hear other peoples opinions. It seems to me that with the so called 'hardcore' gamers making up a much smaller proportion of the fan base than they used too, advertising and hype could play a much greater part in which machines sell than it has in the past. Also from what I have seen on the forums opinion seems to be divided on what console is the next big thing.
Is it possible that each console could have its own proportion of the gaming fans, rather than one taking over? or will the sheep mentality lead to a clear leader appearing?
I will stop now and hold back further questions until I have some replies.
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I have not been around as long as when the Atari or Jaguar came out, so I did not get stung by the console dying out quickly. I did however go for the SNES, and was happy to play all the latest games (which they were at the time). And that colsole did well in my opinion, with decent games to go around. And then the Playstation came out. I was still a student then, and I could not afford the hefty price tag of £399 that the Catalogues were asking for. Then the price toppled to £299, and then after a year it further reduced to £199. Now my ex-mate at that time got the console when it was at the full-price, and he brought it round one day with the new-ish game, Final Fantasy 7. It was not good to just look at, but when I played it for myself, I was totally envolved. Then at my local second-hand games store, they had a 2nd hand Playstation for only £80! All these games are really great, which is why I went for the PS2, as the games look good, but it was for the amount of consoles available, and the games, which is why I Pre-Ordered one. Some people just order a colsole because they love the Company, and if they did it well the first time, then people think "How could they go wrong with a new console?" It is hype which drives most gamers, and the Hard Core which look at the console rather than be one of the "Sheep". It will depend what console survives when the other 2 Consoles come out, it will be interesting to see which one will lead from the rest.
Can the market accomodate 4 different companies? Interesting question. In my opinion definetely yes. Ask yourselves this, "why do you want the PS2?" Your answers will seem different, but at the end of the day it will boil down to the same thing. It is YOUR favourite console.
Now, imagine all the millions of gamers around the world thinking the same question, and divide them by 4, and what do you get? A lot of favourites for each company. The only difference being some will have more favourites than the rest, then you will always get some switching their alligence to other companies, someone might make a technological breakthrough and then you have 5 consoles !!! At the end of all this, the console that you have bought is slow and out of date and it is time for the next BEST THING to come out.
So, in conclusion, no matter how many consoles come out, they will all succeed to a certain degree.
Thanks for reading.
Now, imagine all the millions of gamers around the world thinking the same question, and divide them by 4, and what do you get? A lot of favourites for each company. The only difference being some will have more favourites than the rest, then you will always get some switching their alligence to other companies, someone might make a technological breakthrough and then you have 5 consoles !!! At the end of all this, the console that you have bought is slow and out of date and it is time for the next BEST THING to come out.
So, in conclusion, no matter how many consoles come out, they will all succeed to a certain degree.
Thanks for reading.
Not another two people...
> I feel sorry for you spending £600 on the Amiga CDTV by the
> Babyalonian, that must have been a very large punch to the
> stomach...
It certainly was, mate. And I also bought the floppy drive, keyboard, trackball, IR mouse etc. So in the end it was probably over £700.
So you can see why I consider PS2 extremely good value for money! :-)
> Babyalonian, that must have been a very large punch to the
> stomach...
It certainly was, mate. And I also bought the floppy drive, keyboard, trackball, IR mouse etc. So in the end it was probably over £700.
So you can see why I consider PS2 extremely good value for money! :-)
I have to agree with you about the GameCube using the small disk format. I think that veering away from the standard format will cause them more problems than it solves (in terms of piracy etc). They will hold less (as you pointed out) and also they are bound to cost more to produce as they will be a Nintendo only format, also easier to loose(which is an issue with Nintendo's traditional audience), the reduced space will also reduce the possibilities for streaming straight from the disk.
I must say in Nintendo's defence however that at least it is a step in the right direction. Finally they have jettisoned the clunky cartridge format.
I must say in Nintendo's defence however that at least it is a step in the right direction. Finally they have jettisoned the clunky cartridge format.
About the Gamecube disc thing, I am unsure myself wherever or not Nintendo have made the right choice.
It can be used to help piracy. Yes, the disc is extremely hard to copy, this will encourage designers onto the system. (A lot of money was lost by publishers and developers over the piracy of past.. I am not just refering to PS, but PC as well. Look at Looking Glass for instance...)
It look rather nice, and can be carried in your pocket. This probably wasn't the most important factor to Nintendo though.
BUT. There is a lot less space on one of those discs than on the disc of a PS2. The only problem I can see from this is that people may have to "Insert disc 2 to continue." all over again, and the whole point of DVDs are space anyway...
I think the size will reduce loading times as well, I suppose. Somehow.
I feel sorry for you spending £600 on the Amiga CDTV by the Babyalonian, that must have been a very large punch to the stomach...
It can be used to help piracy. Yes, the disc is extremely hard to copy, this will encourage designers onto the system. (A lot of money was lost by publishers and developers over the piracy of past.. I am not just refering to PS, but PC as well. Look at Looking Glass for instance...)
It look rather nice, and can be carried in your pocket. This probably wasn't the most important factor to Nintendo though.
BUT. There is a lot less space on one of those discs than on the disc of a PS2. The only problem I can see from this is that people may have to "Insert disc 2 to continue." all over again, and the whole point of DVDs are space anyway...
I think the size will reduce loading times as well, I suppose. Somehow.
I feel sorry for you spending £600 on the Amiga CDTV by the Babyalonian, that must have been a very large punch to the stomach...
>In the past I have been burnt by purchasing systems by companies that
>were not from traditional gaming companies and I would hate to see other
>people suffer the same fate. The 3DO, the Lynx, the Jaguar to name
>but a few (at some time or other I have owned pretty much every
>system) and I can tell you there is nothing worse than buying a
>system, buying games for it and awaiting new games that never arrive.
>With each of these systems the support just suddenly dried up.
>I was left with a machine that had cost me a packet and in some cases not even managed a year of life.
Oh, tell me about it! I splashed out £600 on what could be considered the Grandaddy of the current consoles - the Amiga CDTV. I promptly saw the price plummet to £150 over a period of 6 months, before everyone finally gave up on it. A shame, because at the time, it was way ahead of its time.
Then, figuring that Commodore surely couldn't screw up twice with the Amiga name (the computers were so damn good), I took the plunge and bought an Amiga CD32 - only to see the same thing happen! Eventually, I was looking to buy a Saturn, when I saw PlayStation running Wipeout, and left the shop with my very own little grey box-a-tricks.
Subsequently seeing the Saturn suffer a similar fate to the CDTV and CD32, I breathed a huge sigh of relief that I'd made the right choice. This, in addition to the reasons mentioned above, is why I have been reluctant to invest in a Dreamcast; it's a great machine, but it's already around two years into its life-span, and *in my opinion* could well flounder under the pressure of PS2, GameCube and X-Box.
The Atari ST, 3D0, CDTV, CD32, Jaguar and Saturn have all proved that being the first on the market doesn't necessarily guarantee prolonged success.
>were not from traditional gaming companies and I would hate to see other
>people suffer the same fate. The 3DO, the Lynx, the Jaguar to name
>but a few (at some time or other I have owned pretty much every
>system) and I can tell you there is nothing worse than buying a
>system, buying games for it and awaiting new games that never arrive.
>With each of these systems the support just suddenly dried up.
>I was left with a machine that had cost me a packet and in some cases not even managed a year of life.
Oh, tell me about it! I splashed out £600 on what could be considered the Grandaddy of the current consoles - the Amiga CDTV. I promptly saw the price plummet to £150 over a period of 6 months, before everyone finally gave up on it. A shame, because at the time, it was way ahead of its time.
Then, figuring that Commodore surely couldn't screw up twice with the Amiga name (the computers were so damn good), I took the plunge and bought an Amiga CD32 - only to see the same thing happen! Eventually, I was looking to buy a Saturn, when I saw PlayStation running Wipeout, and left the shop with my very own little grey box-a-tricks.
Subsequently seeing the Saturn suffer a similar fate to the CDTV and CD32, I breathed a huge sigh of relief that I'd made the right choice. This, in addition to the reasons mentioned above, is why I have been reluctant to invest in a Dreamcast; it's a great machine, but it's already around two years into its life-span, and *in my opinion* could well flounder under the pressure of PS2, GameCube and X-Box.
The Atari ST, 3D0, CDTV, CD32, Jaguar and Saturn have all proved that being the first on the market doesn't necessarily guarantee prolonged success.
Nice one Babylonian,
I knew I could rely on you to post a well thought out and reasonable reply.
As I said in my original post I am not sure what I feel will happen yet but I personally would hate to see any of the systems die prematurely.
I am not sure whether the DreamCast will still be going when the second generation titles appear on the X-Box and GameCube (or the third generation on the PS2) BUT I hope that it is still around for at least another year or two.
In the past I have been burnt by purchasing systems by companies that were not from traditional gaming companies and I would hate to see other people suffer the same fate. The 3DO, the Lynx, the Jaguar to name but a few (at some time or other I have owned pretty much every system)and I can tell you there is nothing worse than buying a system, buying games for it and awaiting new games that never arrive. With each of these systems the support just suddenly dried up. I was left with a machine that had cost me a packet and in some cases not even managed a year of life.
Eventually of course every system reaches the end of its life but this should be a slow winding down process, so that people who own the systems can move across to the next generation (as PS1 owners will have to eventually).
So I suppose what I am saying is that I hope all four of these consoles can co-exist (even the X-Box if Microsoft manage to produce something that lives up to its potential which somehow I doubt). Unfortunately however I dont think this will happen. Eventually one or more of the consoles will edge out the others and dominate the market. The remainder will have to admit defeat and return to the drawing board to work on their next effort.
It is when this happens, when some consoles become no longer economically viable (or profitable enough,)that some poor sod like me is left with a machine that has been discontinued. Without games support it is no longer a games machine but a useless lump of plastic and chips (case in point the 3DO sitting in the corner of my lounge collecting dust). Value for money up in smoke.
IT is this fear of their consoles death that underlies the whole console wars mentality I think. People defend their console to the death in order to win others over to their cause. There is safety in numbers (the console with the biggest user base will rule, regardless of whether it is the most powerful or not)and the feeling of belonging to one group of supporters rather than another leads to conflict.
Getting rather Freudian here I know but I have suddenly been struck by the fact that you can even apply Jung's idea of the collective unconcious to console gamers. The Playstation is a case in point. It has lead the market for the last five years because it created the right image (of course it then backed this up with games but as we have established non 'hardcore' gamers wouldnt really know a great game from an average one). Through clever advertising (and the impossibility of avoiding this advertising) Sony planted the notion in our unconcious minds that the Playstation is the 'cool' system to own.
Sorry for veering from the point but its all food for thought even if it does look a bit like an exert from a Psychology book (the Psychology of Videogaming by Dr M Att, could be a bestseller!!!
I knew I could rely on you to post a well thought out and reasonable reply.
As I said in my original post I am not sure what I feel will happen yet but I personally would hate to see any of the systems die prematurely.
I am not sure whether the DreamCast will still be going when the second generation titles appear on the X-Box and GameCube (or the third generation on the PS2) BUT I hope that it is still around for at least another year or two.
In the past I have been burnt by purchasing systems by companies that were not from traditional gaming companies and I would hate to see other people suffer the same fate. The 3DO, the Lynx, the Jaguar to name but a few (at some time or other I have owned pretty much every system)and I can tell you there is nothing worse than buying a system, buying games for it and awaiting new games that never arrive. With each of these systems the support just suddenly dried up. I was left with a machine that had cost me a packet and in some cases not even managed a year of life.
Eventually of course every system reaches the end of its life but this should be a slow winding down process, so that people who own the systems can move across to the next generation (as PS1 owners will have to eventually).
So I suppose what I am saying is that I hope all four of these consoles can co-exist (even the X-Box if Microsoft manage to produce something that lives up to its potential which somehow I doubt). Unfortunately however I dont think this will happen. Eventually one or more of the consoles will edge out the others and dominate the market. The remainder will have to admit defeat and return to the drawing board to work on their next effort.
It is when this happens, when some consoles become no longer economically viable (or profitable enough,)that some poor sod like me is left with a machine that has been discontinued. Without games support it is no longer a games machine but a useless lump of plastic and chips (case in point the 3DO sitting in the corner of my lounge collecting dust). Value for money up in smoke.
IT is this fear of their consoles death that underlies the whole console wars mentality I think. People defend their console to the death in order to win others over to their cause. There is safety in numbers (the console with the biggest user base will rule, regardless of whether it is the most powerful or not)and the feeling of belonging to one group of supporters rather than another leads to conflict.
Getting rather Freudian here I know but I have suddenly been struck by the fact that you can even apply Jung's idea of the collective unconcious to console gamers. The Playstation is a case in point. It has lead the market for the last five years because it created the right image (of course it then backed this up with games but as we have established non 'hardcore' gamers wouldnt really know a great game from an average one). Through clever advertising (and the impossibility of avoiding this advertising) Sony planted the notion in our unconcious minds that the Playstation is the 'cool' system to own.
Sorry for veering from the point but its all food for thought even if it does look a bit like an exert from a Psychology book (the Psychology of Videogaming by Dr M Att, could be a bestseller!!!
Wow, what a question!
I reckon the 4 consoles we are soon to have available is fairly close to the limit. You have the long-time-loyal fans who will stick with Sega & Nintendo; you have those like myself who never really looked twice at a console until PlayStation came along and made gaming "cool for adults"; and then you have the X-Box as a relatively unknown quantity.
Sega lost credibility with me personally when their Dreamcast launch featured a guy in a Sonic outfit BBQ'ing Crash dolls. I could understand such behaviour from young fans of a machine, but a multinational company? Very petty, and to me, any company that needs to make such a public spectacle over a competitor is very worried about something. That said, Dreamcast is a fine machine, with some very fine games - it just doesn't appeal to me.
Nintendo I respect. They had a hard time with N64 due to the limitations of the cartridge format, but they've kept their heads down, plugged away and come up with a seemingly amazing machine. My only question about GameCube is the unusual mini-DVD format; will it once again prove expensive for developers, and hold the machine back?
In addition, I think there is still generally a stigma attached to Sega and Nintendo, in that the majority of games on their past systems have been aimed more at kids. This is, I think, why the PlayStation was so huge. Although there have been more 'kiddie' games lately, at first the games were aimed at a much more adult audience - mostly young men between 18-25, with money to spend - and the rest is history.
Things are changing, though, and hopefully both companies will see a return to former glories. I personally would hate to see one company dominate. This situation has pretty much already occured in the PC Operating System market with Microsoft, where we are more or less forced to use whatever Microsoft turn out simply because there is no seriously viable alternative with enough software support.
PlayStation 2 already has its fans, and a huge potential user-base due to its backward-compatibility. It also has the bonus of playing DVD's. Whatever people think of the quality, people are and will buy it for that reason alone. Whatever your choice of console, and whatever you think of PS2 itself, I don't think anyone could honestly deny that it will be a huge success.
X-Box is one to watch. I am wary simply because it is from Microsoft, but I won't rule out buying one at the moment. One thing I am dubious about is the price. I've read the specs, and they reckon they can do it for under £200? I find that very hard to believe. Last I read was that the CPU was to be a P3-733, and that alone costs around £200 at the moment. I know that price will fall between now and release, but you also have all the other components to think of, and the processor spec could be increased again.
In addition, Microsoft has a 'questionable' reputation; many people use their PC products simply because there's little other choice; they've had unfair-practice and monopoly lawsuits brought against them and lost, and their operating systems are excessively large and unstable.
At the end of the day, all four platforms will *probably* succeed in various degrees, but with two long-standing companies and two major international companies already in the market, anyone launching a fifth console would be taking a hell of a risk.
I reckon the 4 consoles we are soon to have available is fairly close to the limit. You have the long-time-loyal fans who will stick with Sega & Nintendo; you have those like myself who never really looked twice at a console until PlayStation came along and made gaming "cool for adults"; and then you have the X-Box as a relatively unknown quantity.
Sega lost credibility with me personally when their Dreamcast launch featured a guy in a Sonic outfit BBQ'ing Crash dolls. I could understand such behaviour from young fans of a machine, but a multinational company? Very petty, and to me, any company that needs to make such a public spectacle over a competitor is very worried about something. That said, Dreamcast is a fine machine, with some very fine games - it just doesn't appeal to me.
Nintendo I respect. They had a hard time with N64 due to the limitations of the cartridge format, but they've kept their heads down, plugged away and come up with a seemingly amazing machine. My only question about GameCube is the unusual mini-DVD format; will it once again prove expensive for developers, and hold the machine back?
In addition, I think there is still generally a stigma attached to Sega and Nintendo, in that the majority of games on their past systems have been aimed more at kids. This is, I think, why the PlayStation was so huge. Although there have been more 'kiddie' games lately, at first the games were aimed at a much more adult audience - mostly young men between 18-25, with money to spend - and the rest is history.
Things are changing, though, and hopefully both companies will see a return to former glories. I personally would hate to see one company dominate. This situation has pretty much already occured in the PC Operating System market with Microsoft, where we are more or less forced to use whatever Microsoft turn out simply because there is no seriously viable alternative with enough software support.
PlayStation 2 already has its fans, and a huge potential user-base due to its backward-compatibility. It also has the bonus of playing DVD's. Whatever people think of the quality, people are and will buy it for that reason alone. Whatever your choice of console, and whatever you think of PS2 itself, I don't think anyone could honestly deny that it will be a huge success.
X-Box is one to watch. I am wary simply because it is from Microsoft, but I won't rule out buying one at the moment. One thing I am dubious about is the price. I've read the specs, and they reckon they can do it for under £200? I find that very hard to believe. Last I read was that the CPU was to be a P3-733, and that alone costs around £200 at the moment. I know that price will fall between now and release, but you also have all the other components to think of, and the processor spec could be increased again.
In addition, Microsoft has a 'questionable' reputation; many people use their PC products simply because there's little other choice; they've had unfair-practice and monopoly lawsuits brought against them and lost, and their operating systems are excessively large and unstable.
At the end of the day, all four platforms will *probably* succeed in various degrees, but with two long-standing companies and two major international companies already in the market, anyone launching a fifth console would be taking a hell of a risk.
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