Wednesday 6 February 2013

Next Gen Gaming

It was rumoured earlier in the week, that the PS4 is soon to be announced, this has got me thinking again of what that will offer us. Firstly the answer to the question which has been asked for many years now, what will the new Xbox be called? We all have our opinions but who will be correct, my opinion, much to my brothers' denial, is the Xbox 360x2 or the x2 for short.

What more do we need?
When we think of the new generation I think of how blown away I was by the performance of the PS3 and Xbox 360, but I can't see how this impact can be had again. The hardware in the current consoles can be on par with a lot of PCs and only the high end can beat them. Saying that though, they also need to make it affordable to everyone.
There will be a blu-ray player in the Xbox, destroying all criticism it ever got, there will be new controllers, a new Playstation controller, dualshock 4? or will they incorporate quadshock for 'better immersion'? I doubt it, they have a product that works, why would they change it.
I believe the Xbox will stay a conservative shape (cuboid) as this seems to be their style where the Playstation will go for something a little more elaborate and more aesthetically appealing. I can see them making use of carbon fibre for the outer shell to make it more lightweight.

What don't we need?
Well we don't need to focus on just one audience, with more and more family/fitness games making a rise from kinect and ps move, I dont want to see a large focus on this on a base console, 'attachments' are fine, just don't ruin a great console for the niche hardcore players.
We do not need the console to be a really stupid shape, where it is impossible to store. I also feel that Xbox does not need to mention that rrod has been beaten, although this will show that they saw the problem and fixed it, it would remind players of what may have been a bad time for them.
We don't need a new online system and do not need to create new profiles to play online.

The most important thing for me will be that they make the best of the hardware and not the software, as proven by both the previous consoles, applications can be added with ease and have great quality, I do not want Sony and Microsoft selling consoles as a entertainment hub, more a gaming hub as the console should be, then the player can make it what they want.
I do have serious concerns that the whole entertainment promise may be too much and they don't create the greatest machine possible.

Frozen Fishy out.

2 comments:

  1. I still believe that the performance of the next gen is going to be outstanding, if you look at the current gen you see that we have only within the last year or two been able to harness the extent of the power held within. Also if anything the fact the the 360 and ps3 are still on par with modern PCs shows just how powerful you can make a device if you specialise and uniform it, allowing a truly optimised experience so you can get every last drop of power out of the current level of technology.

    This brings me to my worry though for Microsoft have stated that they wish to make the next Xbox a entertainment system not a pure gaming rig and so I fear that in trying too much they will allow Sony to get a huge leap ahead in terms of performance, which may serve to further stratify the industry.

    Also there is now a potential 4th horse to this three horse race in the form of the Ouya, the open-source kickstarted console with oculus rift support, which may be out matched performance wise but makes up for it in the ease with which developers can create for it. Thoughts on the Ouya?

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    1. Ouya could be a huge success or a huge flop, they are scheduled to release their console soon so we will see how they do from there. Its an intriguing piece of hardware and could be a sign of what could come in the future. It all seems very promising but they stress "Plus, every game is free — well, free-to-try" which I don't see as a huge difference to other systems at the moment.

      I am interested in what they can do with it at such a low selling point of $99, but then extra controllers are selling for $49 which does not seem right to me. does that mean they are getting the most profit from the controllers (I hope it does) or is the console itself going to be terrible quality and break easily

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