Are the days of simultaneous console launch over?

[Deepak]

This post made me think of this thread.

Do you guys think that next consoles from Sony/MS/Nintendo will launch near to each other? Or the current gen was the last time it happened? The way things are looking we may see Wii2 quickest followed by 720 and PS4 at the end.

 

[tongue_of_colicab]

This post made me think of this thread.

Do you guys think that next consoles from Sony/MS/Nintendo will launch near to each other? Or the current gen was the last time it happened? The way things are looking we may see Wii2 quickest followed by 720 and PS4 at the end.

I think you can be sure console releases keep within about a year of each other for a couple of reasons. First of all you need time to earn money, and devs need time to cash in on their investments too. So that would probably already set you up for atleast a 4 year life cycle (forget about xbox1, ms only intended that to gain market share). The second reason is that you need to keep more or less in line to keep competative. Lets say you want to launch 2 years after console X launched, you'll be in problems because console X already has a decent userbase, has probably decent support atleast from devs, is in the position to drop the price. Now you come in with your new console. You dont have a market, you have a higher price, your hardware is more advanced but its probably only such a relative small advantage that you wont win over the mass market and devs probably wont be to interrested either because of the price and userbase disadvantage.

As far as lifetime goes, that will totally depend on marketshare. The only reason the ps2 is still selling this good is because it has 120million user so even though there are new consoles out it will still be profatable to keep it in production and keep making games for it. OTOH xbox and GC dont have that because their userbase is to small to keep cash & games coming even with newer consoles out.

 

[cthellis42]

All I know is if they name the next Xbox "720," I will have to smack them.

 

[infinity4]

depends on market share and price of future consoles as well as market position of these console makers i would say . anything is possible (i am not talking about saucers or something) if i mean when they launch their consoles, they launch their consoles when they feel it is best to launch the console for

- long term strategy
- to stay in competition

 

[one]

I don't expect PS4 so soon, but expect PS3.1 in 2 years. And PS3.2, PS3.3... etc. to follow as more powerful hardware configurations just like new PC models. This time the OS is separated from games and the current PS3 is essentially a Cell PC with the minimum spec.

 

[Rainbow Man]

Are the days pover?
I didn't know they had even arrived!

Seriously. It's more exception than rule for consoes to launch worldwide.
PS3 euro launch was rather quick after US/Japan comparatively speaking.

Euro had to wait longer tahn that for NDS last year IIRC.
Not to mention SNES N64 launches. Don't remember GC but that took a good while too I think.
Peace.

 

[pascal]

I don't expect PS4 so soon, but expect PS3.1 in 2 years. And PS3.2, PS3.3... etc. to follow as more powerful hardware configurations just like new PC models. This time the OS is separated from games and the current PS3 is essentially a Cell PC with the minimum spec.

I hope so too. And PS3.1 will be cheaper, smaller, quieter, cooler than the PS3. :smile: