Can a console completely dominate once again?

[Shifty Geezer]

It just occurred to me, reading a poll thread, that PS4 is actually in an unusually strong position. It effectively has one competitor seeing as Wii U is playing in another division, no upcoming machines to compete with (SEGA UberDrive due 2014), and there seems to be a lot of lot of ill will among some of the XB users that they are considering buying PS4. Which got me thinking, at what point would devs abandon a platform as a sinking ship and support just the market leader? Or even, would they ever?

PS2 ran away with that gen, getting loads of platform exclusives on account of its sales lead and devs not wanting to waste effort on ports that'd only sell 20% as much as the PS2 version. If games are mostly middle-ware powered this gen (and just checking out Unity 3D, I can see the appeal first hand!) then the cost of porting is greatly diminished, so even with a 4:1 or 5:1 install-base advantage, I'm not sure the economic sense is there in not supporting an extra 20+ million consoles. At least not in download format where you don't have to worry about license fees and stock management.

And if ports are going to happen anyway, then surely there's no 'risk' in buying the less popular machine? And if so, then a platform can't really 'fail' any more to the consumers who buy into it. So I don't think that a PS2 type domination can happen again, which renders the concerns of consumers somewhat moot.

Or, is there still a critical mass, where popularity snowballs on the strength of recommendations from friends and family, that, if a console reaches it, will leave other platforms to be neglected? If, hypothetically, PS4 were to outsell XB1 4:1 for the first 6-12 months (or vice versa), would devs start to ignore XB1 and that platform fizzle out?

 

[wco81]

One console may have decisive lead globally but they may switch leadership in different countries.

Wii dominated the sales numbers but lost its mindshare 2-3 years ago. After allowing their Wiis to collect dust, a lot of the Wii gamers probably migrated to mobile devices.

That's the bigger question, a console could dominate but it's the big fish in a smaller pond syndrome. Will the next generation re-establish the upward trajectory of consoles?

Or will the console market be relegated to a niche, dwarfed by mobile devices which people use every day, throughout each day?

 

[Squilliam]

Well they could possibly. The unifying factor which could tip things over the edge is really the network effect of having multiple exclusive online networks. If people cannot play with their friends unless they purchase a single machine it could really tip things over the edge towards a single console dominating.

 

[Bagel seed]

Right now I don't see any real possibility of greater than 2:1 lopsidedness in sales.. I think even at 2:1 it isn't enough to 'ignore' the weaker platform. But if it did end up greater than that, then yes there could be potential for being left out in the amount of care multiplatform titles would receive.

Hypothetically though, how would that kind of lopsidedness happen with two similar platforms launching at roughly the same time? Now that there's no major sticking point with either console I think the only remaining factor is being out supplied by your competitor. It's possible a 2:1 ratio in the first year could create a snowball effect.

The current console launch situation is mostly uncharted territory so it'll be interesting to see what happens.

 

[BRiT]

What? No poll?!?

 

[patsu]

Shifty's tag should be über-Poll.

 

[BoardBonobo]

In terms of the console market and a singular machine becoming dominant then that could still happen in sheer sale ratios.

But given the players in the market then no, I don't think it could happen in terms of support.

Sony still has traction for getting units into the customers hands. The ill will they generated with the PS3 has long since crumbled in the face of a brilliant series of exclusives. And now they have a huge lead in not only the hardcore early adopters but also in the general public mindshare.

But MS will never let this happen. They will shovel money by the lorry load to developers to buy them into exclusives or subsidised releases. And if that doesn't get a result within a set amount of time they'll just drop the XBone and release something new and shiny without the horrendous PR suicide pact they engaged in this time. But it's an unusual situation for MS, they aren't really used to having competitors that exist in a market that hasn't already either been saturated or buried in MS products from the day the consumer was born. In fact with every market they have tried to enter recently they have had very little success. In fact I don't think they would be where they are in the console space if Sony hadn't screwed up so massively with the PS3.

 

[Cyan]

Market dominance is likely to happen because I have a feeling the PS4 is going to sell like hotcakes.

My original plan is to buy the Xbox One at launch first, and in 2-3 years the PS4 to play all the exclusive games.

However, if I see too much market dominance I might withdraw my purchase because if it happens it isn't usually good for consumers.

Besides that, the Nintendo WiiU isn't dead at all. People attack Nintendo for their lack of ambition -which to me is true- and we are used to see how *kiddie* their systems are lately and we have this tendency to look at them as the underdogs.

Yet, when it comes to making money and profit, they are on point almost every time. In my opinion, that's amazing. Once they release some of their best games and classics it looks like they won't be going anywhere any time soon.

 

[Cyan]

In terms of the console market and a singular machine becoming dominant then that could still happen in sheer sale ratios.

But given the players in the market then no, I don't think it could happen in terms of support.

Sony still has traction for getting units into the customers hands. The ill will they generated with the PS3 has long since crumbled in the face of a brilliant series of exclusives. And now they have a huge lead in not only the hardcore early adopters but also in the general public mindshare.

But MS will never let this happen. They will shovel money by the lorry load to developers to buy them into exclusives or subsidised releases. And if that doesn't get a result within a set amount of time they'll just drop the XBone and release something new and shiny without the horrendous PR suicide pact they engaged in this time. But it's an unusual situation for MS, they aren't really used to having competitors that exist in a market that hasn't already either been saturated or buried in MS products from the day the consumer was born. In fact with every market they have tried to enter recently they have had very little success. In fact I don't think they would be where they are in the console space if Sony hadn't screwed up so massively with the PS3.

That and the RROD disaster of the Xbox 360 also helped the PS3 immensely, it was certainly the X360's weak point that Sony hit for massive damage and managed to sell a reasonably high amount of units.

Sony have invested a lot on R&D for the PS3 and they weren't selling enough consoles and software to recoup those losses.

Taking into account the amount of money they spent on R&D PS3 was an unexciting console in the end for those who lived the PS2 days. It was my first generation and while PS users didn't have the most powerful machine, it had some advantages and cool/interesting features that actually worked.

Microsoft, on the other hand, NOT only had to start from scratch and get into hardware, NOT only they had to create a 300000 servers infrastructure that is one of the largest server farms in the world, NOT only had to purchase & develop their own IPs and developers, but they had to R&D 2 consoles and a MP3 player -Zune- and with them come into 2 brand new markets as a total underdog.

Afaik, their gaming investment was a 20-year plan. They were spending insane money to establish themselves in the market. They have been well on their way with the Xbox 360.

To me the solely reason they can do that is that they had the money to spend, lots of liquid funds. I don't mean losing. I mean spend. Those numbers, of course, aren't lost money. They are just spent money.

 

[Cyan]

Right now I don't see any real possibility of greater than 2:1 lopsidedness in sales.. I think even at 2:1 it isn't enough to 'ignore' the weaker platform. But if it did end up greater than that, then yes there could be potential for being left out in the amount of care multiplatform titles would receive.

Hypothetically though, how would that kind of lopsidedness happen with two similar platforms launching at roughly the same time? Now that there's no major sticking point with either console I think the only remaining factor is being out supplied by your competitor. It's possible a 2:1 ratio in the first year could create a snowball effect.

The current console launch situation is mostly uncharted territory so it'll be interesting to see what happens.

The first year of any new generation is not going to look so hot.

That DRM thing failure makes it look intimidating though...

Very bad marketing from Microsoft -they didn't know how to sell the positives- , many unknowns -what would happen to retailers?, were there any other solutions to the rather non-elegant DRM issues?-, the power of retailers and probably devs pressure killed the idea.

Microsoft should learn how to sell the positive things and make up for the negative aspects of it. I applaud their bravery, I must admit though.

Now Sony are back with a balanced/very capable machine, better CEOs and staff, and this is going to be very interesting!

 

[dagamer]

In order for such lopsidedness to occur like it did with the PS1 vs N64 (3:1) and PS2 vs Xbox/GCN (7:1, though it was sold several years longer), you'd need other systems not to have specific key 3rd party games. With the extremely similar architecture of the PS4 and Xbox One, the ease of ports between the platforms will almost always be lower than the risk of not porting and losing out on sales. There's no reason not to put a game on both if you're a 3rd party publisher. Most importantly, Microsoft has gotten to the point where serious Japanese developers can't ignore the console (Final Fantasy XV, Kingdom Hearts III, and Metal Gear Solid V are proof of that).

 

[eastmen]

Sony would have to take off very fast with the ps4. MS would be able to money hat using the base of the machine and advertising money / strait up cash to get games exclusive to their system. Which in turn will bring in more gamers to it.

Sony would most likely need to sell 8:1 at the start to accomplish that. Think about it . If in june 2014 there are 5m xbox ones and 10 million ps4s that's not a big enough difference for a developer to ignore the xbox. It would have to be a lot more .

 

[temesgen]

I dont see publishers eager to see one platform dominate as that could lead to policies which make releasing games on that platform unfavorable. Even timed exclusives are timed and not truly exclusive in part because publishers want and need to be seen as platform agnostic, too much support for one over the other would have negative consequences.

WRT install base, I don't think the first year is going to matter that much to anyone's long term planning unless we see sales disappointing for both platforms, if that were to happen the major publishers would have to reassesses their overall strategy on AAA title budgets and release dates.

 

[dagamer]

I dont see publishers eager to see one platform dominate as that could lead to policies which make releasing games on that platform unfavorable. Even timed exclusives are timed and not truly exclusive in part because publishers want and need to be seen as platform agnostic, too much support for one over the other would have negative consequences.

WRT install base, I don't think the first year is going to matter that much to anyone's long term planning unless we see sales disappointing for both platforms, if that were to happen the major publishers would have to reassesses their overall strategy on AAA title budgets and release dates.

Already we are seeing lots of cross-gen games being made. Publishers are covering their bases since it's hard to ignore a total install base of 150 million PS3/360 consoles. If history is any guide, we are not going to see any next-gen only games from most publishers for 1-2 years.

 

[Exophase]

In order for such lopsidedness to occur like it did with the PS1 vs N64 (3:1) and PS2 vs Xbox/GCN (7:1, though it was sold several years longer), you'd need other systems not to have specific key 3rd party games. With the extremely similar architecture of the PS4 and Xbox One, the ease of ports between the platforms will almost always be lower than the risk of not porting and losing out on sales. There's no reason not to put a game on both if you're a 3rd party publisher. Most importantly, Microsoft has gotten to the point where serious Japanese developers can't ignore the console (Final Fantasy XV, Kingdom Hearts III, and Metal Gear Solid V are proof of that).

I actually see the exclusive effect as having the exact opposite effect. In the past, or at least before this generation, systems sold almost entirely on the strength of their exclusives. And N64 for instance had a lot of strong ones. It may very well be that developers have enough incentive to generally target XBone, but that of course works both ways - they have little incentive to not target PS4. If there aren't that many exclusives on either side then it'll come down to pricing, features, reliability, press/marketing, and so forth, like it more or less did for XB360/PS3 (which remarkably managed to reach near equilibrium in worldwide sales). In this regard it just looks really bad for MS.. PS4 is cheaper and more powerful and has avoided some of the stigmas MS has garnered (even where they've repealed things, some of the impact has already hit). MS has Kinect but that's not going to be enough to influence more than some percentage of the gamer pool because a lot of people simply don't care, while almost everyone cares about cheaper. The new media features also seem pretty uninteresting to most people. So really MS could be in a bad position unless they decide to start taking big losses with some enormous price cuts.

 

[Grall]

I hope PS4 ends up selling well enough that not too many games end up being xbone-exclusive. Ideally, no game should be exclusive to any console - or perhaps rather, all consoles should be code compatible (*PC waves from over there*... ), but that would be far too utopian for us mere human beings.

 

[Rangers]

Or, is there still a critical mass, where popularity snowballs on the strength of recommendations from friends and family, that, if a console reaches it, will leave other platforms to be neglected? If, hypothetically, PS4 were to outsell XB1 4:1 for the first 6-12 months (or vice versa), would devs start to ignore XB1 and that platform fizzle out?

I doubt it. If such a scenario happens, Microsoft would just cut price until it doesn't happen any more. I mean, 299 drastic measures would surely get it done, if 399 didn't.

That would suck for them but, they can afford it. they'd rip Kinect out, etc.

Provided Xbone has decent graphical punch which it appears too.

One thing I'm pretty sure of though is Wii U is going to be a non factor, so there's only two real competitors. Maybe that would make it a little easier for one to dominate.

I think another factor is that Microsoft seems to have marshaled unprecedented third party support. Both BF4 and COD are now more or less Xbox branded, with exclusive timed DLC. Titanfall exclusive too.

If Ps4 wasn't doing as well (in preorders/mindshare) as it is right now, I think it might have been in some trouble. And MS gave them a big gift with 499 too.

 

[Johnny Awesome]

You guys are funny. MS is going to be fine.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It appears hypothetical discussion are impossible on this board.

 

[mrcorbo]

It appears hypothetical discussion are impossible on this board.

They are exceedingly difficult, at least.

If you're talking specifically about this generation, then I think the hardware similarities between the two consoles almost guarantee ports between them unless one or the other of the console makers actively work to prevent them. And I believe the PC really is a third platform that will also get ports for the same reason.

At worst, though, you may see less effort put into the ports for the less popular platform leading to poorer performance and minimal support for it's unique features. I could see this creating a cycle of cause-and-effect where more people continue to gravitate to the dominant platform causing developers to emphasize that platform more and more making that platform even more attractive to consumers and so on. If this is allowed to happen and isn't countered in some way by the platform holder you could very well see a pretty large disparity in the sales numbers after a while.