Gaming The crash of the videogame industry in the near futre... ******** or not?

[Bloodseeker]

The crash of the videogame industry sometime during this decade has been a point of speculation since the early days of the 64-bit era. I was one of those that always blew the doomsayers off as professionals that didn't understand the mindset of a gamer. But now, as a gamer, looking at the present, I'm starting to think that the crash might not be as farfetched as I used to think.

First, and the most minor of my points, is the new focus on online console gaming. How many people do you know that play online games? On the face to face basis? Probably not very many. Why? Because most people aren't willing to shell out an extra $50 for the hardware and $30 for the subscription. If the next generation of software tries to lean heavy on online play for sells, well, they're not exactly standing on solid ground.

Next is the lack of innovation. I'm going to sum up some of the most popular genres for you.

FPS: Halo, Half Life, Rainbow Six, Wolfenstein
Racing: Gran Turismo, Need for Speed, Burnout
Football: Madden, Blitz

Every genre with the exception of RPGs and Fighting can be summarized in 3 or 4 games. You play those, you've played them all. Sure they have tweaks, but at the core, they're pretty much the same thing.

This one's the biggy.

First, about how long was the average game 5 years ago? If memory serves me right, the average time for a single player game was about 25-60 hours, right? Even action games ran for at least 20. Now what have we got? God of War, the Onimusha games, Fable, most FPS games... they all take less than 20 hours to complete if you're average. Games that take over 30 hours to complete are becoming a rarity. This isn't a good sign.

What's the current outlook on the cost of the next generation systems? XBOX360 is looking to be about $500, and though recent reports suggest that the PS3 will be about $350 at launch, I can't say that I buy it with all of the expensive technology that's being used to in the PS3. Most people are going to be hard pressed to spend that much on a console, especially when most of them already have the extras that Microsoft and Sony are trying to pitch as selling points.

I'd be willing to bet that the cost of the games are going to go up as well. I'm no specialist, but I'd be willing to bet that putting together a game's graphics at the level detail demanded by the next generation consoles is going to take some elite skills, and that hiring people with that level of skill isn't going to be cheap. And how long is it going to take to put all that mapping with photo-realism together once you do hire the right people? Time costs money when you're trying to get a product on the market. How do you make up for that lost money? You either cut the quality (in this case, the length and fine tuning) or you raise the price, or both.

How many of you would continue buying games if 10 hour games with a $70 price tag became the norm? How many of you would spend a whopping $500 on a console to play those games? If you're willing to let them get away with that, you're both an extremely hardcore gamer and a dumbass.

I don't think that a crash in the near future in an inevitability, yet. But if things keep going in this direction, if games continue to get shorter, if console prices continue to rise, if developers continue to settle for generic gameplay, if online play is what developers are counting on for the future of the videogame industry, most gamers will lose interest, and if or when that happens, it won't take long for the crash to follow.

[Morpheus]

I'd say there is little chance of another crash. 3 games per genre X 8 genres = 24 + 8 rpg+ 5 Fighting= 37x$60=$2,220. That's way more than I can spend every 4-5 years. Seriously, look at the games that you have. You have more than 37. That's because there are more than 3 good racers, 3 good fps's or 3 good sports games. Let's take FPS's for example. UT04 has good deathmatch and CTF, Half-life has a good storyline and physics engine, Doom 3 is scary, Ghost Recon is strategic. Each fills there own niche, and each has several iterations so that we can make that experience longer. Before gaming crashes, people will have to stop buying games, and '04 was the second peak of the industry.

[Semjaza]

[quote name='Bloodseeker']Every genre with the exception of RPGs and Fighting can be summarized in 3 or 4 games. You play those, you've played them all. Sure they have tweaks, but at the core, they're pretty much the same thing.[/quote]

I think this is [I]incredibly[/I] over generalizing and shortsighted. I can say nearly every RPG is the same style with some different stories plopped in, but that doesn't work. There will always be clones, sure, but to claim what you're claiming here is ridiculous as far as I'm concerned.

The online issue is a null point really when Nintendo's plans call for free online play, Sony's plans call for free online play and MS charges only $50 a month for some pretty decent services (not to mention every first party game currently comes with a free two month Live voucher).

[quote name='Bloodseeker']First, about how long was the average game 5 years ago? If memory serves me right, the average time for a single player game was about 25-60 hours, right? Even action games ran for at least 20. Now what have we got? God of War, the Onimusha games, Fable, most FPS games... they all take less than 20 hours to complete if you're average. Games that take over 30 hours to complete are becoming a rarity. This isn't a good sign.[/quote]

I really have no idea what games you could possibly be thinking of. I think your memory is clouded or something. Games with 50 hour main quests have never been a norm in any remote capacity. There's always been shorter games and longer games. The first time through doesn't take into consideration replayability and whatever else that many shorter games do offer.

Games being shorter than 50 hours is not necessarily a bad thing as many people do not have that sort of time to commit to something. Getting to an ending should not necessarily have to require a 50 hour investment. If a game is five hours long that's one thing. Twenty is hardly bad.

[quote]What's the current outlook on the cost of the next generation systems? XBOX360 is looking to be about $500, and though recent reports suggest that the PS3 will be about $350 at launch, I can't say that I buy it with all of the expensive technology that's being used to in the PS3. Most people are going to be hard pressed to spend that much on a console, especially when most of them already have the extras that Microsoft and Sony are trying to pitch as selling points.[/quote]

MS is quoted as saying they're going after a $300 launch price. Sony itself has said it was looking to go under $500 for PS3. Considering these are both directly from the company I am not sure where you are getting these figures from.

Whether or not you can afford or want to get something is your own perrogative. People seem to forget how expensive the N64, PS2 and Xbox were when they first hit shelves... not to mention the original Playstation. All of these have done well. Another $300 system isn't going to set a new, horrible trend. The trend already exists.

[quote]I'd be willing to bet that the cost of the games are going to go up as well. I'm no specialist, but I'd be willing to bet that putting together a game's graphics at the level detail demanded by the next generation consoles is going to take some elite skills, and that hiring people with that level of skill isn't going to be cheap. And how long is it going to take to put all that mapping with photo-realism together once you do hire the right people? Time costs money when you're trying to get a product on the market. How do you make up for that lost money? You either cut the quality (in this case, the length and fine tuning) or you raise the price, or both.[/quote]

Well, you don't have to be an expert to know this... You're right about rising costs and this is something that the manufacturers have wanted to address. Nintendo seems interested in making sure games can be made cheaply on their system by both big publishers and small. MS has their XNA program going that helps developers throughout the process. I'm sure Sony has something to that level as well.

Games are going to get more expensive to make, yes... but games are already expensive to make and have maintained a rather stable price mark for quite some time now. Most of that cost has not been put down to the consumer as of yet. Will it? I have no idea. Activision is the only current publisher that has voiced any ideas of raising their game prices next gen to about $55 or $60. Other companies attempt to recoup these possible losses by putting out limited edition sets that cost a bit more. My basic thought here is that we have no real idea if prices will raise or not. They won't necessarily have to.

Movies still cost a ridiculous amount of money to make even compared to games and last, on average, two hours. People are willing to spend $10 to watch them once in a theater, $6 to rent them for two days and another $20 or so to buy the things when they first come out. Almost any game provides longer entertainment than all three of those combined. I don't think paying more for them is necessarily something that is unexpected or surprising.

The original market crash happened because people didn't care about the games. Atari had a bad business model to begin with and began putting all their money into licensed games such as ET because they thought it would sell solely based on the name. They made more copies of that game than systems people owned.

This isn't an issue any more and it's not what is happening now. The idea of a gaming market crashing when every single electronics sector around it is facing higher costs and higher retail pricing schemes doesn't make much sense to me. If prices are too high, people won't buy the stuff. Markets react to these things and prices will be lowered. When it gets into a feasible price range, people will. It happens all the time with everything that can be bought or sold. This isn't a "crash"... but there are other potential things that can lead up to it. I think the idea of costs exceeding profits is something that is very likely to really damage the industry, as you mention here. Not just games, but losing profits on hardware.

There's also the issue of whether or not people actually want these all-in-one media devices. I personally do not. I wonder if at some point these things are just going to turn into what is basically a simple-minded personal computer and gamers will abandon them. That alone would cause some things to pretty much collapse... although I don't see it being on the level of the big one in the 1980s.

[Bloodseeker]

[quote name='Morpheus']I'd say there is little chance of another crash. 3 games per genre X 8 genres = 24 + 8 rpg+ 5 Fighting= 37x$60=$2,220. That's way more than I can spend every 4-5 years. Seriously, look at the games that you have. You have more than 37. That's because there are more than 3 good racers, 3 good fps's or 3 good sports games. Let's take FPS's for example. UT04 has good deathmatch and CTF, Half-life has a good storyline and physics engine, Doom 3 is scary, Ghost Recon is strategic. Each fills there own niche, and each has several iterations so that we can make that experience longer. Before gaming crashes, people will have to stop buying games, and '04 was the second peak of the industry.[/quote]

But over the course of 5 years, that's not very many. And when you consider that most people don't enjoy every genre, you can take a few off of that list.

But you're missing the point. My point is that is that once you play those, you start to feel like you're playing the same game over and over again with little tweaks here and there, and I don't know about you, but I stop buying when it gets like that. Its the reason why the only genre that I've bought more than 3 games in with this last generation are RPGs.

[Goodbye, Face]

I've already decided that I'm not going to buy any of the next-gen systems. It just looks like a load of ******** right now. You're exactly right. All the companies care about are multiplayer modes and graphics. I don't care if I can play a game with 128 people, I don't have half that many friends, and I'm not spending $10 or more a month on top of broadband charges to play online with hackers and ignorant, unintelligent bastards. I don't want to spend $70 a game, I don't even spend $40 on a game, the last time I did that, I bought Disgaea and MGS3 on the same day, $50 and $50. THose kind of games are the only kind of games where the experience is worth that much to me. If I want realistic graphics, I'll ride my skateboard into the city, Wallah! Tony Hawk! I customize myself with tattoos, hoodies, parper bags, but probably not skeleton arms. I could go on with this analogy, but you already get my point. I just did a long rant about this issue in the other "Next-gen" thread, and it made me very pissed off at the world. You should check it out, as I don't feel like repeating that post that took me an hour and a half to type.

[satan665]

[QUOTE=Bloodseeker]But over the course of 5 years, that's not very many. And when you consider that most people don't enjoy every genre, you can take a few off of that list.

But you're missing the point. My point is that is that once you play those, you start to feel like you're playing the same game over and over again with little tweaks here and there, and I don't know about you, but I stop buying when it gets like that. Its the reason why the only genre that I've bought more than 3 games in with this last generation are RPGs.[/QUOTE]


Thats true in my case for sure. I haven't really even gotten half way through GTA san Andreas because I was just getting sick of the series. Or more on target, After playing through DevilMay Cry 3 I didn't really have much fun playing God of War when I got the demo.

[Semjaza]

[QUOTE=Bloodseeker]But over the course of 5 years, that's not very many. And when you consider that most people don't enjoy every genre, you can take a few off of that list.

But you're missing the point. My point is that is that once you play those, you start to feel like you're playing the same game over and over again with little tweaks here and there, and I don't know about you, but I stop buying when it gets like that. Its the reason why the only genre that I've bought more than 3 games in with this last generation are RPGs.[/QUOTE]

The problem with this argument is that people can easily toss it right back at RPGs. Most use the same basic gameplay models. Go here, talk to these NPCs, run around, get in turn based fights. There's been some action based, realtime enhancements, but that fits into the idea of "tweaks" a lot of the time since many of those said battle systems are not exactly unique to begin with since they base themselves heavily off of eachother.

This would lead me to believe you get most of your value out of characters and story. Not all people do. There are also games that aren't RPGs that have these same qualities. You can't really apply personal opinion on games you tend to prefer as to why every other game has gotten redundant.

satan665's example of a series regurgitating itself is one thing. I mean, I get tired of a series when it does little new to itself and feels like a "roster update" like with sports games sometimes. However, this doesn't make sense for what I'm reading here in my opinion. You're applying this idea across entire genres and over broad ranges of companies. I don't see how that works because it just takes into account largely just your personal preferences.

[James]

[color=#737373]I definitely think that a crash is possible, if things don't change. The current path that hardware makers and developers are following is dangerous, because not enough is being done to diversify the product and the market. Sony and Microsoft in particular are still selling to the very same audiences and without overall market growth, it'll be difficult to sustain that for a long period as development costs rise.

I think that Sony's PSP is a prime example of what's wrong with the industry - not the product itself, but the business model behind it. Heavy hardware losses, high development costs, low profitability, confused product focus and a lack of differentiation. It's just a bad business model and it isn't very stable for the future.

There are two really big issues at the moment, I think. One is development cost. No question that this is going to rise. When the industry moved from 16 to 32/64 bit consoles, there were many developers who struggled to make the change, due to the increased cost of producing 3D games. There were quite a few developers who went out of business entirely, despite being quite successful with 2D games.

The same thing has occurred in the current generation, with some developers being bought-out by larger publishers in order to survive. I doubt that Rare would have much chance of survival if they weren't owned by someone, be it Nintendo or Microsoft. Although they're an odd case, because they are a massively inefficient company with terrible staff morale.

So, cost is a very big factor. Unless there are alternatives and unless XNA and other initiatives actually pan out properly...that will continue to strangle developers and further reduce the choice that people have on the shelves. While it doesn't necessarily mean that games will be a lot worse, it's almost like the reverse of what happened with Atari in the 80's. Atari was producing a ton of crap and people soon stopped buying games as a result of a flood of awful software on the market. Potentially, we could see the reverse; a very very limited selection of software that offers no new experiences. That's very important, because it could lead to a decline in sales.

The second problem is the market itself. Right now this is only an issue in Japan. New hardware sales used to keep the market afloat; people would snap up new hardware products and this was enough to keep things fresh. But that rule has really been nonexistant within the last few years in Japan. New hardware releases are not stopping the decline of the industry there. The decline is largely a result of people losing interest in games in general - losing interest in the repetition that so many like-games are providing.

All of this is partly why I'm supportive of Nintendo's approach with DS and Revolution. Although they will obviously do their best to run a profitable business regardless, I think they are the only hardware maker right now who is trying to expand the market and stop the decline in Japan. Sony and Microsoft are doing nothing to achieve that.

The big question, I think, is whether or not other territories eventually start to experience a decline like that. If prices go up and if games in general become less experimental, it's certainly a possibility. But even if it doesn't happen at all, that doesn't eliminate the other problems that still exist.

Sony and Microsoft understand that there are looming problems, which is why they are trying to find ways to make development easier and cheaper. I think they have the right idea with that. But I think Sony's model in particular is problematic and I think they've largely ignored the problems in the Japanese market (which is surprising, because it's still a very important market to them). Ultimately, they'll have to do [i]more[/i] than just make development easier - they'll have to make it even more affordable than they are now, and they'll have to try to cultivate different kinds of interactive products to stimulate the market. It certainly needs that stimulation right now, and it'll probably need it even more in the future.[/color]

[Semjaza]

James's last post reminds me of Matt at IGNCube, of all things:

[quote]I'm assuming this e-mail to IGNcube was sparked by another website's recent evaluation of Nintendo as a business. I read over that, too. Some good points in there for sure. Nintendo continues to be profitable -- more so than Sony even -- despite selling less console hardware and in some cases software. This is because Nintendo's overhead is by comparison much lower. The author of the recent evaluation maintains that Nintendo's business could continue to exist as it does for "another 500 years" and remain profitable.

I don't agree.

When die-hard Nintendo fans claim that the company is profitable and that's all there is to it, they -- very much like Nintendo, now that I think of it -- demonstrate a glaring shortsightedness. Nintendo is profitable now, but it may not be in the future. A deeper evaluation of the company's fortunes and mind share would show that its command of the console market from the early 90s has dramatically decreased. Worse, it would also show that Nintendo loses more and more market share every generation, while both Sony and Microsoft gain it.

That is bad business. A graph that shows a downward slope representing Nintendo's mind share cannot be interrupted as healthy regardless of how you look at it -- unless, that is, you turn it upside down.

It's almost unfortunate, I think, that Nintendo's approach works so well in the short term. You can see the strategy in motion. Game Boy. Game Boy Color. Game Boy Advance. Game Boy Advance SP. Nintendo DS. Game Boy Micro. Six major revisions of what is essentially tech more than a decade old and every time it sells like hotcakes. It's all so cheaply manufactured, which means that Nintendo can easily make a profit -- oftentimes, a massive one. As a result, Nintendo refuses to change.

But what happens to Nintendo's cost-cutting measures when a legitimate competitor steps in? Look no further than PlayStation. At a time when Nintendo was all-too happy to keep proprietary and moneymaking cartridges as its medium for N64, Sony swooped in and took control of the console market with an advanced format. And when Nintendo tried to cut costs again with GameCube, slicing away a larger storage medium again and dropping DVD-playback and a digital out altogether, Sony furthered its lead with PlayStation 2. Here, Microsoft came in and -- to Nintendo's surprise -- stole away GameCube owners, not PS2 ones. Afterward, Nintendo's piece of the overall console pie was missing a whopping bite.

Perhaps a bigger problem still is that third party games sell worse and worse on Nintendo platforms, which have in recent years become so targeted to die-hard Nintendo fans who mainly want Nintendo-developed games. As a result, more and more third parties have abandoned for Microsoft and Sony, which has a huge impact on overall hardware sales. Grand Theft Auto 3 sold PlayStation 2 systems. Splinter Cell sold Xbox consoles.

Whether it says so publicly or not, Nintendo is not happy being number three in the console market. But it put itself there by refusing to take risks on hardware, which is exactly what the most recent evaluation of the company's business side cites as a positive move.

Short term profits. But if Nintendo continues to lose more and more market share where consoles are concerned, will there come a time when its reach is too insignificant to sustain profitability?

I'm not saying it's going to happen. I'm merely playing devil's advocate.

If there's a point to all of this, it's that Nintendo's business model is not nearly as shiny and happy as it appears to be in the short term.[/quote]

It's obvious Nintendo is the only company easily making a profit on its hardware as well as its software. It took Sony quite some time to pick up on PS2's hardware losses. PSP is losing money because of its hardware costs still. As far as I know, Xbox has yet to catch up either.

Repeatedly he mentions things like "Nintendo is doing bad business because they're not number one!" Yet, when I look at it from a business angle, I don't know how anyone can possibly agree with him. It's obvious Matt never knows much of what he's talking about from a business angle to begin with.

If Nintendo is the only one pulling in profits with no major issues as of right now, why are they the ones doing it "wrong"? No, they're not always doing exactly what I want, but they do manage a continued existance despite it. When GameCube is in third place and Nintendo is still doing remarkably well with it in comparison to the other two consoles from a [I]purely money perspective[/I], where does bad business come in? I think Matt (and other people) equate market share with profits and that's the end of it. It works in theory, but when you have a bad business model otherwise, it's not always beneficial.

The idea that making money over the [I]entire[/I] course of your system's development is only good for "the short term" as Matt says just does not make sense. Nintendo is losing marketshare in the console world, true. That's never a good thing... yet when the company ahead by well over two dozen million units is pulling in less profit by their business model after nearly a decade, I have to wonder who exactly is approaching things badly here.

We'll see what happens. I do agree with the genral idea presented in here by Bloodseeker and James that if costs continue to exceed profits (even if they're eventually made up) there's going to be some major problems. I am sure 360 will be losing some money through its design, but MS seems to be coming up with varying sources of revenue for the thing (the system, games, Live, download fees, etc). On the other hand, Sony has this freaking monster of a system coming out that's production costs will likely be astronomical. Revolution by its nature probably won't be very expensive for us or Nintendo.

Being most powerful is great for gamers (assuming the best games come out on it, which is a gamble either way), but it obviously isn't always for business (first party or third; major or independant). I can't really think of another sector in electronics that goes through this level of price fixing in this day and age. It's going to catch up sooner or later.

Whether or not this means a "crash", I have no idea. Like I said, I don't see any problems being on the level of what happened in Atari's day, quite honestly. Games are a bigger part of general life than they were back then, surprisingly. Today's companies don't put all their livelihood into one license based title that is shoddily developed (unless their Acclaim -- they're gone now for obvious reasons lol).

Personally, I think there will be a shake-out, but not necessarily a crash.

[James]

[color=#737373]Matt's response isn't really hitting the mark, I agree.

People were making the profitability argument in the N64 days and they still are now - nothing has changed in that sense. Perhaps Matt doesn't understand what makes Nintendo profitable right now, I don't know.

Their decline in the home console market isn't good, but that decline is matched by an increase in size of the overall market. So I would say that they've remained pretty stable in general. Their profit margins did used to be higher, but this was because of the highly restrictive licensing model that they had applied...which obviously can't be used now.

What Matt seems to forget is the Nintendo DS. That's a new system and like Game Boy, it has lots of life potentially. I can imagine Nintendo updating DS periodically as they do with Game Boy to help keep it fresh. Given its success and high tie-in ratio right now and given its newness, I don't know how he can say that Nintendo isn't planning for the future.

Even if you consider the decline in GBA sales growth (which is natural with a console that has sold more than any other in this generation), you still have DS as a new system that is doing remarkably well despite not having a large amount of hit games. When the big hits start rolling later in the year, we will probably see even better performance.

So even if GBA died off completely, it's not as though Nintendo aren't planning ahead. GBA Micro will no doubt help to keep GBA sales stable for the next year or so and DS will continue to pick up steam and become and increasingly large part of Nintendo's revenue. And the DS business is [i]profitable[/i], like the GameCube business. It's more profitable than the incredibly shaky PSP business.

If Revolution is similar to DS in terms of cost versus revenue and so on, and if it captures a similar market percentage as GameCube...then Nintendo will continue to be a profitable business. It will survive the next generation better than most as a result.

Matt just keeps making these arguments, but they are no better than what I see in forums occasionally. They disregard so many obvious things and they incorporate elements that are really unrelated. It's annoying because I think that IGNcube visitors probably get the wrong impression as a result. Unfortunately though, it's tough to find truly good coverage on this type of issue. I've seen good stuff at CNN Money and a few other places, but it's rare.[/color]

[FunkySpunky]

You know what annoys me?

Halo 2.

Horrible story. Driven by the popularity of the first one. Good multiplayer and online, but way more popular than it should be. There are other shooters out there.

One of the things that really annoys me about Microsoft is their inability to make games on their own. Nintendo's best were created, made and published by their own. Microsoft? Eh...... They only got into it to make money, not games.

You know what game is perfect, as far as I'm concerned?

Katamari Damacy.

It's memorable. This is probable the single most important thing that a game can do, is make you remember specific events and characters, or lines (Wow, that is a nice cancer!) It's about a midget dude with a funky head, pushing a ball around that just keeps snowballing until you can pick up people, or cars, or whatever. The goal is to put the stars back in the sky. Bonus points for sketchy translations.

It's memorable. Stupidly Addicting. Has open ended levels. Each person who picks it up draws a unique experience from it.

To me, Katamari Damacy represents everything gaming should be, but isn't these days.

[50 cent]

When you say that once you've played the best you've played them all, like someone said before that is near sided. Each has it's own areas where it succeeds. Also buying the online packages are cheeper than the games themself. PS2 online is free, the Nintendo Revolution's online will be free, and Xbox live is only 50 dollars a year, honestly if any of you try to argue with me on this one you won't win I have xbox live and ps2 online.

The next gen consoles will not be that pricey as you said. They will not range from $350 to $500, from the news I have heard from bungie ( check out bungie.net for more info) and other major game companies they will be about what this gen consoles were priced on there release dates. There will not be major crash in the gaming industry in the next gen consoles it's actually being predicted as the highest point in the history of gaming.

Also yes Halo 2's story is pretty much the same story as the first, but it's not the story that makes us love it's the multiplayer, yes we all know there is other shooters out there and we will say there is other games that we do like better than halo( seriously ask anyone who plays halo 2 and they will say there is better games). We always talk about it because of it's multiplayer is so interactive. I mean what other shooter have you played lets you snipe a grenade before it gets to close to you and it actually blows up. I mean you might not know about it because you aren't a really great sharp shooter. Me I can do it if I set my mind to it but really if I'm playing in a match I will do it 1 out of every 5 games. Also some of the elements in the maps and the ways they are set up is what makes it great, so stop ranting about it you aren't proving anything

[James]

[color=#737373]People here are not really talking about the price of the consoles though. They are talking about the cost to game developers.

Also, the end price of a console does matter - whether it's expensive or not isn't as relevant as how much money the manufacturer is losing. Microsoft may sell Xbox 360 for $300, for argument's sake, but they might lose $150-$250 per unit or something, because the manufacturing cost is higher than the wholesale cost.

So, believe me, all of these things - developer cost and manufacturing cost - have massive implications for the industry. And these things can only go up. Manufacturing losses would go up [i]especially[/i] if prices of consoles at retail remain the same.[/color]

[Morpheus]

Microsoft was never in this to make money. They wanted to get market share, which they have accomplished. They must now start making money, which they have absolutely no clue how to do in videogames.

They also do make games internally, but only from studios that they have purchased. Bungie is the only good one, though. Rare made Grabbed by the Ghoulies for pete's sake.

[50 cent]

Yes Microsoft was not just there for the money, but hey who isn't to tell you the truth. Microsoft doesn't just sit around and make the console they do help develope most games. Other than that they are just like Nintendo and Sony.

Yes the cost to make games might go up, but it all depends on the people who work for the company. What we have heard though from major companies is tha they will be aiming for same priced games. If we get lucky we might see a five dollar drop in prices, but it most likely won't happen, but most of you forget that a new game for the N64 was $90 and some times even $95. So you never know but we do know it won't go up by much.

[James]

[color=#737373]I think you're still misunderstanding the point I'm making. Even if the price of a console doesn't go up at all - especially if it doesn't go up at all - companies like Microsoft and Sony will likely be taking bigger losses on hardware sales than the previous generation.

If it costs me $500 to make each system and I sell each one for $300, I am therefore making a loss of $200 per system. If I sell millions of systems, consider how big those losses become.

How do I overcome that loss and make a profit on top? Well, Microsoft hopes it will do that through software sales, through licensing, through Xbox Live and through the Xbox Live Marketplace system. Will that be enough? I guess time will tell.

Price drops are also a factor. Sony has said that its strategy with PS3 might be to avoid price drops altogether, so that eventually, profit on hardware can occur. But that strategy is questionable, because many consumers buy game hardware once the price drops start occurring. Many people are not early-adopters, they won't buy the systems at high prices. So that's another issue to consider as well.[/color]

[FunkySpunky]

[QUOTE=50 cent]
Also yes Halo 2's story is pretty much the same story as the first, but it's not the story that makes us love it's the multiplayer, yes we all know there is other shooters out there and we will say there is other games that we do like better than halo( seriously ask anyone who plays halo 2 and they will say there is better games). so stop ranting about it you aren't proving anything[/QUOTE]

Well, I was ranting, but I didn't really set out to prove that Halo 2 is a bad game. I was pointing out that games like Katamari Damacy, which rely entirely on the single player gameplay and experience tend to be the more memorable ones. And the memorable ones tend to be the best.

Nothing against gunning down warthogs while a sniper (who is supposed to be covering you) gets ganked by some lucky n00b. I just think the better game is the one that doesn't rely on other people playing to make it interesting.

[50 cent]

FunkySpunky, you are right that singleplayer does have the moments that we all want to have to have a good moment in, but also shooters are games were it does rely on multiplayer it's just a fact. You know that there isn't a good shooter out there that has a story line better than any rpg or any of the other types of games( except racing) so shooters do rely on multiplayer. The AI is hard enough as it is to try to make it no predictible and hard to learn their strategies, so they have multiplayer where as real intelligence faces off against real intelligence, why because humans have things that ai don't, like thought, instict or other good stuff. So what seems to be a bad idea can be a really good idea to us. So do you see my point now?