Topic: Console Yourself

To be clear, what follows is purely anecdotal, I have not conducted any surveys or anything. It is a feeling of a handful of long time gamers, and I wonder if they reflect any more person's views, and if so, what it may mean for the industry.

Myself and my fellow Nintendo purchasing friends feel fairly disillusioned with the games console market just now. Since the SNES we've always gotten the latest Nintendo. Most of my friends also dabble in other home systems as well. Possibly we're just getting older, but none of us see any reason right now to buy any of the home consoles. Another chum has always gotten Xbox, but is completely underwhelmed by the Xbox One.

Most of us are content with the 3DS, and others are looking to maybe buy the XL version at some point.

The Xbox guy is thinking about his options, possibly getting Android or iPad; but he protests, he wants to play proper big games likes Halo. He doesn't want a tablet or an all in one entertainment system with motion controls, he just wants a console to play those kind of games. Perhaps the PlayStation 4 may meet his some of his needs, but Sony tend to price their consoles too high.

As for the Nintendo gang, we are very content to play Luigi's Mansion and the like on 3DS, and see no reason to get a Wii U yet. It's not unlikely that a big Zelda or Mario game may sway us, but if we don't see one at this year's E3, I think the existence of such a blockbuster may be doubted.

It seems that there is a market for just a basic affordable home console, and it seems strange that none of the big companies is filling it. I wouldn't say that this is the end of home console gaming, far from it. But it does feel to myself and my friends that the industry may be at a crossroads.

Will it go towards more casual gaming on general portable devices, as many have suggested?

With the lines getting ever more blurred, will Nintendo's next console be both 'home' and portable?

Will the home entertainment system model become the norm, or will home console gaming become less mainstream, as it was in the past?

Is this long Betamax-VHS style standoff finally heading towards a resolution? Or is the market simply fragmenting?

This is the first time I think where none us is interested in getting any of the home consoles.

I would be interested to read your thoughts.

CowLaunch

Except for the 3DS, I'm completely UNsatisfied with the consoles out. The Wii killed gaming, check it: the GameCube had 2 analog sticks, they could have beem like SONY and MS! Then Nintendo made the Wii, and they got the stupid idea they should always be so, intuitive, and light-hearted and crap. So SONY and MS followed, and now I hate home consoles. For Pete's sake, the PS4 controller look so stupid and gimmicky. Just give me a good console man...

@WhoBeThat

I was very skeptical to begin with, but I think there is a place for things like the Wii, and the volume of sales would suggest that. I think they may have taken that kind of thinking too far though with launching the Wii U with a 2D Mario and releasing the likes of Nintendoland. E3 is today though, I may well be speaking too soon.

It will be interesting to see how far the price comes down, but I think Sony have missed a trick in pricing the PS4 at $400; I think the could have had the market of standard gamers by default.

Well, Micro$oft certainly missed a trick by pricing the XBone at 500 bucks / euro. Add 200 for some games plus a monthly subscription and you're looking at a lot of money

I think that the Wii U's biggest problem is that there have been gaps devoid of games so far. Don't get me wrong- there are a good amount of games to play on it- but the schedule of when they're actually coming out is terribly awkward. I suspect that the PS4 will suffer from this less as third parties are going to flock to it. Even if the XBox One ends up getting lots of exclusives, the DRM will kill it to many people.

I think the problem is that when nintendo makes a tablet-like controller people said it was boring....
and now today the sony fanboys kept repeating how sony is innovative and special and how no one could have thought of making a tablet controller and SONY is AWESOME for MAKING ALONE THE watch dogs game(yeah the one ubisoft's making)....
so the problem are the FANBOYS
and yeah I've exagerated there using bold(just learned how to do it lol)