A new Zelda, a sequel to Super Mario Galaxy, a new Metroid, etc., with so many big first party titles coming out I got to thinking about how long this console generation will last. From what I understand the norm is about 5 years, but with so many big guns announced in the Wii's third year I get the impression that the Wii could go well beyond just 5.
Well seeing as how Zelda probably wont be out til next Holiday season I would say 2 years more for the Wii. Twilight Princess was released on the Gamecube after all. Maybe this new game will be released on two seperate consoles as well
Microsoft recently claimed they want the 360 to have a 10-year life cycle. Yeah...I don't really see that happening. Damn thing doesn't even have Blu-ray for crying out loud!
Sony continues to hold to THEIR 10-year lifecycle strategy, even though they need to hurry up and kill off the damn PS2 already! It's a freaking zombie at this point!
With Nintendo, though, it's impossible to tell. The Wii could keep going for years or get replaced suddenly (even if only by an incremental upgrade like they've been doing with the DS). They haven't said much one way or the other, and it'll probably depend largely on how sales maintain.
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You know what's crazy? I kind of want to buy a PS2 because of the backwards compatibility with PS1 and low price of all of those awesome RPGs I missed out on because I was on the Xbox train.
Yup, PS2 is still awesome! Just be sure to pick the right model for that PS1 comatibility. I hope PS2 stays with us a while longer since many games are developed for Wii and PS2 at the same time.
I'm sure it will go at least 10 years. I expect Nintendo to treat the Wii like the DS with a Wii lite (in fashion colours, slimmer due to dropping Gamecube compatible controller/memory card ports and more on-board flash; wii remotes with built-in motion+) in the next couple of years.
The appearance of a brand-new machine from Nintendo will depend upon continued health of hardware and software sales I expect. Any successor to the Wii I expect to be backwards-compatible with the existing Wii; possibly having a trade-up program where you can transfer online content/shop account to the new system to ensure the maximum number of users get the new system.
The console cycles are going to be longer this time, especially with digital downloads being cash cows. There isn't much more graphically that can be done with consoles anyway. The next generation will be more focused on new ideas (motion sensing for example) rather than just graphics, so they can wait a few more years until they have those ideas ready.
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Topic: Console cycle length?
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