I think the whole £49.99 for a game thing won't last too much longer. Development for 360 is going to become easier over time, Microsoft are putting a lot of energies into their XNA solution, the sole aim of which is to create an environment best suited for developers.
Sony ballsed up with the devkit for PS2, it was one of the least supported and hardest to figure out piece of hardware there has ever been. It has taken many years for developers to build up a code library that makes best use of PS2 hardware.
I also have high hopes for Revolution. The big N have always had the most fun games. You've just got to look at the Mario and Yoshi platformers. Yoshi's Island still remains as one of my faviourite games. Not just great graphics (and they really were great) but the gameplay... you just know they spent weeks honing the gameplay. Something dredfully lacking in most modern games.
What was the last PC game you played that gave you a real measure of your acheivement and progress? High-scores seem to be a relic of the past. Collecting all the stars/eggs/coins/red wibbly things also doesn't feature.
Ty Tazmanian Tiger is still the best platformer available for Xbox. The sequel sucked, appearing to be a victim of its predecessor's success. The reason it sucked was that it was almost totally 'open-ended', a feature that some games actually list as a good thing. Quite how that works I will never know. A game isn't fun unless you have a solid measure of your achievement throughout.
One thing that will maintain sales of Xbox 360 and PS3 will be small to medium sized downloadable games. I personally can't wait to get my fingers on Gravity Wars 2, which will cost me the equivalent of less than £5. Xbox Live Arcade is potentially a goldmine for small (and not so small) developers. Microsoft have made it unbelievably easy to download these games and the very concept of purchasing has changed from "I'm spending £9.99" to "It's only 600 points" which is a massive psychological barrier being smashed into bits.
I'm sure Sony will have their equivalent (it would be suicide not to) and I would guess that they will also make it far easier for the one-man-band developer to distribute his game this way.
Think of an extension of the Xbox 360 gamercard. What if other Live users can see your gamercard and also select "see this player's homemade games". Games created in a small linux-style environment with a D3D API. What if you could charge 100 points for downloading your game?
It's these emerging technologies that will ensure that none of the new generation die. I believe that they will thrive on it. Nevermind your giga-flops and mege-vertices-per-second. You could have provided the same platform but with SNES style capability and people would flock to create content for it.
Sony ballsed up with the devkit for PS2, it was one of the least supported and hardest to figure out piece of hardware there has ever been. It has taken many years for developers to build up a code library that makes best use of PS2 hardware.
I also have high hopes for Revolution. The big N have always had the most fun games. You've just got to look at the Mario and Yoshi platformers. Yoshi's Island still remains as one of my faviourite games. Not just great graphics (and they really were great) but the gameplay... you just know they spent weeks honing the gameplay. Something dredfully lacking in most modern games.
What was the last PC game you played that gave you a real measure of your acheivement and progress? High-scores seem to be a relic of the past. Collecting all the stars/eggs/coins/red wibbly things also doesn't feature.
Ty Tazmanian Tiger is still the best platformer available for Xbox. The sequel sucked, appearing to be a victim of its predecessor's success. The reason it sucked was that it was almost totally 'open-ended', a feature that some games actually list as a good thing. Quite how that works I will never know. A game isn't fun unless you have a solid measure of your achievement throughout.
One thing that will maintain sales of Xbox 360 and PS3 will be small to medium sized downloadable games. I personally can't wait to get my fingers on Gravity Wars 2, which will cost me the equivalent of less than £5. Xbox Live Arcade is potentially a goldmine for small (and not so small) developers. Microsoft have made it unbelievably easy to download these games and the very concept of purchasing has changed from "I'm spending £9.99" to "It's only 600 points" which is a massive psychological barrier being smashed into bits.
I'm sure Sony will have their equivalent (it would be suicide not to) and I would guess that they will also make it far easier for the one-man-band developer to distribute his game this way.
Think of an extension of the Xbox 360 gamercard. What if other Live users can see your gamercard and also select "see this player's homemade games". Games created in a small linux-style environment with a D3D API. What if you could charge 100 points for downloading your game?
It's these emerging technologies that will ensure that none of the new generation die. I believe that they will thrive on it. Nevermind your giga-flops and mege-vertices-per-second. You could have provided the same platform but with SNES style capability and people would flock to create content for it.