Will you buy a next-gen console?

[James]

Looks like the likely date for the WiiU console won't even come until this Christmas season or next year.

With the rumours of the 2013 machines having the power capability of a 2009/2010 PC, would you purchase a next generation console on its release year?

[Psychotic]

The last generation was overpriced, the next one will be worse. That, and I'm a PC gamer, through and through.

[Siva]

no

[Aidan]

Remember those videos that joked about the video game industry going downhill in the future?


They were right.

[ynnaD]

I honestly don't know

[Tantalus]

I honestly think the Wii U actually has potential, but Microsoft have left it too damn late for me to be interested, thr platform is practically stone age now.

The actual good games are either also available on PC (Watch__Dogs, Star Wars 1313) or given a Wii U exclusive release.

Innuendo actually appear to be taking third party developers seriously again and it might not be a steaming pile of shovelware this time.

Totally not getting it on release though.

[or 1=1]

Don't think that the PC like you know it now will survive forever. Microsoft is pushing the xBox to the "real next generation", a media center that can let your TV surf the web, play music and play\download games (Who knows, in future something like an "xBox" will let you control your whole house).

The 90% of PC users, do only these 3 things: play music, surf on web\social networks and play games, and believe me they'll prefer to buy an xBox than a PC next time.
I work for a PC assembling firm, and I can tell you that since smartphones and tablet came, PC sales have dropped and dropped. People prefer to buy a new 700€ smarthphone than a new PC, because it let they do everything they need.

In south korea, your smartphone is like a personal document. It has no sim card, and it stores all your personal information (like a normal ID CARD) and your bank data, to let you pay bus tickets, groceries and whatever you need. This is going to happen in the rest of the world too.

In future your smartphone will work as personal document\wallet\driving license etc and in your house you'll just have monitors and tvs connected to a central hub in the basement.

Future -> Smartphones and cloud computing
Past -> Pc and tablets

So yeah, you may not buy new xBox but believe me you'll not see many PCs around in 10 years or so.

[James]

What's that got to do with videogames? All that post tells me is that mobile entertainment will knock out console systems. It is what Nintendo and Apple are already aiming for.

[or 1=1]

Just saying that PC is doomed. And even if consoles are crap, they're the future.

[Tantalus]

Portable consoles certainly are not the future, let me tell you.

Your argument completely ignores niches, anyway. It's fact that SLR camera sales have dropped since the introduction of better camera phones. Does this mean the camera is doomed? Not even close to, pro photographers would never use a bloody phone.

Likewise, some morons want to play Angry Birds all day, but millions of customers are happy with playing Steam games (literally millions). If anything, with SmartGlass, Microsoft might bring Xbox games to PC.

Apologies for spelling errors, contrary to your argument, typing on an HTC is horrendous.

[Psychotic]

Just saying that PC is doomed. And even if consoles are crap, they're the future.

The same words were spoken during the last generation, and the generation before that and even before that.

I haven't seen it happen and I doubt it will happen in my lifetime.

Disclaimer: On a technical level, even consoles are computers, but when I use the term "computer" below I am referring to the personal computers (or PCs) that we use to do things such as design and program in. Not computers we plug into our TVs and play video games off that we title "Xbox" or "PS3". This should be obvious but I figured I'd let people know anyway.

Consoles are merely another form of entertainment. Do you know what the programming and visual aspects you see in a console game - even the console itself - were created with? A computer. That's not going to go away.

I can see a future where anything a PC can do a console can also do but I don't think it'll be "better". It may be more mobile and it may even be equal to that of a PC but I don't think it'll ever be better. There's no reason for it to be better.

I find the words "is doomed" a logical fallacy. It's illogical because everything is "doomed" on a technical level. Everything. It's not doomed in the sense that it's utter destruction is inevitable but doomed in the sense that it will surpass it's current form. This will happen to PCs, but it will happen to consoles, too, I just don't think it'll happen in my lifetime.

Consoles and PCs will certainly evolve into a state none of us can forsee as of now. That's how evolution works. Do you think the first humans ever expected us to have what we do now? No, how could they? Such an idea was incomprehensible.

What I find more likely to happen is that the basic concept of a PC and a console merge into one being. So instead of "going to play your console" or "going on my PC", you'd just go on one thing and do whatever you want, there'd be no disparity between the two.

The thing to think about though, is that with a PC, this is already possible. Console-like controllers already exist for a PC and anything a console can do a PC has been able to do long before it, alongside a whole lot more like the development of console software to begin with.

The only reason I could ever justify for buying a console is for console-exclusive titles. Gimmick products like Kinect could quite easily be applied to a PC (and it's been possible to use console-designed gimmicks on the PC with a few "hacks") but it appears to be much more profitable for companies to apply them to consoles, because most people probably already have a PC, but do they have an Xbox?

The reason I don't buy anything but handheld consoles is because I can do everything I want on my PC. As stated, the only reason I'd ever buy a console is to play console-exclusive titles, and I don't because I find console-exclusive titles a pathetic notion to begin with. I find it utterly idiotic how I should buy an overpriced console just to play a few games only available on that console. The entire concept might be brilliant marketing (it clearly makes money) but it's just bloody sickening.

Handhelds are the exception because there's not only some great games on them but they're also portable. I've also been using a flash card on my DS for years to gain access to some awesome homebrew software, so that's great, too (you can do this with other consoles but an Xbox 360 isn't as portable as my DS is).

[Tantalus]

In your lifetime? Really? I can foresee PC's evolving soon.

[James]

Who voted yes?

[Tantalus]

Who voted yes?

Me, would buy a Wii U. Although, MAYBE not at launch.

[ynnaD]

I also voted yes, but my answer is basically "i don't know"

[Allan]

I may do a couple of years after it was released, see how it beds in.

[clyzm]

I remember when consoles used to be exclusively limited to playing games.

[RedDynasty]

No fricking way

[Allan]

I remember when consoles used to be exclusively limited to playing games.

So... any console pre 1992?

[Psychotic]

In your lifetime? Really? I can foresee PC's evolving soon.

I don't see them evolving to the extent that their current form will become "doomed", however.

[Aidan]

PC is nowhere near dying.

I know a LOT of people who have recently discovered that consoles are shit, and now play PC games.

[Siva]

PC isn't fucking going anywhere for at least 10-15 years, and even then it probably won't die.

RTS as a genre would die, yes in South Korea you can order a luftwaffe air raid by scanning your phone through a toilet seat but they still play Starcraft.

Prebuilt PC sales are dying because people who buy prebuilt PC's either belong on consoles in the first place or don't play video games, so they buy a laptop or a tablet

In future your smartphone will work as personal document\wallet\driving license etc and in your house you'll just have monitors and tvs connected to a central hub in the basement.

In the future? Nigga this is my house and my smartphone right now. I paid for a cinema ticket with my phones NFC last week. My HTPC, Laptop, PC and everything else is connected to the server in my loft.

None of this means PC's are dying, bro

[or 1=1]

...

Most of the people now prefers to buy a smartphone than a PC now, since it allows them do everything they did with a pc before (Chat, browse, listen to music) with the difference that they can bring it in their pockets.
I can see it by friends, family and even my girlfriend... they have old PCs and instead of buy a new one they bought a smartphone.

Yeah, gamers, (some) companies and every other figure who'll need a screen connected to a monitor will still buy a PC, but a great share of PC sales is disappearing.

Also PCs are changing too. Soon thanks to cloud storing, cloud gaming and cloud computing you'll just need a crappy computer connected to a powerful server somewhere.

Look at raspberry Pi (25$):



It is as powerful as a 2000-2001 PC and it's connected to a more powerful server with windows 7. So it's not hard to think that solutions like this will be normal soon. Pay XXX$ to your ISP and get VOIP, internet connection and access to a Win8 client in their cloud.

PC (as it is now) it's doomed. It's evolving in something more similiar to a console.

[James]

Man you're the king of fucking buzz words aren't you?

[or 1=1]

I've no idea what a buzz word is.

[Psychotic]

Man you're the king of fucking buzz words aren't you?

And ignorance, it seems.

[e] Allow me to apologise in advance if my post comes off as a bit harsh and stand-offish. Whilst most of mine tend to do so, this one may come off a bit more because I probably shouldn't be posting more debates after just having heated discussions on conspiracy theories.

Will edit later, if found necessary.

too long; didn't read: Cloud-computing is great in concept but pretty horrible in practice. In some situations it's worked out great but non-server-based methods as backups would be nice.

The problems people have been having with the Battle.net service and Diablo 3, for example, are all because the game is server-based. Imagine similar issues with every networked application. The idea of an "always online" DRM would be applied to everything, and that would be really, really shit.

---

Original version:

You fail to realise none of that would've been possible without the contribution that PCs have brought to humanity.

Just because some people prefer using smartphones doesn't mean everyone does. You provide no statistics to back up your evidence that "people now prefers to buy a smartphone than a PC now" except pure conjecture.

You're forgetting that there are billions of people worldwide who work on computers, not smartphones, and who use phones as a "side dish" sort of thing. Handy tools but not something that necessarily replaces a PC.

Office buildings still have hundreds of cubicles with PCs in them. You can't do data entry efficiently on a phone and I doubt people are even going to want to try. Sure, you could probably program an spreadsheet app for your phone and plug a real keyboard in it but why the hell bother when a PC is right in front of you and already has the necessary tools?

I can't truly design or program on a smartphone. Photoshop or Maya doesn't work on them so I can't design a website mock-up, do digital image/text treatment or make 3D models and textures for video games on them. Most developers don't do that on consoles either, by the way.

The general public might be using smartphones but do you honestly believe, when people go home at the end of the day, they sit in front of their TV and browse the internet with their phone? Yeah sure, it's mobile and great on the run, but a keyboard, mouse and monitor is way more efficient, not to mention faster.

As for the whole idea of "cloud computing"? Great concept but as James stated: They're buzzwords. Cloud computing is not a perfect thing and has downsides, too.

The first issue is security and privacy: A third-party vendor will have access to your information and will most likely have terms that let them use it.

The second issue is dependency. Have you heard about the problems people have been having connecting to Battle.net just to play a singleplayer game of Diablo 3? Imagine that but for every network based application? It'd be fucking horrible. There's no way for the end-user to have any content control, you can't control their bandwidth or storage limits, and there's usually no way to measure such things.

How about cost? Do you know how expensive cloud computing is? Fucking expensive. That's how expensive. It's easy, cheap and reliable to have one game running on one computer. It gets more expensive when you wish to serve that same game and reliability to millions of other people at the same time with little to no delay in service.

I agree that cloud computing is apart of our future and it can be a very handy thing but I highly doubt it'll be the killer of computers. I definitely do not think cloud computing will be it's killer. The biggest issues besides cost really are dependency and security/privacy. Dependency more so for most people. It's so easy to log onto Deus Ex and play it when I want but with server-based games like Diablo 3 or any MMO I can only play it when the server owner wants me to.

[James]

The PC videogame industry is a very unpredictable industry, numberous professional analysts have been slammed in the face a countless amount if times since 1994. Presently the game industry is experiencing another golden age as Indie focus is at a whole new high under strong innovative new ideas whenever it is a standalone or modification product. Steam and GoG allow continued interest for developers allowing them to return profit and keep them afloat using their sales to grab people the second, third or fourth time around. Diablo 3 outsold ROCKSTAR's MAX PAYNE 3's first week of sales in ONE DAY. Around May 15th the sales of hardware had a small bloom, look it up.

Meanwhile consoles are predictable. Held down by their public investors and many cuts and failures ss many AAA videogames, Sony and Microsoft struggle to even break even. Publishers crunch down on their IPs to maximise profits on annual releases. Delicate, niche games sell better on PC. Flavour of the week has become flavour of the fortnight. Many console games simply don't sell.

Mobile has potential for Streaming. Touch screen will get good enough one day. Try new OnLive, can't see consoles surviving. Current games make me sick but Infinity Blade: Dungeons etc way forward.

I'm not going to trust a computer assembler on the future of an unpredictable industry.

[or 1=1]

Like decades ago it was too expansive buy a car and people prefered to walk on foot while probably saying "What if they'll stop delivering fuel to the gas station?".

I don't understand if you didn't read my previous post or if you ignored it just because you like using bold and italic text.

Can't make 3D models on a smartphone? wow you must be dumb if you think I really said this.
No statistics to back up my evidences?

During 2011, EMEA sales were 103 million, a 7 percent fall compared to the previous year, with Europe showing a drop of 11.2 percent, the fifth quarterly decline in a row.

The falls are manifesting across both business and consumer sectors but it is consumers who appear to be abandoning the PC the fastest, with demand down 16.1 percent on the quarter.

You can just google "Computer sales drop 2011" for read hundreds of other articles like that.

[James]

YYou have to compare that information under an amount of years. Not just for the previous???

[Psychotic]

Can't make 3D models on a smartphone? wow you must be dumb if you think I really said this.

I was giving an example of what one can do on a modern PC that isn't generally done on a smartphone.

You are trying to claim that PCs are a dying breed, I am giving you very valid reasons why they're not. A consumers usage of a PC means little in comparison to the overall perspective. The mobile generation is evolving but those who consume these products aren't the only people in the world and computers are still very necessary for certain day-to-day activities.

I'm not saying computers won't change, I'm saying that I don't think they're doomed. I think James provides excellent points on the unpredictability of the PC generation, and whilst I certainly agree that PCs are unpredictable, I've also heard so many claims towards the idea of the "PC dying" that I've become very cynical about the entire concept, so perhaps I'm extremely biased towards one side.

No statistics to back up my evidences?

The posts I've been responding to have had no evidence to back their claims. You've provided, up until now, nothing but conjecture. Even then your quotes do not provide sources, instead forcing me to look up the data myself. That's a horrible way to present an argument.

Telling me to "do your research" is a knee-jerk reaction and definitely not one I'd expect from someone if they truly believe their argument has merit. If you believe so strongly in your case then you should be able to back it up with some actual, reputable evidence. The burden of proof does not lie on me to prove your point, it lies on you.