The current generation of consoles is a peculiar thing. In the past I’ve owned games consoles that sat next to the TV, usually in the bedroom, and played games. I used the PlayStation’s CD player a couple of times for novelty value but the TV speakers it was running through really weren’t good enough to make it an entirely enjoyable experience. I used the PlayStation 2 as a DVD player for years (a role it still performs for my mother’s bedroom TV) but it wasn’t a DVD player. It was a games console that occasionally played a movie.
A few months ago my dad bought a PlayStation 3. He hasn’t really got any interest in playing games, although he has become quite a fan of wandering (mostly aimlessly) around the Wasteland in Fallout 3. He didn’t buy it as a games console; he bought it as a media centre. My dad’s PlayStation 3 replaced an ageing Media PC he’d built and had next to the living-room TV for a couple of years. The hard disk was crammed and it couldn’t stream HD media through its Ethernet cable without stuttering a bit. So he researched the best way to do what he wanted to do for the least amount of money. The PlayStation 3 won out in that investigation.
Just this week I was asked by a friend what would be the best way of getting iPlayer to stream directly to his living room TV. He wanted the BBC’s catch-up service, usable with a remote control, on his big screen. I advised him to buy a PS3.
I warned him that the Xbox 360 didn’t do iPlayer (at least not yet) and that the Sky stuff it did do was a bit clumsy and expensive, even though he’s already a Sky TV subscriber. I told him that I’d tinkered with Media Centre PCs in my time but they were difficult to set up and required constant re-tuning and fiddling to make sure they run adequately. He looked into internet TV boxes and Google TV which were both impressive but either not ready yet or quite complicated to learn the basic knowledge needed to make an informed purchase.
He even tried to get iPlayer with his Wii but the streaming quality wasn’t up to much and it looked terrible on his 42-inch plasma screen. He gave up very early in the process. And now he’s looking for the best deal on a PlayStation 3 (and trying to convince his wife that they need one). He has no interest in playing games with it.
This generation of home consoles has seen them strive to become more than just a games machine. Sony started things with their CD-playing PlayStation and their DVD-playing PlayStation 2 and now the PlayStation 3 is, without question, the best currently available console for playing modern media formats, whether that’s DVD, Blu-Ray or encoded and streaming media.
Let’s not forget Microsoft’s contribution though. The Xbox 360 has built on the shaky start to online gaming that the Dreamcast, PlayStation 2 and Xbox all supported but never really got right. The Xbox 360 is now the best connected gameplay experience available and, while that is still very much gaming-related, that’s an evolution from the two joypad ports on the front of my old Mega Drive. The closest we got to connected gameplay back then was sending high-score photographs to Teletext’s gaming pages and waiting a few weeks to see them appear on the TV.
Nintendo, too, have added something to this generation. Even though they avoided high-definition and graphical power in favour of control gimmicks and tried-and-tested characters and mechanics, they’ve put games consoles in the hands of the masses. No longer is gaming the niche activity it was in the mid nineties. Everyone from toddlers to teenagers to the toothless nursing-home crowd can enjoy the experience offered by the Wii and the DS. So much so that Sony and Microsoft, regardless of what their official lines are, want to emulate Nintendo and soften their edges a little with motion control systems that they hope will make them more accessible to that wider audience. And I hope so too.
The question that most interests me, though, is what’s next? Surely the big three platform-holders are already planning their next consoles. Even if not in development they must be in the research stages, these things take years to get from concept to retail. Is there room for another big graphical leap? Is that financially viable? Is the so-called casual market about to take over and deliver the previously unimaginable sales figures to all three platform-holders?
More people play Angry Birds than Uncharted 2 and more people play Farmville than Modern Warfare 2. Is the social networking aspect about to take over or are control systems going to be the most important selling-point of the next generation?
It’s hard to tell what the next step in integration will be for consoles. There isn’t a new media available for Sony to put in their machine, at least nothing that’s ready to ship just yet. Microsoft might be able to better integrate social networking but that’s an evolution rather than a defining leap. Nintendo must surely go HD soon and their control systems are so popular that they will surely stick with that route but what developments can be made there that aren’t merely evolutionary steps?
It’s difficult to imagine what might be possible in the next generation of games consoles but one thing is for sure: They won’t just be games consoles. They’ll be home entertainment consoles and they’ll be in more homes, more living rooms, than ever before.
52pickup
I wish Sony would add more services which are available on their Bravia TV’s and add them to the PS3.
It was only early this year they were saying they want to network these kind of services across all their products including the PS3 and that they want to do it sooner rather than later… I’m still waiting for things like LoveFilm.com on my PS3.
cc_star
They’re coming… I’m surprised they’re taking so long though
DJ-Katy
This will surprise some of you, but here’s a breakdown of how I use my PS3:
– 5% web browsing
– 30% chatting
– 50% watching TV, movies, downloaded torrents over DNLA and listening to music
– 15% playing games
Approximately. Very rarely I will watch a Bluray movie but I only have a few.
My use of PS3 is completely different to all the other consoles I’ve owned (including the 360), it is the centerpiece of entertainment in my living room.
The future of media devices: they will all have PVRs built-in, smart card slots to work with any pay TV provider, they will burn Bluray disks, everything will have integrated Facebook and Twitter, and it will probably have some service to share with your friends.
The future of gaming: cloud gaming (in 10-15 years tops).
These two product lines will diverge.
shifty360
I think ur incorrect they will never allow direct DVD or blu ray recording on a console to much money will be lost due piracy this way they can keep track of you and your console And cloud gaming i’n 10-15 years the current network infustructure i’n Europe can’t stand a gig let alone a full game at next gen standards. England struggles to get full dial up penetration let alone a network capable of downloading and sustaining a next gen game.
DJ-Katy
England and Europe are two different things, we have plenty enough bandwidth here for cloud gaming, my connection is 15Mbit and that’s considered average. VDSL is being rolled out.
As for DVD and Bluray burners, they already exist as standalone products; are you telling me anyone actually uses DNLA for any legitimate purpose besides photo sharing? They included that in 360 and PS3, where do they think the video files come from?
DJ-Katy
You’re also missing part of the point of cloud gaming – you don’t need to download the game.
DJ-Katy
Aside: I’ll tell you one thing that really annoys me about the PS3’s media capabilities. It supports Bluetooth, but not OBEX transfer, so you can’t send files from your phone direct to the PS3. It would be extremely handy for me if I could send photos from my phone via Bluetooth to the PS3, it is a missing feature that always winds up with me having to send it to my PC then copy them over DLNA.
The PS3 detects my phone as a media server and will stream stuff (and therefore copy stuff) from it, but it’s flaky, and it would be much better if I could just click ‘send via Bluetooth’ after I finish making something on my phone.
shakengandulf
My phone (NOKIA N95) had the same connection as the ps3 controller soo it isn’t as bad as your mentioned method, i simply plug it in and choose data transfer to make the memory card accessible than transfer what i like. i cant understand why the OBEX isn’t available as it would come in handy, there’d be a reason katy otherwise it would be standar.
Dazbobaby
Whats next?
No major leap forward, more of a mixture of everything:
3D, motion control, multimedia capable, fully networked gaming and full 1080p for everyone, all consoles, across the board.
The minimum will be HD 1080p, maybe not for nintendo, but for Sony and MS it’s got to be 1080p. 3D is here to stay, it’s not a massive display technology yet, but eventually all TV’s will be 3D ready, just like they are HD ready now.
Nintendo also need to sort out their network gameplay, I don’t know what it’s like now, but shorly after launch it was non existent.
Microsoft need to pull their finger out too and get onboard with multimedia capabilities, the 360 is a joke compared to the PS3’s video playback abilities, and that needs to be sorted via a patch or certainly for the next Xbox.
BUT both Microsoft and Sony had better sort out the hardware problems for their next releases or they might just kill off the console market completely. The PS3 is or seems to be more reliable than the 360, but neither are very reliable, with many Xbox owners having gone through loads of machines and PS3 owners going through a few machines. If this is’nt sorted next time around… the Japs will be falling on their sword and the Yanks get mugged and shot.
shifty360
There is quite a big thing that has always been at the for front of technology. Convergence wether it be we loose all aspects of what a games console is and they become gaming consoles second to other forms of media. Storage is a mute point soon hard drives will become a thing of the past with i’n the next 5-10 years with new forms of data storage such as using a crystal to store infinate amounts of data and also with binary code become dated I’m sure that the next gen of consoles will be very unreal to the consoles of today. We will continue to strive for greater and greater until our computers hold the same as our brains infinite amounts of data.
DJ-Katy
Binary code becoming dated? How do you figure that? All electronic devices run on binary systems down from a wristwatch to a washing machine to a space station. That’s not gonna be replaced anytime soon, and there is no real benefit to moving to ternary or quarternary systems anyway.
As for storage, I don’t think HDDs will become obsolete either, but it is safe to say that within 12 months it will be no hassle to ship consoles with 1-2TB HDDs as standard which will eliminate the need for physical media (an obvious next step whether people like it or not), at least in areas with good internet connectivity.
bunimomike
With you all the way on binary. Nothing shifting soon, that’s for sure. Also, people spoke about HDDs being obselete a few years ago but we’re still way off. Hell, even enjoying SSDs is bloody expensive and “old” SATA drives are still everywhere because they’re so cheap per gigabyte. My last drive was 2TB and that was £113. Tell me where I can get storage like that for my computer for such a price with a different medium.
zb100
Real Life.
That said, I bought my PS3 precisely because it had all the optional extras they’ve stripped out & I was gutted to realised the UK version didn’t have the “Emotion Chip” – but not enough to give that much of a shi’ite.