1. No more used games. Both Sony and Microsoft are rumored to be looking into ways to kill the second hand game market. Sony has even went as far as to patent such technology. This seems very foolish to me. The economy is worse than ever. People aren’t gonna just magically have more money to spend buying every game new simply because you want it so. You know those impulsive kids who buy every brand new game and sell it a week later? I predict they will think twice before buying games if they know they can't get half their money back. Those people are the gaming industry’s bread and butter and killing their ability to sell games will cut that revenue source in half at least. Rumors are they will make the technology available per developer rather than make the systems ban used games console wide. I myself will be getting a lot less games if this is the case.
2. No more optical disks. I believe this was looked into as a solution for the no used games thing. The good news is that the latest rumors suggest that both the new Xbox and PlayStation will include an optical drive. I wasn’t thrilled about it not having them though. It's not like I own a PS3 for all the wonderfulexclusives they have. The previous generation of consoles at least attempted to establish themselves as all in one home entertainment solutions, and the next generation seems no different. The next Xbox is said to even have a DVR built into it. How can one be an all in one solution without a blu-ray/DVD drive? People aren’t exactly rushing to replace their entire movie collection with digital copies. Contrary to the late Steve Jobs' flawed opinion, Optical Media is not dead. If you think it is then just walk into a Best Buy. They have to give away free digital copies of movies just to get us to take them. I think this is mostly because they try to charge just as much for digital content as physical. Part of me is afraid that any movies I own that is purchased digitally can deemed "politically incorrect" and my ability to watch them be stripped away. Maybe that is an unfounded fear but I still prefer something physical.
3. Ridiculous Pricing. Again, The economy sucks. I'm not made of money. The next generation of game consoles are actually rumored to be reasonably priced. I certainly hope so but, considering all that is said to be in them, I have my doubts. Sony shot themselves in the foot with their launch PS3 price of $499.99 for the BASIC system. The Nintendo 3DS launched in the US at $250. That's $250 for a gimmicky pocket sized paper-weight. They very quickly saw the error of their ways and slashed the price to a more reasonable $179.(that's still too much for me.) As cool as the Wii U looks, I think its slightly too expensive, considering it has maybe one game I’m interested in. It's possible that they learned from their mistakes, but I'm willing to bet they only half learned their lessons. I'm expecting the prices to be somewhere between reasonable and outlandish. Which, in my book, is still too expensive. I'm honestly just guessing because I'm seeing too many conflicting numbers to actually list their rumored prices. If you find something reliable, let me know.
4. Motion controls. Don't get me wrong, I'm not gonna pass on a system that also features motion controls, but I won't touch another system that requires motion controls exclusively. My Wii is basically a glorified book end at this point (Or at least it would be if I read books.) It's only saving grace is the virtual console which was pretty much made obsolete by my new tablet. Wii games can be fun but I almost never play them. Why?, because I have to make sure I’m centered in front of the sensor bar and back at least a couple of feet. That may not be a big deal for you but it kinda is for me. What about the Kinect? Once you have finally have your play area lit up enough, your Kinect is finally configured right, and the stars have lined up, Kinect games are good for a half hour of oooooo and aaaahhhh Hey I get to eat storm troopers and droids as a rancor and destroy buildings... then the sun starts to go down or someone else enters the room and messes everything up. After that I just don't feel like messing with it again. I’m on a low storm trooper diet anyway. (I also hear droids are bad for your teeth) The only feature on my Kinect I use is voice commands. I liked using voice commands in Mass Effect 3, and I loved controlling my Netflix with them. The next gen Kinect seems to be much more accurate and user friendly, and will feature some pretty cool things such as projecting images on your wall surrounding the TV so I am pretty excited. On the other hand, IF Microsoft released an Xbox featuring ONLY motion controls, I'd have to say good bye to Microsoft.
5.No Backwards Compatibility. I'll be pleasantly surprised to see this in the next generation of consoles. I fully expect see no backward compatibility at all in both Sony's and Microsoft's newest game consoles. Too be honest, I'm not sure if this will stop me from buying the next Xbox. On one hand, its not like I ever touch my original Xbox games. The last time I tried was when I tried to play the original Knights of the Old Republic on my 360. The resulting bugs made it unplayable and I ended up buying it on Steam. I fully understand not wanting to add to the costs of the next gen console in order to add backward compatibility. On the other hand, I play my Xbox 360 games quite frequently. I shouldn’t have to suddenly give that up, nor should I have to have two different Xboxs connected to the same TV. Downloading digital versions of games on previous consoles is not a bad idea, but I kinda already own these games. I shouldn’t have to buy them twice. They talked about trading in your PSP games for a discount on the digital versions but nothing ever happened with that, at least not in the US. What I’m trying to say is, I have a nice collection of XBox 360 games. I believe the next generation of game consoles should replace the current generation. I don't want both. I want ONE Xbox connected to my TV that truly does everything.
Conclusion
As much as I like a dedicated gaming system, I may end up permanently switching to PC. Most of the time you don't have to worry about backward compatibility. You don't have to worry about it not playing blu-rays. You can custom build one for not much more than the price of a premium game console. The reason I've hung on to game consoles for so long as that they are made for gaming, and games are made exactly for them. I could pop a game in and play it without worrying about compatibility or drivers or graphics settings. I never had to make sure I shut down every piece of background bulk software that Windows seems to love. This is not really the case anymore. I don’t know if console developing is getting too complicated or what, but console games seem to be getting released with more and more bugs lately. Not long ago I actually had a PSVita game that Lagged.(Dungeon Hunter Alliance.) There is no reason for a console game to ever lag. Developers are just getting lazy.
The point is, if the console costs too much, won't play used or old games, or my movies, then I might as well buy my games on steam and sink the money into my computer. (or better yet, a car.)
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