Alternate reality - what if?

[charlesr]

Let's imagine for a moment that Sony don't come out on top in the PS3 generation due to hardware problems and not making it on to the shelves by christmas. What then?

On a superficial level, lots of people instead buy 360s and Revs, leading to a general shift in developer support since the devs are loosing money buy not being able to shift their ip on a regular basis. MS even manage to persuade Capcom to make games for them with exclusivity for 3 months before release on other formats. The Japanese start buying 360s. Rev gets a slightly above Gamecube level smattering of 3rd party support

On a higher level, the shift from Sony dominance to a MS/Sony level playing field creates a knife edge in the industry - no longer is it obvious which platform to get first (the average person would have benefitted most from getting a PS2 first in the current gen) and consumers hesitate before purchasing. Sales drop overall and things start to look interesting - whichever platform releases the most interesting looking games will start to gain a foothold. MS and Sony fall over themselves in attempts to woo dev exclusivity. Money pours into devs Sony themselves. MS realise they have a real chance to make an impact and start to do the same thing. Game quality rises.

Nintendo gain a weird level of support from non-gamers and means that they actually get shelf space This has a knock on effect to normal gamers who suddenly feel that Nintendo might be an option. And it's so cheap, they can afford a Rev as well as their first console.

So the market ends at 40/40/20 split (MS/Sony/Nin).

The PC market remains unaffected and continues to pump out high quality games over a limited number of genres.
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I've tried to go for a non-doom and gloom post. I could easily have gone down the industry is doomed route, but I'll leave that to someone else.

Your turn

[112]

thats a lot of what ifs man......... i dont think games will get better in quality, although production levels might go up. Quality, takes timean that is not somthing that is readily available in the short space between sony getting ps3 out eventually. MS would jus pump out more graphically enhanced games to turn heads.

112

[charlesr]

I'm not talking reality here. It's not what I think will happen. I'm just asking you to think up outside-chance scenarios for the sake of it.

[Sketcz]

Outside chances?

How about this:

What if the Rev's backwards compatiblity is so popular, Nintendo release PC-software-based development kits for the NES and SNES, thereby giving your average bedroom the chance to make homebrew titles for those systems, relatively easily, and they can then be distributed?

We may end up with plenty of new SNES/MD era games. ^_^

[charlesr]

Bring that on.

[Dogg Thang]

Yep and due to the cheap production costs on those games, companies abandon their currents slates and we get a new golden age of 2D gaming. Nintendo abandon the Rev controller as a games mechanism except for it's yearly Wario Ware: Wiggle updates and instead release a retro SNES Rev controller.

All seems rosy...

Until Sega release the Sega Ultradrive 16-bit + Supersystem!

I like this game...

[MattyD]

I personally see Microsoft and Nintendo getting further and further away from eachother - Microsoft is / would head increasingly into the connect-your-entire-house-to-Microsoft convergence thing (where they said they weren't going, yet already are) whilst Nintendo seem to be regressing back into toy makers. I remember reading an interview with Miyamoto where he said that he originaly though he'd end up designing things like Rubiks Cubes when he joined Nintendo, and that is where I see them going. I just don't think they've got the stomach for tho whole 'console wars' thing anymore.

And for Sony's future in this scenario, I could see them serving a small but extremely hardcore niche for much like SNK did or, to a lesser extent, like Nintendo are now.

[Sketcz]

Yep and due to the cheap production costs on those games, companies abandon their currents slates and we get a new golden age of 2D gaming.

I was thinking that same thing, since these older games would in theory be cheaper to make (with a higher ratio of profit to production costs, assuming the distribution model works well enough), some companies might start dishing out portions of budget for small teams to quite literally "make SNES games for the Rev", in order to get extra profit... With the added benefit of hindsight, and years of design experience going into them.

[gunrock]

How's this?

Revolution is great, works how it should and gets a great set of first-party releases, but third-party support is weak in the outset and worsens as quickly as PS3 and 360 games push HDTV sales and Joe Public (who loves his eye candy) sees the Revolution as underpowered and graphically inferior. The games press and fan boys love the console, but ultimately the tide turns and the mass-market come to believe the controller is a novelty, attached to a weaker machine.

Nintendo soldiers on, but utimately pulls out of the hardware market, bar handhelds. The financial pressure of the Revolution failure and the (now much) lower priced PSP leaves the company in unusual territory of profit warnings and share-price tumbles.

In order to stop the rot, Nintendo price cuts the DS, introduces redesigns, new colours but it's not enough. Third party support of the DS is waning and the new market of gamers the DS garnered grows bored of Nintendogs sequels and games with touch screen interfaces that feel tacked on.

The company decides to go multi-platform for it's prized IP, but for the proud leaders of this once great giant it's a loss of face on an unprecedented scale. Ungracious crowing from Harrison and Kutaragi incense the ghost of Yamauchi so much they fall into exclusivity with Microsoft and the XBox 360. Microsoft graciously develop an emulation layer for the Revolution (and thus the GC, N64, SNES and NES) and implement a licensed Revolution controller (with bonus Mario, Metroid, Zelda faceplates available).

So much backwards compatibility and a revolutionary controller are a no brainer for the Mums and Dads of the world and curious would-be gaming public, and the success of the 360 in Japan and then US, followed by Europe, means Microsoft narrowly beats Sony's PS3 market share into second place.

Microsoft later purchases Nintendo and uses both Nintendo and Miyamoto as both brand names and celebrity endorsements as they are featured on Time, Fortune and a thousand other business periodicals pronouncing 'East meets West', 'How the East was won' and other puntastic lead-ins.

[supersmithy]

Hmm....

Microsoft shock everyone at E3 by revealing their new handheld gaming machine - which is basically the bastard child of a DS and a PSP. So you have the decent processing power/graphics, and the touchscreen capabilites. It also contends with the iPod as it has 20gig built in memory. It also has "live" capabilities (on the same scale as the 360) and debuts at a very affordable ?150 around February of 2007.

Obviously Microsoft is making a HUGE loss, but the console does well at launch..

But a few months down the line, things start to look shaky. Sales have died down due to cack games and problems with the "iPod" functions. After their 360 shortage, Microsoft made lots of excess units, and are now stuck with them.

Since they are stuck with these units, they decide to help sales out a little bit, and release a crack for the system (they fake it so it looks like some random hacker has done it), which allows games to be downloaded and played on the system. I guess they were hoping that people would go out and buy the console, pirate a few games, and buy a few games throughout its lifespan (since thats better than being stuck with a load of crap you can't shift).

However, this backfires, and although the machine becomes the most bought system of all time, it is also the most pirated system, with over 95% of the games being played on it being pirated copies. Huge losses are made, and a year down the line, the project is declared dead. They dont even bother making anymore games for it.

Bill Gates takes it as a lesson, after losing around ?2billion of his hard earned cashola. Suprisingly, he makes it back in about 25 minutes :P

Meanwhile, Nintendo's revolution is everything (and more) that we hoped for, as is the PS3. The 360 is also doing well!

The 3 systems live happily together, laughing at the Microsoft.. um..... x..portable..something..

And that is the story of how the Microsoft... thing, failed ?_?

Very good thread to help me waste time at work

[ucci]

What about...

Nintendo Revolution offers a very basic interactivity level with the innovative controller - people in the industry warn of a Virtual Boy style disaster where Nintendo promised so much but delivered so little.

Microsoft in poisoned water debacle - Microsoft in an effort to push sales of its Xbox 360 platform has been shown to contaminate the world's water supply using a mild form of hypnotic chemical called Sheepixam - it affects any host by neuroprogramming the word Microsoft in the psyche so that any thought process is always associated with Xbox 360. America is said to have been under the influence of Sheepixam from the late 20th Century.

Dreamcast lives on! Jenna Jameson has fallen in love with the old sega machine and has used the insides of the console to make a range of shagging machines that will be shown in her latest movie Jenna loves Dreamcast. Sega have let her use the Dreamcast after extensive testing from its Q+A team with cucumbers, coke bottles and baseball bats.
Cliche ridden answers but not bad.

[feelgoodwhale]

what if sony increases it's dominance?

what if nintendo are so successful with non-gamers and old folks that they decide to ditch the hardcore market altogether?

what if people started playing games insteading of just buying more and more and more?

what if suda51's games actually sold?

if only....