4mo ago

"There comes a time when we all declare the war is over": Former PlayStation Studios boss Shawn Layden on the future of video game consoles

www.eurogamer.net

Most of the article is on AAA development as a whole but I found it interesting the comments about consoles in general.

20 comments

We're losing the next generation to TikTok. The competition for gaming isn't Xbox and Nintendo. It's everything else in the freaking zeitgeist that can take your time away from your gaming activity.
Round two: the television strikes back.
- This is only a problem for capitalist shareholders (aka the ultra wealthy) who need to extract more wealth from consumers than they did last quarter but they're already at the limit of how much they can do so. Now the largest barrier is time and attention.
- Does this sound stupid to anyone else?
  Like, the crowd you're "losing" to TikTok was not interested in buying a console regardless, am I wrong?
  
  But... but... the line has to go up! Don't you understand? It's not going up! Panic!
- That quote is just horribly disturbing to me. He’s basically letting the mask drop that their endgame isn’t to make great games, it’s to make you hopelessly addicted to screen time that you obsessively play and spend
  
  Oh you should read the next part
  The pandemic gave us an unnatural pop for gaming, where we thought, 'oh my god, gaming is the biggest thing in the world'. Yeah, when you're locked down, it is the biggest thing in the world. But in a regular world scenario, you've got to combat against all the other distractions that are available to young people. And I'm afraid that we're not facing that threat head on as an industry.
  Motherfuckers see unnatural conditions caused by a once-in-a-lifetime event, think they're the hottest shit ever, and when the numbers come back to normal levels they see other forms of entertainment as a "threat" that should be "faced head on".
  Lmao. How can an industry be so full of itself?
If you stopped doing exclusives then there wouldn't be a "war". Consumers can get the hardware they think will work for them and get to play everything.
- That is not how their business model works. The consoles themselves are sold almost at cost of production or at a loss. The money for Microsoft, Nintendo, Microsoft comes from those exclusives and live service subscriptions. They want to maximize the amount of their hardware in homes and then make the money on selling the thing that actually makes them useful.
Growing costs of hardware components and relatively mild gen-on-gen improvements in visual quality are making the classical console business model (subsidized hardware used to drive game sales via exclusiveles) obsolete.
- One major argument for consoles is still that there is a single unified platform that gives better bang-for-buck than PC of the same price, and that studios can dev and optimize their games on more easily.
  
  That's definitely true. But I would argue every additional "unit" of graphical improvement is becoming more and more expensive to the point where the relative benefits associated with a single unified platform are not as impactful as they once were.
I'm still waiting on the killer titles for the current generation of consoles. I'm frankly amazed that games have become so difficult to make, given how the graphical improvements aren't leaps. Build a stylish lighting system, make sure your textures and geometry aren't too ropey, and then make something creative.
I know it's not that simple, obviously, but I was playing through a fifteen year old FPS yesterday and the difference between now and then is just not that big. It's not nothing but the Gameboy philosophy of doing more with less would go a long way.
This is a really interesting article!
I’m all for an end to exclusivities. Just let me enjoy whatever I want on whatever platform I want as long as it’s optimized enough.
If Xbox people get Uncharted, I ain’t gonna cry as long as I get Gears of War for instance.
Then when will Sony stop paying studios to not port their game to platforms other than PlayStation, regardless of time gate? This has been Sony's playbook since the beginning of their gaming venture, I don't see them stopping any time soon. Its entirely how they gained such a big market share and keep it. People buy consoles because of the exclusive games.
Nobody would be buying a Switch if I could buy Nintendo games on literally any other console. They would be guaranteed to be running way better than they do on Switch.
- I do see them stopping soon. Those deals are benefiting basically no one anymore. Partners like Square Enix are doing way better by putting their games on PC without an exclusivity period. Sony's not growing their console business over the previous generation, even when their competition has been destroyed. At some point it's just money down the drain.
Can someone make this make sense?
You know the Sony fanbase gets really upset whenever a game comes out on PC
- There is a mythical "Sony fan" customer who pays extra for their video game consoles, and justified that by believing it comes with a right to be special and awesome and play games no one else is allowed to.
  It's a pantomine of a Nintendo fan, who pays for an underpowered console for first-party games that use unique controllers. None of whom would ever complain if their games were sold on PC so long as they could bring the controller over.
  AFAIK, the only real people who want exclusives on PlayStation are Sony employees and shareholders.
  
  I know there WERE Sony fans who would get upset that their exclusives would come out on other platforms. Back in the very early 2000s, fanboys would get irate at the smallest perceived slight to their preferred platform. But that hasn't been more than a very niche thing for a decade. Almost nobody cares now.
- Im just not seeing it honestly. Most people just dont care, they only have enough $$ for one major console. And then they go with that console for a while. Its only the diehards that care and that may be who is "complaining".
Its interesting we are seeing the same comments by both playstation and micosoft circles.

20 comments