If the Wii-U’s desperate attempts at relevancy are any indication, there are few tricks left in hat of the traditional game console. If their best strategy consists of tacking an overpriced tablet to an underpowered video game console, something less than epic is clearly afoot. But what about Sony and Microsoft? As coy as they’d like to be INRE the release of new consoles, they’re certainly going to make the damn things. While the specifics of their hardware releases remain a mystery to the average gamer, the rumors stink of desperation. Out-of-the-box Kinect for Microsoft, some bastardized version of PSMove for Sony. Which makes perfect sense... they don’t have a choice.
Between services like onLive and the inevitability of PC gaming dominance (if we are to believe nVidia) what room is there for the console? After all, the iPod was one of the most important technological advancements of ten years ago. It let everyone in the hep world know that they could carry their entire music library in their pocket. It made tangible a concept that could previously have only been grasped by hardcore geeks (and, if you were a geek in the late 90s, you had no option but to be hardcore... it was a lifestyle choice). Surely, the proliferation of the iPod helped the world wade into the digital revolution. It became a new standard. All at once, CDs and DiskMen alike became irrelevant.
And integration pushed forward, and we are left scrambling. As consumers, we have no option but to upgrade every 5 years, 2 years, 6 months. It’s baffling how quickly we went from camera phone to smart phone. It’s baffling how quickly we went from 28.8kbps to 5mbps. From games delivered on disk, to digital download. From digital download to streaming.
Digital download prevails as the disk fails. Soon, as fiberoptic worms its way into every first world home, the digital download will fall to the streaming game. To a universal console. Video game communism. But the content of the gaming landscape will be chosen democratically, as we now choose our political pundits and Reddit threads. The market won’t have room for a game with a 6 hour story sequence and repetitious multiplayer. Such games will be played briefly (adds and all), and dropped for something better. Certain games will be played frequently enough to warrant a “purchase.” Pay a one time fee for permanent access to the streaming version of GTA VII. Or buy it on launch night for exclusive content. Either version delivered to our televisions at a moments’ notice. A split second. Clearly, as denizens of the first world, we can’t be bothered to wait for anything. We have more enlightened pursuits that demand our attention. Like gaining weight and not reading.
Presently, companies like onLive aren’t living up to their potential. There are issues with delay, resolution, etc. But that’s not to say that it’s a bad idea. Eventually the quality of a streamed game will match the quality of one you’re playing live from your computer, and all one would need is an app for the TV and a controller to game with. So I suppose there is some hope for console manufacturers. We’re always going to need game controllers.
Gone is the world in which a consoles exist solely as a game delivery mechanism. These days most of the hardcore sit with a dusty PS3, an XBOX used exclusively for on-demand video content, and a computer full of Steam games. Consoles can exist as technological filler, but they will soon become a redundancy which demands exile. Our televisions will handle everything. One hard drive/router will store data that we access with a tradition desktop computer (which doesn’t seem to have any interest in leaving our homes), or the overpowered tablet/life remote of tomorrow.
Far flung visions of the future aside, at present PC gaming is just... better. You can hook a toy like a Wii or a Kinect to your TV, but it’s just that. A toy. The only games I ever play on my console are console exclusives. Nearly every game that’s important to the gaming industry comes out on PC, looks better than it would on a console, and is given a huge bump to replay value via the modding community. In addition, it doesn’t take much effort or expertise to hook a controller to a PC and that PC to a television. But that’s just me. For now. Soon, it will be everyone.
There is still some hope that a game console of some sort will find itself hooked to the televisions of the next decade. For proof of this, look no further than Microsoft’s scalable console patent, which looks to combine the upgradeable characteristics of PCs with the convenience of an out-of-the-box game console. Then the question becomes: “Why would you bother with proprietary upgrades from Microsoft when you could have a completely customized gaming PC hooked up to your TV?” Why indeed.
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