Friday, December 28, 2007

Thoughts on Game Consoles...

A few weeks ago, I mentioned a thought to Anand about the gaming consoles and their controllers. The recently purchased Wii has been getting a lot of attention from the three of us at home, and I, like many others in the gaming business, am both intrigued and amazed at how intuitive the Wii's controllers are. Nintendo sure as hell got it right; look at the competition - Six-Axis was shoehorned into the PS3 release, and if recent rumors are to be believed, a motion detecting 360 controller is in the making too. Nintendo though, has run away with the grand prize in 2007 - it can't manufacture consoles fast enough, and they've sold around 15 million of them...

To get back to my thoughts at that moment - what struck me as a potentially overlooked opportunity, in a sea of missed opportunities, was Sony responding with a motion detecting controller for the PS2. I know the hardware specs for the console can't change, but they sure as hell can sell an add-on (and make a killing in the process since the accessories are where the margins are) that adds the ability to detect motion in the PS2. Can you imagine playing a game like Grand Theft Auto (or Burnout which I think exists for the PS2) with motion detection turned on? There are wireless controllers out there already, so it shouldn't be too much of a stretch for either a 1st party or a 3rd party controller that sends motion signals to the PS2's receiver. The argument that this move would cannibalize PS3 sales is specious at best. PS2 is the highest selling console of all time, and this would definitely spur sales of the console in the casual gamer category - people like me who aren't into games like the God of War and its ilk. Nintendo has demonstrated that the casual gamer market is untapped, alive, and hungry for a great gaming experience. The PS2 library has some of the greatest games of all time - why not consider upgrading the gaming experience of the console to include motion detection?

Sony, wake up, smell the coffee!

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