http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7052420.stm

what do you think? good idea or bad idea?

Stupid. Very bad idea.

I dont like the idea of having one platform gaming system

Not stupid if its an open platform as the article suggested. Its better for us, devs, and opens it to infinite possibilities. Obviously it bad for Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft who will lose all of profits from license fees.

I think he meant one console in your home instead of three consoles.

The problem is getting it to work seamlessly on all aspects hardware and software. Will it be able to progress and change while the industry standards progress and change. And yet flexible enough to support lesser used formats.

Also will the consumer upgrade hardware when devs reach a point the current hardware is limited example a game needs a better gpu in order to work would I be able to swap out the gpu with a better one. I think it would appeal to the PC crowd naturally and hardcore gaming crowd if upgrading is as easy as just pulling out a memory card and putting it back in. As for casuals well the base hardware should be enough to make game targeted to them.

Eventually this will happen I don't think there will be a one console system. If console makers ever go open platform effectively then the reality is we will probably have more companies taking a shot at it particularly PC companies like Dell, HP, Gateway etc. offering base hardware that will be ready to go at industry standards and easily upgraded.

As of right now Microsoft and PC makers are probably the only companies that can release an open platform system, since they have a history of dealing with open platforms.

Sony probably could do it but they are a company that has been desperately trying to set industry standard and licensing them.

Nintendo is probably never to do it they are the definition of closed platform.

Back in the 70's we had lots of different computer formats: Spectrums, Atarai's, Commodore, Apples, various others, and a small thing called the IBM PC. (which hardly anyone out of businesses used). All of them required software to be written explicitly for them: there was no compatibility. I fyou purchased the NEW Atari... you would probably have to throw all the old programs away, as they wouldn't work on the new machine.

Now it's just IBM PC's and Apples, with the PC's having two operating systems. (windows and linux). This has made it much cheaper to write software, and there is a lot more of it around as a result.

The idea of a universal platform would be great for gamers, provided only that it didn't stifle development and innovation in the platform itself.

Meow Purr.

Isn't the PC the universal system?

Yes in a sense, if your PC is the standard!

One console, all games................sounds ok to me. However i do like the variation, i dont like having to go out and spend £300 on each console. Swings in roundabouts i guess

But you still can have variation, for example on a open platform there is no reason a company can't develop a wii style remote for wii style games. If its truly open platform it also has to be open to new hardware. I can buy a open platform console just for fighting games, yet a friend have a open console (probably not from the same company) but he plays with wii like controllers and game, he can come over to my house and connect it will work.


Yes like the PC there is a high possibility that we will deal with patches and drivers for consoles but that should not be to much of a problem.

Every industry needs competition. There won't be one universal console.

I get what the author is saying here. They want it like DVD players. Although all DVD players are different they all play every DVD.

There wouldn't be a point in having multiple consoles on the market if they all played the same games. The only difference between them would be there multimedia capabilities...which nobody really cares about.

While I can see the merit in such an idea, I doubt it will be happening anytime soon. There is simply too much money to made by Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony with their individual hardware.

Again competition did not stop when PC went open platform instead look at it now its still competitive and even opened more industries for competition. And save it we all know windows is the dominant OS but all other components that make up a PC still compete to be the best in the market.

Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo can still make games.
And they should all join together to make 1, great system, and everybody gets 1/3 of the profit!

There would be no reason for these companies to combine. It wouldn't make any business sense.

Even if it did happen and they formed one big mega company another one will step up to be it's competitor.

People have bin talking about this "one console" thing forever. They talked about it in the atari days when there was like half a dozen consoles on the market. It'll never happen.

True, however that doesn`t alter the fact that these companies can make far greater profits with their own hardware as well as software, then simply on software. At this point in time its just doesn`t make business sense for the three major gaming companies to move to a universal gaming system.

I think its a bad idea. If we have a single gaming console it would be ran by some business cartel, by not having competition, the company is able to set all games from all publishers or w/e into a single or imbalanced rate. And in turn it affects the economy negatively. There needs to be competition in order to win a console war.

We are not talking about one console we are talking about open consoles which would mean you would only have to buy one console and all games no matter how they are made would be scaled to work.

For example like the pc all not everybody has the same system but the game should work anyway, on one system there is a better graphics car and more ram so it should work flawlessly and have highest settings in the graphics and one system has a lower end card and less ram the game would work only on lower settings, and probably at lesser frame rates.

Apply this to consoles one console has better specs then the other so one console it will work flawlessly and on the other lower end console it will work but may sacrifice graphics, take longer to load, etc to work.

Of course like the PC the lower end console if its truly open platform you can easily upgrade it with better components from the console maker or third parties.