I only got my current 360 a couple of years ago so I don't really want a new generation of consoles just yet.
It will have to happen at some point though.
It will have to happen at some point though.
Poll: Xbox needs a hardware update?
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Sorry to piss all over any bodes chips here but we WILL NOT be seeing a new generation of consoles any time soon, it's going to be 4 years minimum before the PS4 or Xbox 720 comes out.
Yea this sucks, i know i for one want them to update the consoles with shiny new (or slightly newer if you wanna be pedantic about it) tech as much as the next guy but the truth of the matter is that no one has the money to be throwing around to develop a new console.
We are in the middle of a global rescission and both Microsoft and Sony are feeling the pinch as there bottom line profits are hit by this. Also the fact that Sony have only in the past few years started to see a return on the investment into the R&D cost for the PS3 (Remember that in the first couple of years the PS3 came out Sony actually made a loss on every console they sold). Microsoft had issues with the 360 hardware and also they backed the HD-DVD format (i.e. poured money into it) and that failed so they, while better off than Sony in the console department, are not in a position to start developing a new console quite yet. This is evident by the fact that they released the Kinect as an add on to the current Xbox. If they were developing a new console to be released any time soon they would have made Kinect one of it's 'killer' new features.
All that and also the shareholders in these company's will not even consider spending money on dev costs for a new batch of consoles until they get a few years of solid profit under there belts and the global market stabilises again so people are once again spending money on luxury goods like consoles instead of worrying like you know where the rent is coming from this month.
One small ray of hope however is that undoubtedly even now there will be a small team in each of these company's who's job it is to start the embryonic design and research into developing a new generation of consoles. So they are coming eventually, it's just that we have a good while to wait yet is all.
***Addendum the first***
We will never see Blu-ray in on the xbox 360, it would be a massive PR disaster for Microsoft. They would basically be saying 'oops we wasted our money on HD-DVD and weren't smart enough to realise that Blu-ray would win...now we have to go to the competition cap in hand and ask if we can borrow there format'. Not gonna happen folks, I would say it's possible verging on likely that it will be on the next xbox though as then it'll be perfectly acceptable as an 'upgrade' from an 'old, obsolete' format.
Sony will happily let Microsoft use Blu-ray btw as they will be in the $$$ from the licence. Microsoft might have to bend over and take it like a man for a while because of this though but in the end thy will cut a deal as it will work out better for both companies if they do.
Yea this sucks, i know i for one want them to update the consoles with shiny new (or slightly newer if you wanna be pedantic about it) tech as much as the next guy but the truth of the matter is that no one has the money to be throwing around to develop a new console.
We are in the middle of a global rescission and both Microsoft and Sony are feeling the pinch as there bottom line profits are hit by this. Also the fact that Sony have only in the past few years started to see a return on the investment into the R&D cost for the PS3 (Remember that in the first couple of years the PS3 came out Sony actually made a loss on every console they sold). Microsoft had issues with the 360 hardware and also they backed the HD-DVD format (i.e. poured money into it) and that failed so they, while better off than Sony in the console department, are not in a position to start developing a new console quite yet. This is evident by the fact that they released the Kinect as an add on to the current Xbox. If they were developing a new console to be released any time soon they would have made Kinect one of it's 'killer' new features.
All that and also the shareholders in these company's will not even consider spending money on dev costs for a new batch of consoles until they get a few years of solid profit under there belts and the global market stabilises again so people are once again spending money on luxury goods like consoles instead of worrying like you know where the rent is coming from this month.
One small ray of hope however is that undoubtedly even now there will be a small team in each of these company's who's job it is to start the embryonic design and research into developing a new generation of consoles. So they are coming eventually, it's just that we have a good while to wait yet is all.
***Addendum the first***
We will never see Blu-ray in on the xbox 360, it would be a massive PR disaster for Microsoft. They would basically be saying 'oops we wasted our money on HD-DVD and weren't smart enough to realise that Blu-ray would win...now we have to go to the competition cap in hand and ask if we can borrow there format'. Not gonna happen folks, I would say it's possible verging on likely that it will be on the next xbox though as then it'll be perfectly acceptable as an 'upgrade' from an 'old, obsolete' format.
Sony will happily let Microsoft use Blu-ray btw as they will be in the $$$ from the licence. Microsoft might have to bend over and take it like a man for a while because of this though but in the end thy will cut a deal as it will work out better for both companies if they do.
Its a fact the thing isnt well made to start with.
Beyond that, its not like theres a whole lot to do, sticking a blue-ray player could be seen by some as bowing down to sony (i know a few people whod say that...) and in terms of power, i dont think consoles will get that much more powerful for a little while yet.
Beyond that, its not like theres a whole lot to do, sticking a blue-ray player could be seen by some as bowing down to sony (i know a few people whod say that...) and in terms of power, i dont think consoles will get that much more powerful for a little while yet.
Why would the 360 need a Blu-Ray player when it has a HDD on which you can install extra content?
Blu-Ray may have more capacity than DVD, but it also has a slower read speed than DVD or HDD, which can affect how much data can be streamed in a game at any given time.
Any game that reads the data from a HDD will perform better than the same game streaming from a Blu-Ray, so if Microsoft was going to update the 360's hardware, they would only release bigger and faster HDDs (or even SSDs), or implement some way of allowing you to use more than 16GB of a USB storage device, rather than divide their customer base and multiply game development costs and times by implementing Blu-Ray.
People whinge about having to buy a larger HDD, but how do you think they'd react if they had to buy a new console or external Blu-Ray reader to play Blu-Ray games?
Blu-Ray may have more capacity than DVD, but it also has a slower read speed than DVD or HDD, which can affect how much data can be streamed in a game at any given time.
Any game that reads the data from a HDD will perform better than the same game streaming from a Blu-Ray, so if Microsoft was going to update the 360's hardware, they would only release bigger and faster HDDs (or even SSDs), or implement some way of allowing you to use more than 16GB of a USB storage device, rather than divide their customer base and multiply game development costs and times by implementing Blu-Ray.
People whinge about having to buy a larger HDD, but how do you think they'd react if they had to buy a new console or external Blu-Ray reader to play Blu-Ray games?
I think the 360 is starting to show it's age. I haven't really been hugely impressed by graphics of any game on it for a while now, except Forza 4. And Forza 4 had to make quite a few compromises to manage what it's doing. If Turn10 had a more powerful console to work with then they could do so much more I think. A longer production time would help a lot as well I think. Although graphics obviously aren't the most important thing, they are still important, and I think a lot of games now on the 360, and the PS3 too, are looking a bit aged even though they are brand new. I'm not sure if I'm personally ready to buy a new console, I'm still relatively happy with the look of most 360 games, but they could be better, and I fear they will start to lag behind significantly in the not too distant future. So I think in a year or two perhaps we will be at the right time for a new console generation, and that looks like that's the way it's going I think.
