The Console Wars has been a huge discussion in gaming for decades. Each console generation has seen arguments over which platform is superior.
However, the emergence of the latest consoles have led to many gamers believing that the alleged war is coming to an end.
This article will discuss whether the console wars are truly over and if they will have a resurgence.
The History of The Console Wars
There have been many iterations of The Console Wars. The first discussions of console superiority can be traced back to the early years of gaming.
The second generation of consoles is considered the start of The Console Wars. This era refers to the late 70’s and early 80’s when Atari, Mattel, and Fairchild were considered the main competitors.
However, the first few generations of consoles were extremely varied as many companies wanted to jump on the home console bandwagon. This resulted in a saturation of the market and the lowered quality of games caused a crash in popularity during the 1980’s.
Because of the large number of consoles on the market at this time, many believe that this era does not count as part of The Console Wars. Instead, the emergence of Nintendo and Sega could be seen as the beginning of the war.
Nintendo found themselves on top of the gaming world during the 1980’s, after many other developers had failed to engage western audiences. However, by the late 80’s, Sega were ready to capitalise on their success by targeting an older audience. Hence, the first true console rivalry had begun.
Sega had struggled to compete with Nintendo with their first console, The Master System. Despite this, they were ready to attack with the launch of the Genesis. Marketing campaigns for the Genesis targeted their rivals by stating that ‘Genesis Does What Nintendon’t’.
After two generations and nearly a decade of battling for supremacy, Nintendo managed to stay in front of the global market. But a new challenger was about to arrive and usher in a new era.
In 1995, Sony globally released the PlayStation. The 3D graphics and CD capabilities revolutionised the console experience, leading to great success for Sony. Sony’s success ultimately led to Sega’s demise.
Nintendo managed to remain somewhat successful during this period due to their family friendly nature. This trend would continue throughout the generations, as Nintendo would affiliate themselves with family based gaming.
The success of Sony would continue through the next generation, with the PlayStation 2 becoming the highest-selling console of all time. The biggest change during the 6th Generation was the downfall of Sega and the introduction of Microsoft’s Xbox.
After failing to compete for quite some time, Sega decided to stop developing hardware in 2001. They would decide to focus on their games and software moving forward.
Microsoft decided to venture into gaming with the Xbox. The success of the PlayStation hindered the impact of the debut console on the market. It would not be until the next generation that Xbox would provide some serious competition.
The seventh generation solidified Xbox, Nintendo, and PlayStation as the three big players within The Console Wars. These three companies are still fighting for sales to this day.
The Xbox 360 would see major success with its impressive online capabilities whilst Nintendo’s innovative Wii console would provide them major success.
PlayStation’s dominance would come to an end during this period. Many believed that the company had become overconfident with the PlayStation 3 as the console started off very expensive and less impressive than rival hardware.
More recent years have seen interchanging success between the 3 competitors with each attempting a range of strategies to beat their rivals in sales. Consequently, these diverting strategies has led to a shift in competition and thus The Console Wars itself.
Discussions about The Console Wars are starting to suggest the beginning of the end. Many gamers are now saying that Xbox, Nintendo, and Sony are no longer direct competitors and that each system now have separate objectives.
But is this really the case, or is this just another development in this long running discussion?
The Views of The Big Companies
Perhaps the best way to understand the current status of The Console Wars is to discover the views and perspectives of the three big companies. Knowing the objectives of each company will determine whether they are still directly competing.
As things stand, PlayStation appears to the be the company that is sticking to its ways the most. Throughout the years, PlayStation consoles have remained focussed on giving players high quality games and hardware that stick to more traditional gaming methods.
Understandably, PlayStation has continued to pursue the methods that made them highly successful during their introduction to console gaming. Offering a variety of amazing single player exclusives alongside lucrative third party deals has been rewarded them constant success.
Although they have dabbled in some other projects, Sony has kept their eyes fixed onto the fundamentals of the PlayStation’s purpose. Given the success of this strategy, it seems very unlikely that this will change anytime soon.
As for their stance on The Console Wars, this approach implies that Sony is very comfortable competing with both Nintendo and Xbox directly. This is because the idea of The Console Wars is likely to benefit them in the future.
On the other side of the coin is Xbox. A difficult eighth generation caused Microsoft to reimagine the Xbox brand. At one point, there were even discussions to scrap it entirely.
Luckily, Phil Spencer and others managed to convince Microsoft to continue the project with a new approach. This new approach attempted to move away from previous mistakes and offer gamers new ways to play games.
Xbox’s change of strategy resulted in the development of Backwards Compatibility and Xbox Game Pass. It was clear that Xbox had begun to pay more attention to services rather than products which has appeared to be a great decision so far.
There was a definite gap in the market for service-based gaming that would offer a similar experience to that of Netflix and Amazon. Xbox capitalised on this and could possibly be seen as the decision that saved them from extinction.
The positive affects from this shift of focus seems to have led Xbox to lean towards their services more recently. Because of this, Xbox has diverted away from being in direct competition with PlayStation and Nintendo.
Phil Spencer himself has been quoted saying that he believes Xbox is no longer competing with PlayStation and Nintendo. Instead, he believes that their main competitors are the likes of Amazon and Google.
Currently, Xbox is still a big part of the console market, with their latest console the Series X being the most powerful console to date. However, their current views foreshadow a future in which the brand is heavily service based.
This could go as far as Xbox becoming collaborators instead of rivals for both Nintendo and PlayStation. Because of this, it is easy to assume that Xbox are counting on The Console Wars to be over sooner rather than later.
The company that is least likely to be affected by whether The Console Wars end or not is Nintendo. For the past few generations, Nintendo has tried to differentiate itself from other gaming companies.
Inspired by innovation, Nintendo has created some of the most unique products in gaming history. Many of these creations have been targeted towards families and casual gamers in the attempt to introduce them to gaming.
This approach has received mixed outcomes with some products like the Wii and Switch being highly successful, whilst others like the Wii U and GameCube being considered flops. Either way, Nintendo has been unphased and continue to push the gaming boundaries.
This suggests that Nintendo will maintain their current mentality without regarding whether this strategy will be as successful as their competitors. Therefore, The Console Wars would not impact their approach.
Overall, the approaches of each company indicates that they have differing opinions on The Console Wars and the discussions around it.
Moving The Focus Away From Hardware
When investigating the factors that may have led to the change in attitude towards The Console Wars, the variable that stands out is the movement of focus away from hardware.
Software has always been an important part of gaming. After all, where would gaming be without the games? Nevertheless, the early generations tended to compete through the means of hardware.
This was because these consoles often had games developed specifically for their hardware, meaning that the consoles themselves were the priority.
However, the development of the internet expanded the capabilities of gaming software. New features such as online multiplayer and digital stores allowed companies to gain a competitive advantage through software.
Developing new software features was also easier than hardware because it required less time and money. This resulted in companies changing their focus from purely hardware to include software as well.
Moreover, the potential options for development created a greater variance in objectives for each company. This caused separation between the three big companies in a way that had never been done in previous generations.
Moving the focus away from hardware has potentially acted as a catalyst for the end of The Console Wars as we know it. Alternatively, it could be considered the starting point to the evolution of The Console Wars.
The Evolution of Rivalry
Looking at The Console Wars from a different perspective could suggest that instead of the wars ending, they are sampling evolving.
From this standpoint, the idea of Xbox, Nintendo, and PlayStation no longer being direct competitors will cause a branching effect, adding more competitors and creating new rivalries.
For example, Xbox moving towards a service based approach is likely to put them into competition with other game streaming services such as of Google Stadia and Steam.
Adding more contenders into the gaming mix will open up the console market as companies who previously ignored the console space may feel obligated to match the services provided by their competitors.
Alternatively, those competing with the big three outside of the console space, such as Xbox’s streaming competitors, may indirectly influence the console market by collaborating with the other console manufacturers.
Though these tactics may not result in a rivalry as intense as previous generations, there are still plenty of ways in which the three competitors will be battling against each other for superiority. The differences will be in how they are competing.
With consoles no longer being the singular focus, The Console Wars could be evolving into a more generic Gaming Wars.
Will The Wars End For Good?
Realistically, it is a mystery as to whether The Console Wars will definitively end. The predictions made during this article are based on analysing recent trends and speculation.
Current events are implying that consoles are slowing becoming a less valuable asset to gaming, with many companies experimenting with cloud gaming, PC gaming and other services.
Failure to captivate audiences with these services could result in a fall back into the heavily focussed console war of previous generations. However, with the advancements in technology over the past decade, it is difficult to imagine such a scenario taking place.
Despite this, Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo are committed to producing consoles for the foreseeable future. This means that the three companies are looking to remain somewhat competitive with each other for a long time yet.
Although the mighty Console Wars may be dying down, there are still many more battles to be had.
What do you think? Are The Console Wars over? Or is this just the beginning of a new chapter? Be sure to comment your opinions below!
コメント