THIS IS WAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGHHHHHHHHH *coughcough*!


(Don't ask me why I used this picture, it just appealed to me)

So who will win the 7th gen console war? Come on, don't care? Or are there no winners?

Well, I would just like to say a few things. The last thing I want to be guilty of fanboyism, so I'm doing my best to play it neutral. Prepare to enter the "no fact zone."

The Wii is currently leading the "war." It has sold more than the Xbox 360 in about half of the time. The wiimote is a fun and interesting innovation that has apealed to people in general, it seems especially those priorly unconcerned with "hardcore" gaming. The wii offers a new way to play games, with your body (mmmm sexy). However, I think I am right in saying that many (including myself) are largely unimpressed by the current or likely future selection of games on the console.

In addition to this, the Wii is underpowered and lacks the memory capabilities of the PS3 and Xbox 360. If you are one to use history as any kind of indication of likely future events, you will respect the continual drive for more processing power and more memory and what this might mean to future consoles.

The Wii has created a buzz, one might even say a fad, in the gaming world. Will it last? Who knows. But it has made a significant impact in the mean time.

The Xbox 360 was the first to be released in November 2005. It got off to a slow start, with widespread hardware failure and a slow initial software startup. The 360 is a purist gamer's machine, it doesn't have all of that superfluous bullshit like the PS3 which noone needs which unnessecarily inflates the price, bogs down the PS3, and turns off purist gamers. Anyway, I think that's what many of you would say, or something to that effect.

The early launch of the 360 may prove to be its trump to the PS3, just as the early release of the PS2 and early key exclusive titles gave it its edge in the previous console war.

The 360 has lineups for what you NEED to game, respective of who you are as a gamer. It doesn't attempt to enter the PC realm.

Due to it's intial appeal to the purist gamer and its early launch, the 360 both consumer and developer support and by late 2007 came out with many great exclusive titles. It's online gaming network is unmatched (though it costs $$$). The 360 supports HD-DVD format, but gamers must buy an attachment to play these movies. The HD-DVD has a maximum dual-layer capacity of 30igs.

The PS3 was released in November 2006, within a few weeks of the Wii. In the time since, the PS3 has become arguably the single most reviled tech object on the internet. It has lost exclusives to the 360 and has sold less than half of the total hardware units of the 360, in half the time of course. It's initial high price point of 499 and 599 was seen as out touch with the average consumer an incompatible with a mass-market consumer electronic device for gaming. The PS3 has yet to release a killer app like the 360, but it has had half the time to do so.

But the PS3 (at least on paper) has more processing power and more memory (hard drive) than the 360, and as we have just seen, an easily modifiable hard drive. The PS3 supports DVD and Bluray playback out of the box. The memory capacity of the Bluray disc is astounding, holding 50gigs on a dual-layer disc. It could increase two or threefold if more layers are added. The PS3 could easily become a home PC with Yellowdog Linux support. While it doesn't compete with the 360, its online network is free for owners.

I believe this war is going to become about Bluray vs HD-DVD, as the price of HDTVs (especially LCDs) drop, more consumers will integrate a HDTV into their home. The slow of the economy in the US has probably affected the integration of HDTV into average consumer househlds, which may also be a factor in the war. If this is true, then it may render my ideas about HD-DVD vs Bluray moot.

If Bluray wins, which I believe it currently is leading in sales, then I say the PS3 wins in the long run, hands down. If you think such things as the "format war" don't matter, then this argument doesn't play with you.

But, if you look at the history of computer development, the trend has gone toward more power and more memory. As memory becomes cheaper and Moore's Law continues its deliverance, history has relentlessly moved in this direction. Another historical trend is the integration of media functions in one device. Skeptically and dispassionately, assess which console drives more toward this historical trend.

If you do, I believe you will find the console winner of this generation, at least in terms of hardware sales irrespective of games.