Right now is an interesting time to be a gamer. Right now is that strange transitional period for the current generation of game consoles into the next generation. We’ve seen this in the past before, and it can be a truly nerve-wracking time for gamers. Some games get rushed to market to make an impact on the current generation of consoles before the hype for the next generation launch and the games that come with it drown out everything else, or we see the inverse; where games are intentionally held back to be launch-window games on the new consoles.
According to a few industry analysts, it looks like “Holiday 2013” won’t be given carte blanche for our desires for a stream of new consoles. Of course, the Wii U is slated to launch this fall, with Nintendo leading the pack with the first of the next-generation, which will always be a risky move when it comes down to how quickly technology advances. The big drawback to being the early bird is that there will undoubtedly be more powerful technology coming up in the near future, and as that happens, the cost of everything else comes down. The Xbox 360 was a money-loser for the first year or so, until the price of components dropped and production costs fell well below cost. For Nintendo, the pros of an early launch might mitigate the cons in that they can try to build an installed user-base for this upcoming generation earlier. Anyway, Holiday 2013 might see the launch of one of the two expected big boys, but not the other.
These analysts are seeing that the PS4 will most likely launch during Holiday 2013, but that the Xbox 720 could be within the first half of 2014. This means that the Xbox 360 might have some more life to it than expected, but the question is; will being the last to launch dampen its release? I think it is safe to assume that the Xbox has always had a bit of a different demographic than Sony’s PlayStation consoles or Nintendo’s offerings, but many (and I mean MANY) titles are cross-platform, and the excitement about a new console, even if not your brand of choice, is a hard one for a lot of gamers to suppress.
