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[Fitzchiv]

One of the things I've really liked about this place is the sheer variety of opinion on what the next few years holds for the industry, and in particular console/tv gaming. We all seem to have a few big opinions/hunches about what feels like a transformative period the likes of which we've not seen in quite a long while. So, where better to post your outrageous predictions, hunches, opinions and tasty bait than here?! (I'm classing the next gen as nominally 6-7 years based on the current console iterations)

Don't feel like you need to back it up with evidence, you'll spend enough time fighting individual battles in coming years and doing that.

Here goes, my attempt at being Nostradouchebag;

1. One of Sony and Microsoft will exit the console hardware business, but not necessarily gaming - so we all see Stadia coming, and xCloud, and PS Now and whatever else services there are out there in development and kind of all agree that it's too soon to be making daft equivalencies with hardware gaming just yet, but my hunch is one of the big boys will throw their hat into a streaming/service model entirely by the end of the lifecycle of PS5/Scarlett.
2. It'll start with the end of the disc - the machines are almost certainly both going to have 4k bluray drives, but by the mid point of the generation several big publishers will announce the end of standard physical copies of their releases (but won't be able to resist the cash grab of the special editions). The onset of the disc-less console will come much earlier this cycle. By the end, games will be released almost exclusively by digital channels, which will influence..
3. AAA Game Prices will increase above inflation - control of the supply chain will result in a change in purchasing culture, with prices held at the top end much longer and seasonal digital sales more of an event. The average price of a AAA title will be 30-40% more than we've seen this gen.
4. Nintendo will go "nearly Sega" - I guess it started withe Cube, but Nintendo's been playing the same game for a while now and the increase in cloud gaming services (and use of smartphone screens) will make casual/on the move hardware less attractive. They won't exit hardware entirely, but by the end of the gen Nintendo will be publishing games for other platforms to back-fill lack of hardware sales.
5. Only one of Apple Arcade, Stadia and Amazon Cloud Gaming will succeed as a top tier game experience, the other two will focus on mobile/casual or be shut down.
6. Smart TV's will adapt to be directly streamed to, quite quickly, and kill the need for lower end hardware such as dongles etc. Sony will make good use of it. Microsoft will release a Surface TV that does all the in-home streaming and smart hub stuff leveraging Cortana.
7. We'll get Halflife 3 - it'll be a massive letdown.
8. I'll piss away a load of money on old machines to play games I can't on the new machines, then a 3rd party multi platform solution will be released - someone will cash in on whatever the impact on older school BC is by the end of the gen.

Pull my hunches apart by all means, they're all inter-related, or go for it with your own.

 

[existensmaximum]

2. So, with almost everyone doubling down on 4k (and beyond, eventually) which leads to continuous inflation of game sizes, do you really think discs are going anywhere? I'm thinking the opposite

 

[Rossco EZ]

1. I too think one of them will exit the console side of gaming and go for all out streaming but i feel like that will be more microsoft, i feel like this next console they put out will be the last if it doesn’t do well.

 

[Fitzchiv]

2. So, with almost everyone doubling down on 4k (and beyond, eventually) which leads to continuous inflation of game sizes, do you really think discs are going anywhere? I'm thinking the opposite

That's a fair point, although I guess you could say Sony's announcement re: partitioned installs could be a way forward on that?

 

[Vawn]

One of Sony and Microsoft will exit the console hardware business

Gee, I wonder which one.

 

[OmaeWaMouShindiggity]

I don't see either Sony or Microsoft stopping hardware, I dont see any reason to when they are both still selling in the 10s of millions (assuming ps4 outsells xbox 2 to 1 then that means xbox has sold between 40-50million consoles). What company in their right mind is going to stop selling a product that has over 30 million sales and creates an ecosystem that people are locked into through digital and physical purchases?

Disc less consoles will become mainstream but they wont take over the market, there are still too many consumers who either cant or don't want to rely on internet-only downloads and/or streaming. Not just in the US but across the globe. Plenty of games are digital only releases already, but I don't see ANY big triple AAA games being a digital only release, youd literally be cutting out a large portion of your consumer base by doing that. And until the majority of 1st world countries have solid high speed internet, that aint happening.

AAA prices will increase, but if people don't feel like the money is worth it then overall sales will drop waiting for price cuts to- hold your horses- $60. so no overall loss compared to if they had just kept prices $60. would you be willing to pay $80-100 for a game that still might have microtransactions in it?

 

[Jigsaah]

Im not touching this with a 10 foot pole.



Ahh...got an eleven foot one...
I DISAGREE!

 

[a multicultural team of v]

My only hunch is that SSDs being standard in the consoles is going to be WAY bigger of an impact than people realize.

Like, games designed with the SSD in mind (which I guess would be PS5 only games since its the only platform with a guaranteed SSD) are going to do some really impressive, crazy, and unexpected things. And a couple years into the gen there is going to be a clear line between SSD and non-SSD games.

I dunno why, I just get this feeling that storage bandwidth has perpetually been gamings bottleneck (and strength to be fair) since carts, and if this solves it then we are in for a treat.

 

[ResilientBanana]

I'll go totally PC if any of those hunches are true.

 

[J3ster]

Microsoft may be the next Sega?

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

I have a hunch that Sony will try to leverage its own PSVR 2.0 against the Switch's portability.

A VR-capable PS4 miniaturized into a tablet with detachable "PlayCons" that double as VR controllers. The tablet slides into a wearable, wireless headset. Would be interesting.

 

[Moonjt9]

I can definitely see one (Or all) of the streaming only services like stadia tanking and being discontinued. It is too niche to make a dent into classic consoles.

I don’t see many big leaps like VR was, just a lot of refinement of existing technology, perhaps to the point of more mass adoption( like a portable vr kit that actually has enough power to makegood enough vr)

 

[Caffeine]

My hunch is the price of both machines. $699

 

[Bonfires Down]

I could only maybe see a price increase for the most popular games like GTA by $10. There is less need for higher base prices now that we have GaaS with season passes and loot boxes and what have you. I could see AA games like Control dropping to $40-50.

There will be a large push for subscription services as the model has significant advantages for platform holders and to some extent for consumers. Getting Sony first party games on day 1 might cost you $20/month though.

If we get Nintendo games streaming on PC that would be amazing.

We will probably never get Half Life 3, not that I care.

 

[Ultradsa]

Nintendo will "switch" over to AMD for Switch pro/2 and use a 2TF 7W Navi APU and hybrid emulate for backwards compatibility of Tegra to be relevant for next gen ports/multi plat launches. Nvidia will catch wind and unfollow Nintendo on twitter further cementing their inevitable separation. Anyone check twitter?

 

[Jigsaah]

1. Nobody is leaving the console market. Even Microsoft doing as bad as they did this gen still made a boat load of money. Gamers will determine the direction they go, but there's no reason not to keep the console iron in the fire. Options!

2. I do think the end of the disc is coming. However I feel like it's time for a new main stream physical format. We been on discs for what...25 years? Maybe like a chip or something futuristic like that, i dunno. I just hope it's not all digital. What will I put in my time capsule?

3. MTXs will ensure prices remain stable. They won't raise the base price of the game AND include MTXs and MTXs aren't going anywhere anytime soon. If anything, the cost of entry for games has been dramatically reduced from the days of Neo Geo ($200 cartridges the size of books) and Some Nintendo 64 games (varying prices, some as high as $80). As MTXs become even more prevalent we'll see free to play more and more frequently. The best I can hope for is that people learn from games like Warframe in how to do MTXs properly.

4. I tend to agree with the OP about #4. Streaming is going to really hurt them more than anyone else. They may be forced to beef up their hardware offering to get back in the console wars or somehow pull something out of their ass like they did with the Wii.

5. Of the 3 streaming services you mentioned...my money is on Stadia. However, xCloud has a huge advantage over all of them with the sheer amount of games on offer.

6. God please no Microsoft TV...

7. Halflife 2 is maybe one of the biggest beneficiaries of nostalgia that I've ever seen in gaming. I don't think it's possible for Valve to innovate to the degree that they did with Half Life 2, so my guess is that Half Life 3 will never see the light of day.

 

[Life]

Ok here I go:

With the death of consoles, Playstation and Microsoft will no longer release hardware, but they will continue to build games to sell on PSN and Microsoft stores - these will exist only on PC. People will eventually come to terms with this - and the only real war that will continue is the PC vs Phone wars.

This is where Nintendo comes in, the only ones still creating hardware. Their games will be exclusively made for phones - but not just any phone. It'll be a Nintendo smartphone that will sell like hotcakes.

 

[joe_zazen]

Someone will buy nintendo.

 

[NahaNago]

My hunch is that Microsoft is going to make a comeback next gen due to all of the studios they bought and future third party exclusives they will have. Microsoft will be the console with the artsy/ unique games while Sony will be the corporate California soul sucking AAA game making company but with less microtransactions. Nintendo will eventually become the go to place for Japanese games due to not censoring games and as a result will have several Japanese game exclusives come to their console but Nintendo will not capitalize on this.

 

[ViolentP]

My hunch is 30fps will still be the standard.

 

[Croatoan]

- A lot of console only peeps do not realize how demanding native 4k 60fps is. They are going to be disappointed when final specs are announced.

- The PS5 and Xbox 2 will have relatively weak GPUs compared to enthusiast PCs. Talking 8-9Tflops here.

-Most games will run native 4k 30fps with drops. A few games will run native 4k 60fps (fighting games, racing games).

- RT for both PS5 and Xbox 2 will be religated to Shadows, and AO mostly. Very few, if any, games will use ray traced reflections or lighting on console, but PC will start to see great advances in all ray tracing techniques in about three years (2 more gpu cycles). Currently ray traced reflections bring a 2080ti to its knees if you need a reason why.

- Shooters like COD or BF will struggle to hit native 4k 60fps on console. To rectify this most shooters will run a dynamic 1440p to 1080p with some AA to get a stable 60fps.

- Devs will start adding in a performance mode to their games (Like BL3 did). These performance modes will drop the game to a lower resolution in order to get 60fps.

- A lot of devs are just going to chose to run dynamic 4k - 1440p 30fps with some AA.

- Bethesda next game (starlight?) will sell better than Fallout 4 and regain them some faith.

- The next elder scrolls game will outsell Skyrim lifetime.

- My wife and I are going to love the shit out of our PS5s but probably end up playing more and more on PC as this generation continues.

- This will be the last generation with disc media.

- This will be the second to last generation with physical hardware.

Looking farther out (15-20 years out):
- Nintendo and Microsoft will have their entire catalogs playable on PC, Apple, Google, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo devices when they become third part software platforms (as hardware starts to die).

- Sony will eventually create the last "Game" console and it will bomb.

- The future is probably a combination of phones that can connect and play PC caliber games on your TV, or streaming once internet speeds get better.

 

[Bankai]

7.

 

[ThatStupidLion]

ps+ will die
psnow will rise

 

[Nitty_Grimes]

2. Will not happen not until broadband is blink of an eye fast and data caps abolished.

 

[Romulus]

- A lot of console only peeps do not realize how demanding native 4k 60fps is. They are going to be disappointed when final specs are announced.

- The PS5 and Xbox 2 will have relatively weak GPUs compared to enthusiast PCs. Talking 8-9Tflops here.

-Most games will run native 4k 30fps with drops. A few games will run native 4k 60fps (fighting games, racing games).

- RT for both PS5 and Xbox 2 will be religated to Shadows, and AO mostly. Very few, if any, games will use ray traced reflections or lighting on console, but PC will start to see great advances in all ray tracing techniques in about three years (2 more gpu cycles). Currently ray traced reflections bring a 2080ti to its knees if you need a reason why.

- Shooters like COD or BF will struggle to hit native 4k 60fps on console. To rectify this most shooters will run a dynamic 1440p to 1080p with some AA to get a stable 60fps.

- Devs will start adding in a performance mode to their games (Like BL3 did). These performance modes will drop the game to a lower resolution in order to get 60fps.

- A lot of devs are just going to chose to run dynamic 4k - 1440p 30fps with some AA.

- Bethesda next game (starlight?) will sell better than Fallout 4 and regain them some faith.

- The next elder scrolls game will outsell Skyrim lifetime.

- My wife and I are going to love the shit out of our PS5s but probably end up playing more and more on PC as this generation continues.

- This will be the last generation with disc media.

- This will be the second to last generation with physical hardware.

Looking farther out (15-20 years out):
- Nintendo and Microsoft will have their entire catalogs playable on PC, Apple, Google, Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo devices when they become third part software platforms (as hardware starts to die).

- Sony will eventually create the last "Game" console and it will bomb.

- The future is probably a combination of phones that can connect and play PC caliber games on your TV, or streaming once internet speeds get better.

Gears 5 is hitting 4k 60fps with impressive settings, large playspaces on a 6tf GPU and a CPU worse than an I3. Lol

I'm not saying most games will be 4k 60, but the optimization efforts this gen with these awful processors won't go for nothing next gen. A zen 2 as a quantum step up compared to that ancient tablet jaguar CPU. Not to mention more/faster RAM and a couple teraflops of GPU power for good measure.

 

[Tarin02543]

As Korea is becoming a big threat to Japan's technology dominance, I expect to see a console from Samsung.

 

[Fitzchiv]

2. Will not happen not until broadband is blink of an eye fast and data caps abolished.

Reckon that'll happen in the next 7 years? I think it's definitely a possibility

 

[BusierDonkey]

1. I doubt Microsoft will exit the hardware market. They are in solid last place, yes, but with over 40 million Xbones sold and being in the black as a business it wouldn't make sense unless the next console does even worse. I'll wait and see both Microsoft and Sony are doing (or fucking up) with the new consoles before I declare one doomed. I do think Microsoft will hop into streaming, but as an augmentation to their offerings, not a replacement.

2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8:

 

[DeepEnigma]

Im not touching this with a 10 foot pole.



Ahh...got an eleven foot one...
I DISAGREE!

How about a ladder?

 

[kraspkibble]

ps+ will die
psnow will rise

i think it's only a matter of time before they merge. To avoid confusion i don't think it'll be called PS Plus or PS Now.

MAYBE they do keep PS Plus/Now. if you just want Plus you can do that. if you only want Now you can do that. if you want both then you can get "PS Ultimate" / "PS Gold" / "PS Super Duper Give me all yo money"

 

[Hobbygaming]

What I think will happen is

1. Playstation will be the number one console seller
2. Xbox will continue trying to get people to sub to Gamepass but increase microtransactions in their AAA games
3. Sony will buy a few more AAA studios
4. The Initiative's game will be released and be very good
5. Sucker Punch and Sony Bend will be added to the list of great Sony studios

 

[Jigsaah]

What I think will happen is

1. Playstation will be the number one console seller
2. Xbox will continue trying to get people to sub to Gamepass but increase microtransactions in their AAA games
3. Sony will buy a few more AAA studios
4. The Initiative's game will be released and be very good
5. Sucker Punch and Sony Bend will be added to the list of great Sony studios

1. Probably
2. Probably
3. Probably
4. Probably
5. Wait..."Sony Bend" isn't already a Sony studio? Seems like a branding error there.

 

[Hobbygaming]

1. Probably
2. Probably
3. Probably
4. Probably
5. Wait..."Sony Bend" isn't already a Sony studio? Seems like a branding error there.

I think they're a good studio but next generation they'll be great, Bend too with the sequel to Days Gone

 

[ROMhack]

Only one that I'm sure about - the next Xbox will feature streaming capability by the end of the gen and Microsoft will play heavily on their surface tablets as the basis of the hardware.

I suspect they won't care about exclusives and will go fully down the hardware route, trying to sell their system as an all-in-one media device (they tried to do that this gen!).

As for what you've said, I don't think AAA games will rise above inflation to the point where it's a massive hindrance. I suspect that they'll leverage a rental/streaming system before that, integrating new games into Game Pass and Sony Now systems, which will probably feature tiered content (so new games would be in the Platinum tier priced at $30 a month or something).

 

[Slings and Arrows]

Local hardware is dead. Stadia is faster and better than local hardware.

Checkmate Sony and Microsoft

 

[Croatoan]

Gears 5 is hitting 4k 60fps with impressive settings, large playspaces on a 6tf GPU and a CPU worse than an I3. Lol

I'm not saying most games will be 4k 60, but the optimization efforts this gen with these awful processors won't go for nothing next gen. A zen 2 as a quantum step up compared to that ancient tablet jaguar CPU. Not to mention more/faster RAM and a couple teraflops of GPU power for good measure.

Uhh is gears native 4k 60, checkerboard or upscale from 1440p?

Edit: I just looked it up. Gears five runs a dynamic 4k 60fps on x1x. Which likely means its 4k if you look at a wall and 1440p/1080p everywhere else lol.

Thats still impressive, but its going to take a lot more for 4k 60fps in, let's say, battlefield 6 with ray tracing and all of the new next gen visual stuff.

 

[Romulus]

Edit: I just looked it up. Gears five runs a dynamic 4k 60fps on x1x. Which likely means its 4k if you look at a wall and 1440p/1080p everywhere else lol.

The lowest resolution value it ever hits is 1584p.

Keep in mind this with a CPU inferior to an I3.

 

[Croatoan]

The lowest resolution value it ever hits is 1584p.

Very cool then! Lets hope that the 2 or 3 more Tflops coming on the PS5/XBX can keep up with more demanding, better looking games!

 

[deriks]

1 - Neither Sony or Microsoft will ever leave the hardware, but they will change, and chances are that Microsoft will be the first that says that their hardware is just another box and you can play on other platforms
2 - The start of the end of a disc based happened on this generation, but physical media will never die
3 - They said this since the PS360, but maybe this time we will see games for US$70 which can see by inflation
4 - Nintendo will never be like Sega. They're too conservative. Sega did games for PC in the golden age, and Nintendo just now is doing small things to atract for the real thing. Also, unlike Sega that won money until the Mega Drive, the Switch is printing money, so...
5 - I agree, but I guess that this will take more time because the mobile market is weird
6 - Microsoft releasing a TV is kinda weird, but an subscription app for new TVs is more likely. Expect that with the Xcloud
7 - That ship has sailed, man
8 - This is kinda already a thing. The Mini consoles do emulation like no emulator before, and they're easy to handle with next to no configuration. Nintendo did well with the Wii, the Xbox One also do emulation really well with past consoles, and the PS4 has a built in PS2 emulator... Nintendo and Sony just need to get their shit together

 

[alabtrosMyster]

Smart TV's will adapt to be directly streamed to

PS Now used to be available on Smart TVs (Samsung), but I think they never kept the app up to date.

Sony hint at the possibility of bringing the feature back.

Can I play PS Now games on my smart TV, smartphone, or tablet?
PS Now is only available on PS4 and PC. It is not currently supported by smart TVs, smartphones or tablets.

I'm sure MS/Google/Amazon are looking into this possibility as well.

 

[Romulus]

Very cool then! Lets hope that the 2 or 3 more Tflops coming on the PS5/XBX can keep up with more demanding, better looking games!

3 Tlops added to X1X with that massive CPU jump sounds good, not to mention more RAM and bandwidth.

 

[Ellery]

Oh sweet. I really like this thread

- The release of the PS5 won't be as magical as people expect it to be in terms of games. Probably similar to PS4 launch lineup. So many good PS4 exclusive games coming out in 2020 right before the PS5.
- Probably takes til 2022 or 2023 for the PS5 to have really great and next-gen worthy AAA exclusive games that people will be amazed by. (next GTA, next Naughty Dog, next God of War etc.)
- Games are going to look great and TFLOPs will (ONCE AGAIN) not decide the console war, but games and features.
- The 15 TFLOP crowd and the 12 TFLOP (BUT YOU HAVE TO THINK IN VEGA TFLOPS IT IS ACTUALLY 14 VEGA TFLOPS IF THEY USE NAVI) crowd will be disappointed.
- Ray Tracing will get a lot of advertisment and hype, but only very little use in games. They will optimize for it so that you will notice, but it won't be a game changer (though I am sure Microsoft and Sony will call it a game changer)
- Nintendo will continue to going to re-release old games for full price. There must be some Wii U games left that are selling for 5$ on ebay that they can release on the Switch for 60$.
- They will find new predatory ways to get your money. I am not going to list suggestions here for obvious reasons. But at first people will hate it and eventually it will be accepted and considered the new normal
- Microsoft will fail to deliver games that have as much "soul" as Sony games. Many half-baked generic Crackdown 3 games for Xbox Scarlett and also the usual games like Forza, Halo, Gears.
- Many facebook users will claim that the PS5 is 8x as powerful as a 2000$ gaming PC.
- Nintendo will squeeze the Switch for atleast 10+ years and release more iterations and better hardware versions of it before the successors for the Switch comes out.
- In 5 years Sony and Microsoft will push VR again and it (hopefully) fails again and again.
- Ubisoft will continue to release games so generic that people will lust for Michael Bay movies with explosions.
- Sony and Microsoft will push hard for mobile gamer's money and they will sell theirs souls

 

[Sosokrates]

At the rate video streaming progressed,

I will say with 100% confidence that game streaming will be as good as local gaming, given a long enough time lime, its could be 10 yrs, 25yrs, etc but it will happen.

I'm sure there will be some hardware that can play games locally, smartphones will always have local hardware and Nintendo will probably have a portable with local hardware too, but when streaming is as good as local play it makes little sense to have local hardware.

However VR will extend local hardware, because having decent VR streaming will take even longer.

 

[Ian Henry]

1. Nobody is leaving the console market. Even Microsoft doing as bad as they did this gen still made a boat load of money. Gamers will determine the direction they go, but there's no reason not to keep the console iron in the fire. Options!

2. I do think the end of the disc is coming. However I feel like it's time for a new main stream physical format. We been on discs for what...25 years? Maybe like a chip or something futuristic like that, i dunno. I just hope it's not all digital. What will I put in my time capsule?

3. MTXs will ensure prices remain stable. They won't raise the base price of the game AND include MTXs and MTXs aren't going anywhere anytime soon. If anything, the cost of entry for games has been dramatically reduced from the days of Neo Geo ($200 cartridges the size of books) and Some Nintendo 64 games (varying prices, some as high as $80). As MTXs become even more prevalent we'll see free to play more and more frequently. The best I can hope for is that people learn from games like Warframe in how to do MTXs properly.

4. I tend to agree with the OP about #4. Streaming is going to really hurt them more than anyone else. They may be forced to beef up their hardware offering to get back in the console wars or somehow pull something out of their ass like they did with the Wii.

5. Of the 3 streaming services you mentioned...my money is on Stadia. However, xCloud has a huge advantage over all of them with the sheer amount of games on offer.

6. God please no Microsoft TV...

7. Halflife 2 is maybe one of the biggest beneficiaries of nostalgia that I've ever seen in gaming. I don't think it's possible for Valve to innovate to the degree that they did with Half Life 2, so my guess is that Half Life 3 will never see the light of day.

#2 is interesting. What will this new form of physical media be? It could definitely be a chip, a UMD, or an archive disc? Who knows at this point.

I also believe that Samsung might enter the console realm in a couple of years or so. Microsoft might leave the industry behind and someone is going to take their place.

 

[Breakage]

DualShock 5 Pro will be a thing.

 

[Griffon]

Game streaming will crash and burn from day one, except game "journalists" will continue to pretend it's relevant for as long as humanly possible. Less efforts to copy/paste PR spiels than trying to do actual journalism.

PS5 will do good worldwide, pretty much like the PS4. I can't picture how the xbox can compete outside of the US, and even stateside it'll be an uphill battle.

PC gaming will continue to be just fine, Epic might try some more scummy moves but I don't think it'll be enough to make things worse. Publishers are now well aware of the healthy long tail PC games have, and will continue to release their big games same day and date as on consoles.

Mobile gaming is dead, and I think someone will try to make it viable again. Maybe valve will make an android version of steam. Or maybe a specialty shop that purposely doesn't feature any F2P games. Perhaps Samsung will try something. There's a move to make here.

The Oculus Quest form factor is the future of VR, portable standalone headsets that can optionally connect to a computer for high end stuff. It might still take a few iterations on the hardware to reach long term mass adoption.
If Sony is smart, they'd do the same, make the PSVR 2 work both as a standalone handeld and as a PS5 accessory. They could focus on letting current Oculus Quest indie devs know that they can target the PSVR2 too.

Nintendo will keep being the king of portable and good games, they just need to keep iterating on switch revisions with better internals, and to keep making good games as they always do.

 

[Imtjnotu]

Nintendo might make a console with the same power as Xbox one s