EA Labels President, Frank Gibeau, who recently flaunted having seen the next-gen consoles, also highlighted the two platforms that should be considered threats to home consoles in the future.
According Mr. Gibeau there is still plenty of room in the interactive entertainment industry for home consoles to not only exist but thrive as well. He is of the belief that there are only two platforms that can give the Nintendo Wii U, PlayStation 4 and Xbox 720 a run for their money.
As each day passes one can sense the level of anticipation surrounding the PS4 and Xbox 720 mounting, however, with no official comment from either manufacturer, apart from the ‘they’re in development’ confirmation, most of the news comes from publishers and developers.
However, along with the hype and anticipation there has also been talk about whether or not the market has a place for home consoles anymore, especially since the mobile gaming market and tablet market have grown considerably over the past few years.
Mr. Gibeau, however, is not too concerned and believes that the only two platforms that have the capacity to threaten the Wii U, PlayStation 4 and Xbox 720 are IPTVs and high-end tablets.
He explained, “The only thing that could really displace that is really high-end tablets and IPTV, and IPTV is further out than just a couple of years.”
The EA executive continued, “But those are the only two places I see that kind of risk occurring, and the good news for EA is that we’re going to publish across all of them. We might ultimately find that to our advantage.”
It seems EA is playing it safe and putting its eggs in every basket it can find, which at this point in the industry’s development period, is a smart thing to do.
The PlayStation 4 and Xbox 720 have remained behind closed doors and there were even reports of an Xbox 720 dev kit being sold online on e-bay, albeit not with Microsoft’s consent. Everyone knows the consoles are well in development, however, there has been no confirmation or concrete news surrounding their technical specifications from where gamers can gauge their performance.
A number of developers have called on the manufacturers not to be concerned about power but rather to focus on providing platforms that in turn can provide the end user with a new experiences. Whether that be with a new way to control the games or a rethink of the console as a platform itself.
Whatever the case, the excitement for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox 720 announcements are mounting and it will be interesting to when Sony and Microsoft announce the consoles and more importantly, whether or not they can wow the gaming public with their products.