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Who of the 3 end up going the SEGA route?

Who of the 3 end up going the SEGA route?

  • Nintendo

  • Microsoft

  • Sony


Results are only viewable after voting.

Calverz

Member
Which of the BIG 3 stops production of new consoles/handhelds/mobile and goes solely by way of developing multi platform games only?

I ask this because I’m still unsure why exactly SEGA stopped making consoles. Is it a question of who’s in the most trouble selling consoles?

I don’t mean this to be a console warring poll/thread. I’m just curious to know what GAF thinks.
None. If it’s ever one it would be Nintendo or Sony. Microsoft can come third every generation and still have the money to buyout Sony or Nintendo. Or enough money to buy both.
Sega pulled out as they couldn’t afford to keep going.
 

ZywyPL

Banned
Sony... they already were close to being bankrupt ahead of the launch of the PS4, neither Nintendo nor Microsoft ever came close to that.

if sony releases a console that bombs they are done. I don't think they have the means to ever financially compensate for that as well as Nintendo or Microsoft could.

one of the reasons is because they don't have any IP that can hold them up outside of selling games. Nintendo has a whole Mario theme park, they can make money off of their games without selling actual games. Sony can't.

and Microsoft is such a giant that they can brute force their way into whatever they want.

People might laugh at what you wrote but this is all actually true:

rlensph.png


dvzD4BU.png



They haven't made any money at all on PS3 (yet some clowns will claim they "won" the generation just because they sold 2-3M more consoles than MS). If PS4 wasn't such a hit there most likely wouldn't be any Playstation anymore, just 3rd party games. But they learned their mistakes, hence the consoles are cheap, the games are expensive, online is paid, games are being ported to PC and so on, they are doing everything to never repeat the PS3 generation ever again.

That being said, I think from the big 3 companies it's MS who is slowly but surely going down the route to become more of a multiplatform publisher than a hardware vendor, they want GP/xCloud to be available on everything that has a display and an internet connection.
 

Soosa

Banned
Purely based on popularity:

Microsoft, as xbox isnt globally really popular even after 20 years of being on market.

While Sega were kind of as popular as Nintendo on global scale.

Xbox is a popular thing on U.S.A. but thats about it, at most of the Europe it is kind of seen as 3rd party or spare option and not serious competitor of Playstation. It have its fanbase, but nothing compared to Playstation. I have heard that it is similar situation on other areas too.

Series S have been available since the launch on many countries, so it kind of tells how different U.S.A. is vs EU on xbox popularity. Series x were also available on some places, but now it is also dried up, maybe because of lower shipment numbers?


But considering how rich Microsoft is, they can keep up with it just by U.S.A. market.

Maybe they turn xbox into service / streaming, but that would be a choise rather than what happened to Sega.

So probably none of the big three get what Sega got.
 

BlackTron

Member
None of them anytime soon. In time? I'd say Sony is most likely, not because they are doing poorly, but because they have the least wiggle room for error. Even when Nintendo releases a total dud (WiiU) they at least manage to stay profitable. When Xbox is struggling, they have the resources to eat the cost while they re-strategize and invest.

History has shown many times that the gaming market can shift totally gen to gen, and I think Sony is the most vulnerable to such a disruption. Microsoft is already becoming a publisher that just so happens to also sell a hardware you can use as an option to play their games. Like imagine if Sega kept maintaining their own system for brand optics/choice, while publishing on other systems...kinda what MS is on the way to being really. But that's not really going out like Sega did.

I don't think Nintendo is going anywhere. They are extremely efficiently run and make a lot of money per dollar of investment. If Sony makes a big error they lose millions. If Nintendo makes an error they lose the ten bucks they put into it. Switch 2 could be another Wii U, Nintendo would still generate a (meek) profit and just come back next time with the next billion dollar gimmick. Their IP are immortal and they whore them out very carefully.
 

Irobot82

Member
Jesus this forum really needs to crack down on the console warring. It's getting as bad as the Politics forum.
 

Topher

Gold Member
People might laugh at what you wrote but this is all actually true:

rlensph.png


dvzD4BU.png



They haven't made any money at all on PS3 (yet some clowns will claim they "won" the generation just because they sold 2-3M more consoles than MS). If PS4 wasn't such a hit there most likely wouldn't be any Playstation anymore, just 3rd party games. But they learned their mistakes, hence the consoles are cheap, the games are expensive, online is paid, games are being ported to PC and so on, they are doing everything to never repeat the PS3 generation ever again.

That being said, I think from the big 3 companies it's MS who is slowly but surely going down the route to become more of a multiplatform publisher than a hardware vendor, they want GP/xCloud to be available on everything that has a display and an internet connection.

Did Microsoft make any money on 360? Or on Xbox One? I don't think so. It wasn't that long ago that the future of Xbox was in serious doubt. PlayStation's continued success is much more important to Sony than Xbox is to Microsoft. I agree it would be much easier for them to leave the console business entirely and become multiplat. In fact, I'd go far to say the only thing that really keeps the console around is the revenue from Xbox LIVE Gold, which is significant.

Phil Spencer also learned from the mistakes made at Xbox. Nintendo's past is checkered with mistakes and missteps. And so now we are in a much more tightly contested console battle which is ultimately a good thing. The console market is strong which makes the question in the OP a bit absurd. Fact of the matter is that all of the companies mentioned have had bad times and all three are on an upward trend right now.
 

Holammer

Member
If Nintendo's' next machine becomes a dud like the N64, Game Cube, WiiU. There's gonna be trouble.
Especially now when they don't have handheld devices carrying the day.
 

Urban

Member
None? Because noone in the whole world has a bad managment like sega at that time. Worst Managment in the history of humankind when it comes to games/electronics.
 

Kilau

Member
I’d hate it but I could see Sony going that way if they mess up big enough.

Microsoft is trending that way but still seem to be hardware committed for now.

Nintendo would just sell toys if they left the console space but I don’t think they ever will.
 

Trogdor1123

Gold Member
I suspect all of them will.

Once hardware doesn't matter anymore there will be no reason to. They will be software platforms, not hardware ones. They will all be everywhere.
 

StormCell

Member
I voted Microsoft in the poll, but my reasons are a little more complicated. What I'm about to describe may not be the same thing as going the SEGA route. I see Xbox as transcending the physical platform barrier. This appears to be an important piece of their long term strategy. In that sense, should Xbox hardware ever become unpopular they would simply ditch it and seek to put the Xbox platform on as many devices as they can. They're not too concerned with making hardware as long as they can keep the Xbox business profitable.

I do like what was said about SONY up above, though. The Playstation division would struggle to eat a lost generation. They absolutely thrive because they're in the lead. If that ever changes it could possibly signal the end of Playstation.
 

Woffls

Member
Playstation business does too well for Sony to give up the eco system

Microsoft most likely because they are half way there already, though it wont be done out of necessity

Nintendo just straight up won’t do that ever because reasons
 

Amin_Parker

Member
I think it would be better to ask who among the big tech will become the next 4th big one.
Amazon, Google, Facebook, Tencent.
I really like this post more than any of the post that was made in this comment thread so far. Someone needs to make a thread about this question that this poster posted. I'm sure it will be way more popular. The real question is out of these for companies that was mentioned who will be the fourth big gaming competitor to successfully be a part of the Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft battle. Who among these companies will compete with the big 3 on a consistent basis when it comes to first-party software and Hardware as well as services. Come on guys, someone please make a thread about this.
 

Del_X

Member
Sega made a lot of unprofitable mistakes. They had to sell studios and wind down a lot of their divisions. Microsoft seems committed to hardware (Surface, Xbox, etc.) and with Game Pass seems poised to build a large subscriber base that they can probably get on a $17.99 or $19.99/month price point by 2024. Sony and Nintendo seem fine, as well. Sony is likely most at risk of poor management outside of PlayStation, although that seems to have diminished.
 
Microsoft is basically there. They aren't tied to the console anymore and are going to produce their ecosystem on anything with a screen. But i think thats the most profitable direction long term. Every other industry services are far more profitable than hardware.
 
Sony's a monster who never fails to sell less than 100 million units per cycle.

PS3.

Anyway tho, yeah, I don't see any of them going 3P. OP, it's not actually about how many consoles you sell, but how much revenue and, more importantly, profit, you can generate from your console ecosystem. That comes from a combination of hardware sales, 1P software sales, 3P software sales, subscriptions & services, and the prices for those as well as what volumes are sold at what prices, when they sell, and what the platform holder's cut is from those.

Weigh that against incurred debts, expenses, taxes, salaries, R&D, software development & marketing costs etc. that have to be paid (and thus deducted from those profits), and you eventually get left with a net profit. If the combination of revenue, profit and net profit aren't high enough to cover various expenses or have the company's market value increase in ways satisfactory to shareholders, then that's when they begin to run into trouble.

SEGA was operating under a mountain of debt and could not spin around large enough quarterly profits big enough to offset incurring losses. It's really that simple. Continuing to produce hardware for them would've kept bleeding cash due to the R&D, production, assembly, QA testing, distribution, marketing, customer support etc. costs that come with console production, so they cut it short before they truly ran out of money and would've had to declare bankruptcy.

Nintendo, Sony and especially Microsoft are not in anything near that type of financial situation, so they will be fine. From a purely numbers and logistic POV, I guess I'd say Sony is the most "at-risk", but that's only if they had some catastrophic disaster with the PlayStation brand, which doesn't look to be happening. The reason I say this is because they generate nowhere near the revenue or profits of Microsoft, and don't have cash reserves to the size of Nintendo.

While they're a lot more diversified as a corporation than Nintendo, most of that is within consumer entertainment fields, which are inherently fickle and risky. FWIW gaming itself falls under that, but that's really the ONLY such type of market for Nintendo, while Sony is in multiples of them be it games, movies, music, television etc. Each additional one increases the overall risk. Unlike the majority of Microsoft's various market segments which come with lots of long-term security/rapport even if they are comparatively conservative/safe (business enterprise, data server networks, military contracts, medical etc.). The only arguably conservative/safe sector Sony has a foot in would be their financing services department.

Again, tho, we're talking some absolutely monstrous, catastrophic blow to PlayStation as a brand that would put a company like Sony at risk of folding out of position as a platform holder. I don't foresee that happening anytime soon.
 
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RoadHazard

Gold Member
Nobody.

But if anyone, Microsoft, because they are a software and service company at heart, and the Xbox division isn't essential to their business.

Sony is a hardware company, and Nintendo would rather exit the industry completely than make games for another company's console.

But really, nobody.
 
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RoadHazard

Gold Member
Didn't we have similar threads in the past?
In my personal opinion it could be Sony. Their smartphone is dying, their electronics business is not in a good position compared to their chinese or korean competitors. The Playstation division is subsidizing the whole company, actually.

You're arguing for the opposite of what you think you're arguing for.
 
Sony.

Nintendo/MS can afford to make some fuck ups but not so much Sony. They don't have that financial security. If they have a bad run then Sony could be forced to quit gaming. I don't see it happening any time soon but I'd bet on Sony being the one to quit first.
 

EverydayBeast

thinks Halo Infinite is a new graphical benchmark
Microsoft can handle not being in the gaming industry they have no reason to be in the console business when you see games like halo and gears on PC (games I enjoy). Sony or Nintendo would die if they lost their gaming divisions and “went the sega route”.
 
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BennyBlanco

aka IMurRIVAL69
Once the streaming nightmare comes to fruition everybody will be 3rd party, but Nintendo will still release a handheld hybrid and have you waggling drifting controllers at a tv
 
I think it would be better to ask who among the big tech will become the next 4th big one.
Amazon, Google, Facebook, Tencent.
Out those I'd rate most likely to be:

1. Tencent
2. Amazon
3. Google
4. Facebook

If Apple decided to enter gaming then they'd almost instantly become the 4th player. They have the most money to play with and their fans are incredibly loyal. They'd easily be able to buy up studios/developers and they can play the long game just like what they've been doing with Apple Music and Apple TV. They could put out a $1,000 console and it would still sell like crazy.

Anyway, Tencent is most likely because they already own or have their fingers in a shit load of gaming stuff. They either own or have invested in: Riot Games (100%), Epic (40%), Supercell (84%), Frontier Development (9%), Don't Nod (22%), Ubisoft (5%), Acitivion Blizzard (5%), Paradox Interactive (5%), Remedy (3.8%), Miniclip (>50.1%), Bohemia (<49.9%), Roblix, Platinum Games, Discord....and many more.

So they have access to or some degree of control over games/products such as:

League of Legends
Valorant
Fortnite
Rocket League
Unreal Engine (used by hundreds of games)
Discord
Call of Duty
Crash Bandicoot
Tony Hawk
Diablo
World of Warcraft
Overwatch
Hearth Stone
Assassin's Creed
Far Cry
Just Dance
Watch Dogs
Tom Clancy
Control
Max Payne
Alan Wake
Bayonetta
Nier
Roblox
Arma
Life is Strange
Elite Dangerous
Jurassic World Evolution

and mobile games like:

Candy Crush
8ball Pool
Clash of Clans
Clash Royale
 
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Tmac

Member
None.

As of right now, Sony is to sucessfulll, Microsoft too rich and Nintendo too different to have any competition at all.
 
If Nintendo's' next machine becomes a dud like the N64, Game Cube, WiiU. There's gonna be trouble.
Especially now when they don't have handheld devices carrying the day.
This is actually something worth considering. In the past when their home consoles struggled (Gamecube, Wii U), they had a separate handheld pipeline to fall back on, which included Pokemon (which really can be seen as a third pipeline all its own).

Nowadays that is no longer the case. The Switch is doing very well, but it will never get near what the DS & Wii did combined during their time. To be fair, that was perhaps an outlier and Nintendo also saw it that way, because if you look at other generations total home console + handheld sales were probably roughly around the 100 million - 120 million mark, and the Switch isn't that far off from those.

There's a benefit to consolidating the handheld and home console lines into one pipeline, as well: less overall costs for R&D, manufacturing, assembly, distribution, marketing, software production etc. Because instead of needing to do that for two distinct products, you're now doing it for only one. I think in the future, if Nintendo can justify it, they would like to take an approach with tiered hardware running under the same featureset but spec'd for various use-cases, kind of what Microsoft is doing right now with the Series S and Series X, but in Nintendo's case it would probably be for a small range of portable options and maybe an affordable home console variant providing connection support a Switch-like device wouldn't be able to.

The key benefit in all of this is you write the software once, and can compile executables configured to each run on a specific hardware device type, but the base code only need account for a singular hardware processing spec that provides consistency in output across the supported devices.

nightmare-slain nightmare-slain Tencent is actually looking less likely than in the past, because it appears the Chinese government aren't too happy with them over something and have pulled back on their investing power.

It also seems China as a whole (well, the government anyway) wants to restrict gaming access times for youth, which would seem anathema to a government that would want to support corporations trying to expand their presence in gaming (and thus presence of gaming in the Chinese market).
 
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If anyone it'd be Xbox, but because of choice not forced. I can see them focusing everything through online and streaming. But i don't think it'll happen, at least anytime soon.
 

Azelover

Titanic was called the Ship of Dreams, and it was. It really was.
Microsoft..

They were already doing the Sega thing as a platform holder anyways.
 

Vagswarm

Member
It was close enough (to 100 million)... especially considering they weren't the market leader. It was no where near the weak numbers of Sega consoles, or Nintendo's underperforming ones. Sega consoles never sold very well.

People also forget that Sega's games never sold that well either, especially compared to Nintendo (or later, Sony & Microsoft).

They really didn't have anything to stand on, unlike the current 3 powerhouses.
 
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yurinka

Member
I think MS is slowly moving into that direction after they realized they couldn't dominate the console market. They have been slowly moving their gaming business from console to PC and from games sold to subscription while acquiring multiplatform studios and IPs and releasing some stuff in other consoles (Minecraft Story Mode, Quake 2021, Psychonauts 2, many updates and DLC for their previously existing games lke Minecraft, Fallout 76, Doom Eternal, Elder Scrolls Online, etc. I think more of their Zenimax and Minecraft games will be multi at launch of after a timed exclusive, like Indiana Jones.

I think they will focus on growing Gamepass on PC, Xbox and mobile (plus if Sony and Nintendo allows them on PS and Switch, but I think the won't allow it) and that if Series aren't their last generation having their own console, the next generation after them will be.

I think Nintendo and Sony will stay on consoles for longer because they are breaking records there so have no reason to move away from what -unlike in MS's case- it's their main business, even if they will continue testing new secondary markets for them to slowly expand like mobile, GaaS/F2P, PC, VR, streaming, movies about their IPs, etc.

Even if in 20 years from now the PC, console, portables, tvs, vr and mobile hardware have merged in a single exact same hardware platform with crossplatform content shared between all of them natively and via streaming once it becomes mainstream across the whole world once they overcome the tech limits and fiber/5G coverage issues they have today to cover the whole world and find a proper business model for streaming that is appealing for the platform owner, the devs and the players, I think there will be still a place for consoles: dedicated portable gaming devices or as device to play games in older tvs and displays that can't run these games.

Consoles market also has been growing every generation, and I think it will continue growing as Sony, MS and the console 3rd parties appeal more new players from PC and specially mobile in countries where until now consoles weren't their top market, like China, Russia or many emerging markets.

I also think MS, Sony, Activision Blizzard, EA, Embracer Group/THQ Nordic, Take 2, Ubisoft and Tencent and a few Chinese and South Korean giants more will continue acquiring companies and creating new studios to become even larger. I think Epic, Sega, Bandai Namco, Square Enix, Capcom, Bandai Namco or Konami will be acquired in the next couple of decades.
 
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NonPhixion

Member
Playstation is more a software and services company than a hardware company.
Thanks for that nugget of knowledge, John Madden. Yes, PlayStation is more software and services. Sony as a whole, is more hardware than the other two.
 
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MrFunSocks

Banned
Thanks for that nugget of knowledge, John Madden. Yes, PlayStation is more software and services. Sony as a whole, is more hardware than the other two.
And Playstation is what we're talking about. Sony making TV's and stereos etc is irrelevant to PlayStation, especially when PlayStation is their biggest division.
 
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