When should we wait for the ninth generation of gaming consoles?

Any self-respecting gamer knows that all game consoles are divided into generations without exception. At the moment, for example, the game consoles of the eighth generation, which began in 2012, include Nintendo Wii U, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One (as well as their upgraded configurations - PS4 Pro and Xbox One X). Many people ask themselves: when do we wait for the console of the ninth generation? Let's listen to what the leading analysts of the gaming industry, the heads of major gaming publishers think about this, and just reflect on this topic.

The Nintendo Wii U console was born at the end of 2012 and was very unusual from a technical point of view. A hefty gamepad with a built-in screen made the gameplay very fresh in sensations. I remember how I spent wonderful evenings with my family and friends in the virtual worlds of Nintendo. However, this enthusiasm was not shared by all gamers. It turned out that the Japanese publisher had saved a lot on hardware, which made the PlayStation 4 much better than the Wii U in terms of graphics quality and special effects. Yes, and the game line of Nintendo was rather meager, although it included several excellent games. But the most evil joke with this console was played by the fact that an unsuccessful advertising campaign confused the customers who believed that the Wii U was just an extra accessory for the previous Wii console. As a result, in a few years of existence, the prefix sold a ridiculous circulation of 15 million boxes, after which it was withdrawn from production.

Sony after not the most successful for itself the seventh generation, which began for her in failure, as a result of which the company suffered huge losses, the right to make a mistake simply did not have. A competent advertising campaign, a good starting line of video games, carefully designed PS4 hardware, which at the time responded to all market requirements, and a low price of $ 399 did their job. After coming on sale in November 2013, the consoles began to snap like hot cakes. The Japanese also played into the hands of the fact that Microsoft "lost its way" and tried to turn its next console into a media center with a built-in TV tuner.

Microsoft has not only lost with the TV functions of its console, it also planned to prohibit the resale of video games, trying to defeat the "secondary market" that they disliked, and to force all of its users to be connected to the Internet around the clock to avoid the possibility of piracy in case of hacking Xbox One hackers. The cost of the console was $ 100 higher than the PS4, as in the kit there was a sensor Kinect 2.0 (now dead and all forgotten, like many other Microsoft projects). In addition, Sony has strongly outstripped the Redmond company in terms of developing its new console and games for it, so the audience had to present the Xbox One in a hurry: the starting line of games was simply not yet ready.

Since then, a lot of water has flowed under the bridge. The market has put everything in its place. Nintendo Wii U, with all its pluses was not necessary to anyone, Xbox One took the second place in the race, and Sony became the undoubted leader of the industry again. The eighth generation became extremely unusual, because it was during his birth that the first intermediate models of game consoles appeared. I mean PlayStation 4 Pro and Xbox One X. Manufacturers decided to design more powerful models of consoles, capable of giving a resolution of 4K in the color range of HDR, as well as more impressive special effects in already released games of the current generation. Earlier similar attempts to smooth out the shortcomings of the aging iron in the gaming industry was not. Is that the company Sega recalls, which released for its prefix Sega Mega Drive first disk drive Sega CD, and then the expansion of the Sega 32X.

But everyone understands that sooner or later it must happen: full-fledged game consoles of the new ninth generation will appear. In principle, the first swallow can be called the Nintendo Switch, but Nintendo itself positions its offspring as something that stands outside generations (many consider Switch to the current eighth generation). We have already told you in detail about this remarkable hybrid set-top box in its detailed review . Now things at this console are just wonderful and the manufacturer is barely able to cope with the constantly growing demand. But we all understand that most gamers are waiting for the next move from Microsoft and Sony. Historically, it is exactly between these two giants that the main confrontation takes place within the console game industry.

Well-known analyst Matt Piskatella of NPD, who has been studying the trends of the game industry and the state of this market for many years, believes that Sony will not release its PlayStation 5 before 2020. But Matt also does not exclude that the Japanese can quite make the move of the horse, as happened in 2013, when quite unexpectedly for all they presented the PS4, ahead of their American competitors and caught them off guard. In fact, the sales of the current PlayStation model are just great, and to date, over 80 million PS4 have been sold worldwide. Microsoft's console is sold about twice as bad, and the company has long ceased to publish data on sales. Apparently, shy.

Another analyst Lewis Ward of IDC is betting on the year 2021. It was then, in his opinion, Microsoft and Sony will introduce their new gaming consoles to the world. There are more bold assumptions. For example, some experts suggest that at the end of this year or early 2019 Sony can show us what their new console will be. Moreover, work on it has been going on for several years, and it started almost after the release of PS4 in 2013. This was confirmed officially by representatives of the Japanese company. If so, then it's silly to think that Microsoft engineers are idle. Having lost the dry in the current generation, Redmond will do everything that depends on them, to recoup the next.

Already, Microsoft is trying to create a reserve for the future for its new console. But if Sony does it through the opening of new studios, the creation of new IP and the development of existing franchises, and also focusing on the development of exclusive games like Death Stranding, Horizon Zero Dawn , Detroit: Become Human, God of War, Spider Man, Last of Us : Part II, Days Gone, Bloodborne and others, Microsoft chose the typical way for American business. Redmond company has begun to buy up ready-made franchises and to redeem the exclusivity of projects of third-party studios. This has already happened with Minecraft and PUBG, it is possible that in the near future we will hear more than once that Microsoft acquired with the guts of some major developer gaining success. However, how effective will this method be to win the love of the gaming community - only time will show.

Representatives of major game publishers uniquely know something that we do not know, mere mortals. For example, Ubisoft president Yves Guillaume said in his February interview that new consoles from Sony and Microsoft should not be expected in less than two years. This, again, confirms the analysts' assumptions regarding the release of consoles in 2020-2021. Whether this or this will evolve completely unpredictably is hard to say for the time being. We suggest you discuss and discuss this topic in the comments to this material.