 |
|
Predictions for 06by Kirk, 2006-01-03 |
||
|
Every new year I like to compile a list of predictions and guesses on what's going to happen in the future. And, of course, most of it involves gaming companies. So, time to make my predictions on what's going to happen in good old 2006.
-------------------------------------------------------- 1. NINTENDO WILL RELEASE THE REVOLUTION EARLY -------------------------------------------------------- Nintendo is one of the top, if not the number one, company in the world for video games. Ever since the Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo has been the people to turn to for quality games. However, as gamers and game licenses age, Nintendo looks to be a "Young" company to many older gamers. Gamers that once played Zelda on their SNESes now look at unchanging Nintendo and find it one of two things- enthralling or mediocre.  So, Nintendo has their Revolution coming soon. When? Well, there's a lot of debate about that. But my guess is that they will release it between the releases of the XBOX 360 (Already happened) and the PS3 (Far into the future?). This is obviously because if they can pick up a point in which no big gaming innovations are happening, they can boost sales. However, I have a second prediction. Unless the Revolution is sold around Christmas 06, it will not make a big dent into the market until the next year. This is simply because Nintendo will be marketing to the generic family, which will take a while to get "Used to" the system. As well, older "Hardcore" gamers won't purchase it unless it has some form of an awesome killer app, which I doubt. Like the Nintendo DS, it will probably slip in almost unnoticed and take the place by storm in 2007. -------------------------------------------------------- 2. HALF LIFE 2: AFTERMATH WILL SUCK -------------------------------------------------------- Half Life 2 was awesome. Counter Strike Source was even more awesome. Day of Defeat: Source was orgasmic. But, as we've seen, not all Valve touches is gold. While they like experimenting with good technology and creating good sequels, Half Life: Aftermath will probably become the equivalent of Gearbox's mediocre spinoff Half Life: Blue Shift- just a stupid sequel with no real impact on the gaming world. Sure, Blue Shift was good, and Aftermath will probably be better. But let's sit down and face it for a second: Half Life 2's story wasn't THAT that great. Yes, it was Orwellian, and yes, it was interesting, but once you hit the end of the game, you become rather tired of the concept- kinda like some popular RPGs. And, of course, those of us with Half Life 2 on Steam will still play it, regardless. -------------------------------------------------------- 3. THE XBOX 360 WILL BE RECALLED, BUT NOT IN THE NORMAL WAY -------------------------------------------------------- The 360 has been shown to have some serious issues, a few of which we've mentioned here on Gametrash. The power brick overheating, the disc ripping to shreds on the DVD tray if you tilt the box, and general "Blue Screen of Death" errors prevail the newly launched system. And all of this is costing Microsoft around $552.27, much more than the $350 launch price. As a result, obviously this is putting Microsoft in a bad spot. Not only are they losing money on the system, but the system is faulty.  Whoops. So, my prediction is that they will recall it, but not recall it. Doing a full recall to the system would cost them millions of dollars and put the XBOX 360 out of competition with the future Revolution and PS3. So, my prediction is that they try their d***edest to fix it without anyone noticing. Maybe this means secret fixes to newly produced systems. Maybe this means a power cord recall like with the original XBOX. Whatever it is, they will have to do something, or otherwise, the cons will outweigh the pros. -------------------------------------------------------- 4. SQUARE ENIX WILL NOT MAKE ONE HIT GAME THE WHOLE YEAR -------------------------------------------------------- I stand by the above statement. Not one game. Now, let me explain. Square Enix has what I call name power. Just by tagging a game with the "Square Enix" logo, you almost guarantee some sales (If you tag it with "Final Fantasy", it will DEFINATELY be a hit). But I guarantee you none of their games will actually be great games. Just like Final Fantasy 11 and Unlimited Saga, they will appear, geeks will buy them, and they will gather dust (Just like my "Your better life now" calendar!). Why is this? I've been convinced that Square is dying. Square seemed to do best when they were limited, believe it or not. The PS1 limited them graphically, so they focused a lot on gameplay and less on graphics. That's why their games on the PS1, especially low-end games like Xenogears, were so great, yet looked horrible.  So, now they have fancy PS2s and whatnot and have to focus on graphics to sell, and they're worsening themselves because of it. And thus, I'm predicting failure. Sad, but that's what happens. -------------------------------------------------------- 5. THE iPOD WILL BECOME A BIG EMULATION DEVICE -------------------------------------------------------- Yes, I said it. The iPod has, for a long time, been the bane of clever hackers who figure out ways in which to make it do what they want. Be it as simple and useful as a file browser to something as complex as black and white video, they've done it. And, of course, they've done it well. So with the advent of the iPod Photo and the iPod with Video, we now know exactly what's going to happen next: iPod Emulation. Hell, iPod Gameboy emulation has been done, so it's not far of a stretch to imagine NES/SNES emulation on the system. While the video screen may be smaller pixel-wise than the standard TV, maybe resizing it might work. In any case, I guarantee you it will be at least attempted by someone. -------------------------------------------------------- 6. WIKIPEDIA WILL BECOME THE NEXT GOOGLE -------------------------------------------------------- Anyone in the Internet business knows the rule of kingship seems to trade hands every so many years. It basically went like this: (Start of the Internet) to 1998: Microsoft was King 1998 - 2000: Yahoo was King 2001-2005(6?): Google is King 2006 +: Wikipedia is king? Yahoo was the building of the internet community as a whole. Google took that community and found ways to give them what they want. Now Wikipedia can show up and show everything anyone ever wanted to know. From battleships to ballparks, from how to row and oar to conspiracy theories, you will learn anything you want to learn. The only downside to Wikipedia is like any wiki- anyone can edit it, so anyone can spam it. However, with a really bolstered logging system and one hell of a mod community, this probably isn't as big of a deal as people make it out to be. So, my prediction stands- Wikipedia for 06. -------------------------------------------------------- 7. DOA:XBV2 for the 360 will make me buy a XBOX 360 -------------------------------------------------------- Okay. All I need to base myself off this: 1. Go to Google on another page (DON'T LEAVE GAMETRASH!) 2. Google "Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball". 3. See a picture like this:  4. Buy an XBOX, the game, and lotion. 5. Congrats! You're a consumer whore! -------------------------------------------------------- 8. Capcom will release more Phoenix Wright games -------------------------------------------------------- Why do I think Capcom is not making any more Phoenix Wright games? Because it looks to me like they plan to do more with the franchise. See, the games were never technically about Phoenix Wright, and Capcom probably figured that out after printing all those carts. Or something. So, lets see- you have a whole lawyer game and the issue of only one lawyer focused in on: How about a re-release? Yeah, that's my prediction- a Phoenix Wright 2, only called something different, from the good old friends at Capcom. Maybe it'll contain some of those weirder characters from the Japanese games. But whatever it may be, I'd love it. I don't know if this is really a prediction or just a request, but hell, let's hope it happens. -------------------------------------------------------- 9. Gametrash will continue to kick ass. -------------------------------------------------------- Seriously. Okay, that's all I can think of. After all, if I guessed too much, I'd end up being totally wrong, so I'm only going with the stuff that I'm really sure of. Next year this time (if I remember), I'll try to go back over these and see if I'm right. And I will be. |
|
|