Kat – Yeah, I have wondered about games on every format. But I think, in a way, this is good for those who don’t have every format going; for those who do, that’s where exclusive DLC etc comes in. It is also good for those who make the games, as they are increasingly expensive to produce. This may appear to contradict my point about identikit consoles but I think many gamers (not all) have bought into a particular company’s machine because of that whole silly “lifestyle” angle attributed to a specific console. If they’re all the same in terms of features…

And you’re welcome! :D

Occasionally we’ll see true innovation in our space, but a lot of the time we’ll see derivative work. Not a bad thing, just not unique.

But they WILL keep trying and every now and again we’ll be forced to sit back and just say WOW!

But convergence on a single system is unlikely, or at least it’s unlikely to last for long, because at some point someone will say “if we do our own system with X cool new feature I’ve just thought of, we won’t need to share the profits from it with anyone else” and the cycle begins again. Plus there are laws against cartels these days.

You hit the nail on the head precisely with this. I suppose you could argue that this sort of thing has always happened in every market, what with everyone vying for attention and integrating one another’s selling points at every turn, but that doesn’t give us any excuse to not be worried about the situation nevertheless. In my comment on Scott’s post I was referencing a conversation we’d been having just previously about how every game seems to be ported (quite poorly, in the majority of instances) to every conceivable system on the market… to me it doesn’t seem like such a stretch that somebody in an office somewhere could decide “Hey, we should all just do this one thing and make a bunch of money, what do you say?”

As gamers we like to think there’s some kind of community here. We like to think that whoever we’re vying for in the “big three” is on our side, looking out for us. But when you break it down to basics… well, they are companies in the end. Honestly I don’t think I could be surprised by anything they chose to do, at this point.

By the way, thanks for the shout out, there. :D I feel like an internet celebrity.

This allows you to distinguish between a score whore with ten thousand points who has five hundred games and someone who has really mastered a certain number of individual games, which is cool.

Still as pointless overall as achievements, though, as no doubt some games Platinum trophy will be easy to get and some will be harder than diamond-tipped ninjas.

I still want one though :)