I'm going to divide this up roughly by era...with the 3-10 most companies in each era. I'd like some imput on this era though. 1972-1979 - "The Bronze Age" Atari, Mattel, Magnavox, Baily, Tatio, Midway Notes on this era: Arcade games are huge, Atari is at it's peak, games are generally on 'one screen', 3rd parties are few, little to no story in all graphical games - predominately gameplay. 1980-1984 - "Nintendo vs. Atari" Atari, Namco, Taito, Nintendo, Sega, Midway Notes on this era: Characters, stories and more complex game-levels begin to appear. Pacman, Mario, Donkey Kong are invented. This is the last of Atari's glory, and the early days of Nintendo's ascension. In the USA, the videogame industry crashes in 1984. 1984 seems to be the end of America's infatuation with videogames, as Atari all but collapses, as symbolized by the massive burying of the ET cartridges. In Japan, the Famicom (NES) is becoming an enormous hit. 1985-1988 - "Nintendo the Monopoly" Nintendo, Midway, Acclaim, Maxis, Sega, Namco, Square, Enix, Konami, Capcom Notes on this era: In 1988, Nintendo accounted for 1/4 of the trade defecit between the USA and Japan. Nintendo accounts for 90%+ of the videogame market in the Americas and Japan. The Sega Master system, the only real competition in this era, sells only a few million units. NES sells over 60 million in the 80's to early 90's. If you were to adjust population growth and the fact that videogames have roughly the same penetration/ population as they did back then, then in today's era, the NES would have sold around 90 million units. However, Atari prevents Nintendo (through legal means) from emerging as a dominant force in Europe. In this era, games become much more diverse. They grow in length, story, and mass appeal. Adjusted for today's dollars, Nintendo profits near 10 billion a year in this era. With the massive userbase, mainstay Japanese and American developers see massive growth. However, Nintendo also forces quality games, and limits the number of games 3rd parties can make per year for the NES (5). Nonetheless, NES has 100's upon 100's of games, and dozens of classics. 1989-1994 - "Dominance breeds Hubris" Nintendo, Sega, Capcom, Konami, Square, Enix, EA, Treasure, Rare, Midway With research, and perfect timing, Sega establishes a strong foothold in the West with the Sega Genesis, and Sonic the Hedgehog. However, with Japan locked up Nintendo wins the hardware race. Nonetheless, the competition leads to three significant changes - a hardware arms race, a split of third party support, and greater emphasis on western style gaming. Change two eventually leads to Nintendo humiliating Sony in an alliance that fell through, while Sega bleeds money on ventures like the Sega CD. The war also expands, with the introduction of Game Boy and Game Gear. Game Gear sets the precedent for the most powerful hardware not winning the generation. Game Boy goes on to sell into the 100+ million unit territory by the end of the 1990's. This is the era that sees the decline of arcade gaming in the West, and the slow emergence of 3D gaming (Donkey Kong Country, Star Fox..) 1995-2000 "The Great Leap Forward: 3D and the Emergence of Sony" Sony, Nintendo, Sega, EA, Square, Enix, Capcom, Konami, Acclaim, Midway After working closely with Nintendo on the Super Nintendo Play station, Sony launches the stand alone Playstation. With the SNES dying, Genesis dead, Saturn a mess, and the Virtual Boy a flop, Sony capitalizes on the mistakes of others to build a market for itself in all three territories. Although the Saturn and SNES put up a pretty good fight in 94'-96' in Japan, it is clear that only the Nintendo 64 will have any shot at stopping Sony's PS1. However, with the year headstart, and a massive software drought caused by the inefficiences of making cartridge games, Nintendo's early momentum in 1996 fades. With the SNES dead in 1997, many view 1995/1996 as the transition in power from Sony to Nintendo. Additionally, because of cheaper costs and a larger userbase, 3rd parties largely abandon Nintendo systems for Sony from mid 1997 through 2000. With innovative 3D gameplay, and the culmination of 2D gameplay, the early part of this era is what I see as the golden era of gaming. Consider that in 1995 to 1997 the following were released: Super Mario 64, FFVII, Yoshi's Island, Super Mario RPG, Tekken, Nights, Mario kart 64, Donkey Kong Country 3, Star Fox 64, Parrapa the Rapper, DDR, Pokemon, Goldeneye 007, Resident Evil, Pilotwings 64, Blast Corps...and many other great games. In late 1999, it looked like Sega might become a significant player again, but the momentum sizzled by early 2000 everywhere. Nintendo 64, PS1 and PS2 outsold Dreamcast in 2000 on a worldwide basis. Sega upped the ante however, innovating with feature such as the 56k modem included in each Dreamcast made. However, in 2000, the Sony PS2 hype machine all killed Dreamcast, prematurely. By the end of the generation it was clear to the industry that even though Sony was on top, it would be nearly impossible to force Nintendo out of the hardware market until it started to lose money. With a Nintendo 64 35% market share worldwide, the invention of Pokemon (seemingly out of thin air) Nintendo was still formidable, if not the dominant presence Sony was. Additionally, the Game Boy Color and GBA stood as a massive block preventing total Sony domination. 2001-2005 "Could Microsoft and Sony replace Nintendo and Sega of the early 90's..." Nintendo, Sony, Microsoft, EA, Square, Konami, Capcom, Sega, Ubi Soft, Take Two The answer of course was no. However, Sega was forced to give up making hardware. This point was made clear by a NY Times article on Dec 25, 2000 which stated that Microsoft offered to buy "the nearly bankrupt Sega" for "5 billion dollars". Much as Sony had worked closely with Nintendo in 1993 and 1994, Microsoft worked closely with Sega in developing the Dreamcast, going so far as to have the potential for Windows on Dreamcast to offset the "PS2 multimedia device". With Sega unable to block Sony, Microsoft entered the market in 2001. Nintendo, meanwhile, prepared for it's first disc-based system - Gamecube, launching alongside the Xbox in 2001. While Sony proved to be too strong in all three markets, Nintendo and Microsoft fought for 2nd place all over the world. Xbox won the 2nd place in the West, GC won 2nd place in the East. Worldwide, this culminated in sales of 100 million + for PS2, and between 20-25 million for Xbox, GC, with Xbox ahead worldwide. With stronger competition, little to no online support, and paltry 3rd party support, it looked like Nintendo might be forced out of the industry - especially after the announcement of the PSP. After years of research, Sony believed it could steal away the one area that assured Nintendo's profitability no matter what. Microsoft also bought Rare, forcing Nintendo to release games more quickly than it had in the Nintendo 64 days, causing some to question whether the quality in games was dropping from a lack of polish. Nonetheless, by the end of the generation Sony was begginning to show signs of arrogance. For one, the DS was underestimated. Additionally, Sony supporters and mainstays such as Square, Konami, and the GTA series began to start making alot of content for other systems. In 2005, Microsoft launched the Xbox 360 worldwide, with alot of fanfare, but not enough units. This effectively killed the Xbox, and with the GC dying as well PS2 sales remained ridiculous through 2005. However, by late December 2005, with 360 out before PS3, and the DS selling better than the PSP, the next generation began to look a hell of alot more interesting. 2006-2011 "How Sony's previous business model began to fail the industry..." Nintendo, Microsoft, Sony, EA, Capcom, Sega, Square-Enix, Konami, Ubi Soft, Take Two For the past 10 years, Sony had developed it's success on the strength of it's 3rd party ecosystems. No other company from 1995-2005 offered what Sony did - a place where 3rd parties could thrive on a) hardware without major 1st party competition b) hardware that was cheap, but powerful c) hardware with the largest userbases and lowest royalties. However, in time Microsoft and Nintendo learned how to eat away at those advantages, even as Sony negated others all by itself. With Microsoft launching 360 first - by a year - it was guarenteed to take away advantage C. Since the PS3 launch, Microsoft's lead has generally stayed at about 6-8 million over PS3. As for advantage B, it seems as if Nintendo and Microsoft nearly worked together to take it from Sony. Wii is cheap to developer for and more powerful than anything last gen, while 360 is cheaper to develop for than PS3, but much closer in power. As for advantage A, Sony has become a talented, worldclass developer in recent years. Microsoft is getting there now, and Nintendo has been for 20+ years. No 3rd party has this advantage anymore. Although Nintendo is the only one with enormous 1st party sales everywhere, Sony has developed specific franchises for each market (although none have the draw of say...Mario...in all three). The next issue is differentiation. With game development costs rising, it makes little sense to keep a game exclusive to 360 or PS3. However, because 360 has a better online interface, and a larger userbase, it will likely keep more exclusives in the West. In Nintendo's case, the motion sensing potential means that games released for all three systems either end up much better, or much worse on Wii, establishing it seperately from the other boxes...for better or for worse. Athough PS3 is more powerful than 360, the difference is negligable that the developers can make graphically epic games for either system. At the same time, innovation in alot of major genres such as sports, party, dancing (and other) games will be made to take advantage of Wii's potential. Because Wii is cheaper to buy, and since it will have epic traditional (Zelda, Metroid, Nights, Kid Icarus, Brawl, Mario) as well as new types of games (Wii Music, Brain Training, Wii Health) it will be seen as a great buy by many gamers - even if it ends up as the second system of choice with only 5-6 games bought for the console. PS3 attempts to have elements of both motion capacity and superior online capacity, but neither is developed well as of yet. Additionally, with a relatively slow adoption rate, developers are given less incentive to develop these abilities. Lastly, for smaller developers who need a big return on their investments, none of the consoles are viable right now. Matching Wii motion to hand movement is costly in terms of time, while developing for 360 online is expensive and time consuming, and PS3 offers little chance of profitability because the game needs to sell a ton to make up for the cost of the graphical capability, even though PS3 has yet to reach the 3 million milestone (in other words it is just about impossible for a PS3 game to sell over 1.4 million units right now - since that is 50% of the base!). The platform for these developers then, is the Nintendo DS. It is the cheapest, has proven that innovation will sell, and is in the hands of nearly 40 million people. Until another console provides the safety (in terms of investment and userbase) of the DS (say 30 million + units sold), it will see enormous support from smaller 3rd parties until 2008 or 2009, as will the PS2 through the end of 2007... Because of the costs to 3rd parties, and the similarity in content from 3rd parties on 360 and PS3, Nintendo's 1st party strength seems to be huge again, instead of a liability for driving away 3rd parties. If most 3rd parties make games for the other two systems, then Nintendo's software would be the most appreciated. Although Sony has become a solid 1st party developer, it is still not the main reason people buy Sony hardware. If Sony can't push it's hardware that way, then it seems logical Microsoft benefits most from 3rd party support, while 3rd parties will gravitate to Wii as the differentiation factor puts Wii in tens of millions of homes.

Beautiful. It will be an inteeresting race. It's also interesting how the face of gaming has shifted over the years. But, it looks like one system always dominates. Maybe the Wii and 360 will control larger, but equal portions. 2 things. In the "Bronze Age" you should note that they comapnies of the time tried to invest in home consoles, but failed. The other, is to mention while Sony had good 1st party titles, the 3rd party was really what shined on thes system.

Great read i wish there were more posts like this, thought provoking, unbiased, yet also someones own opinion. Well done

I agree, a very good read. And I even agree with your opinion. The Wii will get most third party support, especially for games with new ideas, which tend to be more risky for the investors, so low developmant costs are premium. The PS-2 got these games in the last gen. While the PS-3 will have difficulties. The main reason? They made a high end console but what they had in mind was the mass market. But that's not the way a gaming console works. For a gaming console price is premium. Software developers don't care how loud the platform is or how limited the graphics. They simply need a platform that sells games and where you can demonstrate your ideas, what your game makes better. And Wii has the advantage that it does not need an HDTV (IMHO without HDTV the Xbox 360 and PS-3 are pointless). The Xbox 360 was simply designed for high end graphics at a low price. WHile it would be stupid to try to start a price war with the PS-2 or Wii, the PS-3 is a different question. Sony has no chance to become cheaper than the Xbox 360. In fact even the Elite has its reasons. The Elite earns money with every console sold, even if you lower the price. While Sony still tries to get a bigger user base Microsoft already left this stage. They want to make money to earn back their R&D. The core and premium take care of the mass market to prevent the PS-3 from gaining ground, while the Elite is there to earn money. While the PS-3 does not need to be afraid about the number of Elite sold, every Elite sold earns money. And I think they have an even bigger goal for it, when they have IPTV support ready.

great post !

I'm assuming the developer lists for each era are ordered by level of importance? Can you give a little explanation for each list? I think Ubi-Soft should be a bit higher in the "Sony Fails the industry" era, and probably Capcom a bit lower. The older ones I'd have to think about more... either way, I'd love to see some reasonings as to why you chose those particular companies.

Good Post!

Need to add THQ, Activision, and Namco Bandai to the current list, with some argument for Vivendi, LucasArts, and SCi, and I'm real iffy on both Sega and Capcom going forward, particularly as compared to the first three I mentioned. Disney may also be one to watch. I personally would like to see Koei find someone to leverage its brands in North America the way Sony did for Square (their short-lived deal with EA needs a revival, or they could tempt Microsoft or Sony using Japanese exclusives as a bargaining chip), but I don't see it happening, making them just a very large niche player.

Speaking of LucasArts, lightsabre Wii will be a monster hit guaranteed. That title alone will sell many Wiis. If they do it right, it could be one of the best selling of all time. It's one of the holy grails of video gaming.