So I was thinking a bit about the current market and how console sales have looked in the past. Ususally the leading console will get more games and this will start a snowballing spiral. Same with the losing systems.

PS4 and xbone have both been going after a very similar market, and the PS4 has so far beaten it soundly. It's clear that the system will win and 3rd parties have probably been aware of this for a long time. This should manifest itself in the amount of support for the systems in the years to come.When you have two systems serving the same type of gamer and one is the clear winner in the market, what reasons are left to own the losing system? Wii U clearly has a niche carved out for itself, so it's in a very different position. Even worse for microsoft, their flagship games for this gen like Halo and Titanfall didn't perform as well as they needed.

The thing that makes me wonder is how multiplatform development has evolved this and the prevoius gen. I'm not sure if third parties will shift their support in the same way that happened gen 6, but some reaction is to be expected eventually right?

Thoughts?

Is the xbone set to implode or is it not going anywhere?

Obviously. It will start happening next year, with Sony coming out with the latest entries in their biggest franchises like Uncharted 4, and Gran Turismo. Then they have some interesting looking new IPs from their first party studios like Horizon, The Last Guardian, Dreams. On top of that there's some other medium sized exclusives like Hotshot's Golf, Rachet and Clank, Gravity Rush 2, etc.

That's not counting all the 3rd party exclusives, Street Fighter V will make sure every fighting game fan gets a PS4, and JRPG fans don't have a choice either.

Also some truly exceptional looking "indies" like No Man's Sky, WiLD, The Tomorrow Children, Rime.

XB1 on the other hand I believe has reached it's peak this year. Their big exclusives like Halo and Forza have failed to turn the tide, only one left is Gears, and that being passed on to a new unproven developer is likely to make it drop in popularity like Halo.

PS4 literally has every gamer's taste covered as far as I can see, there's no reason to not get one.

That will depend of Microsoft's interests. Most multiplats will come to the XBone, specially if they catter to a western audience, but the moment the PS4's userbase surpasses the XBone's three to one, Microsoft will need to push the system a lot heavier than now. Maybe they won't find it worth it, or maybe they will. As long as it's profitable, doesn't loose money and keeps a healthy brand name, they will push the console.

Who'd take their X1 to the edge of a cliff?

I agree.

I don't think MS has it figured out how to get X1 to complete as the weakest lead platform on the market once NX hits the scene. Reception to big exclusives thus far has been rather soft too.

Well, we never can know for ceartain, but i dont think so.Xbone is selling really well, and third parties are getting really good sales for their games on it.It may not be in the ps4 sales level, but third parties wont ignore a potential profit source.So no, it wont fall off a cliff just because it is losing to the ps4.The industry dosnt work that way.Plus the Xbone is selling better than the 360 relatively to its second year so yeah, its not going anywhere.

Whilst the PS4 is doing best at the moment I doubt that the Xbone is going anywhere!

Yep, I think starting next year publishers will pass on lots of sales on Xbone because reasons.

This. People forget that the xbox one is Microsoft's most successful console. If they didn't include Kinect at the begining and was 400 dollars xbox would've done even way better. Microsoft is exapanding and they are building an army (obtaining Gears and Minecraft ip). Next year they have Halo wars, Gears 4, Forza Horizion 3, Crackdown 3, scalebound and more. The biggest thing Microsoft can do right now is buy some more major ips. Titan Fall should be on their list because it sold over 5 million on Xbox One and it was released as a launch title.

Edit : Also, why would all the major publishers skip out on xbox one? Xbox One, PC and PS4 are basically the same regarding architecture and uses the same engine so porting doesn't take too much time and their is a lot of reward in supporting a console.

no its userbase is large enough, and multiplats sell well on it, that it will still make sense for the big 3rd party games to put their games on it.

In the past the reason console fell off a cliff is because the big 3rd party games were not selling well or not coming to the console to begin with(N64, Gamecube, WiiU, Xbox to a smaller extent).

The games that wont come to are the ones that have never sold as well on Xbox. And wont make a major impact on the audience that buys XB1s.

Well it decline. Yes. Xbox fired its silver bullet (Halo) and it did not cause a major uptick in sales. Fall off a cliff? Absolutely not.