The Next XBox

[Infamy79]

amirnetz said:

Infamy79 said:
I think it's time to go back to cartridges, but include a DVD drive for backwards compatibility
Digital distribution for games will rule out the market in too many countries

Don't count countries. Count relevant markets. Over 90% of the 360 current sales are to markets in which there is no problem with digital distribution. By the time the next gen is released it will be over 95%.

 

Yet games are getting bigger and bigger with higher-res content. More RAM will mean using more detailed textures, these take up more and more space. By the time the next-gen starts a standard HD game could be around 25GB+, this is still a lot of data even in 3-4 years.

Currently there are around 14-15 million registered LIVE users out of 23 million console owners. This means that by switching to online only it would cut out 1/3 of their user base. If MS wants to make a "casual friendly" console then they CANNOT switch to a pure digital distribution model. With the recent price cuts, the Arcade 360 model is making up 50% of it's sales, the arcade is not able to use LIVE for online, so how could you possibly cut out that much of the market by moving to a model that predominantley only the hardcore supports?