I think when these projects were started developers were expecting the PS3 to be where the Wii is at now (~10 million sold) and the 360 to be at several million more than it is now, basically a combined hardcore audience of 20-25 million. That kind of an audience would have made these games a much safer bet but the audience alone isn't the only factor, the fierce competition between the 360 and PS3 benefits third parties, especially the ones with big games like those being talked about in this thread.
Some companies are definitely going to suffer like Midway and Take Two but a lot of others are very large and can spread around the losses so as not to take a critical financial hit (Electronic Arts and Ubisoft). Also some of the financial hits that would have normally gone to third parties are likely going to be absorbed by Microsoft and Sony instead (Microsoft giving $50 million to Take-Two, Sony making deals with Epic and Ubisoft, etc).
I seriously doubt there will be a crash and there are almost always some companies going out of business near the start of each generation. Both Microsoft and Sony need these kinds of games to justify their consoles so it's very likely they'll help third parties carry the load until their consoles' installed bases are large enough to do it without much financial help.
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