Do we really need a Next Gen?

[zarx]

outlawauron said:

zarx said:

outlawauron said:
Hmm, I'm conflicted. I wouldn't mind the PS3 and 360 getting slight upgrades (more RAM, better graphics card, processor, etc.), but I don't an entire overhaul is needed.

but if you do that you might as well release a nextgen console as everyone would need to buy a new console to get the improvements so all the existing owners would be annoyed and the developers wouldn't bother with it because only a small fraction of the userbase would have it. any change of the base components (RAM, CPU, GPU etc) would mean new games would have to be developed for it so you just get stuck with the old problems a pissed off userbase and make no difference to the majority of games.

A new order of parts would be a lot cheaper than developing an entirely new console from scratch. It'd take a whole lot less time as well.

Thinking from the standpoint that Nintendo's really the only one that can take the large hits from the R&D of a brand new console (if done right).

but it's not that simple, the closest thing to that I know about would be the DSi and that did require a redesign and the number of non DSi ware games that can use the improved hardware can be counted on one hand, additional changing the hardware can break some games if they aren't careful with the design. It's not like the just order a different parts and chuck them into the old hardware, even die shrinks that you see on the ps360 requires a lot of testing and firmware updates. And all three console manufacturers are designing their next gen consoles and have been since this gen launched maybe even before.