mchaza said:
Squilliam said:
If the online networks cannot work together then at some point one console will probably take a considerable (>50%) lead and then have a near permament control over the the market and monopolise it. If they cannot work together on networking then there can be only one. Where you have interoperatability you have a competitive market and where you don't you get a monopoly.
The market will move towards one standard whether people want it or not. If we don't get multiple hardware / single network standard then we will get one hardware standard / one network.
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this generation proved that doesn't happen, how come Sony don't have monopolised the market with the PS3 despite PS2 having around 80% of all consoles.
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Online wasn't that important back then. Online is a way to lock people in to a particular brand of consoles. The reasons why the PS2 had >50% of the market were largely social. People tend to buy the console that their peers have, when they want to play online with them they HAVE to buy the console their peers have. The console market has always tended towards monopoly, the generation furthest from a monopoly has been this one but the unique situation which caused this is unlikely to be repeated.
