That's an awfully odd point to bring up, if you don't mind me saying. I was under the impression (but I wasn't even born when it happened, so I may be wrong), that Atari's downfall was due to the videogame market crash thing that happened from over-saturation of products along with a plethora of rushed and poor games which ultimately cost them dearly until Nintendo turned things around with the NES. Wasn't that to do with consumers losing confidence with quality in the industry which Nintendo rectified with the whole 'seal of quality' thing?
I'm wondering, what are the parallels with that situation that can be drawn with the situation Sony is facing at the moment? Arguably, games these days go through more quality control than ever (Black Ops Declassified aside!) and while you could argue over-saturation with PC's making a resurgence and phones & tablets strong-arming their way in, there's still only 3 home console makers and the market is still here for the time being.
To answer the questions you asked, I don't really know the answer to those. What Sony have up their sleeves to return to profitability may simply be a core console which is an improvement but can be sold at a minor loss if released at the right time (people keep eyeing early 2014). As much as I love them, I don't have them down as the type of company to pull a Wii and really shake things up in the industry. But maybe it doesn't need that. Perhaps a consistent, reliable system where you know what you're getting is enough. Options can be added later if need be. I personally get the feeling that some decent goodwill has been built up towards Sony recently (outside of this forum, of course) with PS+ being a good deal for consumers; online services being free & vastly improved; a slew of exclusive games making it worthwhile to buy the console, etc. Taking this momentum into the next gen can be no bad thing.
As for what would happen if Sony did pull out, idk. People keep saying someone else would step in, but I honestly cannot see that happening. With even Nintendo having to release the Wii-U at a minor loss these days, it seems like an odd move for some other company to make to step into a business where it almost seems a necessity to loss-lead in order to shift hardware. Plus, it took Microsoft pretty much a full generation to get a proper footing in home consoles so there's no guarantee that another contender would hit it off straight away either.
I think asking if the "videogame industry" is strong enough to hold on or whether it would accelerate moving to tablets & phones is a bit of a contradiction, though. Whether we personally like it or not, a big shift in gaming is towards tablets and I believe they have become part of the industry. Not a integral part, but where there is gaming they are part of the games industry. The devs who used to work for big AAA studios are now making iPhone games. They're the same people who were delivering "the industry"'s core content, so surely it's the same content that they're delivering now (albeit on a smaller scale).
Anyway, apologies if this is a bit of a ramble or doesn't make sense, kinda tired.
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