Without Sony the console business would have died quickly. After gen 6 of would be very small and the budget necessary for gen 7 wouldn't even be made available. Short story gen 8 wouldn't exist if it wasn't for Sony and co, or perhaps Nintendo only, but I wouldn't call that improvement of any sort.
Nintendo wouldn't have saved the industry, with their ridiculous demands many publishers would step over to pc abandoning Nintendo is inevitable. They handle handhelds the right way, but Sony is the face of consolegaming especially bringing indie and smaller digital games to consoles was smart.
Sony gave the alternative for the mainly same old franchises of Nintendo. Even though it where quality titles after the Cube it got to repetitive. Where Sony offered Jack, Crash, God of War, Ratchet, Gran Turismo etc. It was new and fresh like the Wii in some sort of regard which did quite well.
With a continuation of New franchises 3 already this gen and many third party games Sony ensures a safe platform for consolegamers who want to have a console with a huge library.
Some negative effects to consolegaming thnx to Sony. DLC, Season Passes, Digital only, and partially Paid online.
Please excuse my (probally) poor grammar
