@Makingmusic476

So The Last Story isn't a major Japanese announcement for the Wii?

You are totally disregarding what MS and Ninty might do then... as though it would be irrelevant.

The brand is nowhere near what it was, particularly in the US.

Sony have there work cut out to dominate again in the biggest single market on the planet (US) where they are now a very distant 3rd place.  If you dont win the US you dont win the gen.

Realistically, I don’t think they can be unless Nintendo becomes arrogant and screws up. If you look at the modern videogame industry (NES and newer) there have been 5 console generations and 3 handheld generations and the market leading console manufacturer has only switched place twice. In both cases that the market leading console manufacturer was replaced several very large mistakes were made by the previous console manufacturer that opened up the opportunity for them to be replaced; in the case of the N64 it was Nintendo alienating third party publishers and giving the Sega Saturn and Sony Playstation an 18 month head start to establish themselves in the market, and in the case of the PS3 it was Sony alienating the broader gamer market and releasing the PS3 at the ridiculous price of $600. 

If Nintendo releases a console in the $200 to $300 range (possibly up to $400), 5 or 6 years after the Wii launched, with decent third party support it would be very difficult for Sony to pass them; if Sony responds to a system like that by releasing a console 12 to 18 months after Nintendo and/or releasing their new console at a price over $400 I would expect the PS4 to have lower sales than the PS3.

My turn.

Let's start with the console, Sony learned a lot from the PS3, with the PS1 and PS2 they've basically done the exact same and had great success (sure they shouldn't of changed there strategy but this is Sony, they seem to try something new and different a lot), but with the PS3 they changed it up, tried something different to see what the consumers thought, at first it didn't go well, the brand loyalty they hoped for didn't come through but they had no choice, they had to get the PS3 out.

But with every sacrifice comes a blessing, the Cell and Blu-ray, it'll save Sony tons of money on the PS4. Since the cell is already so powerful they really don't have to do much for next gen, add more memory maybe double or triple the power and there set for another powerful machine, not to mention by next gen all developers will be very familiar with the Cell and it'll be very easy to work with (remember the PS2 was actually more difficult to work on then the PS3 was). So there's a big saving there and will insure lots of good games for next gen. 

Now the Blu-Ray player, all they really need to do is allow it to play the big Blu-Ray disk (128GB), surely we'll not see games over 128GB next gen (although anything's possible). 

So the two things that made the PS3 so costly will now make the PS4 very cheap, this is future proofing your systems. Throw in a big hard drive, revamp the PSN, big debut games, throw in some other feature (something 3D or like those glasses that displays a screen that Sony patent, whatever), at $299 or $349 at the most and you got a number 1 gaming system.

Now handheld, I believe the rise of the PSP2 will be from the downfall of the 3DS. It's looking to be an expensive handheld and that could be a huge advantage for Sony, if they play there cards right they can have the handheld crown. Give it a cheap price, $200 max, dual analogue, fix the piracy, update graphics, and even making it a phone would help big time as well, they wold definitely take the Japanese market, people in Japan use there cell phones more then they use there computers, it's all handheld there.

The next gen is starting soon (handhelds) and things should start to get exciting, were soon going to see what these behemoth companies been hiding up there sleeves for so long.

Because Sony has done less to piss people off than any of the other two, this gen.  No RRoD and no under-powered graphics.  Sony is the "safe" choice.