Imagine if record labels for music made exclusive songs that only worked on iPods. You could emulate the song on other MP3 players, but you'd have to tweak it a lot for it to play smoothly and some just won't work well at all for it to be an enjoyable experience.

Imagine if Paramount Pictures made films that only work on Samsung Blu-Ray players and even though it's still a Blu-Ray disc, it won't work in Panasonic or Sony Blu-Ray players.

Imagine if Netflix only worked on Roku, even though Chromecast, Apple TV, or any video game console could stream Netflix just fine.

Do you see where I'm getting at? At the moment I have a PS4, Xbox One, Wii U, and PC all hooked up to the same TV. These consoles are all running different variations of AMD hardware, with the only major differences being the gaps in power. I find this as pointless as having four different Blu-Ray players.

But this is what it takes to be a "hardcore" gamer. If I want to play Zelda, inFAMOUS, Forza, and DayZ, this is the kind of pointless investment I have to make. Nevermind the fact that every single one of these games could work perfectly fine on a PC. People wonder why it's so difficult for gaming to go mainstream, well this right here is the reason. If people had the options to go for a single, united set top box to play Microsoft, Nintendo, Sony games through services like Amazon or Steam on a variety of hardware like ASUS, Sony, or Samsung, how much more convenient would this be?

I've never been a PC gamer just because of graphics. I support PC gaming because it's the only open platform where I don't have to worry about BS like backwards compatibility. Someday I hope that playing games will be easy and simple as playing music or watching TV.

The fact is the consoles have never been this close

People have always had differences in how to run the consoles and so you get different consoles. The reason the differences matter is that developers squeeze every bit of power from the console by tailoring their game to that console (or not bothering and making crap games)

Microsoft think that every console needs a Kinect and TV stuff, Nintendo think it needs a tablet and not very much power and Sony kept it simple

They all have different philosophies and so we get different consoles

Also, you claim that watching TV is simple, but digital downloads are anything but. By something from iTunes and you are seriously constrained in how you can watch it. You do admittedly still get all the content, though of course Netflix only has some it, since Amazon has the rest... Gaming is more complicated, but let's not pretend the VoD is simple

It's a relatively new and specialized platform. But we are definitely moving toward more openness; I can see the big three fighting it for as long as they can, but it's only a matter of time before everything is so powerful that literally nothing matters but the games and maybe the OS. I look forward to that day, really.

Games are a more complicated medium with varying levels of requirements.

DVD's has the same standardised resolutions, aspect ratio etc and video / audio codecs. A video file is not the same as thousands of completely different game asset files (script files, model files, texture files, audio files), which video games needs, and the console has to support this.

Also, by not having several producers around the world, of questionable quality of the hardware, who knows how to bypass the DRM and other disc protected things (read: a box that can play the game), they can combat piracy too, at least for a while (and that's the most important thing about that).

Cause proprietary is still a thing

Exclusives give you a legit reason to want one console over the other. Is it that hard to understand? It's simple business. Non of these companies care that you won't get to play your preferred game on the platform you like. I'll be getting a Wii U at the end of this year to play all the games available for it instead of complaining.

Imagine if Apple made programs that only work on Macintosh computers and not Windows computers.

That would be crazy right?

Because the 3DO failed. (Open console philosophy)

With paramount blue ray thing. You had that when HD DVD was still in the running. Universal only made HD DVDs.

Not sure if anyone mention this yet, but video games are more taxing for the CPU (ram and etc) than movies. You have to build or modify a computer to play some PC games in their medium settings at 720P or get a specialized PC/gaming machine. For movies, you need a blu-ray player for blu-ray discs but you don't need a specialized blu-ray player to watch Pacific Rim on your HD TV at 720P. Blu-ray drives/players are also much cheaper than PCs that can handle a modern graphically intense game in medium settings.

You also mention every game can be played by a PC, too, if the PC is an expensive gaming device or if you have the know how to make your own. Even if video games would end up in one platform like the PC and a company made gaming PCs cheaper, then expect another PC company to make another gaming PC to have more power or abnormal controllers. They would try to create exclusive video games for their platform too. In fact, what I described is almost similar to Playstation and Xbox.