*sells

Mister political scientist.

You don't have to be psychic to apply basic deductive skills or 

Just look at the companies today and what they are good at and their history leading to this point; its kinda easy knowing what could have been. Till this day MS wipes their ass with everyone when considering the system software/OS department. The always make the best and most functional OSs and are first to jump in on a  great deal of OS based features. XBL, Cross game chat, competent console multiplayer, achievements...etc

Then look at sony, they are always great at making cutting edge hardware. And the gen they make what is arguably a pieced together console, using what must be some sort of engineering socerry they made it all into a box half the size of its primiary competition. The also started the whole motion gaming thing on consoles and now working on VR. Thats just sony being sony...

If not for MS, we would not have a network systme like we do now, cause that is simply not sony's strong point. They would be like nintendo in the online space. And if we don't have sony, we will never have hardware that truly pushes anything, we could even say that the XB1 would have been built into your next cable box.

Hmm, fair point, but I'm not entirely certain myself.  I think there's a fair chance the PS3 still would've floundered for a time, given the worldwide recession that was deeply effecting consumers at the time of the PS3's launch and up to present day really.  At the time the entrance fee for an HD living room was a hard sell to people struggling to make ends meet.  But, ultimately, I think you would've seen more PS3 sales sure.

Still, I think a more apt comparison/judge of competition is PSN vs XBL, the groundwork that Microsoft laid during the initial years and turned into a definite game changer during the 360's years, and then Sony's response w/ the evolution/growth of PSN.  Not really a huge deal either way heh.  Both points basically amt to the same thing...competition is good :)

Agreed.

I agree, domination is good, the 2 best gens are the ones where 1 console reigned supreme: PS1 and PS2.

The problem is that the internet and social media have turned most people from normal rational nice everyday people into anonymous nasty unreasonable people. Huge corporations with little interest in the general public beyond the metrics of disposable income and how to part people from that have taken consumerism to areas nobody would have thought possible.

The advertising departments have realised that tapping into to tribal pack mentality brings about a level of loyalty which is almost cult like. We have gone from a level where we would decide to buy something new, and sit down to see which was the most powerful, had the most games we would enjoy, something for the whole family to enjoy and many other things to instead tattooing ourselves with "Brand X only."

In truth if we choose a platform, we should blame the developers of that platform for all of its faults. Instead they have got it into peoples heads that every single fault on a platform, its users and its games are the fault of the platforms rivals. If say Destiny turns out to be a bad game, the Sony camp will say it was due Microsoft trying to force parity. The Microsoft camp will say it was because Bungie got into bed with Sony. That is just the nature of the conditioning that people are experiencing.

It won't change anytime soon. A thousand thumbs up and a couple of "celebrity" endorsements to say that eating soil out of your garden is a great diet to follow and the average person on the street would suddenly be sat eating a plate full of the stuff. 2 weeks later a guy inside Mcdonalds eating a dirt burger would be getting ridiculed by a guy outside eating an high fibre, diet, vegetarian dirt sandwich.

At this rate unless people wake up, there will be gangs of people going out fighting with people over products. I hope for one that soon we can go back to enjoying our hobby of gaming and looking at every person i meet on the internet as a potential new friend instead of some hate figure because he simply chose one piece of plastic and circuit boards over the other.

Thats the difference between you and me.  I do not care if most people or some people or everyone agree with me.  I am not stating my opinion for a popularity contest.  Just because some people agree with you make your opinion no more right then people that disagree.  Your opinion was not backed up by facts.  You added stuff to your opinion to support your point of view but then again so did I.

Quote: "Why you think you can post your opinion and everyone is just going to believe it is a mystery."

This conversation is OVER.  Goodbye.

 Exactly what you using when you say the PS3 outsold the 360 in its first year.  I remember MS had a heavy shortage problem during its first year but even so, I believe Sony did not top sales since they had limited release during their first year.  Either way, so what.  Sony lost hand and fist during those first 3 years due to making a console that almost cost a grand and selling it for 500/600.  

So you are right Sony had some very expensive parts in the PS3 but it nearly cost the company dearly and they had to cut components and prices big time to make up that mistake.

As to your last point, I guess we can leave that one up to personal opinion since there is no way for either of us to confirm that one.  It would be interesting if MS actually did hold off on the 360 a year and solved that RROD issue as it would have made things interesting if both came out the same time.  

What? How does the iDevices relate at all to what I am talking about?

"because PSs have always been premium priced and introduce new tech to gaming"

The ps4 is priced competatively and released on time because of the failures of the ps3 launch. The ps4 as it is today would not exist without the 360's early release and compeative price. Sony wanted to compete, and were pushed to make a device the consumer would choose.

In every industry, a monopoly ends very poorly for the consumer. Sony would not be pressured to change if it had no competitors.