http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=9759&Itemid=59

By Tom Ivan

”I think dedicated games devices will die [out] in the next 5 to 10 years. The business model is very risky and the costs associated with creating new hardware are incredibly high,” Duncan told That Videogame Blog.

"There is a definite convergence of other devices, such as set top boxes,” continued the man who now heads casual gaming business YoYo Games. “There's hardly any technology difference between some hard disc video recorders and an Xbox 360, for example.

"In fact in 5 to 10 years I don't think you'll have any box at all under your TV, most of this stuff will be virtualized as web services by your content provider."

Duncan’s views echo those of analyst Billy Pidgeon, who told Next-Gen earlier this week that traditional videogame consoles may play no part in the next platform cycle.

“I think it will be very hard for consoles to compete with PCs in five years, or for dedicated handhelds to compete with smartphones,” he said.

“…The platforms of the next cycle may not be a console at all, but software distributed by network to convergent devices like PCs, set top boxes and smart phones.”

In other words, cell phone games, and PC gaming are expected to take over.

Bla, blahblah blah. I mean werent they talking about this in 2000?

Please, give me a break...

of course you would say that after two failed attempts.

Yeah, right. Console software sales are stronger than they ever have been, and the Wii is selling faster than any console ever before it. The console business isn't dying out; it's changing and adapting, and actually garnering a wider audience.

Also, everyone since the mid-'90s has been talking about convergence (i.e., devices that do multiple things, such as gaming smartphones, versus devices that do a single thing, like play games), and we've seen, time and again, that that's not what people want. Consumers are much more likely to buy simple, streamlined devices that do one or a few things easily, rather than a complex multimedia device that does a lot of things. Thus why the Wii is beating the media-center-geared HD consoles and why the DS is beating the PSP, which promised to be "the Walkman of the 21st century," despite the fact that both winning systems simply play games, and not much else.

Plus, how does he expect everything to be virtualized in 5 to 10 years when we still have yet to wean a large chunk of the population off of 56k, let alone provide fast enough broadband to enough people for it to matter?

Tell Nintendo the business model is risky as they've made money in the bad times and truckloads of money in the goodtimes.  5 to 10 years I think is too soon.  I could see eventually just having an IP box as has been talked about before.  But with the economy slowing, I don't think we'll see the necessary improvements in bandwidth to deliver it.  And I think this shows there will be no 720.  But we'll see. 

Sour grapes. She cannot accept their failure to grab the market, and instead of stating that, she says "everyone will fail".

It would have been more gutsy to acknowledge Microsoft may be "on the way out of the console business";
not that this is necessarily true either.

 How is this a surprise to you?

Waaaah Waaaah Blu-Ray won. Waaah Waaah, Digital Disturbutiion will take over!!! Waaah Waaaah
 Blu-Ray is so dead in5 years.

Ring a bell? :P 

If I was an Xbox ex VP I would be thinking the same thing right now...

Someday it might happen,but in 5 years?.....Too soon.