yeah it is miamoto just thought ahead of the curve but a generation is based on time which the wii exists in the same time as PS3 and 360 so therefore its in the same gen

(Alright don't throw stuff at me for what I'm about to say, it's just what I think, and I am a waggle whore so that would explain my answer, I just want to know if other people think this aswell)

I consider the 360 not part of this generation. Every generation seemed to be decided by controls, that was always the biggest improvement every generation. Now I know the 360 has improved controller over the Xbox, but compared to how different the Wii is to the GC and 6-axis to the DS (or the motion consoles) the 360 isn't much of an improvement on controls.

This generation we're in (the 7th gen) I consider to be the motion generation, so the 360 can't fit into that so I would say it belongs in the 6.5 generation.

OF course it is a console competing in this generation. The DS is competing with the PS3, 360, and PC - as they are all gaming devices. Market Segments are a different argument. The consoles are going for a different market segment.

This drew a smile. But it's a strawman argument.

When discussing technology a "generation" is not an historical term. A "generation" in technology is defined by technical criteria. The definition of a technological generation is usually born in restrospect, and by consensus among the specialists.

A "second generation web search engine" or a "third generation nuclear power plant" are such because of how they work, not of when they came out. Of course as technology progresses the chronological order is usually respected. But when technology branches it's entirely possible to have the platypusses of this taxonomy.

Coming to consoles, I am not sure of when exactly someone thought it was useful to group them in "generations". Is that wikipedia link the only authoritative source? We surely didn't talk of "third generation" when the NES was out. We talked of 16-bit computing and 8-bit consoles, and they were poor but still technical criteria.

And if it has no technical content, what is its sense? Not business wise, I already explained why I don't think it makes much sense to put the Wii in the same category as the other consoles.

 I think you problem is you're categorising video games as technology,when they are in fact toys. And thus out of the realm of science. Wikipedia actually works in this case. It's truth by consensus. 90%+ of people agree on these generations, and that's just how it works. The criteria are simply the years listed on Wikipedia.

i consider the wii to be the silent victor. the ps2 was the is loud WE WIN YAYAYAYA OUR GAMES R TEH BESTEST where as the wii is just like... hehehehehehehehehe or wii fit and mario karts shall slowly consume them all

Simply because generations have been defined by consensus, and definitions are established by consensus. Until there is provided an alternative consensus that is more widely accepted than the current generational distinction (Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo seem to be in no hurry to do anything but support this), the word will continue to mean what it means.

Is it arbitrary? Yes. There is no basis for it. And it is very new insofar as that goes, largely coming into being only as a point of propaganda once we got three major players on the scene at the same time. It doesn't mean anything and there's no criteria except for the general (and corporate!) consensus.

It's stupid, but that is how it is, and you're not going to be able to change it with arguments unless you manage to convicne the people who establish this dialogue.

Damn,

about three pages of arguing about GCN and PS2 gfx.

absolutely nothing to do with this topic.


On track, yes Wii is part of this generation.

yes and it's the best system of his generation

I'm only referring to console gaming history, in which generation has become a historical term, the way we talk about generations of human history, not generations of technical change.  I don't remember when people started numbering them though.  It started out as a technical term, as you mentioned, the way it works in most other tech-related contexts, with an 8-bit generation and a 16-bit generation, but as systems got more powerful, the differences between them became too great, so this terminology became obsolete.  If we still used the terms that way we'd have the GBA, the DS, the PS2, the XBox, the Wii, and the PS3 in 5 or 6 different generations instead of 2, and not in chronological order.  So to stay relevant, these terms have evolved into their other non-tech-related definition, as a way to reference time periods when a particular wave of competing products were released.  It's either that or we call this the Wii/DS generation, and the last one the PS2/GBA generation.

It might be a bad idea for a word, but it seems like the majority of the gaming community has accepted it this way.  I can't find anybody on the internet explaining the history of the historical terminology, but every website I find mentioning generations of gaming history use the terms this way, save for the occassional argument like this one, which is inspired entirely by "true next gen experience!" buzz words from marketing teams.  And we definitely can't let marketing teams redefine our history, especially the marketing teams behind the 2nd and 3rd place products.

For gaming, I think it should be a historical term, because the future will look back and remember the Wii trouncing the 360 and the PS3 while they were all on shelves at the same time.  In 20 years nobody will be saying "but but but it was in the wrong generation" the same way nobody today says that about the inferior PS2 or inferior DS or inferior NES.