If video games can be talked about to a common man, and be discussed by a common man, then they will have reached the pinnacle of a truly mainstream audience. They will be as relevant as books, movies and popular music. I agree with her sentiments entirely, as well as the articles she references, but there is a greater problem that the wider gaming audience is missing that is keeping gaming from becoming truly mainstream.
That problem is consistency. It is haste. It is ubiquity. It is complication. There is no "one" platform that a neanderthal can point at and say "video game." No, there is a bevy of boxes and systems. A capitalist free-for-all of whatchamacallits and doodads that all play games competently in their own unique way.
The problem is there isn't one game system. There are fifty. And all of those game systems have different buttons, different games, different costs and different barriers to entry. This wide conglomerate of devices that make up the gaming industry makes the everyday consumer's eyes glaze over. It is only the gaming elite that understand that Mario is ONLY on a Nintendo. Fewer still within the elite understand that the Wii U actually has a backwards compatible library known as the Virtual Console where you can play the original Super Mario Bros. It is a game that is twenty years old and arguably single-handedly responsible for the creation of the market as we know it today, but only a fraction of a percent of the worlds population knows it can still be played on a modern console.
The amount of devices available today is bewildering. Working a retail job at Best Buy full time plus coming home and reading tech articles for an hour isn't enough to keep up with the movement of technology as it relates to the consumer. That's part and parcel of the modern age. Change is good. Competition is good. But neither are helpful when you're trying to alter a nation's culture.
Books became wildly popular because they accomplished two things: They were widely accessible and they were consistent. Once the printing press was invented and education became more accessible to common folk, there was a ravishing thirst for literature. Books were still expensive, but they were freely accessible, especially thanks to Benjamin Franklins creation of the library. Imagine what the book industry in America would have looked like if there was no consistent language. Imagine an early America where you could only read Pride and Prejudice in Spanish. "To read The Secret Garden, young man, you ought to learn French." Would Moby Dick be heralded as a classic if you could only read it in Russian? Here's the best part: Now after these books are released, lets come up with four brand new languages that people have to learn in order to keep reading; any book that we publish henceforth will no longer use French, Spanish or Russian. They'll be written in Turkish, Georgian and Irish. In the year of 1954, The Lord of the Rings will be published as a Turkish exclusive.
Books became mainstream in America because they were all printed in English. Movies became popular because they were easily accessible and could be experienced at any theater. The same is true of music. In any generation of the modern age, there was never more than one standardized format for listening to music. The entire world transitioned from vinyl to cassette. There weren't five different formats to enjoy music on. The same thing happened when CD's replaced cassettes.
This market observation is consistent with movie media as well. The whole world went from VHS to DVD. Then from DVD to Blu-Ray. (There are still some people making that transition) but notice there aren't 3 different brands split down the middle, fighting for the consumer wallet-share. In certain times, there were formats that fought hard to become the standard, but once the standard was picked, the others drifted away into oblivion.
The problem is technology and the constant movement toward "bigger and better." Instead of staying stationary and creatively working around barriers. The creative side can be seen historically toward the end of a console's lifecycle, and the games reflecting in dynamo developers creative methods of pushing aged hardware to it's gum clenching limits. After that brief re-taste of a golden age gone by, the old hardware is set aside to make room for the bleeding edge. It is at this stage, when the old begins to get pushed out, that the biggest sales in the console generation occur. The innocent and unknowing consumer sees the bargain happening at his local retailer. After hearing for years about this great entertainment box, decides to finally fork over the cash and jump in on the fun. Then as he sits down in front of the tv that night, he turns on his Xbox 360 only to see advertisements for the Xbox One, only one of many of the latest and greatest game systems. Now he feels pretty stupid.
Such was the case of the Nintendo DS, the Wii, and the Playstation 2. Radically popular consumer devices that are still used today. Yet once the consumer picked them up, they were no longer relevant to the watercooler conversations, and thus get written off as a fad investment by the majority user.
For games to be mainstream, a platform must be mainstream. For this great pass time to be accepted in popular discussion, it must be widely accepted in a single, consistent, unchanging form. An example would be the Playstation 4 or the Xbox One. But instead of a new generation of consoles coming out in ten years, the market must hold itself still and offer no new, updated products. Time alone will allow the platform to mature to a point where every living room has one; when that happens, the product will have completely matured and the ecosystem it provides will be completely populated. By providing a consistent, unchanging platform, a consistent experience can be delivered to the end user. THAT is what the average consumer needs in order to make gaming a part of their lives.
When the average consumer makes an investment in something, they don't consider that they will need to upgrade the device or service in a few years time. They see a need, provide for the need and then close the case. An example would be a common item like a refrigerator or an oven. Go sell an oven or a fridge to someone and ask them what they need the item to do for them.
"Sir, I see you're shopping for fridges."
"You're an astute, observational young man. Why, yes I am."
"Sir, I perceive that you have particular needs that you need this fridge to provide."
"Most definitely, young man. It must be a fridge of fridges."
"And this great fridge which the world will knock on your door to marvel at. What should it do?"
"I need it to keep my food cold."
"How long will you keep this fridge that you're purchasing today?"
"I'll keep it until it breaks."
A videogame system in the eyes of the average consumer is not different from a fridge, an oven, a bed, or even a television. Once it has been purchased and plugged into the living room, its simply another part of the house. It is not something they look forward to or anticipate using, its simply something they will occasionally use and tell their friends they own. If that user, then, is to be a part of the wider conversation of gaming, and is to pick up that newspaper advertising the latest gaming headline, that game system needs to be relevant for the next five, ten and fifteen years. Otherwise he won't know what on earth anyone is talking about.
Ultimately a mature console cycle creates a massive used-game market, which negatively impacts margins on games and hinders the purchase of newer games. The answer to that issue is to make digital sales a priority. Thus, maximizing profit for creators and allowing greater access of titles to the user. If it ends up holding true that this is the last generation of living-room game consoles, the efforts of Sony and Microsoft to offer online memberships for game libraries makes a lot more sense, as it allows more control to content providers and ensures profitability for creators over the long term. Its not unlike a cable provider.
The only alternative to a consistent hardware platform is a unified software that is adopted across multiple manufacturers (SteamOS) but thats not necessarily the best solution. SteamOS provides a flexible, long-term living room solution for gaming, but the nature of PC development will insist on cutting edge hardware on the side of the end user, which means they will eventually need to upgrade. Of course, upon upgrading, all of thier old games will still work, which does eliminate many barriers. Unfortunately, its a less than desirable solution in a situation where its reasonable to expect more. As great an idea as SteamOS is (and I am in full support of it) it will not be able to contribute to a national culture that accepts gaming as a pass time of the everyday consumer. If Valve decides to put a long-term cap on how powerful the hardware is allowed to be in any given SteamBox, then my argument against SteamOS will not stand. But I doubt that's going to happen.
If console manufacturers are interested in this vision becoming a reality, the strategy will need to be implemented in this coming generation (Wii U, PS4, Xbox One). Sony and Microsoft already provide a subscription games service, so they are well on their way. Nintendo has been making progress by providing digital copies of games before the retail version is available. Eventually a subscription service from Nintendo may be appropriate as well, but their software offerings and excellent eShop format may end up serving them just fine. Despite the strength of the PS4 out of the gate, Sony is the company I would be worrying about long-term. Because they removed the Playstation Eye from the console package, consumers will have to adapt to a complicated controller that may hinder them from picking a game up quickly. If I had to pick the best companies suited for this long-term play, I would choose Nintendo first, then Microsoft.
Nintendo's Wii U is best suited for this strategy because of the casual nature of the controllers. The Gamepad doubles as a tablet and the secondary controllers mimic the everyday tv remote. The Wiimote is perfectly functional for casual play, while the gamepad lends itself to deeper, more complicated control schemes, while offering a second screen experience built-in. The software library certainly doesn't hurt them either. Using the eShop to advertise classic game experiences like Donkey Kong, Super Mario Bros and Wii Sports will provide nostalgia and familiarity, which can provide an entry-level gaming experience for the everyman. The eShop also doubles as an effective digital billboard, where new games are readily provided and the latest news from Nintendo can be watched via Nintendo Direct (which is a genius strategy, I don't care what anyone says). Again, for the Wii U to be truly mainstream, it has to be in everyone's living room. That can only happen by not releasing another console in five years; a temptation Nintendo will have a tough time fighting.
Microsoft's all in one strategy is unappealing for gamers, who understand different devices and their functions. But the average consumer can gain a lot from having everything in a single box. The ability to connect a cable box to the experience is a big win. Music and movie services are also more easily understood on the Xbox, and the casual gamer can play using Kinect, which is easy to understand and great for parties. Long-term, the Xbox will have an easier time fighting the upgrade cycle. The perverse amount of RAM and the flexibility of the system (plus the massive hard drive) will give Microsoft some nice leverage ten years down the line. But again, ten years isn't enough time. Fifteen years, even twenty years may be necessary.
Do console upgrades need to stop entirely for the rest of time? No. But they do need to be slowed significantly. Long enough for familiarity to set in. Long enough for everyone in the world to have the opportunity to own one for themselves. Of course, none of this HAS to happen either. Over the course of a decade, its difficult to say just how much profits will be affected by used-game sales (a priority on digital will not completely solve the problem) and maintaining consumer interest for such a vast period of time will be a huge obstacle to overcome. But if it is decided that these console cycles are long enough and technological relevance is too important to the industry, gaming will only continue to be a hobby enjoyed my hundreds of millions of gamers. Not billions of everyday people.
