Industry analyst Jon Peddie believes console gaming is hopelessly constrained by aging hardware, lack of precision controllers and low resolution.
“The current consoles PS3 and Xbox3 are equivalent to a 2004 PC – a seven year old PC. Would you play a game on a seven year old PC?” Peddie asked rhetorically in a recent blog post.
“[Plus], consoles are limited in resolution to the TV. Maybe 1080p in some homes, most probably not. I need better resolution, lots of pixels. [Of course], consoles can’t do stereovision [and] I like S3D. Consoles can do one screen – I use three to six.”
Peddie also criticized the lack of precision controllers for console games, which is especially important for first person shooter titles.
“I like FPSs and therefore want and need fine precision aiming and fast firing.
“That’s just not possible with a [standard] console controller – one of the reasons hand grenades and big splashy weapons like fire balls or sledge hammers are so popular.”
According to Peddie, a good game is one geared for the PC, which boasts huge open worlds, dozens of characters and lots of intelligent AI.
“[I want] gazillions and gazillions of triangles, hundreds of light sources, real reflections (not baked on decal crap) real shadows, particles, and real physics – a serious, immersive mind grabbing experience with story – not just bash and run bash and run.
“You can’t get those kind of games on a console. They [just] don’t have the memory, they don’t have the FLOPS, they don’t have the speed, they don’t have screen resolution, and they don’t have the pointing accuracy.”