It seems so natural to have competing videogame platforms. We’ve all grown up with it, and without those options, we might feel something missing in the gaming world. However, this may not be the best situation. In her post, skrause2 brings up a quote by Denis Dyack (cited from the Collins reading) that suggests a single platform is not only the best situation for hardware and software companies, but an inevitable situation.

I strongly agree with the first assertion Dyack makes: that a single, ubiquitous platform will streamline the development of hardware and software (he goes into some detail as to how exactly things would improve on pg 83 of Collins). However, it is the inevitability of the convergence that I am not so sure of. As it is, the videogame industry is huge and growing, which means the players driving it must be profiting as well. With seemingly unstoppable growth and relatively high profit margins, there does not seem to be much incentive for the Big 3 (Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo) to converge. Rather, with so much opportunity for growth, they are each trying to set themselves apart as the best console. Also, in an industry as big as videogames (and only getting bigger), there seems to be room for multiple, established consoles competing for users. So, even though a long-term consolidation would likely produce higher profit margins and better games, the short-term incentives are pushing the market in the opposite direction.

For concrete numbers and figures, refer to this 2008 article on the unstoppable growth of the videogame industry: http://seekingalpha.com/article/89124-the-video-game-industry-an-18-billion-entertainment-juggernaut