Sandy Duncan, the man who set up shop for Xbox in Europe, says that consoles as we know them will be dead in five to ten years.
The way Duncan sees it, the business model for game hardware is simply too risky and high-cost to last much longer, especially given the rapid development of technologies such as digital video recorders.
"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 told That Videogame Blog.
Interestingly, Duncan, who was with Microsoft for more than 15 years, apparently feels the same holds true for handhelds. Given Nintendo's strong history with portable game consoles, it seems unlikely that it, at least, will be abandoning the platform any time soon. It's possible, however, that the DS will face increasing pressure from technology that more fluidly combines gaming with other functions, such as the iPhone, and that Nintendo will adjust the DS design accordingly.
What do you folks think -- will consoles be dead and buried in ten years' time?
Image: EastCoasterVA/Flickr
Consoles to "die out" in the next 5 to 10 years [That Videogame Blog]
