THQ: New consoles are the 'last thing' the industry needs

"Frankly, the last thing I think the industry needs now is new hardware. You look at the games coming out on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 now and they look stunning," said Farrell in a recent interview with IGN. "If we were to have another $1000 box that the hardware guys have to subsidize and that software developers have to spend even more money developing, that model just doesn't work."

Farrell went on to praise Microsoft and Sony's attempts to extend their console cycles by expanding to larger audiences with Move and Kinect. "The market will decide if one or both work," he added.

We aren't too hyped about the motion control boom, but our thoughts mostly echo Farrell's. The technological leaps of the '80s and '90s came fast and often, and games had a spacious void to grow into. Advancement hasn't necessarily slowed in the last five years, but it has changed, and the steps are no longer as clear-cut as, for example, the transition from vectors to sprites, or sprites to polygons.

Above: Just a commercial, for now

"Better graphics? They're pretty darn good now. Better sound? No. Gameplay? Probably not. So I think the ways games are evolving now is really a direction we're going. Where it's going to be is in the play experience; richer stories, better characters, production values that are much more like movies," said Farrell.

Excepting the part about film-industry production values, which we aren'tconvinced are often necessary, Farrell is speakin' some sense to us.

[Source: IGN]

Oct 28, 2010

Associate Editor, Digital at PC Gamer