Sometimes it' s good, sometimes it' s bad, but mostly I like it.
Some games benefit from exclusivity since developers can optimise graphics and that stuff for a single console and adapt the gameplay to the specific controller and so on.
Some consoles need exclusives in order to guarantee console sales. First party exclusives aren' t enough to sell consoles. They are too few and the time span between the releases are too big. If a company can' t compete then the overall competition in the industry will weaken. As a result us consumers won' t get as good things as we are now. Competition from the PC market isn' t enough to keep the console market going because consoles and PC' s appeal to different people.
Also, the lack of other consoles than THEONECONSOLE will mean less multitude on the videogame market. If all big franchises like Halo, Metal Gear Solid, Forza, Gran Turismo, Metroid Prime, Super Mario, Super Smash Bros, Ninja Gaiden, Final Fantasy, Jak and Daxter and Killzone would be released on the same console, that console' s own software market would be overflooded and the titles would eat up each others profits. In order words; less consoles mean less games from 3rd party developers. And smaller developers and unique projects would be much more difficult to get approved.
So instead of having less third party games, we have choice.
The bad things with third party exclusivity are the obvious;
Not everyone can, or have the will, to spend money on all consoles and as a result one might not be able to play a really awesome game.
It' s um... not good for the environment if people have three different consoles since it consumes more stuff from the nature.... stuff, you know.
Very few people can afford buying all the awesome games they want anyway, so with some third party games going to a console you don' t own, you won' t have to bother with the difficult choices. And if you can afford buying all the games you want, then I would assume you can also buy all the consoles anyway, so it doesn' t really matter.
< Message edited by ginjirou -- 12 Jul 07 12:15:18 >