Aside from some stragglers picking up a PS2 for the first time, the console transition period is most definitely over. What was "next gen" a year or two ago is now "current gen". Which means it's time to appreciate what we've got, right? NO. No, it means it's time to start looking again towards the future. Forbes writer Chris Morris has polled a number of games executives on what they think the next generation will hold, and while their responses are vague, they're no less entertaining because of it.
Take Sony's Jack Tretton, for example, who uses the question to take a swipe at the both the 360's and Wii's software catalogue:
As far as next generation is concerned, I think one of the distinct advantages that we have is we don't have to go in a specific direction. I don't think the fact that we have a high-end machine keeps us from doing bite-sized casual entertainment. I don't think we're relegated to PC shooters or youth-oriented casual games. We can span the gamut.
Nintendo's Satoru Iwata, meanwhile, prepares us for a Wii follow-up that's a bit of a let-down:
Every hardware needs some revolutionary features. This time around, it happened to be we had a revolutionary user interface. Will it be the same for the next generation? I really can't tell.
It's natural for the current customer to expect Nintendo is going to once again do something different. If the people are expecting so many different things from Nintendo, it's going to be difficult for us to go beyond that expectation again.
Sadly, Microsoft aren't featured, but id's John Carmack is, and he is a man terrified at the thought of a mish-mash of buttons and waggle in the next generation:
The worst case is, Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo all pick a different interface. That's because you have to program so differently for [the different architectures]. … If we end up with a diverse set of GPUs [graphics processing units], it would make life difficult.
PlayStation 4 And More [Forbes]