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8bitjoystick.com's Predictions for 2007
Here are some of my predictions for the next year pulled straight out of my butt.
Worldwide Videogame Market Share
Wii 40%
Xbox 360 40%
PS3 20%
Japan Videogame Market Share
Wii 50%
PS3 40%
Xbox 360 10% and all of them are Blue Dragon fans.
Xbox 360
Xbox 360 has a really good year with great software coming out.
Blue Dragon, Lost Planet, Halo 3 and GTA IV are the big hits.
Japanese game developers get behind the 360 in a big way in order to reach the North American and EU markets.
The Xbox devision of Microsoft becomes profitable.
The "Core" 360 goes away and Microsoft drops the price of the 360 to $300.
Dead Rising 2 is going to be zombastic!
Nintendo Wii
The Wii becomes Nintendo most successful home system since the Super NES and some really creative games come out for the Wii and it becomes a smash with kids and parents.
Once SNK comes out with the NeoGeo emulator for the VC and Hudson finishes the TurboDuo CD emulator for Wii VC a software update will allow external USB devices to store download game data on the Wii.
iPods become popular external USB storage devices for the Wii.
The Wii's controls allows the development of some great creative music games.
Sony PS3
Games trickle out for the PS3 and gamers are turned off by the high hardware cost and the fact that most of the best games are released cross platform for the much cheaper Xbox 360.
PS3 tops at 40% in Japan but only tops 50% once Final Fantasy XIII comes out.
Game developers start to make cross platform releases of both PS3 and 360 to hedge their bets against huge game development costs thus any preconceived graphical superiority of the PS3 becomes irrelevant in the hands of a skilled programmer.
PS3 causes Sony to continue to bleed money.
I don't ever see the PS3 topping a third of the worldwide market.
Nintendo DS
After Nintendo retires the Gameboy Advance SP and Micro they start development of the next Nintendo DS system.
The DS Lite drops to 100 bucks and gets even more popular.
A Pokemon like game makes DS/Wii networking popular and game developers including using the DS to play some Wii games.
Sony PSP
The PSP hopefully hits it's strides and picks up unique titles once developers start to realize that the PS3 is not going to be all it's was supposed to be cracked up to be.
PS2 ports continue like mad.
Sony PS2
Sports game and kids games keep getting released for the PS2 and game developers market "B" games on the PS2 for under 20 bucks.
Blu-ray vs HD-DVD vs regular DVD
No clear winner but Blu-ray does not get a boost from the PS3.
Regular DVD still rules the roost as people figure out how to rip your own movies and put them on their iPods.
Apple
iPods are going to have better battery life and top 120 gigs of media.
Mac OSX 10.5 Leopard is going to be spiffy but I might stick with 10.4 on my iBook.
iPhone rumors turn out to actually be an Apple PDA OS with a touchscreen, VOIP phone service, Wifi networking and an iPod size form factor. It works with both Mac and PC and sells like hotcakes after Apple markets them to the iPod fan base.
Microsoft
Zune is a flop but still has a loyal nerdish fan base.
Windows Vista is good for games but still crashes but the upgrade path and system requirements is going to be hellish and many users are just going to wait to buy a new PC with it pre-installed. The DRM is broken in under six months and Vista only viruses in under 3 months. Microsoft buys Adobe/Macromedia.
Internet and media
Firefox usage hits 25%
Net Neutrality becomes the law of the land.
Competition from DSL and finally drives down the price of cable modems
Netflix buys Blockbuster.
Fan boy all over the US head explodes as the Transformers movie sucks.
Frank Miller's "300" movie will be awesome as will "Hot Fuzz"
The Seattle Weekly goes out of print.
Political
Once Congress does investigations into corruption Bush's approval rating slips to 10-15% and stays there for the remainder of his lame duck term. Mission Accomplished!
Cellphone usage while driving becomes a moving violation.
Jake at December 8, 2006 
Rants
Comments
Speaking of politics, who do you dems have picked to lose in '08?
Posted by: Boyd at December 8, 2006 3:58 PM
If Bush has zero political power to move things through congress and his popularity drops down well below Nixonian levels, I don’t see how any Republican presidential nominee could win in 2008. (P.S. please nominate Newt ) But any speculation I have about who the nominee will be is pointless since I live in Washington state and the frontloaded nomination will be over by the time I get to vote for who the nomination is. I like “Vice”President Al Gore, Governor Howard Dean and Senator Russ Feingold but none of them are running in 2008. But honestly I am more excited about what Speaker of the House Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Reid have planned than the 2008 Presidential race this far out. So far none of the candidates have officially unveiled any plans or issue statements so I don’t know who I will vote for in the caucus.
Posted by: Jacob Metcalf ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.8bitjoystick.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at December 8, 2006 4:28 PM
My desire for PS3 decreased a lot when the Wii remote was announced.
Posted by: Llydis at December 10, 2006 8:23 AM
HAHA.
At least you've got a good source for your predictions.
Posted by: Jim at December 10, 2006 3:15 PM
Did you play the Lost Planet demo? It didn't impress me much.
Posted by: Boyd at December 10, 2006 8:26 PM
The trailers and Japanese reviews of Lost Planet are way more impressive than the early E3 demo.
Posted by: Jacob Metcalf at December 12, 2006 2:43 PM
lol
I agree blockbuster sux,
I rented movies there and when I was a little late they sent a (creepy) automated voice messege telling me that if I dont return the movies they will charge me retail value on my credit card.
no wonder the place was empty when I went there, there were like 2 people in the whole place.
I wanna netflix subscription.
Posted by: tg at December 16, 2006 12:29 AM
