Mike Bantick
Friday, 01 February 2008 16:17
Opinion and Analysis
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One million Nintendo DS units sold in a country of around 22 million people, the figures are impressive for Nintendo, at it is hard to imagine the bubble bursting any time soon. Sony with their sophisticated PlayStation Portable (PSP) have made in-roads, perhaps, despite the overwhelming odds against it, there is room for other players in the hand-held gaming arena. Could Microsoft be that player?
Whatever side of the fence you sit, whether you are a Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft fanboy/girl you have to admit, things are going along nicely in the gaming world at the moment.
As a consumer there is a wealth of choice titles out there that hit all the right human buttons, whilst you hit all the controller buttons.
With Nintendo recently racking up 1 million DS units sold in Australia, and cleaning up in sales charts around the world, it is clear that, along with the Sony PSP, portable gaming is a popular part of the rise in the gaming market. With games such as
Zelda Hourglass on the DS and increasing functionality such as
Skype on the PSP the graph trend can only continue to point up.
My iTWire colleague
Stan Beer has suggested Apple could plunder the gaming market , especially the hand-held world with an iPhone or iPod device. Perhaps, but who better positioned to take up the reigns of third banana in the hand-held gaming market. Microsoft of course.
There were inklings, rumours and hints that perhaps this was a direction that the Redmond company was about to embark when the mysterious
Origami Ultra Mobile PC websites began to hit the internet a few years back.
More recently pundits point to the Microsoft Zune device and its gaming potential.
Last year Endgaget ran a story containing a quote from ex-Xbox chief Peter Moore confirming Microsoft's intention to bring gaming to the iPod challenger. The aim, to be up and gaming by July 2008.
And the Zune could indeed benefit from a broader entertainment focus, incorporating a gaming element, but personally I don't see the current Zune configuration appealing to the gaming masses. Despite its nice size and screen, it still has the media player feel and lack of inputs required to become a modern hand-held gaming device. Plus there is the Zune brand, a Microsoft gaming device would need to be branded Xbox.
