Xbox & PlayStation Face 'Significant Risk' With Their Next Consoles, Predicts Research Firm

God that's a dumb analysis.

There probably isn't room for 3 traditional consoles at this stage with Sony and MS seemingly in a zero sum game between them. One loses the other gains.

But Nintendo sit in a slightly different niche and many gamers will choose Switch 2 as a second machine negating the place Nintendo holds in this discussion. Further, many Nintendo customers don't naturally fall into the bracket for customers of the other 2 and will buy nothing instead.

But the bigger issue with this analysis is that MS are actively trying not to compete with Sony on those terms moving emphasis to cloud, mobile and play anywhere strategies, while Sony continue to maintain and exceed previous hardware sales.

All of which makes this analysis seem a bit of a nonsense.

I'm wondering if Microsoft has already foreseen this and their next console will be some kind of PC/Console hybrid that can play Steam games as well as Xbox PC+Console games.
This "console" would then rely on future titles coming to PC which it can support. This would cut out the worry of third party publishers abandoning the platform as Sony fully takes over that space.

@Medic_alert yeah it's a really strange analysis. Nintendo is a secondary machine for most gamers outside of Japan, myself included, and I don't really use it much outside of exclusives. Not even sure I want the next one because I'm more likely to devote my time to Xbox or pc.

I'm also not entirely sure that the console market is "shrinking", it just has a higher cost of entry for new hardware now. A PS6 priced at $700/£700 or whatever they decide will just mean more people stick with what they have for longer.

@JoyfulFire I hope so. That would be the most compelling reason to get a NextBox

This analysis is brought to you by Nintendo.

The analysis figures just don’t make sense.

3 consoles are currently selling. (Yes one has to be the best, one ends up 3rd) so why would they suddenly drop off a cliff?

We are going/just gone through a financial crisis and Covid yet consoles are still selling well. So what’s happening in the next 3years that’s going to change this? People now have digital libraries built up that they are going to want to access too.

After reading their ‘analysis’ there is nothing of substance in it to explain why they came to this decision either.

MS and Xbox completely killed the market in Eastern Europe. Czech, Slovakia and Hungary. RIP Xbox 😤

Yeah yeah analysts.
My only thing to say is Switch 2 of course will sell well initially and if the release day games are right for me I will be there and the console is powerful enough for what it is a hybrid.
But I’m not totally sure long term.
It’s a different environment now and also there are millions and millions of Switch owners unlike hardly any Wii U owners and a lot of those switch owners mainly general public will keep using their original Switch.
Covid and lock down greatly improved Switch sales, never again please lock down wise.

We shall see but it’s not going to be as plain sailing for Switch 2 long term.

I don’t get it. There has been 3 main consoles basically since SEGA did a “Microsoft” and gave up. I’m sure it could carry on but guess seems like no one wants it to. Maybe i’m stuck in the past but I love the choice as it is.

It's time for all of them to get out of the sole function mindset. Nintendo already did a little bit with the hybrid. Xbox should take it further with full pc integration in its handheld and console future.

The old home console model is like shopping at big brick outlets while steam is like shopping online. If you want to play your Playstation games you have to go to a particular physical Playstation. Steam libraries can accessed from a wide variety of devices.

MS and Sony are both in this weird market space where they’re both trying to dilute their respective brands. The second either of them start…you know making fun games again they win.

I would prefer Microsoft to just come out and say there they are no longer making Xbox consoles, with the way they are going with their play anywhere Xbox strategy and Sony allowing Game Pass on their future consoles so I have the best of both worlds. It will never happen but that’s what I’d like to see.

Like people said above, this analysis is nonsense, as much nonsense as people (Sony die-hard fans) saying that Microsoft should stop making consoles. Microsoft should not sell Xbox at a loss, while earning money everywhere like right now and consider getting rid of subscription for playing online. Keep Game Pass going strong and release a Cloud-only tier for mobile and casual players.

Microsoft should fuse the Microsoft and Xbox Store, so it becomes the same store and games are purchased once but are playable on both platforms without code differences. Since they own Windows and every PC and Xbox game run on Windows, they should make the most of that. The store should be named Xbox store and be available on consoles and PC. The interface should also be the same on both platforms. They do all this and they don't ever have to worry about anything, because the PC market is the biggest gaming market (besides the casual mobile market) and because they are used to making hardware (Xbox and Surface) and are extremely good at it.

@VoidPunk It's looking more like Sony find that solution than Microsoft. Sony are finally hitting a point where they're realising that these story-driven, AAA movie-style games aren't as manageable as seen (too long to make, too short, too expensive - Spiderman last year cost $400million, and they're just moving on without using that engine again), and with Astro Bot have found that even a smaller game (by the comparable standards) can have as good or greater impact (a 1st party title that wasn't even announced until May won GotY). Microsoft are unfortunately on the same path (judging the 2025 release schedule), but also don't have any active projects on the scale of Astro Bot (and that's with the fact that they have access to 3/4 in-demand platforming franchises), and the 2024 slate wasn't much better (Hellblade's praise for graphics was contrasted with criticism against gameplay, and the graphics themselves are more a point for UE5 than the devs). I'd be curious if we could see the 2024 figures for MS with and without ABK's involvement (i.e. how did the rest of Xbox fair?), although I would admit they're probably never going to give those figures without ABK's involvement (considering that they alone are propping up 1/3 of the gaming side).

Elephant in the room is Valve. If they launch a SteamOS living room machine that’s going to cause a big upheaval in the console market. They shouldn’t be underestimated, to say that Steam is dominating the PC market would be an understatement.

I'll always buy the newest Nintendo, Xbox and Playstation consoles regardless. I'm a fanboy of video games. It's a win win win situation for me 100% of the time.

Xbox sales have already fallen off a cliff. They fell off a cliff from 360 to xbone, and have gone down further this gen and now continue to fall quarter after quarter.

"Playstation or Xbox are going struggle to sell consoles next gen, who can guess which one it's going to be?!" Who is paying this person? Have at least some balls and color "system 3" on the chart in green.

The very obvious answer is that the console market needs new blood. I will always say this market has utterly screwed itself and it's a difficult hole to dig themselves out of. Nintendo seems perfectly content in the hole (and they've managed their margins properly so it's fine for the). Sony has decided to stick their head even deeper into the hole. Xbox is fully aware they are in a hole but are flailing as they try to pull themselves out especially as for their efforts they often get smacked down into the hole for their attempts. I think the vocal conversation very clearly highlights the issue though. Consoles out themselves in a position where so far exclusive games have made people NEED them and that's how they competed, but the cast iron truth is that people done WANT a video game console. And why should they? Consoles should have been this accessible entryway into gaming, but became walled off gardens that were fragmented even within their own ecosystems. They aren't appealing to even new gamers and have uterlly failed to pierce the general zeitgeist. Consoles need to take a long hard look at themselves and ask themselves what went wrong. Sony is celebrating their 30th anniversary. Thirty years and their best selling console is still shy of 160 million. The PS1 sold 100m and they haven't sold "that" much more since. There's far more than enough people on Earth and even just gamers, but console gaming needs to figure out how to appeal to new users. Xbox is in a similar boat. Sales are just stuck between the first console hardware sales and last gen.

@WildConcept6 Interesting. What value can console offer new gamers? New users would look at either mobile or PC/handheld PCs. Why would they fall into one of the walled off gardens? How would console gaming appeal to new users? Moving to a PC/console/mobile ecosystem and giving choice and freedom, like what Microsoft is doing. Then, you can let console gamers be and you don't depend on them either. Sony, very slowly, with its share of failures (Neon Koi, some PC ports, Concord...) is trying the mobile/PC/game service market because they know the future is there. Nintendo as long as they can sell cheap to develop games on dated hardware are all right. If the current console market is not enough for Sony with twice as many consoles as Microsoft, the console market is no longer enough and, as you said, is not bigger than it was decades ago. The future of consoles is not walled off gardens, it's being part of a bigger ecosystem.

@Cakefish I'd love a console/pc hybrid that has an element of being open source like the Steam deck.

I really don't know if there is a mass market for it though.

Steam deck seems to have done OK without blowing the doors off.

Well Xbox has become more of an ecosystem than just a console so.. they might as well just say Playstation. I always said (and I know this some fantasy world stuff) it would be cool if Sony and Microsoft teamed up together and made a super console.

@Jenkinss while Microsoft 'struggle' to sell consoles Sony struggle to make AAA First Party exclusive games, so which is best for the consumer A: The one that sells a lot of consoles but makes hardly any AAA First Party exclusive games per year, or B:the one that sells less consoles but makes loads of AAA First Party games per year ?

@Rog-X the one that gets all the games, no brainier. Especially as 3rd party games increasingly skip Xbox without even needing to be paid off because the install base is so small and the users have been conditioned to not buy games.

Just sad Xbox doesn’t like to go out swinging with top games … gears and halo must of been lightning in a bottle

@Peete oh yeah dude, forgot they pulled out of a bunch of European countries. RIP indeed 😢

While i agree that this analysis seems pretty vague. Back at their sister site the same article quoted this analysis with saying “Sony or Microsoft will mightily struggle in a distant third place”

That doesnt sound like an unreasonable outcome to me. That is basically whats happening right now already. Would anyone argue that Xbox isnt struggling in distant third place with their console sales right now? They are selling significantly less YoY every month.

I can imagine that, if Xbox does nothing different console wise and tries to compete with Playstation head on in the high end console market, that they might indeed see themselves yet again” struggling mightily in a distant third place”. This is already Xbox’s worst generstion in terms of console sales, and i can definitely see it getting worse next gen if some Xbox users go to PS. Again, if Xbox changes nothing and just tries to compete with Playstation the same way they have.

I’m not saying the Xbox console should leave, but saying that one of them will not be doing great, and betting it wont be Sony seems like a pretty reasonable take. I can see that becoming a reality, although to be fair, anything can happen.

It’s already Xbox who are and will continue to struggle in terms of a console. I have sold my Xbox Series X and now have a PS5 but still have my GPU sub and use the cloud via my GTech Cloud. It runs at 1080p but it never stutters so it does what I need it to.

I heavily suspect that Xbox will focus on the handheld market anyway with an Xbox 1st party handheld but will also allow numerous 3rd party handhelds as well with Xbox OS.

For Xbox, it will be about the number of active players and that will include PS5 and what comes next.

Nintendo is a strange one. If the next Switch is just a minor upgrade, I would be surprised if it gets anywhere close the current models success.

PlayStation will lead the way still , Nintendo as well and Xbox in terms of hardware will be a very distant 3rd. That said, in terms of money made , Xbox will potentially obliterate the competition with their games on every other system.

Completely wrong. There is room for a maximum of 3 consoles in the market and currently there is 3 which means that it's impossible for any other console to even get into the market. This is what all the doom and gloom is about. Nobody can defeat the other ones and nobody can absolutely win.

@XboxNumber1 lol I love the user name. More 3rd party support than ever! You said it so now it's true.

Nonsense. There is room for a maximum of 3 consoles and currently there is 3 establish console developers in the market right now. The real issue is that it's near impossible for a new console developer to even consider getting into the market right now. The only issue is what the big 3 do going forward. Nintendo has been very profitable and successful but I think they need to do something new and innovative otherwise they can easily be surpassed by Sony and Microsoft.

Next generation 'Xbox' branded console hardware is likely the LAST 'Xbox' console. Either the brand will fade into irrelevance vs Nintendo & Sony (& Steam for that matter) or move to branded 'GamePass' branding for hardware.

I'd be shocked if we even have an Asus, HP, Acer , etc. branded 'Xbox' "console sized'/portable PC after 'next-gen Xbox'/PS6 generation.

The only exception for this is Microsoft just eats all the cost and losses on extremely low sales on hardware.

Despite the Xbox being behind in console sales MS has mandated that the Xbox division turn a profit. So even if Xbox isn't number one, they are still can be substantiated. Sony is right around the top in console sales but has made numerous huge blunders in putting out games for the Playstation and Nintendo has been very successful but it's sales seem to be levelling off and the game they are releasing are not getting the sales numbers of previous titles they have released. Like Zelda Breath of the Wind was very successful but the follow up Zelda Tears of the Kingdom had some interest but people seem to lose interest in it reasonably quickly. I personally wish Nintendo would make it possible to actually own the older Zelda games that are only available with the switch online, but Nintendo doesn't want to do that. Sony seems to want to bring older classics Sony Playstation titles to newer Playstation consoles but they all end up in the top tier and I personally are only interested in a small number of the classics Sony games. Sony does actually allow you to purchase classics titles on the ps4 and ps5, unlike Nintendo. I would like to see MS spend more time bringing classic Xbox titles to modern consoles, even if they are only available via game pass, that would work, in my opinion. To me the only console developer who is actually trying new things is MS with the Xbox.

I switched to ps5 for a chunk of last year but now I’m like screw it I prefer Xbox operating system (quick resume, smart delivery, bw compatibility) I’ll go down w the ship. Plus an entirely sony dominated market will be bad for us all

Honestly I think this will be the last generation I will really care to be a part of. I haven't been happy with the direction the industry has been headed in for about the past decade and this gen has just been a joke, both Sony and Microsoft can't seem to produce anything in the way of exclusives I could care about, and I can't think of anything outside of Nintendo that appeals to me that I can't get on PC.