Consoles, Who Needs ‘em?

Apparently not John Welch, CEO of casual games company PlayFirst. He says that the console per se is a “niche platform” and that they’re just too expensive to make. His argument:

I think the biggest proof point in the death of consoles in my thesis is the Wii. The most successful, most difficult to acquire console in this generation is at least a generation old in hardware. The advances are in software and peripherals. Why do you need a box for that? If the real expansion is occurring because of what Nintendo has done, why do we even need a console? The technology could be adapted to run on your average set top box, at least in the next generation of set top boxes.

Welch does concede that console are more streamlined and easier to use than, say, PCs. His crystal ball gazing is more along the lines of Google-type cloud that doesn’t even use hardware at all. Agree? Disagree?

Q&A with PlayFirst’s John Welch [VentureBeat via EDGE] [Pic]