Nov 22 2008
Top 11 most desired features of the next console generation
8. Rechargable Controllers
If not for my camera and my Wii Remotes, I wouldn’t have any reason to buy AA batteries any more, and I could buy a rechargeable battery for my camera if I used it more often. PS3 controllers are rechargeable via USB cable by default, and Microsoft has released a rechargeable battery pack for their Xbox 360 controllers. Hopefully by next generation, Nintendo’s next console will have caught up. Not only are rechargeable controllers more practical and, in the not-so-long run, cheaper than battery-sucking controllers, they’re better for the environment, too. Greenpeace already hates Nintendo. Let’s not give them a real reason to!
9. Games That Are Only Released When They’re DONE!
So many game developers issue patches for their games soon after release. This can be a real pain. I have an internet connection right now, but for a very long time, I didn’t have one at home. Thankfully, I didn’t have a game like The Orange Box at the time, or it would have taken an impractical amount of effort to make it playable. I don’t pay $60 so I can be a play tester for a game, thanks. If I buy a game, I want it to be complete and not a beta.
10. Consoles That Work
$400 is way too much to pay for a piece of hardware that’s going to die and need to be sent away for repair. Replacing faulty parts with other faulty parts and extending the warranty to three years is not a valid solution. I don’t want to send my console in for repair at all, whether it’s free or not. No piece of hardware is going to be 100% perfect and there are always going to be individual consoles that break. That’s just a fact of life, but a line is crossed long before a console’s failure rate reaches 33%. Hopefully the next generation will be the first one since the 16-bit generation where all of the current consoles are well-made pieces of hardware from the very beginning and we can all get back to comparing games and screaming “NUH UH! UH HUH! YOU’RE STUPID!” in our console wars like we used to.
11. User Friendly Online Gaming
I could tolerate having one friend code to share. It’d be nicer to have a user name, but a series of numbers wouldn’t be so bad if I only have to input one of them per friend. That’s not the way it goes with the Wii, though. I have to gather friend codes from everyone I know (who I want to play online with) for every single online game I own. A lot of the time, I don’t even bother any more because I know I’m not going to be playing a game any more in a few weeks. Just give me an account like I can get with Xbox Live and, to a lesser extent, the PlayStation Network. (I didn’t even bother to sign up for a Konami ID so I could play Metal Gear Solid 4 online. The registration process was too slow.) Admittedly, I don’t enjoy playing online a whole lot anyway. It’s great with friends, but with strangers? No thanks. Something needs to be done about the types of people you meet in online gaming sessions. I think I can live without a horrible 12-year-old blasting obscenities into my living room through my TV, thanks. Sure, I can mute people like that, but I don’t want to have to do that whenever one of these idiots pops up, and I don’t want to have to deal with it in the first place. There needs to be stronger regulations and harsher penalties for dealing with players who can’t act like human beings when they’re not in the same room as the people they’re playing with.
So there you have it. Eleven things that could help make the next console generation the best one ever. Do you have any ideas of your own? Leave a comment! Think of this as a brainstorming session. Who knows? Maybe someone at Nintendo or Sony or Microsoft will read what you have to say and hire you as a consultant, a position in which they will pay you millions and millions of dollars to tell them how not to screw up. Hey, it could happen.
13 Responses to “Top 11 most desired features of the next console generation”
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For fairness, the Wii remote.. Is rechargeable. Granted, you need rechargeable batteries, but even so.
Other than that, nice article! There’s nothing I can really add.
if anyone got that consulting job, it’d be you. you’re my favorite tanooki writer :D
Oh my, you’re making me all warm and tingly!
That’s true, Larke, but I would rather have recharable batteries WITH my purchase. You know, so I wouldn’t have to worry about them screwing up my Classic Controller. I heard something about that with Mario Kart Wii.
@ Helper187: I’m assuming you’re referring to someone using the wrong kind of batteries? Well Nintendo states on their website what kind to use, so. *shrug*
Anyways I’m dragging this way offtopic. ^_^’
Not really. :P It’s a point in the article. It’s perfectly on-topic to discuss it.
@helper187, I have the NYKO rechargeable batteries for my wii remote and use the classic controller all the time for Mario Kart…I have not yet experienced any problems. (also, I have found that these batteries hold their charge very well, I don’t put them on the charger all the time, maybe once a week, and they last quite a long time)
Yeah, Nintendo really dropped the ball with friend codes. As in REALLY dropped the ball. I don’t play my Wii online much anyways, so whatever. Another thing I would add to this list would be free online play. XBox Live makes you pay for online play, which I find pretty ridiculous. If you even plug your XBox into the internet, you get ads sent to you. Why can’t ad space pay for microsoft’s bandwidth?
I think you make a good point. Xbox Live is better than the PlayStation Network, but I don’t think it’s $50-a-year better.
I think I’m one of the few that actually likes the fact that the Wii Remote takes AA batteries. That way I can use regular rechargeable batteries, and when they die, I can just pop them out and insert another pair of rechargeable batteries (It also helps that my charger charges 4 AA in 15 minutes). This way I won’t be out of gaming commission while I put the controller on a docking station, or transforming my wireless controller into a wired controller by charging internal batteries with a cable.
Good point, Ryan.
I dunno $50 a year is about $4.17 a month for the service of Xbox Live and it trounches over the PSN (I have both and use both regularly). I’d gladly pay that fee for a superior online system on the Wii.