cre: Let’s Take A Minute To Appreciate That Sony And Microsoft Managed To Launch New Consoles This Year
SOny and Microsoft have both now launched their next-gen consoles, reaching – for most markets – that Holiday 2020 release date that both have committed to and refused to budge. Inevitably, the next five to seven years of console gaming will be dictated by these two machines, and I think I’m speaking for everyone when I say, we’re all excited to see how video games evolve as a medium. thanks to the immense new potential of player and creator of expression that the PS5 and the Xbox Series X | Bring it to the table.
But while it’s exciting to look ahead, I think we should also stop and take stock of where we are now and how we got there. Console launches are an extremely complicated process – there are dozens and dozens of moving parts, with multiple difficult logistical issues that companies must overcome to ensure there are no disruptions in the chain. supply. From hardware design and development to coordinating with third parties (especially for launch games), coordinating with your own in-house studios, marketing, manufacturing, quality assurance and testing, outreach to retailers and shipping millions of units around the world for a launch – it really is a very involved and complex process.
This is the reason why you never see a “perfect” console launch, why the launch of a new system is always marred by one failure or another, be it shortages of supply, shortages of accessories and games, or high-profile hardware failures, delays of launch games, or even just consoles launched with much more limited functionality than their predecessors had managed to develop over their lifespan. of life. At the best of times, console launches can be nightmarish to coordinate
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2020 is not the best of times. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic has thrown an unprecedented wrench into almost every part of the supply chain – manufacturing is affected, shipping is affected, retail is affected, even marketing has had to be hastily improvised, in the absence of those glitzy, glamorous, and grandiose launch events that consoles typically have. The challenges of even managing the supply for existing hardware in a COVID world are so immense – just look at the ongoing shortages for the Nintendo Switch each month, despite Nintendo being made and more units supplied. that any other console has received in history other than the Wii – honestly, a postponement until next year would have been understandable. People would of course have been disappointed, but given COVID everyone would have to have why the consoles had been delayed (well, almost everyone. I’m sure some lunatics somewhere would have taken their pitchforks and sent death threats to Sony and Microsoft, like the well-adjusted individuals that they are).
The really impressive thing here is that Sony and Microsoft haven’t budged – they’ve launched their consoles amid this pandemic, amid the biggest disruption the global supply chain has ever seen. And to be clear, these console launches in and of themselves are significantly more complex than, say, the Xbox One and PS4 launches. The two consoles each have two SKUs, which means double the coordination needed for R&D, manufacturing, marketing and retail.
Another thing worth highlighting is the general stability of these new machines at launch. While the launch hardware always has more issues than the hardware that follows – remember the flickering launch PS4s or the self-scratching Switch docks? – Right now the PS5 and Xbox Series X appear to be remarkably free of large-scale glitches or errors. Sure, we’ve had a few isolated reports of Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 console bricks, but there isn’t a widespread epidemic of hardware or software failures, which is typically characteristic of every new console launch. The fact that Sony and Microsoft have managed to coordinate quality assurance equally well, on two SKUs each, in an environment that places severe restrictions on what they can and cannot do, speaks volumes for the efforts that have been made. had to be deployed to ensure the launch of these consoles and that they launch well.
There are obviously a few issues – the supply is, as you might expect, extremely limited (which means scalpers are having a blast, and it’s not even clear if it will be possible. for someone to walk into a store and get a new console for themselves this year), for example; The Xbox Series X launched without any major flagship games (or really, no “launch games” in the traditional sense), as COVID delayed the development of Infinite halo, which was originally slated to be the flagship title of the console. PS5 owners report minor bugs, such as their controllers not charging from certain USB ports. But there is nothing even remotely at the same level as, for example, Switch docks that scratched their screens.
I know what some of the video game audiences are like, so I know that expecting people to put their consoles aside and just enjoy their games and support success is a long way. I know in the years to come the Xbox and PlayStation are going to be put to the test and benchmarked against every possible (and inconceivable) metric (with a little Nintendo for good measure to boot). And, of course, the PS5 and Xbox Series X are going to be the champions of the next series of console wars, because that’s unfortunately one thing – but before we inevitably get to that, I just think we can – and should – take a little bit to put that bias aside, and just appreciate the fact that Sony and Microsoft have both managed to deliver more complex console launches than usual in the midst of an unprecedented global crisis – and that they’ve managed to do it better than most console launches have been in the past.
So congratulations to PlayStation and Xbox, and thank you for giving us all a much-needed respite this year, when it would have been easy, acceptable, and, even expected, for things to fall behind schedule. May this be a sign of a next generation of smooth and successful games, in which all players and all platforms thrive alike.
Note: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of GamingBolt as an organization and should not be attributed to them.
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