I don't really feel the need for a new generation of consoles in the near future anyway. To be honest, I've yet to commit to purchasing any of the current generation. I have access to all three and I am still unconvinced that this generation marks a huge leap from the previous generation - motion control aside, obviously. To my eye it seems that there is little on the market that could not have been accomplished on the previous-gen machines, albeit in graphically inferior form. The leap in performance from the 32 and 64 bit systems to the PS2, xbox and Gamecube was very pronounced, but from that generation to this, less so.

I think we are reaching the stage where investment in console development won't be financially viable - as more and more people like myself find that they are reasonably content with how their games look as they are. Perhaps the commercial success of the wii reflects a move away from the traditional notion of a gamesplaying public hungry for their next big graphical fix towards a public eager for new forms of interface?

At heart, though, I still think I'm a graphics whore - but I'm also a cheapskate who needs to see where his money's gone - come and impress me with your pretty lights and colours, console makers! I want to be flabberghasted! Maybe I've just been spoilt...

Interesting article, one where I found myself muttering interjections at one paragraph only to find my concerns dealt with in the next. For me the concept of social reality in games is a sticky issue - yes we should ask these sort of questions, but quite simply without the technology to convincingly reconstruct society in games it remains a hypothetical issue. Do I want games to offer me the immersion afforded by realistic social interaction and situations? Yes up to a point, but that point is when a character I'm attempting to interact with looks blankly back at me or spouts out a handful of generic phrases... on second thought maybe that isn't too far from social reality already...