TechBulletin

2005 was a bit of a disappointment to many fans of stand alone video game consoles.  The expected release of the Sony platform Playstation 3 was cancelled, Nintendo was not even in the running and the Xbox 360 was tainted with a whole host of problems, from supply not meeting demand to the system not performing due to glitches.  This year looks to be the exact opposite.  With Microsoft moving forward with their personal music division and leaving the 360 to hold its own, there are only two major competitors in the market for the 2006 holiday season, Sony and Nintendo, both of whom will release their new systems within days of each other.

The second week of November will see the much anticipated release of the Sony Playstation 3 game console after many delays.  The company is confident that they have skirted all the possible problems that came with the 360 and plan to ship about one million of the new platforms by the end of the year.  Pre orders are being taken through most retailers but the supply will most likely dry up before the holidays arrive.  The secondary market will boom with this release as prices are expected to skyrocket within a week of the release.  The same concept held true for the 360 that was selling through many internet sites for as much as two thousand dollars.

Nintendo, who will release the much anticipated Wii system a mere two days after the Playstation 3 answer is set for center stage.  Though the new system is said to be state of the art it will come in at about half the price of all the competing systems.  Two hundred and fifty dollars is the expected price tag, making it the most affordable game system to be released by any company in the last five years.  This release will also give the company its strongest showing for titles that will be available at the sale time.  The first week will give the owners five titles to choose from, with an additional twenty five available by the end of December.

There are some changes being made to the controls for the game console as well.  The new breed of control is far more realistic in nature. The tennis game will have the player swinging the control as they would a live tennis racket and adding certain spins and such to the hit with a movement of the hand and angle of the controller.  This is a radical new concept that seems to be very popular through the test marketing and so on.  It also comes as an answer to the new live action games available through the 360 and so on.