First of all, I want to talk about graphics (I’m not quite sure that the word graphics would really apply to today anymore). Video games for the most part through history have been fueled by better and better graphics, and that has been one of the main things that have gotten peoples’ attention. Video Games seem to be reaching a plateau in graphics. Look at the Sony Playstation 3. It is supposed to have more than two times the graphics power of the Xbox 360, but both systems look almost identical in graphics. There isn't much else the gaming industry can do with graphics to progress the industry, except make hardware and software tweaking cater to help platforms keep track of more information at the same time (put more polygons in a character's face to show more of the realistic bends and motions). I think the only thing left in graphics that can help progress the video gaming industry would be Motion Capture (which greatly helps animation, which was one of the main factors for Nintendo and its games for the fun factor), and Artificial Intelligence (great example of this is in a new game for Xbox 360 called Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion). The only way to truly continue the progress of the Video Gaming Industry is with great original gameplay, not like hollywood and commercialism that newer games display. Most of the games I play, I rent and never buy them. That is because these games are short and sweet, and have no immersive gameplay to keep me playing. Just like going to the movie theater and watching a really good movie, but one that you wouldn’t want to watch again. There are only a few next-generation games I can say that have the gameplay I'm talking about and give me the desire to buy them, and those are games like Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, Project Gotham Racing 3 and a new title, "FEAR". It does come down to what a person likes however and one thing these days that help gameplay is online play. Refering to an Itunes Podcast from Gamespot.com (Designer Threads episode June 29, 2006 featuring Ron Gilbert), the Gaming Industry is not like the movie industry when it comes to Independent Producers. Look at a movie like “Napoleon Dynamite”. It was a movie made by an independent source for only $250,000 , but was a huge success. The same does not go for Gaming when it comes to Independent Developers. This is because people can see a difference between games made by Independent Developers and ones made by Huge Gaming Companies like Electronic Arts (which is actually a Third-Party game developer). Most gamers lose interest with independent developed games and get distracted by the “Big” games out there. When it comes to movies, you can’t tell the difference because a movie like “Napoleon Dynamite” looks the same as the next Hollywood movie that might cost over a million dollars. Movies is a media that people have gotten very used to and understand, so there is no need to make movies with special effects to be on the box office charts. They make movies in ways that they were made over two decades ago. People don’t understand video games like this, so Independent Video Game developers suffer, because games have unfortunately been tuned by technology. Xbox Live has done a good job supporting Independent Game Developers with the Xbox Live Arcade, and soon the Nintendo Wii might do the same. I don't know how it will be for new gamers that are starting their gaming with the next-generation games, but these are my thoughts, being a veteran gamer since the 80s with the original Nintendo NES and Sega Genesis. I think it is a good idea that the Nintendo Wii (new Nintendo) will let people download any and all games ever created for Nintendo and Sega, and that Xbox Live is already doing so. I think that it is great that the traditional games have not died and are coming back (like 80s music still playing on the radio). These are all my thoughts, and hopefully these thoughts will go out there on the World Wide Web and make some kind of difference if a very little one. I can understand that Video Games are an industry like any other, and the way they progress is out of my hands and in the hands of the people that deal with the money, but I can’t deny at least hoping for a future of better gameplay, just like the old days when I was a kid. -Thanks for listening, Greg My Website: www.myspace.com/tango_buster