I love Nintendo. I really do. I love what they represent in the world of gaming. It's such a unique and venerable company that most long-time gamers can't help but root for them to succeed.

And succeed they have over the past couple years with their flagship Wii and their handheld DS Lite / DSi breaking sales records around the globe. The innovative, gesture-controlled style of gameplay that those consoles brought to the masses were well accepted by the mainstream, and their hardware sales and first-party software sales took off.

Read the rest of this post at the ThreeSpace Blog.

Sony was the undisputed king of the last generation of consoles, selling over 100 million PlayStation 2 systems and a mess of games to go along with it. This happened, ironically, despite the fact that the PS2 was the least capable from a technology perspective. Multiplatform games typically looked better on the XBOX or GameCube. Determined not to have the laggard in this round, Sony threw everything but the kitchen sink into the PlayStation 3, ignoring one of the elements that made the PS2 so compelling in the first place-low cost.

By all accounts, the PlayStation was shipped anywhere from six months to a year late. This not only allowed Microsoft to build up a huge lead in its installed base of XBOX 360 owners, but it forced many game developers to rethink their plans. Games like Assasin's Creed and Grand Theft Auto IV went from being PlayStation exclusives to shipping on the rival 360 as well. The high profile God of War II was shipped for the older PlayStation 2. And Metal Gear Solid 4 still hasn't shipped. Would that situation be different had the PS3 shipped in February 2007 or November 2006? Perhaps.

The PlayStation name still has tremendous cache with developers, so despite a small installed base for PS3s the system still gets considerable software support. And Sony has rewarded its faithful developers of PS3 exclusives with a spate of advertising during this past holiday season. Despite rumors that writing games for the PS3 was considerably more difficult than on the PS2 (or even the 360), most major developers have managed to pull off the same programming tricks that they use on the 360 or on Windows. To this point, in fact, there seems to be more parity between Sony's and Microsoft's systems than in the last generation in terms of raw horsepower. That could change as we reach the end of this cycle, but for now, the question of which console is more powerful is still up for debate.

One of the huge selling points of the PS3 is its included Blu-ray drive. To date, at least five major studios have chosen to support that format over competing HD-DVD, giving Sony an edge over Toshiba in the format war. Unfortunately, adoption of HD television sets has been slower than anticipated, so Sony's gains are still over a pretty small piece of the total pie. And even among HDTV owners, many are still content with standard DVDs, making $300 players and $30 discs a tough sell.

The PlayStation Network continues to grow and expand, and even though its no match for XBOX Live at this point, it could become one if Sony's idea for Home ever comes to fruition. In the meantime, Sony continues to add lots of movie trailers to the PSN, but no movies, a curious omission for a company that controls a movie studio. It's reminiscent of IBM's refusal to sell OS/2 on their own PCs in the 90s. And we all know what happened to OS/2.

Having redesigned and reduced the price on the PS3 a couple of times now, Sony has moved from the high-end, elite space toward the space occupied by Microsoft's 360-hardcore gamers with some cheddar to spend. With fewer exclusive titles so far, the decision between the two boils down to loyalty (i.e. fanboyism) or preference. But it looks like each platform will have the same libraries with a few high-end exclusives on either side.

Like Microsoft and Nintendo, Sony has a second platform in play with the PSP, and yet a third if you count the PS2. The PSP was introduced as a high-end gamer's handheld, offering a level of gaming never before seen in a portable form factor. It also has lots of non-gaming functionality from playing music and video to surfing the web. It was the precursor to the PS3, but it had a price that was palatable to mainstream gamers and MP3 listeners. Despite the fact that the UMD format didn't take off for movies (thanks again to DVD-like pricing), the PSP game library has shaped up nicely. The PS2 continues to sell to new console owners and last-gen holdouts. There hasn't been a PS2 title worthy of envy since God of War II came out.

Will Sony win this generation of the console competition? It seems unlikely. Despite having finally gotten on track with the PS3, the late start has put them way behind their competition, and the gap only gets wider with each passing month. But even if the PS3 doesn't gain the largest installed base, it will continue to attract good games just because of its pedigree. Sony's gambit with Blu-ray drives may still pay off too, which is certainly a nice consolation prize if you can't be on top of the gaming pile.

Since Microsoft was first out of the gate in this generation of home consoles, we'll start by taking a look at them. Microsoft's business analysts crunched the numbers and determined that the first manufacturer to sell 10 million consoles always won the console war. That may still be the case in this generation, but the definition of "winning" may have changed dramatically from five or ten years ago.

Microsoft's early lead has undoubtedly allowed them to establish a foothold with a solid customer base that will be hard to knock out. This is great news for XBOX 360 owners; there seem to be far fewer PlayStation exclusive games, particularly among blockbuster AAA titles. Quite the contrary, in fact, many great games like Gears of War and Mass Effect have only been on Microsoft's platforms so far.

Two of Microsoft's core strengths are its developer tools and it's online network. Through the use of low-cost, widely available, and generally excellent tools for developers, Microsoft managed to turn Windows into the de facto operating system for PCs, and they're hoping that strategy can strike gold again with consoles. With their XNA framework they seem to have the most comprehensive strategy for developers, and they're the only ones who have made any tools available for the masses (i.e. non-professional developers).

The real jewel in Microsoft's crown, however, is XBOX Live. It is without a doubt the best multiplayer gaming service around, bar none (and yes, that includes PCs). Many gamers complain about the cost of the service, particularly given that Sony's PlayStation Network is free for all PlayStation 3 owners, but Microsoft's matchmaking services are top-notch, and the service is pretty doggone reliable. In addition, Microsoft has the best non-gaming content offerings this side of iTunes, with downloadable TV shows and movies available for rent or purchase, many of them in high definition.

Microsoft has an enviable lineup of games in it's 360 library, and many of those are XBOX-exclusives. They still appeal mostly to the traditional "hardcore" gamer though, and despite recent attempts to appeal to a more casual audience with trivia games and simplified controllers, Microsoft won't be eroding Nintendo's expanding customer base anytime soon.

Microsoft could have the first console to drop below the $200 mark (yes, even before Nintendo), and if that happens, watch out-consoles will fly off the shelves at an unprecedented rate as PlayStation 2 and XBOX holdouts jump into the current-gen waters. Right now Microsoft has the highest attach rate, but they would certainly love to double their customer base.

Like all of the Big Three, Microsoft has a second gaming platform in play with Games for Windows. PC gaming, while not as strong as it was in its heyday, has held steady and resisted premature predictions of its demise. With the Games for Windows branding, the cross-platform XNA framework to ease porting between Windows and the XBOX 360, and bringing the Live online service to Windows, Microsoft has shown that it is committed to making the Windows platform viable. And why wouldn't they? Many gaming innovations take place on the PC first before they migrate to the consoles, and with the 360 having the shortest distance from PC development, Microsoft has every reason to want that trend to continue.

Will Microsoft win this generation of console competition? If "win" means selling the most total games or having the most loyal fan base, then maybe. If it means selling the most consoles and establishing 80% market share, then it's highly unlikely. But there's little doubt anymore that Microsoft is a serious player in the gaming market, and with their successes on the XBOX 360, they seem poised to survive this round and make it into the next.

And so begins a new year for the gaming industry, a chance for each company to look back on the successes and failures of 2007 while making plans for total industry domination in 2008. As gamers, it means that the first full calendar year in with all five current consoles is behind us, making head-to-head comparisons a bit more fair. No more "but the Wii/PS3 have only been out for a few months" excuses.

Over the next few days, I'm going to talk about the state of the Big Three console manufacturers-Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft. Each of them has something to be proud of over the past twelve months. They all have some shortcomings. I'll talk about that in more detail in the coming days. But what impresses me about this generation thus far is the parity that has been achieved by the Big Three.

In the last generation, Sony was the undisputed king on consoles, and before that Nintendo wore the crown. Many wondered whether the market would even support three companies for years at a time. And yet here we are with a balance between them that, while not completely steady, could hold for a while.

This is partly because the market has segmented somewhat, without all three companies going after essentially the same gamer as was characteristic of the last generation. Nintendo best exemplifies this trend, choosing to make a less costly console with a control scheme that appeals to the masses. Sony pulled out all the stops to make the PS3 your do-it-all box, while Microsoft continues to integrate the XBOX 360 with other parts of your digital life. It makes for a very interesting dynamic between the three, and though it means that there are weaknesses in everyone's strategy, it also means that there's some legitimate choice for the first time in a while.

So while each company tries to find ways to increase its customer base and/or market share in 2008, I'll start out by taking a look at where they all stand now. That might give us some insight into what plans they have for the near future. Or it might just start a flame war. Who knows.

The new PlayStation 3 firmware that includes the software for Stanford University's Folding@Home project has been released. And setting it up reminded me of the choice I had to make at the DMV on whether or not to become an organ donor. It seems like a noble cause, but there was some nagging feeling I had in the back of my mind about whether or not to volunteer for it.

The Folding@Home project is not only a scientific marvel, but a technical one. It is perhaps the most ambitious distributed computing project ever devised. Its findings could revolutionize modern medicine by increasing our understanding of the human genome. What's not to like?

And yet, I had questions about it. Will this thing suck up all my network bandwidth? Will my games slow down while I'm playing? Will it monitor my gaming habits and send them back to some Master Database? How much extra electricity will I be using by leaving my PlayStation 3 on while I'm not gaming? Will it in any way limit my ability to enjoy my PlayStation 3?

But the benefits seemed to outweigh my concerns and paranoia, so this past weekend I went ahead and installed it. The setup was pretty painless. There were no inputs to make and no options to configure. I just had to accept the license agreement and tha was it. And then it was up and running.

In its default mode, it shows a rotating map of the northern hemisphere showing locations where folding is being done. Naturally, most major urban centers are well represented. Los Angeles, New York, Seattle, Chicago, Atlanta, Boston, and Tokyo are all shown with bright yellow dots over their locations. Press a button on the controller, and up comes a small window with an image of the protein being worked on. I have no idea what mystical calculations are going on behind the scenes, but the molecular representation shakes and shimmies, going through rapid preterbations like a cell in a petri dish. There are a few options here to change the look of the molecule, but they're strictly esoteric.

Each "work unit" as it's called takes about eight hours to complete, so even running around the clock the PlayStation 3 will only report its results back about three times per day. So there's little consequence to your broadband Internet connection. So far as I can tell, the application only runs when you tell it to run, so you'd have to quit out to play a game anyway. (Fortunately, your progress will be saved and calculations will pick up where they left off after you quit.) So my enjoyment and games are unaffected.

I also realized that I'm not as diligent about turning off the console as I would like to believe. I may routinely forget to shut my PS3 off after I answer the phone, or if my children start making too much noise or anything happens to distract me. Once I get pulled away, I may not get back to the console for hours even if I expect to get back in a few minutes. So leaving the console on intentionally to do some good work should be an easy call.

As it turns out, the Folding project has been pretty harmless while running on my PS3. The only downside I've seen so far is that it causes the PlayStation 3 to work hard, a lot harder than any game I've played to date. The system heats up and the fan blows at a pretty high rate. It's not as loud as the XBOX 360's DVD drive, but it is a noticeable difference, especially without the sound of a game to drown it out.

I've also learned that there are Folding clients for Windows, Linux, and MacOS, so I may put clients on my PCs (some of which are always on) in order to help contribute to the project. In fact, it's an easier call to make on the PCs if only because I don't leave them on by accident.

So I'm officially part of the project now. While I've been writing, the PlayStation 3 has completed about 30% of its current work unit, with about two hours to go before it is completed. Seeing the difference that the addition of an army of PS3s has made to the project is impressive, and I'm proud to have been a small part of that. It certainly seems that my fears were exaggerated if not unmerited. It was just like the DMV all over again.

Oh, and I did sign up to be an organ donor. :)

Hardware sales were way up in year-over-year comparisons in both the US and Canada. Leading the charge in hardware was Nintendo, with it's Wii and DS systems forming a potent one-two punch. Both systems were consistently sold out, and I suspect they could have sold even more units had they been in stock in most stores.

The XBOX 360 continues to sell at a steady pace as more gamers decide that the games are finally compelling enough for them to take the plunge. In Canada, XBOX 360 games took three of the top ten positions on the sales charts for February, while in the US said games took half those ten slots. The XBOX 360's attach rate seems to be growing steadily.

Sony's PlayStation 3 is still trying to get its legs so that it can catch up with the other guys. Granted, many of Sony's woes are Sony's own doing, but all they can do now is wait for compelling games to arrive. Virtua Fighter 5 and Motorstorm are good additions to the PS3's anemic library, but I doubt that they're enough to drive PS3 sales on their own. God of War II could have been such a driver, but of course, it's only on the PS2; they simply couldn't do the volume they'd want on the PS3 at this point.

Nonetheless, it was a good month for the industry as a whole. It will be interesting to see how the large influx of non-traditional gamers into the market will affect game sales and development decisions a year or two down the line. If Nintendo has its way, we could see a point where games like Halo and GTA are being eclipsed in sales by games like Wii Play and Rayman Raving Rabbids!

I've been kicking this idea of doing a blog around for a while now. I haven't committed to the idea because I don't know if I'll have time to keep it up even if I do start it. But it's a new year so I guess I'll give it a shot. My first act is to actually set up my consoles and my PC for gaming purposes. I can't really write about games if I'm not in a position to play them, now can I?