Claim: The PS3 will ultimately 'win' this generation because of Blu-ray

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This is hard to think, and even harder to say, but if the editor of Next-Generation says it, I’m inclined to believe it: the PlayStation 3 will be the ultimate winner of this generation. And, like in an academic paper, the author actually defines what “winning” means (and what it doesn’t mean).

First, “winning” isn’t what it used to be: no one console will be an unmistakable dominant force; no one console will “fail.” Rather, with this generation, all the players (Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo) will go home with some sort of prize. Nintendo will have “won” in opening up the video game market to a whole different group of people, for example. Microsoft may end up making some money off its Xbox Live Marketplace. And Sony has Blu-ray.

Come on, you knew it was going o boil down to that, right?

Right now, Blu-ray on the PS3 is irrelevant. Early adopters are the only ones interested in upgrading their, for everyone else, “good enough” DVD collection. High-def is still a luxury to most people. But as these holdouts upgrade their TVs and DVD players, they’ll look closely at the PS3. A Blu-ray player from a brand I trust that just so happens to play games too? Sign me up!

That’s the idea, at least.

There’s a few other things working for the PS3. Its game library this year looks to be better than last year’s, with the likes of Metal Gear and Little Big World appealing to the hardcore and mallcore, respectively. (I really just wanted to use the word “mallcore in a post here.) PlayStation Home might actually take off, or at least it deserves to take off.

Look for the PS3 to not suck nearly as much as it has these past few years. That much is certain.

Editor’s View: The PlayStation 3 Rebirth [Next Generation]