We can rebuild him, We have the technology

At a recent economic circle jerk forum an Activision rep blurted out something along the lines of, “Don't worry about that whole console business soon we're going to provide our games without consoles", with allusions cast to pie in the sky ideas like OnLive. Now Activision are responsible for a reasonable number of douche baggy things recently, listed after the jump, but the bottom line here is claiming to have the ability to sell games without consoles in the near future is just plain dumb. The only realistic outcome I can see from Activision's little speel is that we can expect to see an increase in the number of instrument and rhythm games that you plug straight into your TV for some low polygon count stereo sound only limited fun.

Most of Activisions recent douche decisions are centered around there supremely smug, Fanta pants CEO Robert 'Bobby' Kotick but the whole company has certainly earned the title of 'the new EA'. Here's a hit list:

• Kotick famously said to EA after dropping Brutal Legend, Ghostbusters and a bunch of other games that they were no longer interested in games that: "don't have the potential to be exploited every year on every platform with clear sequel potential and have the potential to become $100 million franchises". Yeah, who needs originality anyway, sooo over rated.
• Despite saying this Activision then decided to try and block Brutal Legend from being developed claiming some tenuous financial hold on it after EA rescued it from oblivion.
• 'Threatened' Sony to lower their console price otherwise Activision would no longer support them. A transparent and supremely douche PR move, soon to be followed up with the 'they lowered the price because we threatened them' quotation drop in a future interview.
• Decided to charge above the generally accepted RRP for Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 just because, 'people would still buy it'. Yeah, way to support your consumer base.
• Dropped Kurt Cobain into Guitar Hero in what has to go down in history as one of the most awkward and uncomfortable sights in a video game ever.

Overall I'd be pretty happy if some dodgy book work saw the collapse of Activision. Sure there'd be some industry fall out, but I'm sure other publishers would fall over each other to acquire Infinity Ward (maybe not Treyarch though) and I think we've had enough musical games that don't even teach you how to read music.

More instresting than this faux announcement and Activision's general asshat behaviour is the resurgence of the whole idea of a multiplatform delivery of software and the question of why we even have a console war any way.

We don't have DVD player wars, or mobile phone conflicts, while there's the matter of LCD TV versus Plasma TV there's hardly thousands of millions of discussion threads where LCD fans question the sexual orientation of Plasma fans. There just isn't the retarded animosity, fanned to wildfire by the occasional drip feed of bile from one developer or another, that exists in gaming. The most asinine part of the whole thing is that in about five years it's probably not going to matter a toss.

Admittedly I'm crystal ball guessing here but it seems very likely that the only platform distinction in the future will be mobile gaming and home gaming. It's only a matter of time before we have a single console with all our games available to download directly to the machine, play until bored and then delete. It might be a coalition between a few big name companies or could be some pioneering company like Toshiba or Apple stepping up and saying we have a device that plays all those games you love and more. PC gamers may well have the last laugh as PC and console gaming evolve to become one and the same.

You want proof, well, tough, I'm making this up as I type, these are ruminations and speculations, a flexing of the fingers on my keyboard in time to my thoughts which are often too quickly distracted. For instance, now I've forgotten all about console wars and want a bacon sandwich. Ah, the divine chaos of genius, I'm like Sherlock Holmes, and my Moriarity is a bacon sandwich, forever locked in a battle of wits until we plunge together over a waterfall.

Although if you really wanted some evidence of a one console future in five years and twisted my arm, which would be mean, and dangerous as I'm short tempered and larger than most people, I could point to each of the three consoles of our generation and perhaps suggest that you compare their various peripherals and functionality at launch to what they offer now and how they all seem to slowly creep towards a homogeneous format for everything they do. When you look at online download services, motion controllers and communication options across all three consoles they almost provide the same thing now, or are about it. Holiday season 2010 will probably see the PS3 clean up as the only console to stand apart with Bluray.

Of course I might be wrong, it's happened before.