During an interview posted yesterday with Eurogamer, Epic Games Vice President Mark Rein spoke quite a bit on the subject of the industry and where things in the video game business are going. Of note are a few of the following excerpts. During one part, he reiterates the notion that instead of bringing an entirely new console to market, Microsoft will be using Project Natal to prolong the life of the Xbox 360, and Sony will likely be doing the same with their motion controllers for the PlayStation 3. And part of that is due to a number of people not having yet made the HD transition yet. "Over half the users who played Gears of War 2 so far do not have HDTVs," he says. "…of the systems that are out there now, the majority of them aren't plugged into HDTVs. So there's no way we're ready for the PlayStation 4 or the Xbox Whatever." Moving to another topic, Eurogamer asked Rein what he thought of Activision CEO Bobby Kotick's recent threat of discontinuing support of the PlayStation 3, due to its lower install base when compared to the Wii and Xbox 360. Rein, who felt it was a weird comment, was asked if he had a sense of understanding when he read it, or if he simply thought "What a nob." "People talk about, 'The Wii has run away with this generation,' Rein replies. "I don't think that's true. Nintendo's made a lot of money and the software developers on that platform are scratching for seconds." He continues, "Microsoft is clearly a big market for third-party games. PS3 has a smaller installed base, but it's still millions of users. I'm sure Bobby still sold three, four, five million copies of Modern Warfare." "I think he's just frustrated in that he hasn't sold seven or eight million, like he has on 360. The truth is Sony has had a difficult year and I think they had to do what they had to do to try to be profitable. They have their own financial issues to solve and lowering the price of the console would probably have made their situation worse. They will get around to it in their own good time. If you're willing to look at this as a long-term play, they're going to be just fine." You can find the entire interview here, which includes some rather funny exchanges about Gears of War 3, Cliff Bleszinski and his public persona (and whether Mark Rein should become "Marky R"), the Unreal Engine, and more. I encourage you to check it out, if only for the laughs.
