John Carmack: Sony likely to kick off next console generation

John Carmack has been in the news a lot lately. Most recently, the id Software co-founder shared some of his thoughts on who he thinks will be the first to roll out an eighth-generation console. His bet? Sony will be out of the gate first.

John Carmack has been in the news a lot lately. Most recently, the id Software co-founder shared some of his thoughts on who he thinks will be the first to roll out an eighth-generation console. His bet? Sony will be out of the gate first.

In an interview with CD Action, Carmack explained that it seems likely that Sony will release a new console first to make sure that the head start the Xbox 360 got won’t be a factor again:

The whole jockeying for who’s going to release the first next gen console is very interesting and pretty divorced from the technical side of things. Whether Sony wants to jump the gun to prevent the same sort of 360 lag from happening to them again seems likely.

As developers, we would really like to see this generation stretch as long as possible. We’d like to see it be quite a few more years before the next gen console comes out, but I suspect one will end up shipping something earlier rather than later.

Carmack also said that he expects at least one console geared solely toward digital distribution (in other words, no optical media) would be released.

I think there’s a decent chance that one of the next gen consoles will be without optical media… the uptake rates of people who have broadband connects surprised everyone this generation. It’s higher than what the core publishers and even the first party people expected.

Translations courtesy of Edge Online.

• Pachter predicts: this is the last consoles race; analysts disagree
• Microsoft: this generation of consoles will have longer life cycle
• Ubisoft: next generation of consoles coming 2012

Via CD Action