14 DAY TRIAL // Bobby Kotick, the Chief Executive Officer of Activision Blizzard, arguably the biggest videogame publisher in the world, spoke at the Deutsche Bank Securities Technology Conference in San Francisco for just 45 minutes but the ripples of his talking points might be felt for quite some time. In addition to tackling the non-console future of Guitar Hero and the broad appeal of the next Blizzard-made MMO, Kotick also said a few things about the future of gaming consoles and when they might arrive.
He mentioned that the usual practice is for console manufacturers like Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo to talk to game publishers and to show them specs about their upcoming hardware about two years before they are actually released.
Kotick said that, at the moment, none of the major console makers had offered any information on new stuff, be it the Xbox 720, the PlayStation 4 or the Wii HD. The CEO of Activision Blizzard believes that this is an indication that all the companies are more interested in reducing the manufacturing costs of the current gen devices and in turning a profit on sales and the price cuts can be taken as further proof of this trend.
Even if there are no clear plans for a new generation of hardware, Activision is getting ready for it. The company has been working on a new technology that can be used to render the movement of the body in real time. Kotick claims that the Activision tech can make players become more attached to the characters in games, creating emotional links, which were not previously possible.
Apparently, the real time rendering tech will be usable before the next generation of console arrives but only games that are now entering development will be able to take advantage of it.