Bell$ and Whi$tle$

You remember when mobile phones used to just do one thing: be a phone? Then they could text. Then they could take photos. Then they could connect to the internet.
People pay hundreds for the latest iPhone, which does a ton of things on top of being a phone, and which is why I DON'T OWN ONE!
I carry a phone because I might need to make a call.
Don't think that I'm some sort of Luddite that takes offence at all the bells and whistles they bolt onto the little boxes. I'm not. I just have no use for them, and so, I don't want to pay for them.
I can go into my local phone emporium and pick up a device that is a phone and only a phone for £19.99 (or even less!). No camera, no internet access, just a crappy little green screen that displays a number.
It's a phone, nothing more.

Which brings me to the next generation of consoles.
As far back as I have desired them, they have cost around the £100 – £200 mark at launch, even when they started doing things they didn't need to, like play DVDs/Blue Ray.
I bought them to play games. That's it. It doesn't need access to social networks. It doesn't need a camera. It doesn't need to play movies or TV series. The only reason I ever hooked my 360 up to Xbox Live was so I could play Team Fortress 2 (Halo fans: this is what a real multiplayer shooter looks like).
Next gen consoles will do all of that, whether we like it or not. And you'll be paying for it.

Xbox One: £429
PS4: £349

F**k. That.

I want to play games on my games console. That's all. I'll obviously need to get on-line with the thing to patch all the shoddy, incomplete software that'll be released onto it, but beyond that, I just want to play games. I do not want bells and whistles on my hardware, so I'm sure as sh*t not going to pay for them.

In my eyes, the PS4 appears the more desirable unit. It's cheaper, you can play second-hand games on it without issue and all my favourite game franchises are released on all platforms, but there's still no way I'm buying one at launch. They rush these things, now. In the past, they used to take their time and iron out the kinks. Now they're caught up in the panic that they might not hit the shelves before or at the same time as their rivals. With such insanely complex tech and supporting systems, that makes devastating flaws more likely to surface.

The console on my "to buy" list for 2013 is probably….the SNES.
Never owned one. I was a SEGA fanboy in the 90s, back when every console had its own unique roster of games, so there's a swathe of titles I've never played.
Yeah. I think I'll get a SNES, because retro-gaming has never looked more appealing.