“With software sales for traditional game consoles and PCs projected to reach $35 billion this year, one analyst believes a new Apple TV with a dedicated App Store could have a noticeable impact on the company’s bottom line,” Neil Hughes reports for AppleInsider.
“Rod Hall of J.P. Morgan is bullish on the prospect of a new Apple TV model rumored to debut at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference in June,” Hughes reports. “In a research note to investors issued Monday, a copy of which was provided to AppleInsider, he noted the combined console and PC gaming market is expected to sell $35 billion worth of software this year.”
“The analyst noted that the A8X chip found in the iPad Air 2 is capable of near PlayStation 3 quality graphics,” Hughes reports. “If Apple were to use that processor to power a next-generation Apple TV, the company could make a formidable splash and compete with the likes of Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo in the longstanding console market.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: This year’ WWDC is going to be verrry interesting!
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Gaming is a terrible idea. Even if Apple captures the *entire* gaming market it will just be another revenue failure like their $30 billion iPad product line.
/s
Make that at least 1 billion credit card holders that Apple will then have…!
I could see them doing great with various games on the ATV but without a proper controller and the limited horsepower of the previous generation consoles they will have a hard time taking over the core gaming market.
Then… why not create a proper controller?
They could very easily create a proper controller. Will still leave them in a position of a weaker console against the PS4 and Xbox One but really that would only affect AAA titles that command a premium in the market. There is a lot of casual and existing games out there that would probably sell great on an ATV.
The rumored ATV might turn out to be a weaker competitor to the existing console options. But it is also possible that Apple might put some serious processing and graphics horsepower into the new ATV. It is plugged into the wall, so Apple does not need to worry about battery life and can afford to spend some power on cooling, as well.
I don’t feel that Apple wants to go after the existing consoles with the ATV. If iTunes content and streaming is the big draw then going after the PS4 and XOne seems counterproductive since the cost of the hardware alone would jump considerably if they wanted to match the performance of the current generation of consoles.
It would change the target audience for the ATV too much in my opinion if they wanted to compete at the console high end.
Yeah, Apple has no chance of coming up with a better controller than the incumbents. These phone guys aren’t just going to come in here and show us how it’s done. They have never done anything like that before.
The controller is only one missing piece of the puzzle and easily solved but feel free stay clueless and rely on another BS quote if that’s all you got.
Nearly every major announcement that Apple has made in the past 5 years has involved working directly with third-party software and hardware developers to complete the full experience. It could be the same with gaming… Apple could already be working with third parties to create compliant wireless controllers.
It will be interesting to see what happens. Apple has been doing great on graphics in its A-series SoCs. Perhaps the new ATV will host an A9X?
I am not sure what you mean by the “core” gaming market. Mobile devices/operating systems are increasingly important in the gaming market. Consoles may have “limited horsepower” relative to Windows PCs, but consoles can produce incredibly realistic HD graphics. And I believe that consoles like the PS4 and X-Box One have captured a fairly significant piece of the FPS gaming market. My guess is that fewer and fewer people are shelling out the money for “gaming PCs” in recent years. Am I wrong?
By core gamers I mean the people who want to play the latest and most advanced AAA titles and are willing to spend the money to do it. The consoles absolutely compete with the PC on many levels and offer a great gaming experience that is often on par with PC builds of games.
I agree with MDN I think WDC will be very interesting. I would LOVE to see a big update to TV.
My family and I just got back from Spring break, we always take our TV with us when we go on vacation – however this year my Children wanted to take the ROKU. Their logic was we get Netflix + Amazon (we have Prime) and can rent movies over Amazon, with the TV we only get Netflix and can buy movies over Apple’s purchase library. They have more entertainment choices with the Roku…I far prefer the TV interface but its hard to argue with their logic. Apple needs to innovate or it will be gathering more and more dust.
Why not stick TWO A8X chips in the box, charge an extra $10-20 and be done with it!
Having a single multicore CPU is very different than two multicore CPUs trying to share the work. Not a simple as “being done with it”. 🙂
Don’t confuse the ‘intelligencia’ lurking in the dark corners of the internet with facts. This is a fact free forum and any stupid lame idea goes here.
Thank god I am not the only one who sees this. I have been saying this since last WWDC. If Apple does make this move, it will kill Nintendo. They are half dead already. And if I was Apple I would buy them. They have the gaming experience and some valuable franchises. Then with this combo along with PrimeSence They can put a hurt on Sony and Microsoft. Only a hurt because it will cut into their bottom line. Apple already has game made by EA and that is a good part of both of Sony and Microsoft catalog. Most of all since Microsoft is planning to put windows 10 on the Xbox. That is confirmed. I got some inside info on that one. And if they add the TV programming in Sept. and try to put it between Sling’s $20 and Sony’s $50 subscriptions that will be better. Yes MacDailyNews This will be a very, very interesting WWDC and I wish I can get a ring side seat. I just hope and pray that Apple will follow through on this one.
Apple buying Nintendo makes SO MUCH SENSE (from a high level point of view) but I don’t think they’ll do it.
If you think about it, when entering the video game market they could either start from scratch (like Microsoft did and I think they STILL haven’t made any money from this decision) or make a deal with Nintendo, Microsoft or Sony or buy out one of them.
In terms of buying out Sony and Microsoft you would get a lot of bloatware hardware or software that Apple don’t want or need, with Nintendo they would only get Games Console hardware and software experts.
In terms of making a deal Microsoft or Sony wouldn’t really have much to offer, Nintendo could offer their games, but they probably wouldn’t be willing to do that for any reason except a merger/buy out because Apple would be a direct competitor.
Entering the video game market makes a HUGE amount of sense for Apple in terms of conquering the TV space because video games are still better experiences on consoles on TVs than simply on touch screens because of the custom hardware and the immersive nature of full on console games that makes them so much more powerful.
Merging with Apple makes JUST as much sense for Nintendo, because Apple would be able to offer best in world hardware expertise to keep their consoles ahead of the competition technically (something they haven’t always focussed on and have lost out to the other companies because of). Because finally translating their games onto Apple hardware is easy thanks to Metal, because FaceTime and Messages could make in game messaging far more intuitive when they’re connected with all of your phone contacts and not just your Nintendo friends.
Because by merging with Apple they would be able to justify selling Nintendo games where appropriate on iPhone and iPad for immediate cash as well as on future Nintendo/Apple built consoles and because Apple store would provide a huge number of extra customers introduced to Nintendo’s software.
In both cases they would benefit from bringing two incredibly loyal fan-bases together and heck they even have a shared love of great music.
However, you do have to remember that there are two language barriers between Nintendo and Apple, the first being Japanese/English, and the second being the software languages used (C++ vs Objective C/Metal/Swift) – although obviously with Metal, that second barrier has been made much much less.
And there’s another reason that Apple might want to be careful about buying Nintendo… Imagine how much longer people would hang around in Apple stores if they could play video games in them! 😉
Yes, gaming on the TV will be great!
Last year at WWDC the third party controller builders were asked to build one for apple. Maybe this will be the year for the App store on the TV
Can’t wait for this.
ATV needs to be a gaming center if they want to simplify TV down to one device. I already hate going back and forth from our Comcast box to ATV. And Apple, please include an input, for outboard flash.USB or whatever is best at the time.