Game economics (was Re: The good old days of tape players)

I would hazard putting forth the view that a "cycle" exists in gaming where consoles dominate a few years, then take a nose dive, and computer based gaming dominates, repeat. Video games have some powerfull points pro and con. Pro Dedicated hardware, massive sales, and low priced consoles. Con Low priced consoles mean hardware budgets are TIGHT, serious lack of talent (ie lets do Donkey Kong one more time), no third party innovation, 3 dozen different games isn't a lot choose from, Long product revision cycles (ala 3 years vs 6 months). TV based products have limits that PC based does not. I can play most N64 games on a moderate PC, most playstation games on a newer G3 mac. When you look at just what a current generation machine can do, I'm not sure how much all those bells and whistles will really gain a person in actual game play on the new consoles.