I'm glad that I'm not alone when it comes to interest in a book about video game console predecessors and prototypes. I'm undecided on which is the best kind of author for such a book. One the one hand, I'd like to see a book covering all of (or at least most of) the major hardware producers, so that would probably be best tackled by an independent author that would have to have access to the prototype vaults and key hardware developers at each company. That seems like an unlikely prospect. On the other hand, a book covering just a single company could be handled by the company itself, meaning that the material covered in the book could be much more detailed. However, a large part of hardware development involves reacting to one's competitors, so a deep examination of, say, the Super NES CD-ROM might feel incomplete without a similar review of the Sega CD. Either way, someone needs to get on this and write that book. Lately I've been reading The Greatest Sci-Fi Movies Never Made which chronicles the development hell cycles behind the unmade versions of the Spider-man, Superman, Alien, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, and Star Trek films which has really put me in the mood for more of these kinds of stories.
Speaking of prototype hardware, that rumor about the Sony PlayStation 3 take on the Nintendo Wii remote isn't going away. Sony obviously wants a piece of the casual gaming, motion controlling pie that Nintendo has managed to bake, and producing a remote of its own could be just the, um, pie knife needed to serve hungry gamers with some... OK, that analogy doesn't really work, but you see where I'm going with this. Does the possibility of a Wii remote style of controller for the PS3 interest you? Let's hear your thoughts.
