Sony, it seems, is gambling on multi-connectivity becoming the new rock & roll of home electronics. This is a pretty good bet: the concept of an all-in-one digital box that can do everything from playing movies and music to running videogames and decoding digital TV signals seems to be the way things are going - Motorola, for example, are currently working on their own product along these lines, named Streamaster, incorporating Nuon technology.

Sega on the other hand, gave Dreamcast a proprietary CD format, effectively isolating it form the rest of technology. Not very smart. The PlayStation 2 even supports new digital interconnectivity standards so players will be able to hook up a keyboard, modem, printer and mouse to the thing, just like a PC!

Ah yes, the PC. Sony have their beady eye on that as well. By comparing the PS2, not with rival consoles, but with the latest Pentium machines (as Kutaragi did at the March announcement), by making the PlayStation peripheral-friendly, and by including backwards compatibility, the head guys at SCE are effectively adopting a computer rather than console business model - they are pitching the machine up there with the big boys, competing against Microsoft, Intel et al, rather than Sega and Nintendo.

In short, they are altering the course of interactive entertainment - creating a hybrid Frankenstein's console - part movie player, part games console, part computer - which they can thrust into every possible consumer electronics niche. This is impressive, ground-breaking stuff. Surely, the best way to corner a market is to totally redefine it in your own image?


But wait: 10 reasons why PlayStation 2 could fail.

Nothing is ever certain in the videogame industry. Although it may look as though Sony have a tight grasp on things, there is still time to snatch disaster from the jaws of success. Dreamcast, after all, is very much alive and kicking. Although it may not have the sheer power of PlayStation 2 it does has several months to capture a slice of the market before Sony's new machine comes out.

Back in 1989, when Nintendo dominated the videogame industry, Sega released their technically inferior Mega Drive a year before the Super Nintendo, and managed to secure a massive chunk of the 16bit market. If it happened then, it can happen now - especially as Dreamcast already has a promising list of forthcoming titles including Powerstone, Blue Stinger and the possibly staggering Shenmue.