Well good morning to you too, sunshine
There's a simple rule I go by with game systems... if you put the capability in, don't decide later to take it out. PS3's backward compatibility, the Genesis' headphone jack and volume control, the DS' ability to play GBA games... they were all there, working fine and quite appreciated by people. These were nice features that weren't really in the way of anything to warrant removal.
That may seem unimportant to some, but I figure if you include a capability in a given system, leave it in for that system's duration and official redesigns.
Bleck- I'm not talking about comparing one company's product to a different company's similar product. Samsung isn't making their own version of Wii to compete with Nintendo's. I'm talking about one single system being redone multiple times by its parent company during its rather finite 5-8 year life span. A system competing with itself basically.
To use the DS again, there are four models, all with different additions and subtractions. Some minor, some quite major, but it's all the same basic system with different features added. Why make one version for launch, then another version with improvements, then add more to it again, and finally add more once more? Why not make the system once, leave it with it's feature set and let it ride? Making it more compact or drain the battery less is fine and understandable. But repeatedly adding more traits and adjusting others?
I should never have to say, "this year's 360 has more features than last year's," but it's almost at that point. In my mind, a video game system shouldn't get the same yearly/bi-yearly updates and upgrades that a car, microwave or stereo line would. It might be the way the manufacturing world works, but that doesn't make it sit any better with me because it's already a part of so many things. Does it have to be a part of gaming too?
Give the game system a feature set and save any additional things for either an add-on, or the next generation system. To do otherwise just feels like you're pissing on the feet of those who jumped on board at the start, while handing something better to those who came after them.
Anyway, those are my thoughts on it. Agree or disagree, hopefully I made them clearly enough.