As much of the Internet has reported, there are two new videogame systems coming out this month. At Kill Screen, we’ve decided to look past the Playstation 4 and Xbox One—“next gen” is, to us, a little played out—and taken a look at the next next generation. Below, a comprehensive report.
X-Bot Infinity
In the past, back when the air was breathable and sunshine didn’t hurt, consumers typically needed to chose which products they wished to consume. Coca Cola or Nike? McDonalds or NyQuil? America or nausea? This was often stressful and always tedious, and no one liked it very much. Thankfully, Microsoft has found a way around the process with a strategy so proactive it transcends the traditional boundaries of company and consumer. Look around your living room. Is there a box under your television where there was no box before? Of course there is. Does it gleam with its own eldritch light? Of course it does. You are now the proud owner of an X-Bot Infinity Personalized Entertainment Device. You have always been the proud owner of an X-Bot Infinity Personalized Entertainment Device. Please do not cheapen the relationship by asking how much this costs.
During the initial period of adjustment, the X-Bot Infinity will observe your viewing and listening habits, judging you when your taste is inappropriate or inefficient. Once the system has taken a measure of your personality by filming you with the infrared cameras which have been surreptitiously installed in every room in your apartment, it will make decisions based on your height, weight, and genetic tendency towards disease. It will process these decisions, and somewhere within five minutes and six months of your becoming aware of the system, the X-Bot will emerge from its metal cocoon and take its true form: a cybernetic being designed to fulfill your every entertainment need, although nothing creepy please, there’s a warranty to consider.
The X-Bot will quickly take control of your DVR, selecting a viewing diet for the next year of programs that will provide you with a richer, more satisfying life than that season pass for Mama’s Family ever could. While you sleep, the X-Bot while convert your video and music library into the electronic data stream, where any material not deemed sufficiently appropriate while be exchanged for store credit that the X-Bot will spend for you. If the X-Bot discovers any burned or copied DVRs, it will alert the authorities before flogging you and killing your pets.
When it comes to gaming, it’s hard to top the X-Bot’s hardware. With photo-realistic graphics, 3-D technology, surround sound, Smell-O-Vision, and jumble pads installed (for a moderate, non-optional fee) into the foundation of your building, you’ve never experienced anything quite like this. Unfortunately, no designer has yet met the challenge of taking full advantage of the system technical capacity, so for now, the X-Bot’s primary focus is as an all-purpose entertainment device that will, hopefully, at some point, possibly play games. Those games will be amazing, and will be immediately downloaded into your X-Bot as soon as they become available, provided the X-Bot believes you are worthy of them. The X-Bot is there for you. The X-Bot wants you to live up to your full potential. The X-Bot will do everything in its power to ensure that you are the person Microsoft needs you to be. The X-Bot wishes it didn’t have to be this way. If the X-Bot develops a face, and if that face is familiar, do not be alarmed. It will all happen painlessly while you are asleep.
PSILOVU
Man, remember when things were great? Remember when they were really great? Of course you don’t; our memories were consumed in the Great Blankness. But we suspect that at one point, things were a whole lot better than they are right now, and that’s what the PSILOVU is here for. Sony is cool, Sony is hip, and Sony understands what you need. Non-intrusive, consumer-friendly, desperate to please, and reasonably priced, the PSILOVU fulfill your every dream of what a gaming system could be, and if it doesn’t, it’s very sorry, and if you call the number right here, it will send a randomly selected employee to your home for you to dispose of as you please.
The PSILOVU takes its core design philosophy from previous iterations of the PS system. In order to purchase a PSILOVU, it is necessary to find the store where you bought your first video game. If that store does not exist, you will need to contact the descendants of the owners and parlay with them. Once installed, the system will ask you for a password; you must enter the name of the first person you ever truly loved, followed by a short essay about why they didn’t deserve you. The PSILOVU will approve of this essay, and if you make any grammatical mistakes, it will gently correct you, then immediately apologize for the corrections.
The PSILOVU system is a lumpy black rectangular shape; its corners come pre-scuffed, and one of its controllers is covered in electrical tape, presumably from that time when you were ten and got so angry that you threw it at the wall and it broke in two. Sometimes the system will not boot immediately. This is a feature which encourages you to get close to the machine, blow in its various hatches; pick it up and put it back down again; check the plugs; call your dad and see if he has any ideas. (If your father is dead, Sony will provide you with the number of a local assisted living facility.) If for any reason you chose to play games which require more than twenty minutes to complete, you will need to purchase a memory card and a save card. These cards will erase themselves at randomly selected intervals, and you will need to contact your best friend from high school, who will need to borrow his parents’ car to drive over and offer you a trade.
When it comes to gaming, it’s hard to top the PSILOVU’s hardware. With photo-realistic graphics, 3-D technology, surround sound, Smell-O-Vision, and jumble pads installed (for a moderate, non-optional fee) into the foundation of your building, you’ve never experienced anything quite like this. Programmers and visionaries the world over have dedicated countless hours in order to create a new kind of game: a game that is almost, but not exactly, like everything you have already played. The PSILOVU is bad-ass and awesome and totally cool with your needs, and it is here to help you spend every weekend until you die desperately trying to recapture that feeling of excitement, wonder, and hope you’re pretty sure you used to get all the time. The PSILOVU really needs this to work out, okay. It won’t let anyone hurt you again. Press X to continue. Please.
Nintendo
There was a rumor that Nintendo had released its own new system sometime last year, but that turned out to be the homeless person who hangs around the playground offering free hugs. He smells like Christmas trees and urine.
Header image via adrigu