Considering the PS3 is Sony’s third attempt at a console it would only make sense that at some point in the future they would come out with a PS4. In the past, Sony has said that the PS3 will have a 10 year life span which means it will still be around well into 2015. However, the PS3 is quite an amazing machine itself, so what could they do with the PS4?

Sony’s Jack Tretton doesn’t seem to know either, recently stating that he “can’t even imagine what can be done technically beyond the PS3 in the near future”.

Well, Mr. Tretton, I’m sure you guys will figure it out before it’s time to say goodbye to the PS3.

via joystiq

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However, Sony did comment on the rumor, where an unnamed Sony executive said “Larrabee can help us to plan PS5 and PS6, but it cannot make it into PS4.”

The PS4 is expected to be released around 2012-2013.

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While we are just over half way through this current console generation, curiosity, rumors, and speculation on the next generation of consoles has been far from dormant. The Wii HD has all but been announced, the PlayStation 4 has been mentioned several times by various Sony employees, even if only speculatively, and the Xbox 720 is probably going to be announced the next year or two.

While these future consoles are still in development, there several features and functions that we should be able to expect from all of them.

#1 Real Custom Soundtracks

While all of the current generation consoles have custom soundtrack abilities to some extent, the implementation is extremely lazy. Using the same amount of effort as to play “custom music”, players could simply turn the music volume off in a game’s options, and listen to their iPods while playing.

The problem is that the music isn’t dynamic at all. A consequence of this is that players have to go out of their way to adjust certain settings, for example it’s difficult to balance music and dialogue in any given game, and players often have to go out of stop the game so that they can pause music during cut scenes and other important game instances.

All of the next generation consoles should remedy this with advanced custom soundtracks. What this means is that each game should have it’s own settings category where players can select tracks for specific situations. For example, the players can select “track 15″ for ambient music, and “track 9″ as their chase music. Then the game will know that there is a chase, and when the chase is over to return to “track 15″. Or, better yet, the advanced custom tracks could be built into the consoles themselves, which then automatically changes the song or it’s volume and have the game communicate the appropriate circumstances to activate them. Microsoft, and to some extent Sony, are in excellent positions to do this because they could easily modify the achievement/trophy technology to work as a soundtrack handling system. If a system can tell when you roll a car four times without landing, and then pop up an achievement notification on the screen, it can easily know that you’re in a fight and to switch songs.

#2 Free Online Play…. That works

Actually, this is something that should have been expected this generation. There’s no reason that people should have to pay to play online, right now the Xbox 360 is the only device that charges for online play. Circumstance allowed Microsoft to get away with it, but if there’s one thing that needs to be changed for the Xbox 720, aside from the pandemic of the red (rings of) death, it is free, completely free, online play. On the other side of things, players should also expect that online play will work. It’s no use having free online play if you’re getting what you pay for, friend codes should be treated as numeric gamertags, not confirmation codes, and online multiplayer should be encouraged more for third parties. Then it should work properly, unlike, for example, in Super Smash Brothers Brawl. Online games shouldn’t be near unplayable.

#3 Competent Media Players

It isn’t too much to ask that the new consoles should be able to play virtually any and all media that console owners place into their consoles. Not in a DRM sense, that’s an unavoidable issue. Rather the list of formats supported for videos and songs should be extremely large. If someone edits a home video, then exports it under an incompatible video format, it’s a bit ridiculous that the system won’t play it. Right now Sony has the best support for video since essentially any movie you put into your PlayStation 3 will work. Only supporting the most popular formats on the console’s media player is unnecessary.

#4 Free, Effective Web Browsers

There’s also no reason that the next generation consoles shouldn’t have more or less fully functional web browsers. They don’t have to be advanced, but it’s completely possible for a working web browser to be built into the console. There’s also no reason to charge for this functionality. Now, this is a novelty and not a necessity, but if the consoles, today can do it, there’s little reason not to include browsers into the consoles of tomorrow.

#5 Complete Backwards Compatibility

If I pay $60 or so dollars on a game, it’s not fair that the game only works for five years. Sure, it isn’t too much work to plug in both my new and old console, but it’s an unnecessary waste of A/V jacks. Even if you had unlimited jacks available, what if the old console dies? New 360’s are hardly reliable as it is, and it isn’t a big setback to implement backwards compatibility into the software of the consoles. If the consoles do have backwards compatibility, it should also be done properly. It is unreasonable that Microsoft only supports popular original Xbox games. If nothing else, proper backwards compatibility should be included as a sign of good faith to customers.

#6 Motion Controls

At this point motion controls have gone from being Nintendo’s innovation, to Sony’s gimmick, and soon it will probably be Microsoft’s latest “discovery” and “advancement”, like Avatars. But more than this, I think it’s become expected. Much like rumble, motion control should be included in every next generation controller, preferably competent motion controls of Wii Motion Plus caliber. And if game developers exploit it and turn motion detecting into a cheap, gimmicky button replacement, at least, like rumble, there could be an option available to turn it off.

To be clear, the motion control support should be native to the standard controllers. No perhipherals, attachments, or any other extra equipment should be neccessary to use it. What would be the icing on the cake was if all the consoles supported IR sensors. Sure, fans can complain all they want about ripping off the Wii, but it would make playing shooters on the PS4 and Xbox 720 a lot easier.