Vaporman87 wrote :

This just smells like royal crap to me.

Seriously... what was Philips doing with these patents? And how can a company possibly know every patent they may violate with an invention or device? This patent business is getting out of hand, and abused.

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Patents have probably held the world back from advancing technology by decades. I understand why a person wouldn't want someone else stealing their idea but you can't just patent some broad technology and expect the rest of the world to wait on your bright idea. Same thing happened with the Wright Bros. they tried suing several aviation companies. Imagine if they got their way, we might be making transatlantic trips on gliders!

blueluigi wrote :
Perhaps Philips is trying to seek revenge on Nintendo after their deal with the CD-I fell through.
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That would be a silly thing to do.  The aftermath of that worked out much better for Philips than it did for Nintendo, who it could be said is still hurting because they couldn't agree.

I get the feeling this is all from CD-I butthurt

My brother just got a wii u the other day and it's really awesome.

PC Gaming and steam deals are really the way to go, you can get most of the latest titles at greatly reduced prices while their console counterparts refuse to drop below $50-$60. Also they have a huge library of retro and modern games, I just bought the Blackwell Legacy for 49 cents.

If you're looking for a next gen platform I would say the three biggest factors would be cost, multimedia features and 1st party titles.

Unfortunately there is no clear winner because while Wii U has the most 1st party titles, it lacks a blu-ray player.

Given the situation I would say my ideal configuration would be-

A PS3 for multimedia (blu ray and netflix)
A Wii U for 1st party titles and "party games"
A PC for serious gaming (strategy games and shooters)

 

I think when it comes to patent lawsuits (and well, basically any lawsuit), the outcome should result in "loser pays" as in the UK. That would stem some of the clogging up of our court system with crap suits.