Nintendo's next console -- playing catch-up

Nintendo will release its next games console in 2005, according to a Reuters interview reported at Gamers.com. "The PlayStation 2 debuted one-and-a-half years ahead of the GameCube," according to Nintendo President Satoru Iwata. "If we had launched the GameCube at the same time as PlayStation 2, the result would have been different. We will get ready for a (new) battle in 2005 although foreign game developers are now saying that rival next-generation systems won't come until 2006." Comment: Nintendo's problems started when the SNES (Super Nintendo Entertainment System) was horribly late. By the sime it arrived, Sega had already taken over the market with the MegaDrive/Genesis and Sonic the Hedgehog. Nintendo may have taken a decade a wake up, but it finally seems to have realised that it would not be a good idea to make the same mistake three times in a row. Next time, there may not be a phenomenon like Pokemon to save it.