3D Realms CEO talks consoles

As the CEO of Duke Nukem Forever developer 3D Realms, 'persistence' probably ought to be Scott Miller's middle name by now - so it wasn't too surprising to read comments from the outspoken executive this week reiterating his argument that Microsoft "made a business mistake" with Xbox.

"I said from the beginning, back in the late 90's, that Microsoft made a business mistake getting into the console business. And from a profit and loss standpoint, that has certainly been the case - they've lost well over a billion dollars, enough to sink many Fortune 500 companies," he told Firing Squad this week when asked about the current Xbox situation - which 3D Realms is taking an interest in with its Human Head-developed FPS Prey, set to appear on the console as well as PC. "I still think it's a business mistake for them, detracting from their core business strengths (Windows and business software)," he added.

However Miller's glad they're in there, "because despite their loss my company gains tremendously by having another platform to exploit". He even added (perhaps jokingly) that he hopes IBM and Intel do their own consoles - "it would make just as much business sense, after all".

As for his predictions on the rest of the current next-generation tussle, while he admits he hasn't spent much time looking into it, he fancies Sony to "end up leading this next generation" thanks to their position as a consumer electronics company. Meanwhile, he reckons Nintendo has "an image hurdle to overcome" because "most people look at Nintendo like they look at Disney".

As for 3D Realms itself, those headlines about the developer's desire to do another Duke Nukem game after Forever are true - "of course as soon as Duke is done we'll begin a new one" - and a Prey sequel has already been mapped out from "a high-level story standpoint" with another unannounced project also in the works.

However, as we approach the ninth anniversary of Duke Nukem Forever's announcement on April 27th 1997, attention occasionally flicks back to the game still in development at the Texan dev studio - and Miller concedes, "we've definitely screwed up along the way". "But in the end, it'll work out fine as long as we produce a hit. If we manage that, few will care that it took so long."