Vivi, I totally agree with you that smartphones and tablets have severely undercut the handheld market. But like I said, that's only for "casuals" who would be embarrassed to call themselves gamers. While the handheld market might be smaller than consoles, I still believe there is a strong base of tens of millions of enthusiastic consumers who will gladly buy many games for the system. As long as that endures, there will always be a reason for console manufacturers to produce machines to meet that demand. If you look at Japan, they've been ahead of us with phones for years, but you still see PSP and DS games raking in tremendous sales on a consistent basis.

I agree phones have come a long way, but I don't see them infiltrating the dedicated gamer base. They've all flocked to touch, and as I've already stated, touch controls fail just as hard (if not harder) than motion controls at competing with traditional games. Cell phones next year or the year after may be just as powerful as the Vita, but without a viable interface, I can't see them changing my desire to use them for gaming. It takes more devices like the Xperia Play (PlayStation Phone) or Microsoft's patent here to change this. But because such devices would have trouble amassing competitive content to what Sony and Nintendo provide (hell, even the Xperia Play has), I can't see their corporate executives seeing much of an incentive to go this route.

I also disagree with consoles becoming outdated in relation to PCs. I didn't play primarily on consoles because they were cheaper than PCs - I played on them because it's more comfortable to game on a television than it is a computer monitor and there's a lot of games that just don't appear on PC, or aren't as practical. I'll always prefer a large screen with surround sound and a comfy couch or bed to a vision-deteriorating monitor with a small stereo set and a wheely-chair to hunch over on. And as I hinted at, home consoles are becoming arguably more relevant than ever with the advent of Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network. Not only do they play disc-based movies (Blu Ray for one of them at that), but they have a multitude of streaming options for movies and television, current television if you use Hulu. With ESPN on Xbox Live and MLB, NHL, and NFL Sunday Ticket on PSN, the need for the cable box is diminishing. There's already hints of cable coming to Xbox Live. Not to mention you can also surf the web on PS3 and both systems adequately function as networked media centers for your connected devices. I said above in the future your cable company will give you a controller along with your box and remote, but I think it's becoming increasingly likely that your console manufacturer will include a remote with your system and controller.

The ironic part of all of this is that, as you said, I fully agree that this generation has been a bit underwhelming. There's a lot of great content out there, but the really special experiences are shockingly few and far between. I think development costs are just too high for a truly creative vision and until developers find some middle ground on this, we'll stay in a drought. But that doesn't stop consoles from flying off the shelves, and it certainly won't prevent Call of Duty from selling a guaranteed 20 million units in 2 months, at $60 a pop.