Here are some of my random thoughts about the next generation:
I am willing to argue, that for the next generation, going with the playstation is a better idea than the xbox. I went with the xbox last generation (I had both the original and the 360), but I am really hesitant about going with them again.
It all comes down to, xbox has like no exclusives. When the 360 launched, the Xbox 360 had Call of Duty 2, Crackdown, Gears of War, and a bunch of other major exclusives. When the PS3 launched, people always joked that it had no games.
For the younger me, I went with the xbox 360, because hey, it had Call of Duty 2 (still probably the best game in the series).
But than what ended up slowly happening, most games that were on Xbox were on playstation too! but games that were on playstation were not on xbox.
If we look at the last year, the PS3 got one solid exclusive every month, Whereas unfortunately, the Xbox 360 only got like 3 exclusives. Even longtime exclusive Xbox titles are going to playstation or have already made the jump (Mass Effect, The Witcher).
A lot of it really comes down to the fact that Sony has 12 (I believe) development studios working full time to create content for the Playstation. Sure, the Sony 1st party IP isn't as famous as the Ip from other companies, but they are VERY SOLID.
I fact, I am willing to say that Little big planet is better than Mario, MLB the show is the single best sports game on the market, and Uncharted is better than Tomb Raider. (good thing subsim is a civil community, if this was any other site, I would be buried by hateful comments already
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Sony is a very good publisher. I think that Sony is very smart towards independent developers. If you are developing games for playstation, they would actually provide support and help, especially if you are willing to keep the game exclusive to playstation. Compare that to Nintendo (just slap on a seal of approval), Microsoft (dump it in the xbox live marketplace), Ubisoft (as long as we get a cut, you can borrow our name) or Valve (just throw your game on steam), Sony does a great job as a publisher. They are willing to promote and support good titles that they publish.
This is evident by the fact that one of the best games of 2012 (won a bunch of GOTY awards) is Journey, a 3rd party game that Sony published.
Finally, when Sony sees a deficiency with say a category of games, they are smart enough to throw money at the problem. Microsoft and Nintendo simply isn't willing to do that. Its no secret that Sony throws money at western developers for them to release their games on the PS3 and localize it for the Asian audience. But when was the last time you saw Microsoft try to seriously attract Japanese developers and publishers?