Industry analysts predict that 2003 will be a year of consolidation. Companies are forced to combine efforts due to rising development costs. When Sony and Microsoft release their new consoles in two to three years" time, customers" demand for quality games will have risen exponentially. The new machines give developers the opportunity to devise tremendously sophisticated games. These advancements will obviously be accompanied by signifcant development costs. In particular Japanese companies will benefit from sharing these costs, for the market there has contracted for two years in a row.