…and so does the next generation
Nintendo might disagree - its Wii U launched last year - but 2013 was the year the next generation of consoles arrived in the form of the Xbox One and the PS4. The marketing has been more interesting than the games so far: Microsoft's campaign was so bad we wondered if Sony had infiltrated its PR team.
FIFA's eye on the ball
FIFA isn't just an enormous gaming franchise: it is, of course, football's global governing body. This year it announced that it would be deploying goal line technology in the Confederations Cup and next year's World Cup. The aim is to prevent controversies like 2010's famous "goal that never was".
Spy nets and Skynet
Perhaps the most depressing story of the year was the revelation that the entire internet appears to have been compromised by the US and other security services to carry out massive and indiscriminate surveillance. So it was a little worrying to discover in late December that Google had bought Boston Dynamics, purveyor of truly terrifying military robots. We'd love to know how being a military contractor fits with Google's famous "don't be evil" motto, as it seems more like "let's become Skynet". But Google isn't the only tech firm with a military division: Samsung's Techwin division makes military robots too. We think we know where this is heading…
Elon wheels
Who will defend us from our evil robotic overlords? If we were going to pin our hopes on anybody, it'd be charismatic Tesla Motors founder and Iron Man inspiration Elon Musk. Not content with revolutionising the car industry he's behind the Space X space programme and found time to design Hyperloop, an extraordinary transportation system that can turn humans into pink mist at the speed of sound - er, we mean get people from city to city in the blink of an eye. If anyone's going to save us from the robot armies, it's him.
