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I don't think Nintendo has much interest in even a PS4 level system though.
They're just now really getting the hang of last-gen HD engine building, they're not going to up turn the tea table and make their dev teams have to make games again with double/triple the budget on a console that very well may sell just as badly as the Wii U (a lot of people simply prefer Sony/MS' to console making, that's all there is to it). If a game performs badly with a large budget in that scenario they are pretty much screwed.
So a microconsole 2x-3x the Wii U in power would probably be more than fine by Nintendo.
The "handheld holding the console back!" thing isn't much of a concern I think in Nintendo's eyes anyways.
You can make a pretty beautiful Mario Kart, Mario 3D, Pikmin, Zelda game on Wii U hardware as is, I think like the GCN-Wii era, Nintendo is just fine staying in this relative ball park for another 5 years past 2016. If the microconsole is say even double a Wii U with say 4GB RAM, I think for Nintendo's design teams they're happily eat that up and pump out some gorgeous looking games.
We're headed to another GameCube to Wii type deal I think.
