If the 9th gen consoles launch with BC in 2020, is there any reason to produce 8th gen consoles beyond 2020?

[Pemalite]

Mr Puggsly said:

Pemalite said:

There were a plethora of advantages even if the prices didn't move much with console revisions... Lower power consumption, less noise, less heat, more reliable...
Even if Sony did drop features to get there. (Ironically Microsoft did the opposite and added features like Wifi.)

There wasn't a rapid movement in price though at the start of the 7th gen because Microsoft and Sony were taking some financial losses on the hardware... The 8th gen is very conservative from a hardware standpoint as well, with very much fixed costs that aren't moving much.

It depends, revisions aren't objectively superior. Features can be removed, reliability varies, etc. There are examples of both improvements and downgrades in revisions of MS, Sony and Nintendo hardware.

There is certainly little or no interest in losing money on hardware. But with diminishing returns in visuals, I think that helps them get away with it. I mean modern games can be gorgeous on reasonably priced specs.

Oh I agree. Hence the need to judge each device on it's own individual merits upon release.

There is certainly some negatives that can be drawn from the Xbox 360 E and Playstation 3 Super Slim compared to their prior versions the Xbox 360 Slim and Playstation 3 Slim for example... But I cannot think of any negatives of the Xbox 360 Slim over the older fat OG Xbox 360's.

But in general, the trend is a smaller, quieter, simpler, more efficient, more reliable device.