Poll - Is Switch a 9th gen console?

[The_Liquid_Laser]

JWeinCom said:

The_Liquid_Laser said:

I'm thinking that what our disagreement comes down to is which systems actually compete.  I very much think the Wii U competed with PS4 and XB1.  That is a big reason why it sold so poorly.  Also, the 3DS and Vita definitely competed.  That is why the Vita did so poorly. 

What generations don't do is determine who will win, which is something you've been pointing out in your post. Maybe that is why you don't think they are meaningful.  They don't tell which system will win, but they do tell which systems are competing. 

Of course, we don't seem to be able to agree on which systems are competing.  We are probably talking past each other, because we don't even agree on which systems are competing.

Yes... the Vita and the 3DS competed... and by looking at the factors we could have predicted how the competition would look.  Same with the Wii U and PS4/One. Looking at price points/features/ and specs we can actually predict how one system will impact the other. 

I figured that was the point... to actually make meaningful predictions about the market. If your point is just to predict which consoles will be "competing" in some sense, that strikes me as profoundly useless. As someone who worked in gaming retail, I can tell you that people with next to zero knowledge about the gaming industry and no concept of generations figured out which systems were competing easily and without conducting anything resembling a scientific study.

Products compete when they're similar. That's about as simple as it gets. We could talk about exactly which factors are similar, but if you want a one word explanation, there it is; similarity. Saying that they're competing because "they're in the same generation" is not actually any simpler, because it requires creating an unnecessary term, and worse, nobody really seems to agree on what that term means.

And similarity actually explains why consoles would compete. If we assume people buy a product because they want it for some particular use, then it's basic common sense that a potential customer will choose between products that have that functionality. On the other hand, there's no logical reason to expect that two products would compete just because they were launched a certain amount of time after a predecessor. 

To give one clear example of why this concept is pretty much useless, let's say, hypothetically that next march, exactly four years after the Switch's release date, Nintendo releases a new system that is more powerful than either the PS5 or XBox SX, is still a hybrid with roughly the same size as the Switch, has identical third party support to the PS5/XBox X, and costs 100 dollars.

If, generation, as you define it, is the relevant factor, then this would be a gen 10 system by your logic, and would not compete with PS5 and XBox SX or hurt their sales. Is that what you think would happen?

Let me be clear and specific then, and also bring this back to the topic of the thread.  Here is my hypothesis and prediction for our current situation.

Hypothesis: Switch is a Generation 9 console that is competing with PS5 and Series X.
Prediction: PS5+Series X lifetime sales will be at least 30% lower than PS4+XB1 sales.

Since Switch is obviously very successful, it should take sales away from Playstation and XBox if they are competing.  If it doesn't, then they aren't competing.

Do you agree with my prediction?  Do you think it will come true?  If you disagree, then it is a meaningful prediction.  My hypothesis is predicting something that all of your analysis is not.  On the other hand, if you agree, then we'll have to go back to debating Occam's Razor.  So do you agree or disagree?