Is nintendo the winner of the 8th gen or the 9th gen?

[Kyuu]

Chrkeller said:

curl-6 said:

Honestly, I think it no longer makes sense to group Nintendo's consoles into the same categories as PS/Xbox as they release on different timelines now.

Ultimately, categories like Gen 8 or 9 are completely arbitrary.

This and game engines are super scalable.  Generations do not exist anymore.  Back in the day engines had a lot of customization and couldn't run on weaker hardware, that died a long time ago.

Games can run in a gtx 1660 all the way up to a rtx 5090.. and 5090 is 600% higher performance.  But again, most games can run on both.  

Generations do not exist anymore.

Edit 

As a real life example, minimum for SH F is a 1070ti, and gpu from 2017...  almost a decade ago.  Yet, still runs SH F.

Game engine scaling killed generations.  

It is also why nobody should be surprised the S2 can run x, y and z.  Just a question of resolution, fps and graphical settings.

The "lowest common denominator" is getting lower in relative terms, but generations will continue to exist, just not as we knew them.

The long cross generational period between PS4 and PS5 only delay the inevitable. Ultimately, the PS5 will recieve countless games not availabile on PS4, but most of them will come after the PS6 is launched. A modern console has a weaker start than a typical old console, but a much stronger post successor support. There is just a delay effect at play. On Nintendo's side, this delay effect isn't as obvious, because their old console's specs are too weak per modern home consoles/PC standards, so traditional generational transitions still very much exists for them and should continue to.

As time goes and more people buy capable comupters and consoles, games will be more demanding and will still gradually require higher specs. We're in 2026 and most AAA developers still target lower specs than a PS5 as their base. A lot of this has to do with the fact that most PC and console gamers still play on weak hardware due to high prices, lack of exclusives, fucked up economy etc. But it's not going to stay like this forever.

In the old days: new consoles had a major influence on the base specs developers would target.

In the future: I suspect highend mobile phones will decide the base spec. This doesn't mean that "generations are over", it just means the base spec got lower.