It's going to be the same jump as last generation or bigger. We've had more time between generations and going from 720p to 1080p is a smaller jump then from 480p to 720p. And most games will probably still be 720p next gen. That leaves a lot of room for graphical improvements especially for open world games which have been severely hampered by memory limitations this gen. Draw distance, lighting, shadows, reflections, pop up, smoke and particle effects will all see dramatic improvements again.

I already think Skyrim on PC looks vastly superior then the console versions. Sure up close the difference is not that bad, but look out into the distance and the difference is huge. So without any extra polygon or texture work it will already be way better.

The next gen is really going to test the mettle of all the big developers. This gen developers had the luxury of the switch over to HD, which automatically made everything look light years better than previous generations. Next time around, they'll have to actually put some effort in making games that look significantly better than their current gen counterparts.

Next gen is going to be a small jump, not even comparable to the NES to 16-bit jump, but more like the jump from the TG-16 / Genesis to the SNES.

The reason Nintendo went with weaker graphics on the Wii (though I don't think they expected it to be as weak as it was) was that they said we had reached a point of "diminishing returns" as far as graphics were concerned and that we had reached a point where games looked so good that it didn't make sense to focus on power. Fast forward to today and we can see that it was a load of poppycock. The graphics jump was greater than we ever expected.

Now I'm not saying that the average looking games are going to blow what we have today away. Like the OP said, they may actually be comparable. The upper echelon of games, I suspect, will be a VAST improvement, though.

I don't agree with this. Going from 512mb ram to anywhere between 2- 4gb will provide a dramatic increase in texture quality and resolution. The extra raw power and in hardware features will also contribute to the overall look and effects displayed on screen.

The base level will be on par with the pc equivalent of today's Crysis and GTA 4 mods. It's being done now. What is being achieved now on pc usually becomes the standard of new consoles.

We will also get the benefit of better looking larger maps, and if engines like UE4 prove to be true and can reduce development time for mundane tasks, it will hopefully allow more time spent on game play and design.

It's evident since the release of Crysis 1 on pc, that developers haven't been pushing the boundaries of game design. They have been sticking to a standard baseline to cover 3 platforms. Next gen resets that baseline.

Games like Skyrim will be designed from the ground up with higher textures in mind, with more characters and more detailed objects on screen.

It will be a substantial improvement, just not anywhere near the silly comparisons to Avatar quality that has been thrown around.

I don't think there'll be any more big graphical jumps like the ones from gen 4 to gen 5 or gen 5 to gen 6. If you look at the best looking games from gen 6 they can easily stand up against most of the standard looking games this gen. We're quickly arriving to the point where graphical improvements will seem minimal between gens.

Naturally, the ceiling on the next gen of console hardware will be higher by way of loosening up constraints imposed by current hardware, namely limited memory.

By that merit alone, ignoring the given advances in processing power and in GPU capabilities, next gen consoles should run closer to the typical decent spec gaming PC rig of today (but not of 2-3 years from now) in terms of frame rates (60fps+), resolution (1920x1080) and API effects (DX11). These are almost universally accepted as the "great advances" PC gaming offers over console gaming (UI/M+KB is simply a preference), and in just about every case, these are the exact (read: only) advantages of gaming on any decently built gaming PC.

Personally, I'd be okay with the above plus whatever individual advantages each platform brings to the table (Wii U tablet features, Xbox Durango's Kinect 2.0), with 1920x1080 at a locked 60fps at bare minimum, allowing for the double resolution required for stereoscopic 3D enabled games. If we're still seeing games natively rendering at 1280x720 or 30fps frame rates, then I'm not really sure consoles will have actually been ready for the next gen performance offered by the modest gaming PCs of today.

Beyond the hardware, visuals will be dictated by next gen gaming engines and how well they are optimized to run on next gen console hardware. Assuming engines like UE4 run smoothly on next gen consoles, by that merit alone, the same franchises that were running on UE3 today will look better when developed for UE4.

Recognize that in game development the rule is not "more resources = more cost" but more resources means less time spent optimizing once programmers are familiar with the software engines and hardware capabilities and idiosyncrasies which should be minimized next gen (no more CBE, let's reinvent the wheel sheenanigans). At worst, artists will be making higher res textures (high res textures typically already exist and are scaled down during the process of development) and higher poly count models and characters (high res versions of both already exist almost universally in any given project, which are then scaled down during the process of development).

It goes without saying that by mere merit of being "next gen" games, they will not be longer and larger than the current gen as it's not as though having better hardware to work with suddenly means "let's spend more time in development making longer and larger games."

If nothing else, next gen consoles should help facilitate streamlined development pipelines, allowing for faster and more efficient development.

I agree. The average game will look around Uncharted quality. Uncharted 4 however will look like cgi, as well as other top tier games.

I think we'll see a moderate jump.

The best graphics we see this generation (things like Uncharted 3) should be easily run at 60fps with anti-aliasing in an average game. The best games will look considerably better, comparable to Crysis 2 on PC.

People say that graphics can't get much better than Uncharted 3, Gears of War 3 and Heavy Rain, but you have to remember that these are standout titles with extremely high production values. The majority of games honestly don't look that great.

I think the upgrade will be small to moderate, depending on the developer. For the lesser ones it will be more of the development process getting much easier without the hardware constraints, while the top ones, mostly first party, will probably be the ones pushing graphics further.

The next generation after the upcoming one will face much more of an issue, since Epic already predicted you need hardware two thousand times as powerful as today for photorealism, which should be the demand by then, and developing costs will be sky high.