A common misconception that assumes "simple programs". Let's look at a hypothetical game with a few worker threads and a few "other" threads, take the worst example, 8 threads. On a dual core cpu, you immediately see the problem, every thread gets less than 1/4 of a core. On a quad-core, hyperthreading processor, each thread would roughly get (a little less than) half of a core. Suddenly your super 3.5GHz quad core processor behaves like an 8 core 1.6GHz processor. To make a long story short, whether the 8core PS4NextBox processor is weak or strong entirely depends on how the game code is organized. If it is well organized (particularly no cache stalls between the two 4core groups in the rumoured Jaguar-type processors), then an 8core processors could perform better than quad-cores. If you program a tic-tac-toe-like game on the PS4nextBox, then indeed the processors will be weak, otherwise 8 cores can (but need not be) a real bonus.

A common misconception that assumes "simple programs". Let's look at a hypothetical game with a few worker threads and a few "other" threads, take the worst example, 8 threads. On a dual core cpu, you immediately see the problem, every thread gets less than 1/4 of a core. On a quad-core, hyperthreading processor, each thread would roughly get (a little less than) half of a core. Suddenly your super 3.5GHz quad core processor behaves like an 8 core 1.6GHz processor. To make a long story short, whether the 8core PS4NextBox processor is weak or strong entirely depends on how the game code is organized. If it is well organized (particularly no cache stalls between the two 4core groups in the rumoured Jaguar-type processors), then an 8core processors could perform better than quad-cores. If you program a tic-tac-toe-like game on the PS4nextBox, then indeed the processors will be weak, otherwise 8 cores can (but need not be) a real bonus.

That would be true if Sony didn't go with AMD Jaguar cores which have an inferior IPC compared to even a 7 year old Desktop PC processor, AMD hasn't even been able to compete in the high-end since the Athlon 64 days, they certainly haven't improved the situation since then, Jaguar is a low-powered part targeted at Netbooks and Laptops and tablets, it will never compete with a 100 watt TDP desktop processor, just like Cell.

Plus... When you add more cores to a processor, the scaling isn't linear, you get diminishing returns due to things like bandwidth constraints, cache misses etc'.
It's all well and good to play with numbers to put things into a positive light, but the issues surrounding performance scaling on processors with more than 4 cores have been known for many many many years.
So regardless of how the developers use the 8 core processor, it's still going to be weak, no magic cure for that I'm afraid and it looks like my Core i7 3930K @ 4.8ghz isn't going to get a good workout with console ports yet again.

As for Hyper-threading, it's not always the ideal method to extract more performance, in-fact sometimes it will do the opposite and decrease performance depending on the kind of work load placed upon it as each thread has to compete with resources on the same core.

PS3 and 360 have less than half as much RAM as Wii U.

PS4 has more RAM because they wanted higher resolution textures, bigger, more detailed worlds, etc. However, a lot of PS4 games won't use it all, and for many the core gameplay will be able to be scaled down to fit into 1GB with graphical detail concessions, just as PS3/360 COD's core gameplay can fit into the Wii's smaller RAM with detail concessions.

I've played MW3 on Wii, its actually a remarkably close replication. IGN gave World at War on Wii a good review for being further from the PS3/360 versions, so they're not very consistent.

Don't forget the issues with the CPU as well. An media format like HDD. 

Realistically, the Wii U will not get most multiplatform games for the PS4/720. If it does, they will be heavily watered down which always takes away from the game experience as the game was not designed to be watered down.

You're forgetting mods that fix all that in morrowind and doesn't drive up memory consumption of the game, but does drive up the CPU and GPU usage.

It's called progression.

Play any PC exclusive, like Sins of a Solar Empire and you will know exactly what I mean. :) No "Push X to win"

Less detailed visuals doesn't necessarily mean a game will be worse. Pointer controls made COD preferable on Wii for some players.

Just less visuals? Try less NPC's, less music/script/sound files, simpler AI and of course more basic visuals. 

Not necessarily. For example, a Modern Warfare Wii dev confirmed the enemy counts weren't reduced.