“...we think that product compatibility is a very important element during the transitional period from one platform to another. The software lineup for a new platform is not very rich during such a period and many consumers do not want to throw away the software they bought for the previous platform."

"...when you have never played a game, you can enjoy it as nothing but a newly released game. We would therefore like to take advantage of business opportunities to sell software for a previous console.” - Iwata

Just because the PS4 got by without BC doesn't mean it wouldn't do better with it. That line of thinking is stupid. "It's in first place, so it's obviously perfect and doing everything right!" Same in reverse. "It's in last place, so obviously it's because everything its doing is bad!" 

The combined library of retail and digital games is far from small. Let's not start spreading lies.

Just to add to that I'm not saying backwards compatibility all has to go down the toilet. But for crying out loud make modern, intelligent decisions with your hardware design based on *new games* and the future first and foremost.

Then from there hopefully you have enough horsepower to emulate most of these systems via software.

Wii U you won't be able to literally emulate, but since there's only like 20 "must play" Wii U games and most of those are due for sequels anyway, you could just easily get away with porting 8-10 of them over 4-5 years and no one would really care.

The Wii U can't profit off those games because they aren't all part of the ecosystem. They aren't being sold as new because they're limited to physical media. The NX won't have that issue, because it'll be digital. Companies will profit off these games until they're pulled off the store, and they'll be put in the same library as new NX releases.

And guess how that's working out for Steam? Peachy.

The PS4 wouldn't be the system it is today if it had backwards compatibility. They'd either have to gimp the CPU/GPU by being forced to go back to Nvidia or reusing the CELL (bye bye x86), or literally paste the PS3 chip into the PS4. Which would then make the system more expensive and negate the advantage of price that the PS4 had early on and took full advantage of to kick Microsoft's ass and build momentum that by now is look a giant snowball rolling down a hill that no one can stop. 

Sony made the right call. No doubt about it. 

They wouldn't have to do any of that. Microsoft is managing it with weaker hardware.

Backwards compatibility with the CELL processor and an Nvidia GPU is much more difficult. Sony made the right call. As they usually do. It's Nintendo/MS that make poor hardware decisions, which is why they are where they are fairly consistently. 

MS doesn't have anywhere near even 50% BC either. 

BC is not one of them. And it won't be on the NX when that system is digitally BC with the entire eshop.

Thanks for the read, it's nice to see this "leaker's" personal predictions if nothing else.

The quoted part above does not make sense to me, though.  The Wii U has been the lead-weight that has been pulling Nintendo down all gen.  Splatoon did extremely well, but let's not forget that even Mario Kart couldn't save the Wii U and Splatoon is no Mario Kart. Splatoon also isn't fixing the Wii U's dismal console sales. Splatoon is definitely a sleeper hit and a huge find for Nintendo, but I just don't see that being enough to justify the Wii U's existence for another year.  If the Wii U is still Nintendo's main console in fall 2016, that will only be because Nintendo can't get the console NX ready in time for a 2016 launch.  Nintendo wants to bury the Wii U as soon as they can (once they have fufilled their release commitments to their fans, which will be mostly done this year).

The 3DS on the other hand has been Nintendo's cash-cow all generation and we're seeing A LOT of content coming to it in the coming months.  The device is getting old and it wouldn't surprise me if it gets replaced in 2016, but I'm not seeing evidence that Nintendo is abandoning the platform in anyway yet (heck, the 3DS is even getting the Metroid game that Wii U never got).  If anything, we're seeing a lot more Nintendo and 3rd Party support for the 3DS this year and into next year than we are seeing on the Wii U.  Nintendo is also pinning a lot of hopes on to Yokai Watch and so it will be interesting to see if that does anything unexpected for the 3DS.

In my opinion, contrary to the predictions above, Nintendo is moving the Wii U projects to the NX while continuing to support the 3DS into 2016.

Slow down on your BS. I can't believe I have to draw this to you again, but here it goes:

You forget that x1 will emulate the x360, even though it's x86 and the 360 was power pc and the x1 only has 6x the 360's power. wii u's sucessor will probably have 8-10x the wii u's horsepower, making BC through emulation even easier.

about your "unified ecosystem" bullshit from earlier:

1. untill nintendo says so, it's a fruit of your imagination.

2. if the "unified ecosystem" is true, it won't be the retarded way you think of (sharing ALL games, wich would be impossible and stupid, devalueing both platforms). The correct strategy is sharing VC and games like 2d mario, smash bros, mario kart, animal crossing, splatoon + smaller franchises like kirby, 2d metroid, fire emblem... all with cross buy and cross multiplayer but each system would have it's big exclusives.

3. you mentioned before that a handheld as powerfull as ps vita would be too weak for it. while the 3ds sucessor will be much more powerfull than the vita, that's not the point and you are again clueless to simple logic. check smash bros for 3ds and wii u. the 3ds is 50-60x less poerfull than wii u, but it totally managed to get a lower version of smash. A 3ds sucessor with 300 gflops (probably 15x less powerfull than wii u's sucessor, much better than 3ds vs wii u) and same architeture as the home console could get the job done in a much easier way, 540-720p lower graphics on handheld, 1080-1440p-4k better graphics on home console.

Oh, about these "rumors":