Well, I guarantee Nintendo isn't going to go into power race, if they did, they wouldn't talk about unified platform between home consoles and handhelds. However, depending on the release date, a console more powerful than PS4 and Xbone shouldn't be a stretch, unless it's handhelds we're talking about, that might take 5 to 10 years.

I don't see a point in direct competition with PS4/XB1. It is a dead market anyway as the costs are high, computer games most of the time play better on PC, and tablets and smartphones are eating the space from the computers on TV's, smart-TV's take the content distribution channels. It's a smart move from Microsoft to move their goals from console sales to XBL memberships, because that's where they can make money. The reason why MS entered the console business, was to co-opt Sony's disruption the Playstation was intended to make. Now that Sony is getting their ass handed to Google, Sony is no longer a threat to MS.

I think we'll see in a generation or two a completely different market than that we've seen so far. Microsoft will try to compete with Steam in the digital distribution market, and will probably leave the traditional consoles aside to focus more on PC-like premade setups with the XBox brand attached to them. Sony is going to keep the PS brand alive, most of their services can be sold through PS devices. They'll make a lot of emphasis in streaming and other things like that. Nintendo will focus on hybrid systems slightly less powerful than PS and XBone, while still having decent hardware, and also becoming some sort of multimedia enternainement company. With mobile and miniconsoles becoming more and more powerful every day, there's no real need for high end hardware, specially when most companies can't fully use it without a giant finantial risk.

I don't believe that Nintendo is going the power route either, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't offer a console that noticeably better than Wii U. And that's hard to do if they go with ARM. Also the point of comparing NX to PS4/X1 is because those consoles are the current offerings from the other console manufacturers, and given that both are more powerful than Wii U, they're also what most gamers will compare NX to.

I'm not on camp of those that belive that this is the last gen of consoles or that they are going to disappear in the next 5 years or so, so I won't comment on the second part of your post.

The more they are like Apple, the best they are going to sell.

@JEMC: I don't think CPU really matters that much, as GPU is the trickier one with the need of being scalable between different devices, screen sizes and different requirements for power consumption.

I don't think it either that consoles disappear. The situation is similar to late 80's and early 90's, when the game centric computers were replaced by IBM-clones in the high end and consoles in the low end. PS4, XB1 and Wii U are more like the game centric computers, whereas the microconsoles are what NES, Master System and the likes were in the 80's. Another interesting thing is Steam OS. The only market where Windows is bigger than Linux, is the desktop market, which is largely credited for games available. However, if Steam OS gets the big guys to start porting their games to Linux, this advantage is largely gone.

@Darwinianevo: That's close to what I'd say too. However, Microsoft doesn't have any incentive in hardware market other than to defend themselves from anyone who might disrupt their Windows business. Steam on Windows is their friend, but Steam OS is something MS doesn't want to see (it really may flop hard). And I don't if Nintendo really ends up as "entertainment company", as that would mean a big change in how they do business. Not sure if it's the Sony model or the Apple model Nintendo's planning to copy.

Oh thank god. It'll be nice to only have one thread I need to ignore rather than several every day. Wake me when there's actual info.

But CPUs still matter, and they are the reason of many of today's problem. PS4 and X1 are too GPU bound to the point that the CPU is a true bottleneck. Jaguar is a bad processor, and not even adding 8 of them is enough to avoid the problem.

About SteamOS, I'll be honest: I don't see a future in it. Linux (and MacOS) games have been increasing in number in the last years without the help of SteamOS, and their Steam Machines, im my humble opinion, have one big problem: they're all different. That shouldn't be a problem, but they are PC at their heart, and with each machine having diffeent specs (and most of them not even mentioning which hardware they have, check the Steam page to see this), I'm affraid that the mass market won't make the jump, and if someone does and gets a lower specc'ed machine that doesn't meet its expectations, it will go against Valve and the whole SteamOS market.

They have a successful line of Amiibo figurines/cards, they have upcoming ventures in mobile apps, theme park attractions, feature films and a brand of health/fitness/education products. Nintendo is definitely on track to becoming an entertainment company rather than just a video games company.

I'm like 99.99% sure Nintendo wants to emulate the Apple model rather than the Sony model. The future of Playstation (not in the next few years but perhaps in the coming decade) is going to be streaming content to tons of different products/brands through PS Now while Apple has a self-contained ecosystem that consists of a family of devices (iPod/iPhone/iPad/Apple TV/Apple Watch), that's more of what Nintendo wants.

Nintendo wants to be like a combination of Disney & Apple, the strong IP of Disney with the ecosystem of Apple, if done right I think they have a strong chance of pulling it off.

They are GPU heavy because it fixes the issues the HD twins had last gen - the GPU's were way underpowered. I'm really having problems thinking of a system that didn't have any bottlenecks, moreso as it depends on where the software focuses on. The games don't yet push GPU's due to being this early in the generation. 

I didn't think that much of the NX GPU being pushed by software, as much as the need of being able to work with many different display devices (some of that Nintendo having no control of) with largely varying power consumption requirements, while the same software needs to run on all the devices.

Of course, I'm not holding my breath while waiting for Steam to take over the world. I know Linux and Mac having had more games lately, but I believe the big publishers with high budget games have largely been with Windows and consoles. If the games start coming, it's not going to happen that instant, but we could see change in five to ten years. It is true that virtually no market exists at the moment and Valve is forced to create one almost by itself

Sucker Punch complained about the CPU being a bottleneck when they launched Infamous. It looks like they went from one extreme to the other.

I'm not sure to understand what you mean with the NX GPU having problems with the displays. Are you saying that because you belive that the APU in NX will be used in several devices, each with their own dislpay and resolution? So a handheld, a home console and maybe a tablet all using the same APU? Because I'm not in the camp that believes that, I believe that both the handheld and the home console (I don't think there will be a tablet) will have its own APU, both both based on the same tech. After all, you said that ARM processors were very scalable, but GPUs are even more scalable than them. It would make sense to use a GPU with less resourcess on the smaller device, and another GPU more powerful for the one that will need to take care of a 1080p TV.

And about Steam, SteamOS and Steam Machines, my problem is with the execution. What Valve should have done is to impose a min. set of characteristics for a PC to be called a Steam Machine. And to not offend any partner, they could use a three steps rating, allowing users to know if they are buying a (for example) Gold, Silver or Bronze class Steam Machine.