The discussion about the importance of Ray Tracing has to me the same energy as the people that were discussing back then as to why it is important every minute details on a character's haircut must be represented.

I've seen RT on my brother's computer playing various games with it enabled and surprise surprise, the strongest reaction I got from it was just a "nice."

And like any game you actively play, graphical details, lighting and such become afterthoughts to the gameplay once you're "immersed" in the experience.

The Switch 2 or whatever certainly does not need to implement or have parity features with the current console box just like the Switch proved it did not need those to get a slew of it's own 3rd party games or some port. It's not like I'm gonna complain if it does however but this is prolly a point that is not on Nintendo's priority list unless Capcom pulls another one asking Nintendo for more RAMs again which actually lead the Switch to be more powerful than it was supposed to be at first

lol someone sure loves ray tracing haha. Regardless, ray tracing is a special effect. That's it. DLSS can provide higher resolutions at much less cost. Which, not only allows for better graphics because you can run the graphics at a lower actual resolution, but also as I pointed out, obviously means greater likelihood of ports to a handheld like a Switch from more powerful consoles. It closes the power gap. Ray tracing on the other hand makes cool lighting effects. Ray tracing requires more power, DLSS allows games to run with less power. For a handheld, where power is a bottlenecking resource, DLSS is obviously wayyyyyyy more important.

You lost the argument when you decided to way over hype ray tracing, and meanwhile passed off DLSS as "doesn't mean crap." lol. And I dunno if you've noticed, but games have had real time lighting for a long time, and stealth games have existed for a long time. Ray tracing is a cool graphical effect, but it definitely is not "hardware generation defining", nor does it allow all sorts of new games to be made as you suggest. Games can have ray tracing turned off and you just lose some cool effects. DLSS on the other hand allows the same game to be played at less expense, meaning games with higher level graphics can be played with fewer resources. Ray tracing isn't remotely comparable to DLSS. For a handheld like Switch 2, ray tracing is an entirely skippable feature considering it would require more resources on a platform that by definition must be resource constrained. Whereas DLSS will do the opposite, make games take less resources. DLSS is a huge technology for next gen Nintendo, ray tracing is a cool to have but not needed feature, and when Switch 2 gets ports of console games they can just turn off the ray tracing.

Whatever happened to the new age hair thing in gaming? I remember it being a big deal around the TR reboot but haven't heard much since. I kind of forgot all about it.

Either way the switch 2 will be a hybrid which will limit its power.  RT us power hungry, DSLL works better with less power....  pretty simple.

Ummm we're 3 months away from Xbox Series and PS5 being 3 years old. Saying developers haven't even started (lol) to cut their teeth on the hardware yet is beyond ridiculous. These systems are probably 40% into their lifecycle. You could have made this claim TWO years ago, definitely not now.

Exactly. NOT having ray tracing is going to be a big feature for Switch 2 in terms of getting ports. Console games with ray tracing won't be nearly as maxed out graphically as they would be without ray tracing. Thus you turn off ray tracing for Switch 2 and you immediately close the power gap between Nintendo's handheld and the consoles. You then combine this 'anti-feature' with DLSS so you can drop the console resolution from 4k or whatever it is down to like 540p or 700p or something, then jack it back up on the cheap to some higher resolution.

Having DLSS and not having ray tracing would be a great combo of features for Switch 2 in allowing current gen console games to potentially be ported with much less downgrading than it took to get last gen console ports on the Switch, which means much greater likelihood of ports. And of course DLSS also just means more powerful non-ported games on Switch because resolution takes fewer resources so those resources can be used for other things in the game.

Uh what??? That makes no sense. You say Switch 2 is going to be low-end (of course because its a portable) but it "needs" to have hardware feature set parity with the consoles...that doesn't make sense. Those two things are contradictory. Especially when what we're talking about is a special effect that can easily just be turned off without affecting the game play.

Yeah that bolded part. A handheld system can't afford to put in features that put a significant strain on its resources all just for a cool special effect. Ray tracing sure looks cool as hell, but it is not remotely worth it if it makes the entire rest of the game have to be pared down. Should the Switch 3 have ray tracing...by then yeah probably. Should the Switch 2 have ray tracing...hell no!

I think permalite just bought hard into the marketing hype of the current gen consoles that was trying to sell ray tracing as this generation defining thing to get people excited about another generation of consoles in which the graphical difference is obviously shrinking between generations (as it naturally will over time). With PS4 Pro and Xbox 1X you had realistic looking games at 4k (or I think maybe they were just upscaled to 4k and not native but whatever the average person doesn't care about that), now with PS5 and Xbox Series you have moderately more realistic looking games at 4k....but we have this really cool new lighting effect so everyone get suuuuper excited for cool lighting this gen and start believing it totally changes games! haha. This is what permalite clearly bought into and is sticking with even 3 years later.

But... whether their hand was forced or not, they released the DS and it was hugely successful. Even with the first real competition in the handheld market, it sold far better than the GBA did, and I think it is safe to say far better than a more powerful GBA would have in the GBA's place. Why would the lesson from all this be that Nintendo shouldn't try to innovate unless it is absolutely necessary?

If you have a monopoly over a type of product with a relatively fixed demand, that's one thing, and you can get away with not really trying. But, a monopoly in a luxury market is different. Especially when your monopoly is over a small subset of a luxury market. There is a large chunk of the audience that might simply say "meh" and drop out of the market. So, whether or not another major player can or will introduce a Switch competitor, Nintendo's sales can still vary by tens of millions depending on their hardware choices. 

So what do you do when playing Metro Exodus? Are you actually playing the game and concentrating on the actual gameplay? Or are you constantly starring at the pointless lighting effects and marveling at how magnificent they look and then don't actually play the game?

When I'm immersed in a game Idgaf about lighting effects. I'm having fun playing. Right now I'm playing Nier Automata on my Switch. It's a ton of fun. It looks great without raytracing and already has great lighting. It wouldn't make a difference to the gameplay, which makes it automatically not important. Unlike what Pemalite said, the Switch 2 does not need it.

"We are in the era of ray tracing" my ass!

I did already say hopefully no secret sauce, but I thought of a new analogy to explain it. Here is an exchange from Kung Fu Panda.
Mr. Ping: The secret ingredient is... nothing!
Po: Huh?
Mr. Ping: You heard me. Nothing! There is no secret ingredient.
Po: Wait, wait... it's just plain old noodle soup? You don't add some kind of special sauce or something?
Mr. Ping: Don't have to. To make something special you just have to believe it's special.
[Po looks at the scroll again, and sees his reflection in it]
Po: There is no secret ingredient...
Switch 2 needs no secret ingredient, at least not out of the box.
When you consider that Sega was now stiff competition, Nintendo didn't make that many screw-ups with the SNES/Super Famicom. If Genesis was niche like other Sega platforms, SNES probably would've equaled or surpassed NES/Famicom in sales. A bizarre gimmick with SNES probably wouldn't have made it sell anymore. Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance had no secret ingredient compared to Game Boy. They just had better specs and games people wanted to play.
Switch's hybrid nature is enough to make it unique in the field. Nintendo just needs better specs and games people want to play and you're looking at 100 million at least, possibly 115 million or more.

Maybe it'll innovate even further on the Joy Cons.

Specs like Xbox One X.

Pretty feasible in docked mode, especially if the docked has an actual chip and does more than Switch's dock does. Don't count on One X or Series S performance in handheld mode.