I've been skimming the comments (holy crap this was a divisive episode!) and I feel like I need to point something out. I don't think the next Xbox and PS4 are going to be any more powerful than what we see in top end PC games today.

Let's look at this realistically. We know that the next Xbox will have Kinect 2.0 included. We also know that Sony has been losing money for years now. Kinect 2.0 is going to add considerable cost to the next Xbox (as much as a fancy gamepad with touchscreen I'd guess). Microsoft can't have a super powerful console AND Kinect unless they want to charge you $499 or more. So something has to give. It'll be the RAM and CPU/GPU that take the hit. Sony on the other hand will try to make a profit on the PS4 from day one. Why do I say this? Because they did it with the Vita. ( http://www.industrygamers.com/news/playstation-vita-3g-actually-profitable-for-sony/ ) They' can't afford to take a loss of hardware. They've been losing money for years now. Just the Playstation division alone lost 45 million for the quarter ending in June. The company as a whole has lost a total of 11 billion dollars over the past 4 years. I've included links to show just how bad Sony's financial situation. (They'd have to sell off 80 percent of the company to pay off their liabilities.) The point is they CAN'T sell at a loss. This means you're not going to get another PS3 type powerhouse.

So, anyway, I think people need to remember these things and adjust their expectations of just what we're going to get in the next generation. And when you look at it from this point of view the Wii U, while still the weakest, isn't going to be that much less powerful.


Sony financial links:
http://www.notenoughshaders.com/2012/09/08/the-ten-year-decline-of-sony/
http://www.gamespot.com/news/sonys-game-division-loses-45-million-6389811