More power to CDProject Red getting their game onto another platform, especially one as constrained as the Switch. If it plays well and otherwise is faithful to the general overall experience on console and PC, I can't knock it. More choices and another outlet for revenue.

The opportunity is in CPU processing capability and RT image improvements. The latter, if used correctly can actually be used for gameplay elements, visual & even sound. The former will make hitting performance targets much easier for devs. Eight-core Zen 2 at ~3 GHz offers 4x the general performance, 8x the SIMD of even the upclocked Scorpio APU. It felt like there was some big regression in interactivity and dynamic systems this gen. Zen 2 can fix that because it won't be so hampered. Imagine GTAV with 4x NPCs and vehicles or something like that. Ass-creed can have legit large crowds not composed of instanced, cloned animations across multiple NPCs. Interactive fluids should be doable on top of all the other tasks asked of the CPU.

It did matter when the PS4 and Xbone were announced. Beyond Sony actually focusing on games, the performance gulf and resulting improved image quality on PS4 over the Xbone versions likely helped it quite a bit. The mid gen refreshes would not hold the same kind of clout because they did not set the stage for the generation. They were simply upgrades that would not establish the foothold created by the original machines.

I think it's a bit up in the air that the PS5 and Scarlett get top end refreshes this gen though. They will be getting relatively high end GPU arrays, probably in the 12 TFLOP range, and on par with Radeon VII, if RDNA's utilization improvements scale with CU counts and clock speed. Throw in the hardware RT abilities, even if minor, and alot of PCers will be wanting to upgrade to catch up or stay ahead. It's not the same situation in 2013. The PS4 in 2013 had less than half the TFLOPS of the top end Radeon 7970 that released almost two years prior, the Xbone, not even a third. Then there was the R9 290X.......... The refreshes last gen were necessary to satiate a quiet demand for improved image quality and performance, though both refreshes are still massively held back by the Jaguar cores. But graphically the systems look great at above 1080p resolutions. No doubt.

The rumors of MS having a lower end SKU to follow Scarlett Anaconda are founded (Lockhart), and it makes sense because there is a huge difference in performance required for 4K and 1080p, esp when considering ray tracing. A 6 TFLOP machine could cover this as the Xbox One X will lack the massive CPU processing capability an octo-core Zen 2 processor brings to the table. But I would argue that such a machine would not get released until a year or two later, since the XB1X and Lockhart would be competing against eachother until XBone releases trickle to a close. RT could make the real difference though, even at the same base TFLOP as a preceding console, assuming the RT hardware is comprised of specialized units a la Turing. But knowing AMD, I could see them devising a unit useful for RT or other general rendering tasks instead of sitting their idling in software that foregoes RT.

It looks very current gen in terms of rendering make-up, but with next gen like image quality since it's 4K and has very little aliasing. The sheer lack of easily detectable polygon edges is very impressive though. Some nice modeling and likely some very well thought out tessellation control. However, gameplay in the big outdoor spaces teased by the original trailer is going to be the real test.

PS1 looked great compared to the 3DO, Jaguar, and the Saturn pre-launch and early on. Even after the N64 came out, devs figured out tricks to make PS1 games still look nice despite the major gulf in image quality (N64 having sub-pixel precision, z-buffer, texture perspective correction & interpolation). Plus there were the inherit advantages of being disc based. I still have to sometimes remind myself that the PS1 pulled off games like MGS1, Ridge Racer Type 4, and the Spyro and Crash Bandicoot series. Arguably those games are outliers in PS1 development competence, but they were PS1 games never-the-less. Throw them on ePSXe with the proper graphical plug-ins to modernize the rendering pipeline, and they can often look like Dreamcast games.

PS2 was technically an absolute monster at first reveal, in excess of what even PC GPUs could do at that time, namely massive raw polygon counts and pixel throughput. The lack of built-in-hardware features hurt the system against it's competition and later on in it's life, but in the right hands, could hold it's own. Launch window games were mediocre, but 2001 saw the arrival of the first excellent playing and graphically competent titles like Gran Turismo 3, Final Fantasy 10, Ace Combat 4, and MGS2. There are alot of very good looking games on the system, esp 1st and 2nd party devs that knew how to use the Emotion Engine and GS combination correctly and to their complete advantage.

The consoles are probably just a custom version of AMD's StoreMI technology. You can optimize to hell and back when you're in a closed box with standardized hardware and I think it'll be advantageous for consoles in the short terms. But PC SSD solutions (including StoreMI on PCs) will continue to march ahead in read/write speed and as per usual, just brute force their way to superiority.

When Dr. Su mentioned two more things at the end of the E3 show, I was really thinking the GPU surprise was going to be a 5800 or 5900.

Oh, an anniversary edition 5700 XT.........woohoo. That said, I might actually spring for the 5700 XT when it releases, just because I can. I'm only semi-satisfied with my RX 570 4GB, but it was a big 'ol jump from an R9 270 ;)

1st gen Navi is supposed to get a software based solution along with GCN, with 2nd gen Navi having dedicated RT hardware. I'm interested to see how AMD adds RT hardware and whether it's RT only, or useful for other things.

1050Ti and it's 2.1 TFLOPS akin to the PS4 Pro's 4+ TFLOPS? I don't think so. Even with how efficient Nvidia's GPUs are at extracting that compute, that's too much ground for the 1050Ti to have to make up.

If it's not powerful enough, developers won't even bother with their top-tier games on PS4, Xbone and PC, just like what happened with the Wii and Wii U.