Console Refresh Gap

With the PS4 Pro's release last year, the Scorpio or later this year... and now the rumor of another PlayStation out next year (ugh)...

It made me think about what the refresh cycle should look like. Because if this is "the new normal", and I'm betting that it is, what's the best amount of time to let one sit before introducing the next?

I would say three years, but the PS4 Pro had a three year gap from the original PS4, and that seems to have been too early. Phil Spencer actually made a comment about this that I liked - that the Pro is a good 2016 machine, the Scorpio is a 2017 machine.

In that sense, the Pro didn't seem quite ready to do what its stated goal was, be a 4K console (though I own one, and the games look gorgeous).

So maybe 4 years is the golden number? After all, 4 years was the gap between the original Xbox and the 360, everyone seemed okay with that. And as the new business model doesn't immediately void the last console when releasing the new one... should be all the better.

4 years might provide enough time to show gamers a real difference, and make them feel like they got their money's worth from the last box.

What do you think? 4 years? 3? 2?

First off, none of this is really "New"

Nintendo had 3 iterations of the NES. The Fat VCR one that we know and love, The Original Famicom,and the Top Loader.

There's also been multiple iterations of the Sega Genesis. The Original, The 2nd Edition, and the 3rd.

And you know what? The Original Playstation had multiple versions too.

I think 3 years is pretty good for a mid gen upgrade and then 3 years after that move on to a next gen system. If you wait any longer then 3 years for a mid gen upgrade then it's probably best just to wait a little longer and jump right into a new gen. However I'm not sure how tech is progressing these days so diminishing returns may be factoring into hardware generations and altering timelines for the practicality of the upgrades.

Xbox has been rumored to hope this is the last generation. Instead of new systems they want to do hardware updates to the current gen making games playable no matter which version you own. That would be a nice solution but I find it hard to believe.

Those are basically just variations on casing - slimmer models for hardware that was more condensed over time, variations for different markets... none of them provided any real concrete benefit to performance.

Apples and oranges. The PS4 Slim and Xbox One S both accomplish what we've seen before, but the PS4 Pro and Scorpio most certainly DO NOT.

Personally, I own a PS4 Pro, it looks great, and I can see a noticeable difference between games running on it and the vanilla PS4.

But I do think it'd have been smarter for them to wait. The Xbox is obviously the console in most need of an upgrade, so let them do the Scorpio this year... then come back next year with a 5-year upgrade to be the "2018 console"... the PS4 Pro felt too soon, and now, a 2018 console refresh would, again, feel too soon from the Pro.

If they DO attempt a 2018 refresh, I see it being received poorly.

Why does it matter? No one is forcing you to purchase every refresh. Instead of buying everything new like a sheep, judge if its worth it to you. I skipped the Pro and have no regrets.

I am only wondering how long do they support the old ones (in the case of hardware upgrades) before cutting the cord?

They probably support 2 consoles at the same time, so support for Xbox One, and PS4 will drop when Microsoft/Sony releases their 3rd console. That's my guess

Because of the quality of current graphics, I think gens can wait longer. The differences just aren't that big anymore vs the best looking games on PS3/360.

The Pro and Scorpio are targeting an audience I don't think is even worth it yet. The amount of people with 4K TVs vs 1080p TVs is going to be a tiny percentage of the gaming market. The PS4 Slim is outselling the Pro and will continue to do so, and the One S will outsell Scorpio.

Maybe next gen once 4K TVs and content really become common then it will be worth targeting, right now though I think it is a waste of resources. I hope next gen they try to target 60fps for all games.

Still nothing "new".

I guess the new versions of the consoles aren't the same to you so I guess I'll just point out that these systems did have "enhanced" peripherals. (less so on PS1 then the NES and Genesis)

the Famicom had the disc system that added some new features to the NES like Saves, Higher Quality Music and sometimes voice overs. And The Sega Genesis had the infamous Sega CD and Sega 32X addons.

The Sega CD and 32X were treated as different systems, but at the end of the day, the Sega CD and 32X were just a Sega Genesis. Just like how the PS4 Pro is still just a PS4.

You people act like this is a fact. It's not, only a rumor. Second Sony would be killing the PS4 off if they did this. Everyone that bought a PS4 pro would be getting a big Fu from Sony and would piss a lot of people so much they would never buy a Sony console ever again.

It's okay, the pro was an optional thing for people who couldn't wait and the scorpio no one will buy.

Exactly... the good thing about what MS/Sony are doing with these upgrades is making everything backwards & forwards compatible (at least for a decent amount of time). So you don't have to upgrade at all if you don't want to, it's up to you. It's just giving us more options.

I don't really care that much. Might buy a Scorpio if I like what's shown, but you can play games on both the PS4 and XBox One that work on the Pro and Scorpio. Kind of just like having a better gaming PC.

PS5 won't arrive until 2020, don't care what some analyst thinks. PS4 is running fine there is no incentive to release next year.

I like the idea of a new gen console every 6 years with an optional mid-gen premium version of the console released after 3 years.

So something like this:

PS4 Vanilla - 2013

PS4 Pro - 2016

PS5 Vanilla - 2019

PS5 Pro - 2022

PS6 Vanilla - 2025