It's not all doom and gloom though, the upside to the lower spec is that Sony's exclusive games will be well ahead of everything else like they were during the PS3/360 generation, Sony's 1st party devs will devote their life to show off the benefits of that SSD.
But regular SSDs aren't even standard on PC yet so multiplat devs can't really do much with it beside shortening the load times.
Yeah, I think this might be an issue with Sony's strategy here. It will make their own exclusive titles so much better, and I can't wait to see what they do there, but for multiplat games the difference might be much, much less noticeable. The SSD represents a huge improvement in design capabilities, which is great, but design is much, much more difficult to adapt than graphics. DOOM Eternal, for example, can run on a Switch whilst still being a technical showcase for current-gen platforms.
The fact they have been shown means nothing for what will be available at launch. Microsoft and Sony's marketing strategy have obviously been vastly different, but we've basically only seen Microsoft's hand. It's hard to really draw any concrete conclusions. The number of views on Hellblade 2 + Halo Infinite's trailer ultimately will mean nothing for the success of the consoles and their lineup.
It's really, really hard to judge what the public at large will feel, even what the enthusiast crowd will feel, based on the reactions on ERA. What will actually define success has almost nothing to do with performance, and assuming all people care about is "which runs fifa or cod faster" is also extremely reductionist The overall package of hardware + exclusives + price will dictate success, and we simply do not know these factors yet.
Basically the information Microsoft and now Sony have put it only serves for bickering console warriors. They have little influence on the commercial success of either platform.
Of course they will mean something for the success of the consoles and their lineup. This notion that marketing is about simply making sure that things are OK 'in the moment' is a gross misrepresentation of what marketing is, which is creating and maintaining narratives over time. Right now Microsoft is doing much more to creative a certain narrative surrounding their new console than Sony is, and that
will have an effect on launch. If you want an example then look at the Xbox One which suffered throughout its entire lifespan due to a single conference that created a wrong narrative about the product. I'm not saying that the PS5 will see such a drastic effect, just trying to point out how your notion that marketing at this time 'doesn't matter' is ridiciulous.
As for the second point, I feel that you're taking an 'all or nothing' stance here on everything. No, power isn't everything, of course it isn't, but it is a major factor that will affect the narrative surrounding the PS5 and Series X in various ways. The Xbox One suffered because, alongside the other obvious factors, it released to a bunch of big news stories saying how it's a 900p machine whilst the PS4 was for 1080p gamers.
Though, frankly, if you're gonna say that the information right now is "only for bickering console warriors," then I'm not going to bother as I find that kind of insulting. What I'm doing here is analysing Sony's marketing strategy at the moment, not trying to bloody win some stupid console war. For crying out loud.
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