"However the Xbox Series X does not join the PS5, and instead, the Xbox Series S takes its place. With Time praising its approach as a portal to Game Pass"

Lol! Weaker little brother actually beat out the big brother.... Personally, I don't think the series s should deserve this award just because it's a much affordable next gen console. Might as well give awards to the cheaper, lower end smartphones awards as well then!

The Xbox Series S has put a hamper on next-gen games. A game design is going to have to take it into account. That means whatever physics and other hardware demanding features that would affect gameplay would have to be scaled back because of the Series S. I'm extremely disappointed by this, I've spent 20+ years in this industry and I love new console launches and the creative options they open up. The Series S is not last-gen tech -- it's strong-- but if us devs only had Series X and the PS5 to worry about, the options would have been much wider on what we could achieve that would have a direct impact on gameplay.

I'm also very much disappointed in Sony for having their first party studios develop cross-gen for the next 2 years. Both MS and Sony are taking away tools that we could have wielded to make the next-gen really show what it's possible of.

At least in ~2 years we'll see next-gen exclusives from first party developers. It just sucks that we have to wait that long. I am sure Horizon 2 and God of War (which is rumored to be cross platform) will impress graphically, but there will be gameplay ideas that will be cut because the games also have to run on the PS4. They think, perhaps accurately, that since gameplay ideas that require a lot of horse power aren't easily recognized by the general gaming community they'll get away with just putting better textures, better resolutions/framerates, adding raytracing etc. on the next-gen versions people will be satisfied.

Does anyone remember the Phanta Rei demos? Look it up on youtube. That was running on the PS4 and running gaseous fluid sims in real-time showed the effect it could have on gameplay. It's just one example, and the PS4 was struggling so Capcom decided not to push ahead with those technologies. This is one area that is now completely possible on XBSX and PS5, but we won't see it for a while. At least not implemented so that it would affect gameplay. This is just one examples of hundreds of technologies that are now possible next-gen.

We'll get Ratchet and Clank in April which is supposed to be PS5 only and it shows some things not possible on last gen. Would it be possible on the XBSS? I would have to try it, but I doubt it. So MS screwed everyone by launching the XBSS. You can't just lower the resolution, texture resolution etc. and get all that power back that the XBSX has. Wish they would have gone the PS5 digital edition route.

We'll see pretty graphics and I and others will rave how good they look, but behind the curtains only us devs will know what you guys are truly missing out on. Really hope the God of War cross-gen rumor isn't true. I really do need to sit down and make some demos illustrating my point as I'm sure this will be downvoted like all my other posts despite being proven right many times (not saying I'm always right but in this case I am, it's what 20+ years of experience teaches you).

PS only gamer here but I'd say Quick Resume is pretty innovative and unique

The SSD loads up games fast anyway and the Quick resume is not enough. Not a game changer. They could have updated the UI and controller instead of making you feel like the Series X is just an Xbox one X pro version