Pc parts aren't cheap either...

They know that by the time they release, a gaming pc will cost twice as much.

I've been complaining that the consoles and graphical fidelity have been seeing diminishing returns since the PS3 / Xbox 360. At this point, we're just pushing way more power for minimal improvements. It's stupid.

AI datacenters and greed.

I'm kinda hoping valve waits for component costs to calm down before releasing it - otherwise I could see the price making it DOA.

Famous last words, now your RAM and GPU are going to fail

As a long time PS customer, the Steam Deck has been probably the smartest/luckiest impulse purchase I’ve made. I used to not have a PC backlog, but now I own a PC port of pretty much all my favorite console games PS4 and backwards, among others, and the majority of those purchases have fallen under the “might-as-well-at-that-price” category of expense. I’ve been playing on Deck nearly every day since I got it and have only scratched the surface of library I’ve built since buying it.

I pray for immaculate memtests on us all for all eternity.

Seriously, anything after 2015 has perfect graphics, I don't need slightly more realistic hair or whatever. Even a lot of 2010 is enjoyable. And this is only about graphics quality. For gameplay, story etc, you know shit actually matters, there already is way more than I can play.

You...

You think they care?

They want people streaming games to phones/TVs and paying by the hour.

Not subsidizing console sales anymore will make cloud gaming seem more attractive, and that's where the most money is at

searches

https://www.ign.com/articles/nintendo-switch-2-production-cut-33-following-weak-holiday-sales-report-claims

Nintendo Switch 2 Production Cut 33% Following Weak Holiday Sales, Report Claims

Nintendo has reportedly cut back on manufacturing Switch 2 consoles following weaker than expected holiday sales for the console.

That's according to Bloomberg, whose sources say Nintendo now expects to make 4 million Switch 2 units this quarter, down 33% on the 6 million it previously planned to manufacture.

Nintendo recently confirmed it had sold fewer Switch 2 consoles internationally over the holiday period than it had once hoped, particularly in the U.S. — though the impact of this had also been dulled somewhat by stronger sales in its homeland of Japan.

Stares at RAM and GPU prices

1. The price Sony and MS pay for RAM will keep going up regardless of whether there is a hardware refresh or not. So keeping the old version won't keep consumer costs down. If they don't refresh the cost increases will just look sillier.
2. They avoid having to search for time on older process nodes while fabs try to migrate to newer ones by updating periodically.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninth_generation_of_video_game_consoles

The ninth generation of video game consoles began in November 2020 with the releases of Microsoft's Xbox Series X and Series S console family and Sony's PlayStation 5.[1][2][3]

The duration from the eighth generation until the start of the ninth was one of the longest in history, having started in 2012 with the release of Nintendo's Wii U. Past generations typically had five-year windows as a result of Moore's law,[10] but Microsoft and Sony instead launched mid-console redesigns, the Xbox One X and PlayStation 4 Pro.[11] Microsoft also launched a monthly console lease program, with the option to buy or upgrade.[12] Some analysts believed these factors signaled the first major shift away from the idea of console generations because the potential technical gains of new hardware had become nominal.[13]

The eighth generation video game console period ran for about eight years, so there'd be precedent for the ninth generation consoles to do the same, which would take us to a 2028 release date for the tenth generation.