So for those of you that have been doing this for a while, what are some practical expectations for next gen games on PC?
I, at least, have none. WYSIWYG, whether 3, 5, 10 years or more down the road; it's going to be the same.
It's a fixed/locked platform. I'm dumbfounded that people still pit one against the other when console has such a significant flaw.
I'm not saying PC is flat out better; PC expands to far more than just some games and movies, essentially landing in a different category from the Home Entertainment that is consoles - Oh right! DIY!
A)Although 8 cores, 1 is reserved to the OS, so at most, some games will run on 7 cores max.
B)Consoles take greater priority to power consumption and thermals over performance thanks in part to the small package, so the cpu and gpu processors will have lower frequencies than their desktop equivalents - whatever those may be.
Sounds a lot like laptops...
*Now I remember someone saying that the Series X would utilize a liquid cooler on the cpu. I wonder how they feel now that it's not true... KEK...
Since those are optimized, how does that translate to PC components?
Depends on how lazy they are - or whatever the excuse may be for launching a PC port in a broken state.
They'll iron out bugs over time, or not at all.
The above really needs to be answered by some software devs.
Your TLDR requires a crystal ball or someone with a TARDIS, because no one can predict the future, instead making second-guesses based on current and past events.