"I think we're certainly approaching the upper end of it, as far as what developers are able to do with it," Fergusson told Gamasutra. In the near term, gamers are covered: "There will be games in development that won't ship until 2010, and I'm sure they'll look killer," he assured.

But 2010 releases leave two years before the Gears of War developer's own projections on the release of its next-generation graphics technology. Epic plans to deliver a console-focused Unreal Engine 4 in 2012. Crytek, the studio behind graphical powerhouses Far Cry and Crysis, also plans to deliver its next step forward in 2012.

Fergusson, for his part, is unsure of what's in store for the end of this console generation. "Just looking at all the demos we saw [at last week's Games Convention]--ours and others--it's clear that all the games just keep improving, and keep pushing that bar."