I've got a crazy theory on why Lockheart was canceled.
* Tinfoil hat on *
Lockheart makes a lot of sense. If we look at the steam hardware survey a year before the PS4, in 2012 only 17.7% of PC gamers had a 720p monitor while 25.6% of PC gamers had a 1080p monitor; a lot of people had 1080p TVs and in general, everyone was super excited for the consoles to get to 1080p and finally match the PC gamers who've been gaming at 1080p for years. But in 2019, according to the latest Steam survey, only 1.6% are gaming on a 4K monitor (another 4.7% in 1440p) while a whopping 62.5% are still gaming on a 1080p monitor. Today most content isn't available in 4K, even huge cultural phenomenon like the MCU movies are mostly unavailable in 4K. In short, the world is much less excited to go 4K compared to 2012 and 1080p. Even right here in this thread, where the core of the core is posting, we see a lot of pushback to the idea of going native 4K. Yeah, we still want 1440p + reconstruction to 4K but we are the hardcore of the hardcore and we don't care much about native 4K, so does the layman even care about 4K at all?
After considering all that, a Lockheart console makes a lot of sense. If Microsoft had a 1080p console that runs the same games and they mostly look the same only in 1080p instead of 4K for 300$, that could be one hell of a deal for a very large group of customers that would have never bought a 500$ Anaconda or PS5. Customers will have a choice, the more casuals (which makes most of the gaming community) will buy Lockheart while the core who wants the best hardware around will buy the 500$ Anaconda. So why cancel Lockheart? Why invest millions in R&D and throw away such a great idea (I know that a lot of users her oppose this idea but they will probably agree that at least financially it's a great idea)?
Well, that's where my crazy theory comes in. What if Microsoft, by the Cerny interview or from stories from developers, had realized that Sony is aiming at a 499$ console. What if Microsoft had realized that the PS5 is more powerful than the Anaconda just like the rumblings during E3? That will make the Anaconda kind of miss its' point to be the crazy high-end console for the gamer who has to have the most powerful machine around. Silicon is already set in stone, memory setup and bus are already set in stone; they can't do much except add a few GB of memory and clock the GPU or CPU a bit higher and who knows if that's enough. So how about using Microsoft's biggest weapon, money? What if they've decided to price the Anaconda at 399$? It will undermine the whole idea of Sony having the more powerful console at the same price, if they are 100$ an a bit weaker, Scarlett really makes sense. Thing is, it will make the Lockheart make no sense any more, after all, why do they need a 300$ console if they have a 400$ console that is already PS5-grade (even if it's 10%-20% weaker)? So they've killed Lockheart, they might have the weaker console but they also have the 100$ cheaper console with Halo and probably Forza 8 ready for launch day.
I know what your thinking, why not just price the Lockheart at 250$ or 200$ so they can get that casual crowd anyway? They can't. With a 500$ and 300$ strategy, they probably lost very little money on both SKUs, at least they probably took a pretty low hit on the Lockheart because it's aimed at the more casual audience. If they cut the Anaconda to 400$, they will lose extra 100$ on each console but these customers are core enough to make it back 10 folds. As we saw in the Sony presentation, year one adopters of a 400$ console will spend 1600$ in the console's lifespan which makes losing extra 100$ on launch day not that bad if it means getting a good starting user base for the console. But the casuals who will buy Lockheart? Not so much, they spend much less than 700$ (the 700$ figure includes the early adopters that spend 1600$ so a casual probably spends a lot less) and losing extra 100$ isn't worth it. So Lockheart at 300$ and Anaconda at 400$ doesn't make much sense. Anaconda alone at 400$ while PS5 is at 500$? That makes a lot more sense, striking a balance between power and price is the name of the game.
* Tinfoil hat off *
I enjoyed the wild speculation, but I don't think a steam survey on PC user display resolutions is reflective of even a minority of console gamers and the displays they play on.
If MS at one point thought Lockheart wasn't a terrible idea, it would have been based on better data than steam survey.
Why Sony and not Sony Interactive entertainement on the photo? I think this is a really good fake.
It's possibly from a legit Sony event that had nothing to do with PS.
