Well this has been known for a while. Back when they were messing around with the idea of doing the Votive Offerings (combining low tier blessings to make higher ones) they said this.
Also in that gamescom whatever footage they had red items and the ‘Dynax’ chainsword so I think maybe, the console launch was a giant impetus to their content roll out but also the idea of them increasing the power of weapons. They most likely didn’t want console players to start even more behind than they are already.