Then you aren't labeling it correctly. Preferred doesn't work for your argument. Expected /= preferred.

And I don't see how what I'm saying is more powerful than what the evidence supports when I'm trying to project what the final might resemble, not the performance level of the early kit.

A now i recall, the only where i saw RV730 was actually on the WiiU GPU speculation article featured here.

Ultimately, it's just guesswork based on what we know of tendencies for silicon processes, die sizes, and focusing mostly on the ALUs (which themselves are attached to a specific number of TMUs). The early vague rumours (+50%, x-times perf etc) had a hand in it as well, but that's why we mention a range.

Understandable



Wanted to add a comment on the ongoing idea abotu eDRAM thingy, however im still 3 pages back so still reading to get here so i'll be short:
I think that might actually be a CPU thing and might not have anything to do with the GPU's discrete(?) memory. Anyway it goes, i would be disappointed if the console will have only 1 GB of whatever memory, just won't compete in long-term. Memory is so much more important just makes all that hardware useless if you peak the mem out you can't make games better, no matter how fast the CPU, GPU is, this is exactly what Carmack from ID Software points about in many interviews.

I thought this was very interesting:


http://www.gametrailers.com/side-mis...riguing-wii-u/

This guy is right, as were the share drops in the stock market when they refused to disclose tech specs about the console (implying it would be kinda weak for a 2012->2017 gaming console).

Take the hint, Nintendo.. take the hint..

Double the size of the console, and then we can start talking again. :p

I don't know if they need to double it, per say. But it would be helpful if it didn't look like a safe deposit box.

Maybe that's why Nintendo feel comfortable putting their money into it? :o

lmao

Really though, I wonder about the length of that thing. My tv stand is a bit on the shallow side, which is fine because the Wii is so small. But if the Wii U is as long as it looks, I'm going to have to find a different place for it.

GAF has pointed out to me the interview is old. It's originally from a summer 2011 issue of Ngamer (so heck, it could have been from like March given mag lead times).

Makes more sense that way anyway as Nintendo is likely running out of time to change things one way or the other at this point.

The "RAM thing" is confusing you not me. Take a moment to look at Arkams posts, he specifically says he's talking about the dev kit, not the system itself. Therefore he's claiming the dev kit has 1GB of RAM, where as lherre insinuated his had 3GB*

*Lherre said that Nintendo had a range or memory they were looking at starting at 1GB in the final system (2GB in the corresponding dev kit) but that his current dev kit was using the higher end of that range. So I'm assuming that was 1.5GB (3GB in the dev kit). Could have been higher I suppose but I won't make that assumption.

Maybe he meant that regardless how much was in the system, it was known that 1GB would be in the final.

If you had a dev system with 2GB of RAM and 1GB was basically extra/scratch pad/debug, you might refer to it as a 1GB system, since the extra RAM was just to enable ease of working with the 1GB you were actually limited too in games you were working on.

He didn't mean that. He was very clear about everything he said. I believe him and I believe his company still had the earlier kit.

You really are special, i mean, you bring up these ridiculus ideas that devs would KNOW before nintedo them selfs even finalized their position.

Your argument about 1 GB being enough is very weird, what on earth would you be sufficed with this. 1 GB WILL not be enough to be competitive in the long run, heck the RAM is the most important and quite probably the BIGGEST BOTTLENECK, they will NOT be able to produce games that really push some big stuff. Im talking about the console's cycle, that's the long-term, and 1GB for long term, is a suicide, with 1.5 GB they would be just fine.

Because the power of the device is useless if they can't fit all their intended textures on, eDRAM doesn't help, eDRAM is not for storing, it gets filled from the main ram , so it won't help with the bottleneck issue.

I hope that they are all talking about the main memory, while nobody mentioned GPU RAM ... but i don't know really.

It's not how it works, and for the record, it has been noted that it might be AN OLD REPORT from the old dev kits.

I think your an imposter in this forums and please stop diluting this thread. Everything that's presented you keep downplaying it.

I won't speculate much further, your personal right is to say whatever you want no matter what, but for sake of morale keep it down a notch.

The reason we don't take seriously the negative is simply because they seem have no idea what they are talking about, these "devs" that came in the forums and said it's "slower than X360" without providing any specific information that could indicate and prove that, all those that were negative didn't say which kind of RAM and didn't said the supposable model of the GPU ... nothing.

And also, some of the devlopers who migh slip out aren't necessairly the most experienced geeks to know these things enough, what if that was some QA guy or maybe some whoever person at the company who heard things over the counter and didn't remember it well enough.

One thing is for sure, those that aren't really familiar wouldn't be making up any very high predictions just because of the moral reason a normal person wouldn't be making stuff up, they might be some guys who were lurking around the company, don't know the hardware but maybe have seen the internal demo or whatever and they saw the FPS maybe, and that made them think, but that's just the possibilities.

Little understanding of the technology could tell you this cannot happen with a R700 chip that's supposedly 40nm and a 45nm CPU.

However this is all based on what we currently have. If it turns out to be less powerful then nintendo did obviously blew it and the system will probably be a massive disappointment to me personally as well as others who expected more since expectations were set by these very rumors.

Seriously? No one should ever tone it down for the sake of morale.

wrong word , i meant ethics

I can already say that this come from European big studios which have logically the latest dev kits available to third parties. To be clear, these are not small studios that could have remained at earlier dev kits because they are not important enough to receive Nintendo's latest updates quickly.

So, from what my sources saw on their screens, they clearly stated that they experienced superior capabilities in comparison to the Xbox360. This is the positive aspect of my info: you can be sure that the Wii U is not on par with current gen HD. You can remove this idea from your heads, and stop speculating about it, it will not happen. The point more negative now: On the power scale, they told me that it’s closer to 2x Xbox360 than 5x. On paper, some components (you can guess which) are mathematically 4 or 5 times more powerful, more in quantity/number, than in the xbox360, but it does not translate for the moment in 5x prettier images, with 5 more complex and finest scenes, etc.

Further details: These impressions are from a time when studios used revision 4 of the dev kits. Lately, 4.2 kits shipped from Singapore. I don’t know if there is a significant power gain with “.X” type of revisions, I guess it’s the case, but not as important as a change of revision number (from Rev 3 to 4 for example). I’ve heard that V5 kits may exist. It is likely, as for many other consoles before, that Nintendo and first-party have more advanced and therefore more powerful/optimized dev kits. However, these v4 kits are apparently from the end of the year / beginning of 2012, and they are those which have benefited from the hardware boost reported on the net. For people who hoped that this upgrade would make the Wii U 5 times stronger and 5 times more capable of displaying beautiful stuff on screen, from what I know, this is not the case for now, but there are several variables that can explain this, I'll come back to this subject in other posts, but can say that this “not 5x Xbox360” is only valid in the context from which I gathered my informations (third-party, second-hand, subjectivity, news given at a certain time knowing that the console will come out maybe 10 months later so will receive more upgrades, etc.). But again, I put the emphasis on the fact that it’s clearly not on par with the xbox360, it’s at least 2x.

Furthermore, but read that with a grain of salt, many graphical effects are applied near the “end” of the visual development of a game. I guess some parameters that cause what is rendered on the screen to be more or less clean, complex, for example the type of shadow, the AA applied, and new effects that the Wii U GPU is probably capable of fall into this category (the shiny stuff that developers adds at the end, once the engine is running well), and therefore the final result will feel more like a 3 or 4 or even the famous 5x than 2x Xbox360 to the eyes of my sources, I keep in touch with them to know if it will be the case.

That is all I can say for now, there will be other posts to come. Do not expect revelations from each of my interventions though. This in not the main purpose of my decision to post on NeoGAF. As my nickname implies it, I want to share my ideas (of game design, background, etc.) confront them, do theorycrafting which I love. I’ll participate on topics that interest me, and of course this one, by writing “normal” and light messages with some funny things, gifs, images, and above all, ideas !

From GAF.

GAF still dosent seem to get what this guy is saying.

He says components are basically 2x360 overall system performance not that the images are 2x prettier.

You might want to read it again for yourself then.

He says overall the system is closer to 2x than 5x (somewhere between 2-3x overall, which is what I've always expected BTW). That doesn't mean the graphics can only be twice as good though. He does mention that "On paper, some components (you can guess which) are mathematically 4 or 5 times more powerful". If that component is the GPU then that will allow for much more than 2x the graphics fidelity. Of course 2x as pretty is a completely subjective judgement, there's really no point in discussing such a thing.

NOTE: I'm commenting on this before I've even looked to see what I think of this guy as far as reliability goes, so I'm not believing any of this at this point, even though it fits the kind of performance I've been expecting from the console.

I won't discuss the validity of that post, but to me it indicates 800 VLIW5 shaders @ ~500MHz for the "X360*5" part (since shader performance is the cheapest thing to multiply from Xenos), and 32/40TMUs + 16 ROPs for the "X360*2" part.
Again, a reminescence of the first rumour: the GPU being very close to a RV770.

I'll definitely be buying the console if it carries that kind of GPU performance.

Wow.

You never stop.

He never will, just to clear things up:

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost...ostcount=11625

Again, who knows how true it is, seems reasonable though, we'll have to wait and see.

Do not call Rangers an imposter. He's been on these forums a lot longer than you have and nothing in his post you quoted was any actual downplaying. It is customary for dev kits to have double the amount of RAM that is in a system, and the extra memory is used for all the things Rangers listed.

As far as your weird perception that 1 GB is not enough, why the hell not? Nintendo is looking at being competitive with 360 and PS3, clearly not the future generation of consoles. Nintendo finally wants to compete with Sony and Microsoft after it sees its actual market share of game buying people shrink to what it was in the heyday of the Wii. I would hope for Wii U to have more than 1 GB, but that's plenty enoguh to compete in the current gen.

Again, do not call Rangers an imposter. You have been warned.

That part i do know, but
Where's the point of discussing a system in anticipation of being it a failure with bad hardware or at least slow hardware.

At the end, who cares about the dev kits, they really don't matter to anything that would factor the success of the console and consumers experience. So all this info might be for nothing, since the final hardware will not be like the dev kits, obviously the RAM being the biggest and only variable, so all these Ram rumors might be ... well , totally useless.

On the GPU side of things ... remember that the RV770 rumor also had the word for "eyefinity" so that's multiple outputs at the same time obviously tie with the fact of multiple screens ....
The point is that nintendo didn't commit to 3 screens at the same time, they will now after e3 they picked up a lot of feedback on that and they confirmed that you will be able to connect 2 tablets to WiiU, which is probably and obviously going to get something better in the GPU and RAM side of things as well to make that viable to use in a good multiplayer game, they surely won't support 2 tablets and say "oh if you have one tablet you can play in 1080p but with 2 you can get 720p on the main tv screen" - that would be ridiculous and a big loss.

So the added power could be used on Singleplayer focused games to get more graphical visual eye candy on the main screen, obviously those games going to use the second screen for the HUD and INFO that's not going to render any demanding scenes.

I don't think there's anything fatally wrong with that, to be honest.
Reducing resolution when doing split-screen multiplayer has been made for many years since Goldeneye for Nintendo 64.
I'm not sure about current-gent, but I'm pretty sure the Mario Kart Double Dash for the Gamecube reduces the rendering resolution when doing 3 or 4-player split-screen.

Besides, the more tablet-centric the game is, the less you'll be looking at the main screen anyways.

Just out of curiosity, what are the consequences? I mean, you've warned him, but what will you do to him if he doesn't learn?

These new rumors are interesting, but as with all rumors, I'm taking them with a grain of salt. I'd be quite happy with a console like that, but imo, all rumors are just that until more evidence is available to support them.

I've seen a few people around the net say this before.
" Wii U is meant to compete with PS3 and 360" and it always amuses me that they actually believe it considering it makes no sense.

Why doesn't it make sense? There's a remarkable lack of basic business understanding among some quarters.

Nintendo believe their product will sell on the value of its tablet experience. The rest of the system is thus designed around the best price/performance option Nintendo can go wtih based on their expectations for product interest and hopes for profit margins. If they believe the tablet will sell the machine to 100 million users regardless, why spend another $50 per system on better hardware when you can make more money off from the cheaper hardware? The only reason to invest more in the system performance is if the money-men can make a good argument that it'll increase total sales. Current gen, 7 year old tech, performance is selling 25 million consoles a year, while gamers buying awesome PC hardware to get a next-gen experience aren't showing massive growth. The evidence is that visuals aren't going to be that important unless ushering in a proper next-gen in the conventional mold. So unless Nintendo go with a monster machine to be sold on the strength of its power, wherein the tablet plays an ancilliary role, then there's nothing shocking about them being conservative.

The ongoing talk seems to be Nintendo evaluating options, getting feedback off the devs as they push the performance forwards cautiously without blowing the bank unnecessarily. Quite how there are such big arguments over this, and complaints and threats made, over what's a pretty simple matter, is kinda mind-boggling.

If their stated desire to attract more 3rd party AAA games is true, then they would be absolutely stupid beyond belief to release a system on par with the current consoles.

Are you operating under the (mistaken) impression that the 360 and the ps3 will cease production with the launch of their next generation consoles? If Nintendo feel they will be well short of the 720/ps4 (due to launching earlier with a new controller, and a desire to be small and quiet), what sense would there be in launching a money loser just to be closer?

Yes i see current consoles will be supported by ports for a long time. 360 can even be the lead platform for a lot of middle tier games. Nintendo should take advantage of that if their target is a five year console.

2012 is just too soon to launch high end console from a 3rd party standpoint. There is no content or teams to support such machines for the first year. They are still too much in current-gen development and are only researhcing next-gen engines. When Call of Duty launches on a new engine then next-gen has begun.

For Nintendo that is targetting families and casuals from the get go $399 cannot be the target.. i suspect they will go $299 just because they can at launch and drop to $249 when others launch new consoles or sooner if sales dont come

That's a chicken or the egg argument. Who would buy hardware for games that don't exist? Who would make software for a market that doesn't purchase?

Even with that, there was a substantial PC hardware uptick when BF3 came out last year and actually took advantage of DX11 GPUs which were launched 2 years ago.

We'd have to have hard numbers from Nvidia and AMD on their gpu's to get a glimpse of how big the market is for high-end graphics because the sales of games on PC will not tell the story. And with that, you'd have to keep in mind that there hasn't been a new game that was built for high end PC GPUs since Crysis1 back in 2007 and even this was the uber high end. Most new games are running fine these days even on integrated graphics.

That should tell you something.

From your argument, that tells you that nobody cares about graphics anymore.

For me, that says nobody is coding for the high end PC anymore (piracy).

That is of course unless a competitor (BF4) launches on nextgen first as a launch game running buttery smooth nextgen visuals and establishes a new NG online community before Activision can build a nextgen engine capable of taking advantage of the new hardware...

I understand where this presumption is coming from, but Apple is proving this wrong on a daily basis. $500+ Ipads are flying of the shelf and into family/casual users hands. Same goes for $400 kinect bundles, ipod touch, iphones, and other uber phones (even to kids! :shock: ).

It didn't/doesn't make much sense to me either in some cases, but it goes to show, money is seemingly not the roadblock it once was (recession be damned! :razz: )

If a product is desirable enough, they will buy it. ~ If it isn't desirable enough, they won't regardless of how cheap it is (wii $99 bundles).

This lesson may have been too late for Nintendo to put into action for their WiiU plans, but hopefully that is not the case.

this

I'll go on record with my $249 Wii U launch price prediction.

I believe the price will be announced as "under $300" at E3 w/ the actual price specified shortly before the launch at $249.

Everything on the PS3/360/Kinect side should be $50 cheaper by then.

Didn't Iwata said wii u would be a more expensive console?

I think nintendo will launch at a higher price than only 250. They launched wii at such a low price because the hardware was so cheap and because they didn't know if wii would sell. Wii u is, imo, likely to be relatively speaking much faster than ps360/new consoles than wii was and the pad probably makes it more expensive as well. Also they don't have any direct competition from new sony/ms consoles. Since I believe it's fairly likely to for the hardware to be a fair bit faster than ps360 I can see them launching wii u at a higher price to put it in a bit more exclusive, but still afordable, pricerange and compete with wii against ps360.

Launching wii u cheap would push the wii out of the market and put nintendo in a position where they can't play with wii u pricing much anymore.

I'm expecting $349. $329 if we're lucky.

$300 - $350.

More expensive than Wii is now..

Those prices are beyond Nintendo's target audience? We are all making our best guess, but I don't think Nintendo is making a core gaming console to go against Sony and MS. Nintendo never goes head-to-head.

It's another gimmick based console doing its own thing for a wide casual gaming demographic that at its core includes kids and Nintendo fans.

Nintendo is still feeling the burn of 3DS's high priced launched disaster.

the hardware really plays the factor here ...also for the initial buyy is the name factor considering itll get a more hardcore name for its the target audience atleast getting the big guys fit, since the name doesnt make the casuals more excited, its nintendo, families gonna buy it for mario regardless of the name, but in the mainstream it might make some effect , certainly ther hardcore dont really care about things like this
but it-s a plus if it has more professional feel to it, really want to see the results of how they want to suffice both groups .. will nintendo make it , if it does, ladies and gentleman this might be nintendo revolution ...

and i kind of dont care about 3rd parties personally from a gamer perspective since i usually play first parties and thats why i use nintendo, but also cause i play most other games on PC where im savvy well enough for any tech issues which arent a big deal for me.
but on the other hand obviously i dont want to see it fail or below expectations since they were commited to just this cause to get back into serious gaming , but heck when you look at it , they diddnt reall lose the hardcore, not me either, metroid didnt sell any less, ssbb sold like hell and has great community, and everyone still waited for zelda.

but there is one reason i would like nintendo to succeed above expectations, just to prove michael pachter wrong!

what i wanted to add, is that it feels so great when your perdictions are better than some "professional" and to see the whole web melting seeing all those noobs being all surprised, kind of amusing , not being evil. ;P

Wider and deeper.

Just like most people ignored the blue ocean speech given with Wii's reveal, most people also seem to ignore the speech given at Wii U's reveal.

The system is meant to target both the casual and core audience.
Nintendo clearly said they want the system to be a balance between both audiences, something people who are already calling it a 'casual machine' ignore.

Also Reggie said that Wii U at launch will be for customers who want the "latest gadgets and have a higher disposable income"?

Yes, he or some other top level exec said one would need over $60K of disposable income to be in the market group they are targeting with it, otherwise you should be looking at the Wii original.

Here's the discussion we had on that over here: http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread...92#post1608492

Well when the rumors first came out the reported BOM was $350-$400. I think the 3DS situation is what keeps it from being $400. Though the 3DS' lack of software was as much if not more to blame.

At the same time Nintendo has made multiple references to who their target is at launch and it's not the $249 casual. I'm not saying $349 will work, but that's what I expect it to be around.

Also I'm of the belief that $349 will be $50-$100 less than what MS and/or Sony offer so it's not like it would be going "head-to-head" with them.

This is why I'm estimating the amount to be what it is. Approx. $300 on the console and approx. $50 on the controller. Iwata said himself they are deciding whether or not to sell Wii U hardware at a loss. A price of $299 or $349 would guarantee that based on my BOM, and even $349 might be a slight loss when factoring accessories packed in.

Expensive hardware also means expensive games. I guess it isn't that visuals aren't important, the importance of graphics are often overstated mainly because of their lack of cost effectiveness. If you have to sell games at $40 then you always have that problem like with say the Vita of someone coming along and selling a pretty equivalent title for $5-10 on iOS, then you can ask whether the lower margin on the hardware and fewer overall sales made up for the additional performance?

I suspect that the level of performance they are targeting isn't in relation to beating or matching current generation consoles, I suspect they are more looking at being able to reproduce functional renditions of current and next generation games. The big problem with the Wii wasn't that it's hardware 'sucked', it was because it couldn't play functionally equivalent current generation titles albeit toned down. In hindsight I believe that even reproducing a toned down 480P rendition of current generation games would have been of more benefit to them than backwards compatibility.

The big question IMO isn't whether or not the Wii U will make current generation titles look any better. The question really is whether or not you can take nearly 100% of next generation titles and make them feature and art complete.

Not trying to get into another hornets nest, but to me the "almost as good" argument doesn't really fly either.

Even if, Console X is only 30% less powerful than console Y, I believe it's still probably basically a lost cause.

If Wii had been half as powerful as PS360, I see it's sales outcome as being almost not moved an inch from what it did anyway. Half is still not nearly good enough. Nobody would have been like "ooh, I'm going to get COD on the Wii!" What, at half resolution? Half framerate (this would have been more tolerable I can almost see it working, then again it would be 20-25 FPS)? Half the effects? Which option is palatable?

Just imagine if, PS3 had been downclocked a mere 10% from every clock it's currently at (so, 2.9ghz Cell, 450 mhz RSX, whatever-10% RAM or say -50 MB's). Or, the same exercise for 360. In either case ramifications likely would have been pretty huge. A mere 10%. -20% would have ended the ballgame for either imo. Support would have consolidated around the clearly stronger machine and since they sell almost 50-50 it wouldn't have taken much to tip the scales.

As it is Ps3 and 360 are eerily almost exactly equal. To this day if you put a gun to my head I dont know that there's a clear winner between the two technically (the argument would be PS3 exclusives versus 360 better multiplats), which is kind of astonishing, but I suspect a rarity we arent likely to see again.

This idea that "oh if wii u is 80% as good as the other guys it'll be close enough" sounds appealing, but imo probably isn't even true. Although it's in range where it might be reasonable, because you would have a year+head start. 70% would definitely be to the point of a lost cause imo. The other big problem is going to be that controller is going to add a cost burden regardless and aside from any other issues. If you are 80% as good and a year headstart, in order to really make that work you're probably going to have to be aggressive on price, which is going to be a specific problem for Wii U. On the flipside you could believe the tablet controller will be an external force creating demand the other guys dont have, like motion control did for the Wii. Personally i dont see that though. If anything I see that being an annoying nag, but it could have appeal I havent realized yet.

As ever, you misunderstand completely what's being said. I didn't say there's no future for a super-powered console, or that there isn't a market for it. I even explained where Nintendo should focus if they do want to go that route. What I did say is there's not much market for this-gen graphics at higher framerates and resolutions. If Wuu is only going to offer moderately perked versions of current gen games, it won't be attracting business from core gamers. Ergo, what's the point in enabling a machine to render MW3 at 1080p if Joe Gamer is happy to play MW3 at <720p when enabling that involves added cost for Nintendo? (That's not a conclusive argument against, but the sort of consideration an intelligent designer/engineer will be pondering.)

Now, repeating myself as you seemed to have missed it last time, if Nintendo decided to create a proper next-gen console to attract the core gamer, then they would see success with a fancy graphics powerhouse. But that same console will only cost more with addition of the tablet that won't be needed for those core gamers, so why bother with the tablet? If Nintendo want to do a core console, it makes little business sense to also incorporate a tablet and try to sell that side of the market, at least in the same one device. Nintendo have decided, rightly or wrongly, to go with the tablet as their strategic approach for their next box. Taking that as fact, the sense in putting in awesome hardware at added cost which isn't going to affect the desirability of the tablet much isn't there. It was the same with Wii - what was the minimum hardware cost Nintendo could go with to enable their business strategy? They could have added better hardware, but if that extra $20 a console costs lead to only 5% added consumer interest/sales, because the draw of waggle was very strong irrespective of graphics performance, then Nintendo would have lost a billion or two dollars.

It's the same designing any product. It'd be nice to offer everything to all people and have the widest appeal, but adding features adds costs. So engineers know to take a set of options (speed, strength, cost) and pick some of them, not all of them. Out of the variables Nintendo has to juggle, they will be deciding around the tablet experience, not the uber-gamer experience. Hence the choice of hardware not being uber-powerful is not at all shocking.

Just like PS2 was a lost cause after the Xbox came out right? After all it was 3-4x as powerful...

Just like playing PC games on a 7770 looks terrible and is a lost cause because its ~1/3 the power of the highend hardware that was targeted, right?

You're reaching too hard.

Shifty might be on to something here. There was an interview where a top guy at Nintendo, maybe Iwata, said the machine will not be limited to HD resolutions. It might be that the machine's games could do next gen graphics, just scaled back to an acceptable performance level. What sacrifices in graphics that will represent is remained to be seen. Because let's face it, PS4 and Xbox3 will definitely be more powerful than Wii U, and if the Wii U has a large enough installed base then many games will be ported to it.

I would like to see a decently powerful machine, but knowing Nintendo they like to gimp their hardware in the name of saving a dollar. I just really wonder how the devs at Nintendo have felt during the current generation being limited to Xbox level hardware. They must be itching to make games on something far more powerful.

Nintendo's business model is selling first-party games, w/ much lower than typical AAA game development costs, to the widest possible audience with very long sales charts legs. Any machine priced over $300 would preclude that. It's not happening..

There is no business model in which Nintendo significantly increases its development costs (w/ fany next-gen visuals), as well as its hardware costs, while shrinking their initial audience for over a year until the machine drops to a mass market friendly price.

If the Zelda, Metroid and Mario Galaxy series aren't AAA then I don't know what it is.

That's the whole point we're taking into account, the controller can't be better to shift from motion control, it's just a win, it'll be good for old classic games, plus with all the motion stuff, plus the screen, i mean, this is the shifting, but the public will have a bad perception if it ends up only 100% or 2x times better than the current gen, that will not sound like next gen which is what everyone would like, but still if it goes horrible, will probably buy it anyways for first-parties, but probably not on release date.

Nobody really bashed the controller much aside of the % that obviously don't want to think and if you just take the devs who talked about it in interviews those that didn't even had stuff in development (eg carmack from id software), what everyone pointed out is the multiplayer and nintendo listened the feedback.

I can say that they are listening closes+ly and taking a lot of feedback from developers, Darksiders 2 developer pointed some things out.

Because i was worried aswell when i heard about only one per system:cry:

And this:
http://shrani.si/f/1A/Kt/3qINCCPC/nintendowin.jpg

Just one idea ... out of hundreds.


Good point, especially the second paragraph.

Oh man

News on some new kind of sensor on the controller.

http://thewiiu.com/topic/2681-ninten...nit-for-wii-u/

Except 'the public' won't. They have zero understanding of relative performance. They just see the graphics and decide if they like them or not, and they see the experience and decide if they like it or not. "Wii doesn't look very pretty, but it does look fun. Let's buy it!"

Nintendo's whole gamble is the tablet experience being attractive. If it is, the rest of the system doesn't matter a great deal, so they can save money on it ("Wuu doesn't look very pretty (actually it looks no worse to what everyone is happy with at the moment), but it does look like fun. Let's buy it!"). If it isn't, the rest of the system won't save them, unless they invest massively in it like a conventional next-gen of console hardware. "Don't get that Wuu tablet controller, but Modern Warfare sure looks good. Let's buy it!" But with that strategy they will almost certainly lose out to the next systems who will likely be more powerful (later) and maybe cheaper (no tablets) and who already have the core gamer entrenched in Live! or PSN. Unless there's a role reversal, with MS and Sony going cautious next-gen, maybe with lower performance and gimmick. Then Nintendo could trump them with a monster rig and maybe, just maybe, lure the core away from Live!/PSN to the Wuu. That'd be one hell of a gamble though. It makes far more sense to be as conservative on Wuu's specs as possible, to strike the best balance between desirability and cost to maximise profits if it succeeds and minimise losses if it fails. And there's no scientific method to gauge that balance. Nintendo just have to sound people out, ask the devs, consult with their suppliers, etc., to come up with a feel for what's right. The only logical argument applicable to the specs is going all-in doesn't make sense when the platform is riding on the tablet. The choice of the tablet means Nintendo have to go with a minimal-weighted balance, starting with the bare minimum and seeing how far they dare stretch.

Ignoring the condescending and insulting response, I get what you're saying, and as I said, I strongly disagree with that notion.

It would have been like Sony deciding "ok we really want Bluray in PS3, but the BOM for the BRD alone is $300 and we've already decided the highest acceptable BOM is $400. So team, let's put whatever else we can in that $100 budget".

It's an interface which is already seen in devices everywhere and so the unique "wow factor" that would make people want to buy it on it's own is practically nil.

Now, if they accept that the interface will be an accessory-to-the-main-experience (not the reason to buy the machine) and designed the rest of the machine with the thought of competing with nextgen offerings, they might have a shot.

But trying to wii this thing with competing products that already wii, that's a recipe for failure.


I completely get what your saying with fixed BOM > tab costs x > subtract x from BOM = chip budget. I'm just saying that if that equations chip budget equals ps360 SOC then WiiU == fail.

It's up to Nintendo to decide what that fixed acceptable BOM is. HD7770 should be the baseline of what they're looking for in a GPU. That is, if they are looking to compete nextgen with something other than ipads, iphones, ipod touches, kindle fires, and all of their free to $5 games ...

But maybe that's just the business sense in me talking...

This epitomizes the desperate struggle Nintendo finds themselves in. What practical use does this have in games? Same for the vitality sensor idea they had.

I just hope that if/when they go down the Sega road they don't lose their passion for games creation ... but then again that seems to have already started with Miyamoto's one foot out the door and subbing out projects like Metroid.

I seriously can't wrap my head around what happened to all the profit they made from Wii and why it wasn't invested properly.

Except the experience will be different - you won't be able to play Mario Galaxies Evolved on iAnything, and people may be willing to spend $60 a pop for that game en masse even if it looks marginally better than what they are seeing on PS360 now. Graphics hardware alone does not make the experience and does not define the value of the system to consumers.

Not business sense (business sense wouldn't question the validity in a bare-minimium performance target), but a lack of faith in the tablet. That lack of faith may be justified, but if the tablet proves to be the Next Big Thing in gaming, Nintendo will be laughing all the way to the bank again, with more cash the cheaper their hardware gets. Hence the logic that some refute in targeting lower performance.

Why are you so obsessed that everything has to be about games?

I agree with Shifty if you say games are the primairy reason for people to buy a console. Let's be honest here, media functionality of ps360 is pretty gimped. You can buy a ac ryan for 90 euro's and it will play just about every format out there. Even a lot of tv's these days support playback from usb/hdd/network for the most common file formats available for download on the internet. So even if ps4 or x720 would have perfect media playback, which I doubt, especially for sony as they don't have a lot of incentive to make that happen given blu ray I don't see anybody buying a ~400 console for that when maybe their tv already does it for free or they can get a media player for 90 euro's that does the same (and likely better). Internetting/social media on a console isn't somebody cares about either now that just about everybody who is likely to buy a ps720 will already own a smartphone or tablet who are much better at that than a console with a crappy controller for text input.

So the only real reason somebody is going to spend 400 euro's on a console is games.

I don't understand what you're saying. That Wuu will appeal due to non-games and super-high-power will be important for that? :???: The argument for high-power is solely driven by gaming, pretty much the most demanding application any consumer computing hardware can be turned to. If Nintendo aren't looking at making a big ticket of their games then having a smaller GPU is even easier for their customers to swallow. Although good luck selling people on an iPad-type tablet experience that needs a base station to work.

It isn't about lack of faith in the tablet.

The tablet interface isn't an issue in and of itself. ipad proves this with every quarterly result. The problem is the direct comparisons it will inevitably draw, and the weaknesses on which their new console will be exposed on.

It's like an ipad, but not portable outside the house, and can't get the apps from the app store, and can't get itunes, can't play half the media library, oh and the games are about ten times as much money.

Nevermind the fact that like you said, tablet growth is exploding.

By the end of this year with ipad3 hitting the shelves soon, I can only imagine how many IOS, Android, and win8 tablets and mini tablets will be in peoples homes and on offer.

Trying to sell in that light is beyond foolish for Nintendo, considering their background.

But yes, you are correct, nobody else will have Mario.
Then again, at one time there was only one place to get Sonic too...

As my sig points out, things change.

Exactly.

...and all the other goodies on offer from IOS that do not exist in Nintendo land.

It wasn't meant for you, I just had the reply window forgotten open for ages :lol:

The reply was meant for TheChefO's comment on the new sensor - not everything in the console have to be meant just for games, or for games at all.

You unquoted all the context. As Shifty points out in the rest of his post that's not what Nintendo doing - they *are* going to make a big deal out of their games.

An iPad doesn't do the same thing that the Wu will. It may be that people don't want what Nintendo are offering, but what Nintendo are offering is not an iPad. What Nintendo are offering will work or not work with a degree of independence from raw hardware performance.

I will say Nintendo made a nice little run there for a while with Wii-fit in going outside traditional gaming uses, but that fitness venture has been brought to its logical conclusion in Kinect.

For the rest of the console+ experience, I'm not seeing Nintendo really picking up the ball here and running with it. They can't even keep up with Sony and MS on the gaming+ services.

But it's good to know they are researching ways to find out what season it is and let us know what the weather will be.

Yeah it's really boiling down to their games (not interface, nor spec:?: ), and as I said, at one time, there was only one place to get Sonic and AM2 games too...

do tablets really get into every home? besides some cheap low end android it's an expense you have to justify. if so, are they really shared or more personal stuff? do they even support user accounts, as even win9x did in a limited form? with the added caveat of the small flash drive.

but yes, it's all about the games. phone/tablet games mostly are modern flash games, and/or have lousy controls or the difficulty is based on those very lousy controls. I had the displeasure of "gaming" a bit on a shiny windows phone phone, and it was inferior to a 1989 game boy.

people technical or not will notice the vast difference in game quality and complexity and how a stick or cross is better to move your character.

It's not just tablets, it's smart phones and tab-lite experiences like ipod touch. And yes, they really are selling gangbusters.

For the games angle, it depends on who that audience is and what that game experience is expected to be. For the past 6 years, Nintendo has cultivated a casual image and lured those looking for that casual experience.

Now with the surge in devices which offer a casual gaming experience (along with many other functions) and offer those casual gaming experiences at prices 1/10th what Nintendo charges and it becomes a much more difficult proposition to sell. Mario or not.

For those wanting a richer experience, PS3 and xb360 (with motion controls) are on offer as well.

And for those dead set on Mario, the Gamecube audience would suggest that audience is about 20m.

Well, people do actually buy separate "clock-weather-thingys" which show the temp, weather etc, so considering the sensor(s) probably don't cost much, adding it to the tablet can have its uses for similar purposes as those.

And it could actually give quite unique features for games too - think about the possibility of having a game where weather is actually dynamic and based on the weather of your actual location?

You start playing on some sunny day, in a sunny game, and suddenly a thunderstorm appears not only in real life, but in the game too?
Or you play at winter, and it's winter in the game too?

Littlest things can do miracles ;)

Why does that require a sensor? Why not just tie in to existing internet-based weather services like those used by Windows gadgets, iOS, etc? If it's in the controller, all it tells you is the conditions in the room. How variable is that going to be? Are we going to have to mount a sensor on the exterior of our house in addition to the sensor bar on our TV? Seems silly when it should just be internet and location aware...

This.

It was a futile attempt to sell more plastic.

Heart-rate via a wired finger clip. Why? To see how all that wii flailing is working at keeping up the heart rate? It certainly isn't for gauging emotional engagement on devices which for all intents fail to engage the user due to pathetic spec which detracts from the experience.

Going forward, perhaps it will be integrated to the WiiU, but again, I don't expect a strong support from Developers to track heart rates and do anything meaningful with it.



All this periphery just so Nintendo can try and avoid comparisons with true nextgen consoles when the solution is rather simple and not all that costly. Just put a decent freakin' GPU in the box. 120mm2 won't break the bank.

Valve seem pretty keen on Biometric gameplay and since we all know Valve is superior to all other third parties, that is enough.:smile:



True, it would be up to the more creative devs to take real advantage of it.

For you and other enthusiasts such as yourself the solution is simple, just more power and preferably the same controller. You don't really care much about price.

For the mass market and many other gamers, we appreciate new ways to play and interact with games, that's a big part of being 'true' next gen. We like not having consoles that are so similar you can hardly tell the difference.

All Nintendo needs to do is be powerful enough to get good next gen ports, have a good online system and do it all at a good price.

^
Great post!

I agree that biometrics is a potentially interesting idea.

I'm not convinced that heartrate alone is sufficient to tell you anything meaningful about player response. Every time someone gets up to go make a sandwich is screws up your data. You can't tell the difference between any number of things that can elevate heartrate (excitement, fear, frustration? You have no way to know!)

It's going to tell you at best that your jump scare is a jump scare. Great? I don't understand how that data is any more valuable than a playtest where you can actually *see* how people react to things.


Regardless, I find it enormously unlikely that Nintendo even *considered* any of those sorts of applications before announcing the thing. It sure seems to me that they just wanted it to be a Wii-Fit add-on that you could use to track your pulse and blood oxygen while working out and they figured that people would eat it up because they were pushing crap tons of Wii Fit at the time.

Once upon a time, I believed that Nintendo really knew what they were doing. Now it just seems increasingly like they just throw together whatever comes to mind as cheaply as possible so they can see what sticks and how much plastic crap they can sell you.

The DS and the Wii were both pretty innovative relative to the device market at the time. Meanwhile, the 3DS was just an attempt to jump on the 3D bandwagon and the WiiU is an attempt to jump on the tablet bandwagon. I find it hard to attribute any "grand schemes" to anything Nintendo does at this point.