1 Million Tears or Why the Wii U is Weak *SPAWN*

[Entropy]

As I've said many times before you simply can't use exclusive titles to compare hardware, what are you comparing it too?
Who's to say Naughty Dog couldn't have built a better looking Uncharted on 360?
Or Halo4 couldn't have been better on PS3?

The damn thing is that the reverse is true as well. If a system has particular qualities/weaknesses that are difficult to fully exploit/avoid in ported applications, then these cross platform applications aren't a good measure of the capabilities of the system.

Example underexploited strength: Cell SPU programming
Example difficult to side-step weakness: Lack of CPU SIMD units.
If you're doing PS3 exclusives you can go berserk with SPE coding/piping/whatnot that just isn't transferable to any other platform and a wasted effort, or added problem even, if you are going to port your game.
Or if you are making a game for a console without SIMD units, you simply design your game from that base.

All you can ever do iss look at trends in cross platform titles, if PS3 titles generally run at lower framerates and lower resolutions, you can start to draw conclusions, tat perhaps the GPU or it's path to memory is a limiting factor.

This is sensible, but limited in scope. The GPU or its path to memory would be a limitation compared to what you request of it. The crucial point is that a game that was balanced for the PS3 wouldn't make such demands in the first place - the PS3 is limited in comparison to the lead platform. And if the PS3 has strenghts compared to the lead platform, those are less likely to be fully exploited.

While looking at exclusives for performance evaluation is flawed just as you described, that doesn't mean that turning to multi platform titles will provide better data.

Benchmarking is a bitch. If multiplats is going to be your main fare, then by all means, that's a good sample set. But if you are more interested in the titles that are specific to a platform, it is not.

The most interesting part of the WiiU stuff so far it is isn't running cross platform titles at higher resolutions, it isn't running with better AA, enabling these things takes minimal effort, these two items tend to imply that it has either 8 ROPS (the same as 360/PS3), and that's the limiting factor or the bandwidth to EDRAM is limited.

Seems reasonable.
I'd speculate the ROPs, since even if EDRAM bandwidth is unlikely to be staggering in absolute terms, it should still compare well to the RAM of the PS360.
Personally, I find interesting that lack of CPU SIMD doesn't seem to matter all that much - implying that the die area/power budget devoted to that functionality on the HD-twins was a dubious investment.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The Wii has an attach rate on par with the PS3 and 360.

All Nintendo games though ('cept maybe Dance Dance and/or Sega Something-or-other?).

Well, the number of systems sold is small as well. What you say has been trivially true for every console at launch. How could it be different? It hasn't been available for more than a few weeks after all.

New console owners buy new games. A lack of presence in the top 40 (which goes down to a few thousand units I estimate) means very few new consoles being sold. This is one of those every-console situations that could provide easy reference datapoints, but I don't know of any way to look up charts for a given period of a console's life. Googling UK charts for 2007, I get this saying 12 titles in the launch week for PS3 including the number 1 top spot. Wii U's exclusives peaked at number 11 on its launch week. Of course, it only sold a 1/4 of PS3's launch numbers in the UK. We don't have better details than this, or at least, I don't. But developers have the same sort of info even if codified with GfK and NPD metrics. Wii U's aren't flying off the shelves and selling lots of titles. This EG article reports COD on Wii U accounted for just 1% of the game's sales. When you know Nintendo's software is a principle purchase by Nintendo console owners, and you see evidence of lack of interest, lack of 3rd party software adoption, and you know there are another two big consoles just around the corner, does it make a lot of sense to invest in ports? A wait-and-see mentality strikes me as prudent, and given the lack of 3rd party support coming for Wii U, it appears many other devs/publishers are like minded.

 

[Ghostz]

He still has a job because he knows how to make money for NINTENDO. What that says about third parties and their relation to Nindedo's products obviously is of little concern to them.

It may not be good for third parties money making, but like the Wii, Nintendo made a lot of money themselves on their own games and their own products. That will always be Nintendo's first priority going forward.

Do you honestly believe the WiiU is going to make Nintendo much money at all?....

No, that shouldn't be the question....how much more profitable do you believe they'd be if there was stronger 3rd party support? It would dwarf what Nintendo can make on their own. Relative to the hardware sold to other top selling electronics, the 360 is making a killing on software. Sooner or later the Nintendo's business practices were bound to catch up with them.

...but no, I mostly put the blame on their very Japanese way of doing business; their In/Out culture homogenous BS kills most Japanese business in markets that are global.

 

[Arwin]

1 million tears, full of fail, hidden special sauce, magic bullet, nintendo snake oil

I only just noticed this. LOL!

 

[Exophase]

Relative to the hardware sold to other top selling electronics, the 360 is making a killing on software.

That may be true (then again I bet they make even more money from Live - not sure if you're counting that), but how much more money does Nintendo make selling a first or second party title than a third party one?

I'm guessing it's a huge amount. It's so huge that Nintendo expanded significant efforts towards second partying on DS.

Nintendo games seem relatively cheap to develop, compared to AAA games on other titles. If they gross $500m on a huge seller they probably get to keep hundreds of millions in profit, vs tens of millions at best from the biggest selling third party titles.

Nintendo should be fine so long as they can rake in multiple millions of sales on their biggest franchises. Even if that requires almost every Wii U owner, narrowed down to the Nintendo faithful, buying all of them. But if those big franchises ever lose their appeal (ie if people would rather just keep playing the last Mario Kart and Smash Bros) Nintendo will probably be in trouble.

 

[function]

Sorry

Weak U

WiiK saUce

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You've just come from your triumphant ___8box names feeling cocky and decided to lay the smack down on Wii U.

 

[function]

I couldn't stop myself!

In that moment, it felt so right.

 

[Inuhanyou]

Obviously. People were feeling down about Durango and now that they feel somwhat more confident they can come and attack the Wii U. Well i tell you what, Wii U will have great games and great experiences regardless of the specs of Durango and Orbis!

 

[MrFox]

Here's a million tears.

I have a (used)N64, and bought my GC and Wii on first day, and have been a nintendo fan for a long time. I remember that I was angry at the Wii being ridiculously underpowered, but still enjoyed it, because I loved nintendo games.
This time, I held off buying the WiiU because it's on par with the 6-7 years old consoles, they really went too far milking the cow. If they had multiple new IPs and games that aren't minor iterations of previous games for the 10th time, and if it was priced under $200, it wouldn't be so bad. I already have all these games on GC/Wii, and any interesting third parties are already on my PS3, so why would I spend $350 on the WiiU?

 

[Ghostz]

That may be true (then again I bet they make even more money from Live - not sure if you're counting that), but how much more money does Nintendo make selling a first or second party title than a third party one?

I'm guessing it's a huge amount. It's so huge that Nintendo expanded significant efforts towards second partying on DS.

Nintendo games seem relatively cheap to develop, compared to AAA games on other titles. If they gross $500m on a huge seller they probably get to keep hundreds of millions in profit, vs tens of millions at best from the biggest selling third party titles.

Nintendo should be fine so long as they can rake in multiple millions of sales on their biggest franchises. Even if that requires almost every Wii U owner, narrowed down to the Nintendo faithful, buying all of them. But if those big franchises ever lose their appeal (ie if people would rather just keep playing the last Mario Kart and Smash Bros) Nintendo will probably be in trouble.

Does Nintendo even have a property that can rake in 500 mil anymore? Pokemon maybe? How many Pokemon games do we get in a generation? Comparably, 3rd parties release far more content. The mathematics don't favor Nintendo.

Though, Nintendo will do fine selling their brand as Nintendo products but this is exactly why you see them reporting inconsistent earnings, being constantly erratic. They run a low costing-high yield business and that will work but when all the best talent on this side of the globe doesn't want to work on your platform it's a slow death.

How many billions of potential revenue is lost because they didn't want to make technological relevant hardware. They are going to have to better weigh the cost benefits to simply have Western 3rd parties Vs simply being a Nintendo machine. The odds don't favor Nintendo.

 

[Exophase]

Does Nintendo even have a property that can rake in 500 mil anymore? Pokemon maybe? How many Pokemon games do we get in a generation? Comparably, 3rd parties release far more content. The mathematics don't favor Nintendo.

For $60 games $500m gross is a bit over 8 million sales. For comparison, the best selling games on Gamecube, an overall fairly lackluster performance by Nintendo, were over 7 million - but the market has grown a lot since then. Especially Europe, which likes Nintendo games.

Third parties release more but most of it doesn't sell that well. DS, quite a successful platform by any measure, was utterly dominated by Nintendo sales.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Nintendo_DS_video_games

Though, Nintendo will do fine selling their brand as Nintendo products but this is exactly why you see them reporting inconsistent earnings, being constantly erratic. They run a low costing-high yield business and that will work but when all the best talent on this side of the globe doesn't want to work on your platform it's a slow death.

How many billions of potential revenue is lost because they didn't want to make technological relevant hardware. They are going to have to better weigh the cost benefits to simply have Western 3rd parties Vs simply being a Nintendo machine. The odds don't favor Nintendo.

It's really no different than it was multiple times in the past now. This wouldn't be the first time Nintendo has done fine being a Nintendo machine.

 

[Ghostz]

For $60 games $500m gross is a bit over 8 million sales. For comparison, the best selling games on Gamecube, an overall fairly lackluster performance by Nintendo, were over 7 million - but the market has grown a lot since then. Especially Europe, which likes Nintendo games.

Third parties release more but most of it doesn't sell that well. DS, quite a successful platform by any measure, was utterly dominated by Nintendo sales.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_Nintendo_DS_video_games

Though, Nintendo will do fine selling their brand as Nintendo products but this is exactly why you see them reporting inconsistent earnings, being constantly erratic. They run a low costing-high yield business and that will work but when all the best talent on this side of the globe doesn't want to work on your platform it's a slow death.



It's really no different than it was multiple times in the past now. This wouldn't be the first time Nintendo has done fine being a Nintendo machine.

Yea Europe likes Nintendo games so much, in the UK, there wasn't a single piece of WiiU software that broke the top 40 in the month of December, not even Mario. Secondly, the increase in sales the industry has experienced on the software side of the business over the last decade doesn't come from Nintendo. You also act as though Nintendo has several properties that can do 500 million, they don't, they have maybe 2 and it's not like they release them once every year, like Call of Duty, more like 1 every 3 or 4 years.

Finally, things are different now for 2 reasons 1)their cost of development will rise and 2) the cost to manufacture their machine is higher. They are 7 years too late but there won't be any Wii like profits probably ever again. Maybe they should drop console development altogether because nobody is going to be making games for the WiiU besides what Nintendo pays for and just ask Sony, that only means LESS profit.

 

[ERP]

For $60 games $500m gross is a bit over 8 million sales. For comparison, the best selling games on Gamecube, an overall fairly lackluster performance by Nintendo, were over 7 million - but the market has grown a lot since then. Especially Europe, which likes Nintendo games.

Yeah but Nintendo isn't making anything like $60 per unit off 1st party games, I'd be surprised if they made $35 a unit, and you have to deduct development and marketing costs from that.

By comparison Nintendo makes ~$8 per unit manufactured by a 3rd party whether or not they sell with no risk and no additional cost.

 

[function]

Obviously. People were feeling down about Durango and now that they feel somwhat more confident they can come and attack the Wii U. Well i tell you what, Wii U will have great games and great experiences regardless of the specs of Durango and Orbis!

That didn't have anything to do with any Durorbis rumours! The Wii U stands as a weak machine on its own merits. I've been pretty consistent about celebrating all aspects of the WiiK U's lack of power since the first reveal of its case and itty bitty little fan. Although the sheer unpotency of the final system has surprised even me.

As a general rule, the moment you think you've lowered your expectations of Nintendo's hardware enough is the moment you start expecting too much.

It'll have some utterly superb games of course, but none that would be made worse by running at a higher resolution, for example.

 

[function]

Here's a million tears.

I have a (used)N64, and bought my GC and Wii on first day, and have been a nintendo fan for a long time. I remember that I was angry at the Wii being ridiculously underpowered, but still enjoyed it, because I loved nintendo games.
This time, I held off buying the WiiU because it's on par with the 6-7 years old consoles, they really went too far milking the cow. If they had multiple new IPs and games that aren't minor iterations of previous games for the 10th time, and if it was priced under $200, it wouldn't be so bad. I already have all these games on GC/Wii, and any interesting third parties are already on my PS3, so why would I spend $350 on the WiiU?

Diisappoint U.

 

[MrFox]

Diisappoint U.

Exactly, it disapointed Mii.

 

[Inuhanyou]

When you turn on the Wii U and see the graphics, you will say "WOW"

 

[(((interference)))]

I would also like to add, that while I thought the Wii U would be bad, I certainly didn't expect it to be this bad. Weaker CPU than both consoles, slow RAM and eDRAM, pathethic controller battery life, slow and buggy OS, convulted DRM etc.

I hope Nintendo ends up like Sega, then we'd be able to see Nintendo games on proper hardware. Everyone wins.

 

[MrFox]

When you turn on the Wii U and see the graphics, you will say "WOW"

I'd say "WoW... I wish this thing could at least run WoW."