Nintendo announce: Nintendo NX

[Shifty Geezer]

Ignoring the fact it fits into large coat pockets, I see plenty of people with bags these days, including geezers. Ask LB about fashionable Italian man-bags - he'll point you in the right direction (unless he goes all innuendo!). A Shield Tablet is every bit as portable as an iPad Mini, and iPad's are definitely go-anywhere devices.

 

[east of eastside]

AMD Greenland graphics to be integrated into K12 APU... HBM?

http://www.fudzilla.com/news/graphics/37386-amd-working-on-greenland-hbm-graphics

Targeting semi-custom and embedded in '16. 14/16nm. NX candidate?

 

[wco81]

What they can do is come up with a controller with a cradle that you can slide our phone or mini tablet into.

But that also means the mobile versions of Nintendo games must also support touch, for those times you only want to take your phone, not the controller-cradle thing.

As for them holding back the console games, someone already put out a Mario 64 that ran in a mobile browser. Nintendo got them to pull it but there may be others who don't comply. So either Nintendo puts it out or their back titles will get put out by others. That's simply the reality.

 

[Rikimaru]

Ignoring the fact it fits into large coat pockets, I see plenty of people with bags these days, including geezers. Ask LB about fashionable Italian man-bags - he'll point you in the right direction (unless he goes all innuendo!). A Shield Tablet is every bit as portable as an iPad Mini, and iPad's are definitely go-anywhere devices.

It's almost 0.6kg. I do not want to carry a brick everywhere. Even 3DS XL is not lightweight either.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The Shield Tablet is 390g. 3DSXL is 336g. Shield Tablet is lighter than iPad Air. If carrying around an iPad Air is carrying a brick for you, you probably need to hit the weights.

 

[Rikimaru]

The Shield Tablet is 390g. 3DSXL is 336g. Shield Tablet is lighter than iPad Air. If carrying around an iPad Air is carrying a brick for you, you probably need to hit the weights.

I thought you were talking about clamshell with buttons.
Shield Tablet is still enormous for a portable gaming system. And if you are using public transport (main reason for a portable gaming device) very fragile.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

What you're saying is Nintendo have to release a product like DS again. It has to be as small as DS, without a good 7"+ screen, to be pocketable and usable on the train. That puts them in eternal conflict with mobiles which everyone already carries around and is capable of providing entertainment enough for the commute.

If Nintendo are selling content for the small form factor commuter already on mobile, they don't need to cover that market with another device. Quite the contrary, a new device should be about opening up Nintendo's market to one that isn't perpetually shrinking. The tablet form factor with dedicated controls, the Wuublet, only potent and classy, is something novel for the portable entertainment space, while the machine provides a console and home entertainment experience too.

I suppose they could do that with a DS style, have HDMI out, Wireless HDMI, and support external controllers, but then you have different games for the split screen and for the tablet/TV. If you want a unified experience, you need a single display on the unit. Maybe they should go with a 5" screen tablet (mobile even), built in controls, TV out and controller support? Although you get less power in such a device and it'll definitely be a last-gen experience, which I really want Nintendo to move on from!

 

[McHuj]

Why not both?

I think it would benefit nintendo if they went with a design that had a scalable GPU for various resolutions. That way they could have a small portable device and a larger tablet like device. Both play the same games, but they serve two different clients.

 

[Rikimaru]

Nintendo won't do multiple GPU configurations.
They already have gaming tablet proto in Wii U. It's enormous and heavy.

Next handheld will be either 3DS XL formfactor again or Vita-like 1 screen.

Unified experience does not mean they have to share architecture at all. Only OS and similar SDK.

There are a lot of cross PS4/PS3/PSVita games. Sony made it easy to port. PS4 and Vita OS merging into 1 codebase. Look at latest update. They got similar features at the same time.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

They already have gaming tablet proto in Wii U. It's enormous and heavy.

It's a poor implementation and by no means what a gaming tablet has to be. That's why I referred to Shield. Add a couple of direction nubs and some svelte buttons, it'd be both stylish and playable for core games. Nintendo would just need to move their industrial design mindset into the 21st century and the age of classy iThings.

 

[Rikimaru]

It's a poor implementation and by no means what a gaming tablet has to be. That's why I referred to Shield. Add a couple of direction nubs and some svelte buttons, it'd be both stylish and playable for core games. Nintendo would just need to move their industrial design mindset into the 21st century and the age of classy iThings.

It's expensive and unnecessary.
A lot of people think new portable must have 720p or even a 1080p screen. But for Nintendo portable it's a waste. You won't see a game in native resolution. And what's the point then?

I think new portable would have a 480p screen, even smaller resolution than Vita.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I don't like seeing pixels so much these days. And considering everyone else is moving on from low-spec screens, why shouldn't Nintendo? You have a very conservative view for Nintendo's future, it seems. I think they've a chance to make a name for themselves in a new, high-tech way if they embrace a more dynamic and fashionable view of the market.

 

[Rikimaru]

I don't like seeing pixels so much these days. And considering everyone else is moving on from low-spec screens, why shouldn't Nintendo? You have a very conservative view for Nintendo's future, it seems. I think they've a chance to make a name for themselves in a new, high-tech way if they embrace a more dynamic and fashionable view of the market.

Nintendo is using "Lateral Thinking of Withered Technology" mantra since GameBoy.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It doesn't work, they need to change, unless they are content to be a shrinking niche. And the fact they are moving into mobile proves they are willing to change. May as well go the whole hog!

 

[Entropy]

As far as pixels are concerned, as long as you use anti-aliasing, you don't need 300+ dpi for games to look good. I agree with Shifty though, unless they choose to use something like a 3D-custom screen, I find it hard to credit that Nintendo would go out of their way to not use readily available and thus low cost screens. I'd assume that they would use something that suited their purposes at the time, and could be sourced from one of the usual phone screen suppliers at decent cost. And games don't have to be rendered at native resolution anyway (if scaling is high quality and zero latency), so the issue is not such a big deal any more.

Iwata, while managing to avoid saying anything substantial about the NX, still goes out of his way to describe it as "Nintendo’s dedicated game system with a brand-new concept". Brand-new concept kind of implies that we are not talking about either a straight 3DS or WiiU replacement, but beyond that it is damn difficult to interpret, since "concept" is so vague.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I'm sure it's not my idea, but I would count a portable that works as a console (very nVidia Shield Tablet, which has a really crap name BTW!) as a fairly new concept. Maybe not brand new in the tech space, but brand new in the console space as a dedicated gaming device.

 

[Entropy]

I'm sure it's not my idea, but I would count a portable that works as a console (very nVidia Shield Tablet, which has a really crap name BTW!) as a fairly new concept. Maybe not brand new in the tech space, but brand new in the console space as a dedicated gaming device.

As I've indicated before, this is what I personally find most likely. But there are other possibilities, and "brand-new concept" opens up, well, a lot.
This kind of device is something AMD hasn't really designed for before, so if (a) the AMD deal was really with Nintendo, and (b) it targets a portable device with connectivity like a stationary console, we have nothing to really base any assumptions of design pedigree on. A portable device needs some 3-4 hours of battery life, minimum, and that limits system power draw, but without knowing the size of the device or battery capacity, it still leaves a lot to speculation.

 

[Rikimaru]

I find it hard to credit that Nintendo would go out of their way to not use readily available and thus low cost screens. I'd assume that they would use something that suited their purposes at the time, and could be sourced from one of the usual phone screen suppliers at decent cost. And games don't have to be rendered at native resolution anyway (if scaling is high quality and zero latency), so the issue is not such a big deal any more.

Nintendo is using 480p TN screen on Wii U.
Non-native games will be blurry. And Nintendo rarely uses any form of anti-aliasing even on Wii U.

 

[AlNom]

I don't like seeing pixels so much these days. And considering everyone else is moving on from low-spec screens, why shouldn't Nintendo?

Doesn't battery consumption go up with these higher resolutions?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

As I've indicated before, this is what I personally find most likely. But there are other possibilities, and "brand-new concept" opens up, well, a lot.
This kind of device is something AMD hasn't really designed for before, so if (a) the AMD deal was really with Nintendo, and (b) it targets a portable device with connectivity like a stationary console, we have nothing to really base any assumptions of design pedigree on. A portable device needs some 3-4 hours of battery life, minimum, and that limits system power draw, but without knowing the size of the device or battery capacity, it still leaves a lot to speculation.

They could certainly add something weird to a mobile device. Maybe they're making underwater gaming glasses?... It's hard to think where new concept could go as a lot of concepts have already been tried. Person tracking, motion tracking, controllers, tablets, gaming gloves...seems to me anything new would likely be treading in the realm of niche/weird, but then maybe they having something mine-blowing and not weird that we mere mortals just can't envision?