Possibly market feedback. I don't think the hardware is done yet.
EDIT: They are probably under pressure to pick up Wii's slack. But E3 is a good time to talk to developers too.
Nintendo Conference
- Thread starter Nesh
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Possibly market feedback. I don't think the hardware is done yet.
EDIT: They are probably under pressure to pick up Wii's slack. But E3 is a good time to talk to developers too.
I don't think they're desperate, I do think they want to beat Sony and MS to the punch, if either of them are looking at a 2013 launch, they'll likely show at E3 next year.
I don't think N wants to get caught playing direct comparison with a state of the art $400 console, given that I don't think WiiU is going to be a lot cheaper.
I thought the whole presser had an odd feel, I didn't really get the impression anyone at Nintendo was particularly excited by it. And I was stunned they didn't at least have something first party to showcase it. But you can read way too much into these things.
Actually E3 is a really lousy time to talk to developers, it's mostly about press and buyers.
Talking to devs is usually done behind closed doors at private showings.
Huh there's no way a gtx560m is faster than a gtx485m.
In any case both are way faster than a xbox360 or ps3.
The xbox360 should be somewhat close to a hd6530m, but the latter has quite a bit more shader power (though the former could be faster due to the edram-based rops).
It's as if the announcement was suited strictly to trying to lure publishers and developers over to supporting Wii-U too. Maybe they were hoping for massive fanfare service and trying to use the hype to persuade pubs/devs that are on the fence.
Though I'm completely with you, it doesn't make sense in any other way.
Me neither, it was just a response
They still can't compete with MS and Sony at their own field, AA hardcore games, and now they've lost the motion control advantage too. So they have to invent another playground, where they're the only players - but what else is there? I think they're running out of ideas, especially on how to counter Kinect with something even more unique. It's like, hey, the iPad is very successful and trendy, let's try to go in that direction and see where it leads.
They'd be foolish to ignore it. Touch screen gaming ballooned much faster than Kinect, or even Wii. There are 200 million iOS devices in consumers' hands already. This is not counting the other vendors like Android and Windows phones. It's a much larger threat.
While the CPU/GPU power discussion may have wagged the dog, I think it's more important for them to show their uniqueness on the new controller vis-a-vis iPad/iPhone.
Motion gaming won't be able to compete against touch screen gaming if that touch screen is everywhere today.
While the CPU/GPU power discussion may have wagged the dog, I think it's more important for them to show their uniqueness on the new controller vis-a-vis iPad/iPhone.
Motion gaming won't be able to compete against touch screen gaming if that touch screen is everywhere today.
Some but developer attendance is spotty at best, E3 is mostly about the press these days, and secondarily about buyers from the major retail outlets. It's just not the right place or atmosphere for serious dev discussions.
FWIW Last time I was at a Nintendo developer presentation it was in their offices.
I guess you could use it to gauge press reactions, which wouldn't be a bad idea.
I'd just expect to see more to get a good feel for it.
It's just that to beat the PS360 you don't really need anything resembling high-end chips. If you're aiming at only "just" about similar performance, that is definitely considered lowend compared to anything available for pcs nowadays (think a bit faster than Caicos / HD6450 (with gddr5 at least), nowhere near the still quite low-end Turks). I wouldn't really consider a console "next-gen" if it were something like twice as fast as the PS360, but the cautious statements seemed to indicate it will probably not really even match it.
But well Wii was just the same so it wouldn't quite be that surprising.
Ah, saw Coffin's tweet yesterday. Dice seems to be surprised by the announcement. So the developer community doesn't know about Wii U at all ? I expect them to pull Nintendo execs aside and request for more info.
The press are definitely important for their announcement, especially considering WWDC is running in parallel. Doing it in E3 sounds normal.
Since it's capable of rendering two different images at the same time, both at ~PS360 or better fidelity, it would stand to reason it's more powerful. Also, since it will (alledgedly) have 25GB BR-based discs as storage it implies it needs more room for assets = higher performance.
How much more powerful may be irrelevant really, since Nintendo managed fine with 2000-era tech in the Wii ten friggin years later. I think it's difficult to argue with credibility that this thing would NOT be more powerful though.
If you wan tyou can take a look at this
http://uk.wii.ign.com/articles/117/1174592p1.html
and have even more bit to digest on the gfx side (eg. they say they can use the same art assets on all platforms now and they still dont have the final dev kits).
Anyway quite a few more games and ideas discussed there, really eye opening IMO.
http://uk.wii.ign.com/articles/117/1174592p1.html
and have even more bit to digest on the gfx side (eg. they say they can use the same art assets on all platforms now and they still dont have the final dev kits).
Anyway quite a few more games and ideas discussed there, really eye opening IMO.
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itsmydamnation
Veteran
the big difference is 13(A/N) non over lapping channels vs 3(B/G/N)
Yeah, I'm sure that helps, but since the tablet will be the wiiu's big selling point and will be integral in many games, Nintendo just CAN'T have the thing glitch out, it would destroy the console's whole purpose entirely. That's undoubtedly going to make Nintendo extra cautious. Can the video link exist entirely in 1 channel, or will it need several? 450Mbit/s n-routers need 3 channels to deliver full performance AFAIK (unless I'm wrong, so if that's the case pls disregard
), so those 13 channels could get gobbled up pretty quick if there's a couple overlapping 5GHz WANs in the vicinity. I think their main concern now is trying to keep the existing Wii user base, and announcing full backwards compatibility with Wii games and accessories is an important message. A year is a long time, but for those heavily invested in the Wii it's a signal that the platform is alive and evolving.
Yeah, I'm sure that helps, but since the tablet will be the wiiu's big selling point and will be integral in many games, Nintendo just CAN'T have the thing glitch out, it would destroy the console's whole purpose entirely. That's undoubtedly going to make Nintendo extra cautious. Can the video link exist entirely in 1 channel, or will it need several? 450Mbit/s n-routers need 3 channels to deliver full performance AFAIK (unless I'm wrong, so if that's the case pls disregard
I feel that the "restriction" is an artificial one:
http://www.news.com.au/technology/g...-u/story-e6frfrt9-1226071923070#ixzz1OjQL7AD0
Sony's PS3 announcement almost two years before launch did not hurt their PS2 sales all that much.
It's a matter of wanting to control the messaging. If they had waited any longer, the leaks would have gotten out of hand and they would not be in control of the momentum. It seems par for the course to annouce your new hardware about a year and a half before planned launch. At that point you're far enough into design that you know the practical ability of the system, you've got some early devkits with developers, and you've signed up a bunch of launch titles. It's also early enough that there's a good chance there haven't been too many leaks yet. If, as people are expecting, MS and Sony plan to launch a new console in 2013, I would expect them to announce some details at next E3.
The PS2 was in a much stronger position than the Wii is now. Its third-party support was vastly-stronger than the Wii's is, even in the lead-up to the PS3 launch.
