"Nintendo's New Direction"

[Wunderchu]

http://www.gamespy.com/articles/505/505234p1.html?fromint=1




(I first heard about this article from here: http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33752929 )

 

[Almasy]

Wow, that sounded awfully familiar...where have I heard about it?

Mmmm....I know! About three years ago, when Nintendo was getting ready for GCN!

 

[Li Mu Bai]

"We are going in a different direction than Sony. We believe that other companies are already investing in state-of-the-art semiconductor development, says Iwata. "Nintendo is not actually trying to create a state-of-the-art technology that is not known to the world. We are reviewing technologies that are in the early stages of development [by other companies]. Nintendo should be able to find the optimal solution to make the best possible hardware by cooperating with several partners."

This is nice news. Like Mosys 1-TSRAM & the embedded DRAM manufacturing process used for the GC's Flipper. (now commonplace) I am very interested in what technologies they choose, & how their architecture differs esp. from the Xenon. Efficiency & no bottlenecks seem to be the design philosophy once again. Yes, they share ATi & IBM as common technical partners with MS. Although their RAM provider is a complete unknown, as well as its size, system seperation, & speed. Then there are always possible design alterations (custom changes Nintendo wants) made to both the dual-core Cpu (as they modified the PPC 750CXe with 40 specific gaming instructions) to their respective GPUs could prove to be quite significant. Not to mention DX & Open GL 2.0 API differences.

Wow, that sounded awfully familiar...where have I heard about it?

Mmmm....I know! About three years ago, when Nintendo was getting ready for GCN!

You heard no such dedication to the fostering of 3rd party relationships, nor diversification to appeal to the broader demographic from launch date of the GCN.

 

[V3]

Generally different direction is more risky, but the risk involved with the general direction is already too high, so its a risk worth taking IMO.

 

[Almasy]

You heard no such dedication to the fostering of 3rd party relationships, nor diversification to appeal to the broader demographic from launch date of the GCN.

Here are the main points of Nintendo´s "new direction", that also happens to be done by them with GCN, or at least promised.

offload hardware to 3rd parties? check
focus on content rather than hardware? check
easy to program hardware? check
offer software for all ages? check
better 3rd party relations? check

It should be obvious to anyone following the company this was just a bunch of generic repetitive PR by Nintendo´s president. This has been Nintendo´s direction for the last 4 years or so.

 

[jvd]

offload hardware to 3rd parties? check
focus on content rather than hardware? check
easy to program hardware? check
offer software for all ages? check
better 3rd party relations? check

Hmm compared with the n64 it seems they met all those goals .

Whats your point almasy ?

All three companys spew bs constantly esp before a launch.

 

[Qroach]

I think his point is, that it's all been said before, so to call it a new direction for Nintnedo is stretching it.

 

[jvd]

I think his point is, that it's all been said before, so to call it a new direction for Nintnedo is stretching it.

A new direction mabye not . A good direction it remains .

I don't need an all in one box that will link my living room together . I want a system that plays games and costs as little as possible.


Its why i got my cube over the xbox or ps2.

If nintendo can again launch a system with comparable graphics with out the extras that ms and sony put in the system like usb and firewire ports and launch it for up to a 100$ less that is a great direction

 

[notAFanB]

A new direction mabye not . A good direction it remains .

debatable whether 'good' is enough to continue to pull through such agressive competitors in the coming rounds. Hopefully they won't fall into the 'niche' category too much.

 

[MfA]

Like there is much choice, the only thing they have any real choice in is storage ... for the rest market realities did the choosing for them.

 

[Teasy]

Almasy

Firstly a lot of what was said has only been Nintendo's philosophy since a while after GC was launched, not before. So no your mis-remembering if you think this was exactly Nintendo's stance before GC launched. Secondly the only person calling this a new direction is the article writer, not Nintendo AFAICS. So stop bashing Nintendo for something they haven't said.

 

[Teasy]

Like there is much choice, the only thing they have any real choice in is storage ... for the rest market realities did the choosing for them.

I doubt it, Nintendo have certainly ignored market realities plenty of times in the past to go there own way.

 

[Deadmeat]

...

So what is N5? GameCube Turbo(Overclocked GC chipset)???? That's not a bad idea, as long as Nintendo can launch quickly and underprice its $299 and $450 rivals...

I agree with Iwata; technology doesn't matter anymore, only marketing hype does.

 

[Evil_Cloud]

Re: ...

So what is N5? GameCube Turbo(Overclocked GC chipset)???? That's not a bad idea, as long as Nintendo can launch quickly and underprice its $299 and $450 rivals...

I agree with Iwata; technology doesn't matter anymore, only marketing hype does.

It will be completely new hardware that *will* be able to compete against other next-generation consoles. It might as well be be even easier to program for than GameCube -> Cheaper and shorter development of games.

 

[OICAspork]

http://www.gamespy.com/articles/505/505234p1.html?fromint=1


(I first heard about this article from here: http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33752929 )

Heh heh, thanks for linking to my thread. o.o/ you allowed me to get the scoop here, once removed! XD

For those that are bashing Nintendo and talking about how its dejavu all over again... keep in mind that Yamaguchi isn't at the helm anymore, Iwata is... and since he has taken over, Nintendo has done A LOT to improve developer relations and improve market penetration. I think Nintendo is in better hands going into the next gen than they were coming into this one.

 

[clem64]

Re: ...

So what is N5? GameCube Turbo(Overclocked GC chipset)???? That's not a bad idea, as long as Nintendo can launch quickly and underprice its $299 and $450 rivals...

I agree with Iwata; technology doesn't matter anymore, only marketing hype does.

What in the world are you talking about Deadmeat? There is no successor to the GC. Yamauchi said so himself!!

 

[Teasy]

Am I going crazy or did Deadmeat just admit that he believes N5 does in fact exist?

So what is N5? GameCube Turbo(Overclocked GC chipset)????

Nah that's not Nintendo's style. It wouldn't make sense to do that anyway. That sort of thing can sometimes make sense if a company wants to extend the life of there technology to get more money for there initial investment in that technology. However Nintendo didn't design the parts in GC, they just paid for the finished chips. Its far better to simply go with whatever newer technology ATI/IBM are working on at that time.

Looking at that interview Nintendo already answered this though.

we are trying to make unique hardware, not just a beefed-up version of GameCube

 

[Deadmeat]

...

What in the world are you talking about Deadmeat? There is no successor to the GC. Yamauchi said so himself!!

GameCube Turbo would be considered a faster version of current GameCube, not a next-generation machine with new capabilities. It may even come as an upgrade to base GameCube. Like Iwata pointed out, GameCube failed not because its hardware sucked, but because of delays and poor marketing. Reinventing the wheel to follow the others with deeper pocket does not solve the real problem of Nintendo console business.

Considering the situation Nintendo is in, the GameCube Turbo makes a perfect sense... A GameCube Turbo with 1.5 Ghz CPU, a 500 Mhz Flipper2, and 256 MB of System RAM will do very well in graphics department. Maximum bang for minimum investment.

 

[Deadmeat]

...

we are trying to make unique hardware, not just a beefed-up version of GameCube

I interpret that as the confirmation of a GameCube Turbo with some unconventional features(Like that second screen of DS)

 

[Teasy]

I interpret that as the confirmation of a GameCube Turbo with some unconventional features(Like that second screen of DS)

Well I think its a bit of a stretch to interpret it that way. The obvious interpretation of that sentence would be that they are making a entirely new console. Not a faster version of GC.

Considering the situation Nintendo is in, the GameCube Turbo makes a perfect sense... A GameCube Turbo with 1.5 Ghz CPU, a 500 Mhz Flipper2, and 256 MB of System RAM will do very well in graphics department. Maximum bang for minimum investment.

You can't just easily overclock old technology to whatever speed you want. A chip is designed with a certain speed in mind. Small redesigns and process shrinks will only take you so far until you just need to design new technology. Speed bumping a 162mhz Flipper and 486mhz Gekko to 500mhz and 1.5ghz respectively would be either extremely hard or impossible without loads of extra cooling. Nintendo certainly can't afford to throw big heatsinks and fans in its console. Even if it could be done what advantage would Nintendo see from this? Yeah it would be able to keep development tools from GC and devs would be instantly familiar with the console. But I don't think that makes it worth all the trouble if they can already design a new console that's faster, more feature rich (maybe even cheaper) that is equally easy to develop for. It'd just be more trouble then its worth AFAUCS.

Although I think this paragraph from Iwata certainly clears this up anyway:

We are reviewing technologies that are in the early stages of development [by other companies]. Nintendo should be able to find the optimal solution to make the best possible hardware by cooperating with several partners.

Reviewing technologies that are in the early stages of development by other companies obviously means they are looking at tech companies are already developing. Which is quite different to going to IBM/ATI and saying "give us a speed bumped Gekko/Flipper".