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Wii U Speculation Thread The Third: Casting Dreams in The Castle of Miyamoto

C

Cosmonaut X

Member
re: RAM allocation for the OS. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a similar situation - though this more particularly with processor usage - for the 3DS, where the OS at launch was using far more in terms of system resources but that has since been brought down with a revision and made available to devs?

Is it at all possible that the comparatively large allocation of RAM, apparently for the OS, is to give Nintendo lots of wriggle room in terms of what they're wanting to do with it, and that the final usage could end up being dramatically less?
 
A

AndyMoogle

Member
The 3DS OS takes up 32MB; the same amount as the 360 OS. While the 3DS is lacking many of the features available in the 360 OS, it still has some nice multitasking features; though, they are limited to the built in software.

512MB for an OS from Nintendo... Well, I'm guessing they will build upon the multitasking capabilities of the 3DS OS. At least that's what I hope. More multitasking is always welcome. Hopefully they will also have party chat and a bunch of other features.
 
A

AceBandage

Banned
Cosmonaut X said:
re: RAM allocation for the OS. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a similar situation - though this more particularly with processor usage - for the 3DS, where the OS at launch was using far more in terms of system resources but that has since been brought down with a revision and made available to devs?

Is it at all possible that the comparatively large allocation of RAM, apparently for the OS, is to give Nintendo lots of wriggle room in terms of what they're wanting to do with it, and that the final usage could end up being dramatically less?
Click to expand...

Yes, and barring that this is true, that's how I see it. There is no way they will ship the system and need 512MB of RAM for the OS.
 
N

Nilaul

Member
AceBandage said:
Well, that wouldn't need a lot of RAM for the OS, though. You would have two programs running, and would need more RAM dedicated to them instead. Even then, it wouldn't need 512MB. That would be for an absolute ton of background features.
Click to expand...

Well perhaps you could have skype/msn, facebook/ gamechat running real time, while your watching netflix?


---------

Somebody mentioned downgrading spec last minute... doubt it. Spend millions on R&D deveping a cpu/gpu and specialised motherboard and ram, and a wireless streaming component, and then last minute downgrade the spec when developers including your own were working on powerfull kits?

A change like that might create a bigger loss then actually loosing out 20 dollars on every WiiU sold. How would downgrade a console last minute? Replace the proccessor with a weaker one? And how do you know that that proccessor will support all the development, the streaming combabilites of the Wii U? Change any element or weaken it and some other part might not work, and developers might have to rush to change the game codes so that it runs. Its not a pc were you can swap any part for any part and you know its going to work. A change like that alone will cause a huge loss.

It just not worth downgrading the hardware.
 
G

Gahiggidy

My aunt & uncle run a Mom & Pop store, "The Gamecube Hut", and sold 80k WiiU within minutes of opening.
ozfunghi said:
Ideaman basically mentioned it the first time he hinted ...
Click to expand...

Oh. I thought it might have come from one of the confirmed developers. Or both Ideaman and someone else. I won't bother speculating on this until I hear about it again from a second source.
 
T

TheExplodingHead

Banned
Nilaul said:
Well perhaps you could have skype/msn, facebook/ gamechat running real time, while your watching netflix?


---------

Somebody mentioned downgrading spec last minute... doubt it. Spend millions on R&D deveping a cpu/gpu and specialised motherboard and ram, and a wireless streaming component, and then last minute downgrade the spec when developers including your own were working on powerfull kits?

A change like that might create a bigger loss then actually loosing out 20 dollars on every WiiU sold. How would downgrade a console last minute? Replace the proccessor with a weaker one? And how do you know that that proccessor will support all the development, the streaming combabilites of the Wii U? Change any element or weaken it and some other part might not work, and developers might have to rush to change the game codes so that it runs. Its not a pc were you can swap any part for any part and you know its going to work. A change like that alone will cause a huge loss.

It just not worth downgrading the hardware.
Click to expand...

I honestly think it depends on what price point Nintendo intends to hit.
 
L

luffeN

Member
AceBandage said:
Well, that wouldn't need a lot of RAM for the OS, though. You would have two programs running, and would need more RAM dedicated to them instead. Even then, it wouldn't need 512MB. That would be for an absolute ton of background features.
Click to expand...

What if those 512MB for the OS do also handle apps like video chat and such?
 
O

ozfunghi

Member
Nilaul said:
Somebody mentioned downgrading spec last minute... doubt it.
Click to expand...

Not sure if you're talking about one of my posts, but in that case you misunderstood. Also Ace (i think) said something that might be misinterpreted, that Nintendo wouldn't ship it with 512MB reserverd for the OS.

What i (and i think Ace as well) meant, was that they would reduce the amount reserved for the OS, so that there is more to work with for developers to spend on games. Not that they would just leave out the amount they saved on the OS.

If you're talking about something completely different, i'm sorry. In either case though, you are absolutely right, that they would not downgrade specs last minute. It would be problematic for all studio's 1st, 2nd and 3rd party, already working on games due out by launch.
 
W

walking fiend

Member
I am wondering, if Nintendo maybe is going to directly attack the tablet/iPad market and make WiiU very app friendly; like a Kindle kind of stuff: not fully tablet, basicly for another service, but very close.

in a fantasy world, couldn't WiiU be theoretically compatible with Android?
 
H

HylianTom

Banned
IceDoesntHelp said:
Because I don't like Opera?
Click to expand...

My feelings are ambivalence, mixed with slight hope that they change things up. I wasn't at all impressed with the Wii's browser, and high up on my U wish list is a good browsing experience. Not because I want to use it (I'm inseparable from my iPad)(i.e., inseparable from GAF), but because I really think it'll really move systems if they nail this one big thing. North America seems to have gone pad-crazy, and I think many underestimate this aspect when predicting the Wii U's sales prospects.

{Oh, and another thing: dearest Nayru, please let this be a quiet day. Both here at work and here at GAF. Praise be, and pass the Kbups!}
 
C

Cosmonaut X

Member
walking fiend said:
I am wondering, if Nintendo maybe is going to directly attack the tablet/iPad market and make WiiU very app friendly; like a Kindle kind of stuff: not fully tablet, basicly for another service, but very close.

in a fantasy world, couldn't WiiU be theoretically compatible with Android?
Click to expand...

Not sure if there's any significant cost in making something like the Wii U Android-certified, but possibly?
 
W

walking fiend

Member
HylianTom said:
My feelings are ambivalence, mixed with slight hope that they change things up. I wasn't at all impressed with the Wii's browser, and high up on my U wish list is a good browsing experience. Not because I want to use it (I'm inseparable from my iPad)(i.e., inseparable from GAF), but because I really think it'll really move systems if they nail this one big thing. North America seems to have gone pad-crazy, and I think many underestimate this aspect when predicting the Wii U's sales prospects.
Click to expand...
I am in the same boat; I guess if they can deliver in terms of 1. Browsing 2. Multimedia (hulu, etc.) 3. Video (skype, etc.), it has the potential to vastly oversell even Wii.

However, what I don't get, is why don't they add DVD/Bluray playback; can't that really be a very obvious point? I guess streaming is particularly not much used outside of US?

Not sure if there's any significant cost in making something like the Wii U Android-certified, but possibly?
Click to expand...
well, I am pretty sure Nintendo will never do that. Apparently they do not like partnership with things bigger than them.

But I am not sure if technically it would be possible to make a gaming friendly OS which supports android too
 
E

ElFly

Member
HylianTom said:
My feelings are ambivalence, mixed with slight hope that they change things up. I wasn't at all impressed with the Wii's browser, and high up on my U wish list is a good browsing experience. Not because I want to use it (I'm inseparable from my iPad)(i.e., inseparable from GAF), but because I really think it'll really move systems if they nail this one big thing. North America seems to have gone pad-crazy, and I think many underestimate this aspect when predicting the Wii U's sales prospects.

{Oh, and another thing: dearest Nayru, please let this be a quiet day. Both here at work and here at GAF. Praise be, and pass the Kbups!}
Click to expand...

3DS has a better browser than the Wii's, but it is still a toy thing.
 
H

HylianTom

Banned
Cosmonaut X said:
Not sure if there's any significant cost in making something like the Wii U Android-certified, but possibly?
Click to expand...

Nntendo has stated that they are holding back on some system features, and that would be one heck of a final secret.. a Wii U Droid app store? Almost sounds like we're in fantasy land here. I'm not a fan of bloating a gaming system with non-gaming features, but I also realize that if it helps sales, it can't hurt all that much.
 
O

Oddduck

Member
Those tech demos (Zelda, Bird) can't be done on a console that is less powerful than 360/PS3.

Either all of these websites are lieing or Nintendo is lieing about what the system is capable of.
 
G

Grampa Simpson

Banned
HylianTom said:
Nntendo has stated that they are holding back on some system features, and that would be one heck of a final secret.. a Wii U Droid app store? Almost sounds like we're in fantasy land here. I'm not a fan of bloating a gaming system with non-gaming features, but I also realize that if it helps sales, it can't hurt all that much.
Click to expand...
I actually like this train of thought. Android running in a virtual machine behind the OS, clock restricted in the background, running the GUI and managing background things like downloads. The obvious question is security, but virtualized, this may not be an issue, or at least a manageable one.
 
T

Thraktor

Member
Nilaul said:
It could be 1.5 GB high end ram for games and 512 MB cheap ass ram for os?

I doubt devs need access to the os. So the Dev kits could only have the ram needed for Game running and debug.
Click to expand...

This is quite unlikely for two reasons. The first is that having two RAM pools increases motherboard complexity to the extent that it's probably cheaper going with a single pool of fast RAM, even if the OS doesn't really need it.

The second is that the amount of RAM used by the OS can come down not just before launch, but also after. The PS3 saw OS RAM usage decrease in firmware updates, and the 3DS will see OS CPU usage decrease in a firmware update soon enough. A single pool of RAM allows this kind of thing to benefit developers more easily.

As far as the 512MB of RAM for the OS goes, I would imagine that Nintendo are simply treating that as the upper bound, and then reducing as it comes closer to launch (probably to a target of 256MB or so). There's still 6 months or so left until launch, so they're probably still getting the OS to a feature-complete state before they start trimming the fat RAM wise. A final value of ~256MB wouldn't surprise me too much, though. Keep in mind that Nintendo only revealed at E3 last year what they had to: touchscreen controller and HD graphics. The dev leaks forced their hand. OS features aren't something third-parties have any reason for knowing, though, so Nintendo can wait to reveal them on their own terms, and I'd expect them to unveil some unexpected OS stuff at E3.
 
W

wsippel

Banned
Grampa Simpson said:
I actually like this train of thought. Android running in a virtual machine behind the OS, clock restricted in the background, running the GUI and managing background things like downloads. The obvious question is security, but virtualized, this may not be an issue, or at least a manageable one.
Click to expand...
Sounds like an incredibly wasteful and stupid thing to do.
 
W

WiiRevolution1

Member
I have not posted in this thread but I've been lurking and watching the crazyness in this awsome thread.

I just had a dream about E3 (the second one actually, can't remember the first tho...) and wanted to share it for the heck of it. If I have anymore I'll also share them.

It started with Iwata coming on stage and ssying that Nintendo has tots of good stuff to show us. He says that today Nintendo will show games that are fun. A picture of the title screen of Super Mario Advamce 3: Super Mario Bros. 3 appears on the screen. (I know its advance 4 in reality, the power of messed up dreaming.) The advance part of the logo is red and below the Mario Bros. 3 logo.

I realize that I'm in the audience (lol) and look at the logo again but it doesn't say "Super Mario Advance 3: Super Mario Bros. 3" but "Super Mario Bros. 3: Episode 3" (WTF? I guess my subconcous got Half Life episode 3 in this mix even tho I'm not into that franchise. Just seeing it so much on gaf probably got in my head.

Anywayz: footage shows and its like NSMB Series except its cell shaded 
In a way that reminded me of Toon Link from Brawl.

My subcoucous sucks. If I would've dreamed anything it would've been a new Zelda HD game or Zelda WW HD. Even if it was a a 2D Mario Platformer it would've been a 2D Sprite one since I wanta sprite one. Not to mention Mario Bros.  3 aint even my favorite 2D Mario wierd.

I just wanna chime in and say I was done writing this post in the iPad notes app but a paragraph or two just got deleted WTF!!! I JUST WOKE UP IM AND IM TIRED! COME ON NOW!!!!

...Anywayz: Anywayz: Footage of Mass Effect 3 shows up. (In reality I only played and beat the first one and seen the ending to see how horrible it is.) 

(Starts pressing copy in the app I'm not retyping this stuff again.)

Anywayz: Anywayz: Anywayz: I realize I'm not in the audience but in my room looking at the iPad streaming from a unknown website. I goto view GAF but I can't remember what they are saying about the conference...thats about when I woke up and decided I don't wanna forgot this fream so I wrote it down in the form of a post. I hope you enjoyed reading my subconcous because I still don't understand it. WHERES MAH ZELDA HD SUBCOUNCOUS?

PS: Sorry for any misspelling I'm tired and wanna go back to bed so I'm posting this now.
 
B

BD1

Banned
I am not surprised Nintendo would dedicate a lot of RAM to the OS. I think they are trying to tap into that "Tablet Surf" culture of sitting on your couch - watching TV, watching a movie, playing a game - and simultaneously playing around on your tablet. Anyone who owns an iPad knows what I'm talking about.

I think while in-game, using the tablet, we'll be able to web browse, message friends, open certain apps (Strategy Guide/Mii Maker/CoD: Elite?/etc) and do any host of other things at the OS Level. I have also always expected Nintendo's big online feature to be Video-Chat IN GAME instead of just voice. Trying to bring some aspects of local multiplayer to online multiplayer.
 
O

onilink88

Member
HylianTom said:
Man would I love that.. ha.. I'd have to come-up with a list of surgical procedures, tools, standard screw/nail/plate sizes, etc, but that'd be pretty easy.

Another part of the game could take place in another surgical suite where coronary catheterizations are performed. You could guide your wire and the tools gliding over it up someone's leg all the way up to the heart, inject contrast to highlight arterial stenoses, switch to a balloon tool, guide the balloon to the right spot, and deploy to open-up that vessel. Then, if indicated, you could deploy a stent in the right places.

Getting the right camera angle to show different vessels would be most important on this kind of procedure. You might see that the left anterior descending artery is fine on one type of oblique view, but that view might not show all of the circumflex artery, forcing you to check from another approach.
Click to expand...

Hmm, that'd be more suited to the Wii remote, wouldn't it? Though, you could use the stylus. I'd still prefer the former, as I liked the endoscopy operations, and these would be similar, correct?

HylianTom said:
Cerebral angiography, lower extremity angio, shunt placements, inferior vena cava filter implants.. so much to do!
Click to expand...

Hmm, from the games I've played (Second Opinion, Under the Knife, New Blood, Team), brain surgery hasn't been touched yet. A department that could be added to a Trauma Team sequel. C'mon, Atlus, gimme moar Trauma Team! There's a gold mine of ideas for this series just waiting to be explored. Also, if they do make a sequel, I'd love for it to follow the first in respect to its non-linear storytelling and comic book presentation.
 
AgentP

AgentP

Thinks mods influence posters politics. Promoted to QAnon Editor.
Nilaul said:
Android is pretty much open . WiiU runs on Android. That would be pretty big. All the android games/applications that you could run.... on the Wii U
Click to expand...

But they would not, unless the WiiU had an ARM processor. Even the Logitech Revue which had Android 3.0 didn't run an apps unless they were recompiled for the Intel processor it had.
 
J

jump_button

Banned
walking fiend said:
I am wondering, if Nintendo maybe is going to directly attack the tablet/iPad market and make WiiU very app friendly; like a Kindle kind of stuff: not fully tablet, basicly for another service, but very close.

in a fantasy world, couldn't WiiU be theoretically compatible with Android?
Click to expand...

well if the OS got alot of ram this maybe why, at E3 they did say play games from just the pad
 
K

Krev

Unconfirmed Member
BD1 said:
I have also always expected Nintendo's big online feature to be Video-Chat IN GAME instead of just voice. Trying to bring some aspects of local multiplayer to online multiplayer.
Click to expand...
I think you're right on the money about that. It fits with Nintendo's multiplayer philosophy and it explains that big camera bar's placement on the controller.
Plus, they've already toyed with this idea with StarFox 64 3D.
 
O

ozfunghi

Member
AgentP said:
But they would not, unless the WiiU had an ARM processor. Even the Logitech Revue which had Android 3.0 didn't run an apps unless they were recompiled for the Intel processor it had.
Click to expand...

I don't believe any of this Android stuff, but i do believe WiiU has an ARM processor onboard (not the main CPU of course).
 
H

HylianTom

Banned
onilink88 said:
Hmm, that'd be more suited to the Wii remote, wouldn't it? Though, you could use the stylus. I'd still prefer the former, as I liked the endoscopy operations, and these would be similar, correct?
.
Click to expand...

Absolutely right - the Wii remote would be perfect for guiding the wires and scopes through 3D space while the pad serves as a camera.

The more I talk about it, the more I expect that someone should pick-up on thisl It's times like these where I wish developer spies were lurking in our thread..


stilgar said:
If Wii U is not a giant Penis, this thread is irrelevant.
Click to expand...
MadelineWaitAMinute.png
 
B

birdchili

Member
ElFly said:
3DS has a better browser than the Wii's, but it is still a toy thing.
Click to expand...
the wii browser was *horrible*, but i still used it when i wanted to show a bunch of folk something on youtube... hd and a touch keyboard will already help a lot...

it's not like i'm going to be doing a lot of surfing the web from the couch, but if they can make it good for youtube and other video sites it will definitely have a place.
 
G

GameplayWhore

Member
AndyMoogle said:
The 3DS OS takes up 32MB; the same amount as the 360 OS. While the 3DS is lacking many of the features available in the 360 OS, it still has some nice multitasking features; though, they are limited to the built in software.

512MB for an OS from Nintendo... Well, I'm guessing they will build upon the multitasking capabilities of the 3DS OS. At least that's what I hope. More multitasking is always welcome. Hopefully they will also have party chat and a bunch of other features.
Click to expand...

I think it may be a matter of Nintendo overestimating ahead of time how much memory they might need for the OS. That way, if they end up using more than they originally thought (but still less than the insanely overestimated upper limit), existing memory hungry games being developed won't crash from not getting as much available RAM as the devs expected to have.


HylianTom said:
Haha.. now, are we talking true floppies - 5"? Or the 3.5" ones? :)
Click to expand...

Bite your tongue!

3½" floppies were pretty terrible, though. Almost never had a 5¼" disk die on me, but I've had to survive tons of DOA "diskettes".


And is there any reason that Nintendo would drop Opera for another browsing program?
Click to expand...

I hope Opera doesn't get the blame for the relative shittiness of the Wii browser. It's not like they had tons of system resources to work with. For a system with ~64MB available memory (the other 24MB was used by the gpu, right?) and a 480p workspace, they did a pretty solid job.
 
R

Redford

aka Cabbie
Your dream brings up an opinion I've been nuturing, WiiRevolution.

I want to see the NSMB series get the axe, at least in it's current form. It always seemed like a cheapening of the SMB brand. The first one on the DS was great in itself. But along with Animal Crossing, they sort of ported both of the series under our noses, expecting the typical Wii consumer not to notice. It just felt so underhanded, that they would try to resell a very similar experience like that.

NSMB is a very generic offshoot, and NSMB Mii only looks to make it even more so, IMO. I mean, look at Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island. That is the kind of change and creativity I would like to see. So yes, I would love to see cel-shading for the next installment. Not this plastic and characterless style. The gameplay is good, sure. But ehhh...

Anyways, just my small rant. I respect your opinion if you like it, as I speak for myself here.
 
B

bgassassin

Member
ozfunghi said:
The problem is, that these so called anonymous sources simply can not be correct, for the simple fact that they are contradicting each other. One CVG source says the GPU doesn't have "more many better shaders"; the other source says "GPU is not the problem, it's the CPU".

And the anonymous THQ source basically stated WiiU blows PS360 out of the water back in september. The Gearbox guys also seem to think it's more powerful. All the Vigil comments combined (there were 3), also indicate it's more powerful but that they are simply not going to be using the extra muscle.
Click to expand...

To me this stuff reminds me of the time when we were going through the "Wii U's network will be a Wild, Wild West" system. People chose to focus on just a few random bits and make exaggerated claims instead of focusing on the totality of what was being said even if it was kind of vague at points. When put together it was pretty obvious Nintendo was going to have one system with a user account which we got confirmation of that this year.

Going back to Arkam when we first started hearing that issue and since then the one common issue seemed to point to the CPU. That could only mean that either the CPU was being a bottleneck or the way they are programming isn't properly optimized for the hardware. Considering that it's very likely the ones complaining are doing straight ports, they aren't really doing much, if anything, to optimize these launch window ports for the hardware and it's bogging down the CPU. Again this is just the ones complaining as the ones who aren't are most likely doing more to take the other hardware components designed to alleviate a lot of the burden from the CPU.
 
I

IdeaMan

My source is my ass!
hatchx said:
If this is true, I would only imagine the OS has some serious functionality like mid-game pausing for face chat, or ability to pause some games, play others, and return to said games in the same spot.
Click to expand...

It's seems already possible (or planned to be possible) in V4 dev kits, to pause your game, "store" your progression, switch to OS/Background functions, then switch back to your game instantly and go on where you stopped.
 
Smiles and Cries

Smiles and Cries

Member
IdeaMan said:
It's seems already possible (or planned to be possible) in V4 dev kits, to pause your game, "store" your progression, switch to OS/Background functions, then switch back to your game instantly and go on where you stopped.
Click to expand...

this is very detailed info idea man what happened? no longer afraid of Ninjas are we?
 
F

fabricated backlash

Member
IdeaMan said:
It's seems already possible (or planned to be possible) in V4 dev kits, to pause your game, "store" your progression, switch to OS/Background functions, then switch back to your game instantly and go on where you stopped.
Click to expand...

Which would be awesome if it's in the final product. 3DS and Vita really spoiled me with this feature. Playing on the 360 and Wii now feels so cumbersome with lack of savestate available.
 
G

GameplayWhore

Member
HylianTom said:
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e323/HylianTom/Mel%20Brooks%20Gifs/MadelineWaitAMinute.png
Click to expand...

I'd like to reiterate that History of the World, Part I and Spaceballs are two of my favourite movies, and you are making a big fan here by using them as source material.


IdeaMan said:
It's seems already possible (or planned to be possible) in V4 dev kits, to pause your game, "store" your progression, switch to OS/Background functions, then switch back to your game instantly and go on where you stopped.
Click to expand...

So they're basically improving upon how the Wii VC works? Does it also suspend the state to disk?
 
P

Pociask

Member
IdeaMan said:
It's seems already possible (or planned to be possible) in V4 dev kits, to pause your game, "store" your progression, switch to OS/Background functions, then switch back to your game instantly and go on where you stopped.
Click to expand...

If true, awesome! One of the best features of handhelds.
 
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