Zoramon089
Banned
Wii U weaker than the 360
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Wii U Speculation Thread 2: Can't take anymore of this!!!
- Thread starter ClovingWestbrook
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Wii U weaker than the 360
Just to be clear, I'm not the one assuming 720 games couldn't be ported to 360. So it's not up to me to explain their reasoning.
-Pyromaniac-
Member
I have absolutely no qualms with the WiiU being being PS360 level (though I'd obviously prefer better), but if it is at that level, I EXPECT/DEMAND that the price very much reflect it.
But it won't. Iwata already said as much. It will be better. The question is HOW much better and where is it better. And the last important question is how much better will the 720/ps4 be compared to it, that's a more important comparison than the ps360 one people are making here, because that will help determine the games it gets.
But it won't. Iwata already said as much. It will be better. The question is HOW much better and where is it better. And the last important question is how much better will the 720/ps4 be compared to it, that's a more important comparison than the ps360 one people are making here, because that will help determine the games it gets.
IceDoesntHelp
Banned
How come you haven't done the laundry yet? I asked for it to be on my desk by 11.
I thought it was the devkit that was weaker?
Can't be like that, even if they wanted to.
I mean, developers has been working since last year's E3 on ports and games (heck even earlier than that); they can't go and tell them now.."sorry, all those specs are a lie here are the new/lowered ones".
Vigil was making a Darksiders II last year that their plan was to have it identical to the 360/PS3 versions; based on the dev kits they had back then. That they were going to allocate budgets and more stuff depending on the final kits they ended working with.
“There’s plenty of horsepower there, so we’re not going to have to make any visual concessions at all for Darksiders 2. At a minimum on par (with 360/PS3), for sure. Whether or not we can go one step further, that might be driven by what’s available on the PC and whether or not that is easy to translate to the Wii U hardware, because there are most likely going to be resolution choices for the PC version of the game. We know some gamers are just going to have more horsepower at their disposal. It’s probably going to be the same graphically, regardless of any minor or major horsepower improvements on the Wii U. But, in all honesty, if the Wii U turns out to be this ridiculously powerful machine, we will probably make changes to our budget and scope to take advantage of that. But that’s currently not the plan. It’s going to be a direct port. That’s what we’re planning on. But that’s based off of what we believe the hardware’s going to be like.” - game director Marvin Donald
The kits has been upgraded since then (according to the rumors and sources/people talking about it), and there's apparently more stuff (ram, etc.) on them; along with the upgrades to the tablet and the streaming.
The Wii was a special case in that it's hardware had no support for programmable shaders and 1/8 of the RAM. So for Wii U to be in the same situation, there would need to be some kind of earth-shattering new development in GPU technology in the other consoles. There's nothing like that in existence, nothing that compares to the difference of having shaders vs no shaders. GPU tech development is on a plateau, the major advances are about power - not things that would inhibit scaling between platforms.
That first statement is 100% correct, it would be very hard and something with around 400spu's would smoke the 360.
The 3rd statement is a pretty horrible example. First off, it has a CPU in it. Second, you could just use the GPU by itself (the HD5570) and be at 60watts (including ram and unnecessary parts.) What Arkam has said, and what other devs have said fits perfectly with what IGN said if you can forget about multiplier babble, x720 uses HD6670 according to that source, and it's about 20% faster than Wii U, which would put Wii U's GPU in the same performance with the HD6570.
What I said above fits perfectly with what Arkam mentioned (a decently featured GPU with no teeth) it also fits with what you've said in the past even, that a 3DS to Vita comparison between the Wii U and the PS4 (the PS4 might not be that powerful, but for now lets assume it is.) The important part here is diminishing returns and that the x720 will be much closer to a 3DS than a Vita.
...Whoa. It's like 2006 all over again. Calm down. I like your posts, and it's never good when normally levelheaded posters get consumed by the rage.
Anyway, I don't think it's a question of people being graphics whores. In fact, I think it's been fairly obvious that most of the posters in this thread made their peace with the fact that the Wii U wasn't going to be as powerful as 720/PS4 long ago. I don't think hoping for Nintendo to make a graphical leap over the current gen consoles and into porting range with next gen is asking for too much, but releasing a machine in late 2012 that's comparable at best with hardware from 2005 is another thing entirely.
The question for me isn't just portability (because using hardware that supports modern shader technology will help greatly with that), it's incentive. Basically, what incentive would 3rd Parties have to lend AAA support to the Wii U long-term if it really is just circa 360 powerful?
If I was a developer that's the question I'd be asking myself. Early dev kits for the 720 have already been making their rounds, and the chips for the final dev kits were taped off a few months back. Next-gen hardware is coming, and soon. As a dev, would would make more sense: spending resources preparing for the inevitable graphical bump the 720 (and eventually PS4) will bring? Continuing development on current gen hardware and taking advantage of their established user bases? Or diverting resources to develop for a new console that won't have an established base, has no discernible advantage over current gen tech besides a tablet controller and extra ram, no proven online infrastructure, and will be completely obsolete when the other next gen consoles launch?
If what Arkam revealed is accurate (and I still want to believe it's not), I see very little incentive for 3rd parties to support Wii U past initial launch commitments. It also adds a bit of context to why Crystal Dynamics aren't bringing Tomb Raider to Wii U...
DragonKnight
Member
...Whoa. It's like 2006 all over again. Calm down. I like your posts, and it's never good when normally levelheaded posters get consumed by the rage.
Anyway, I don't think it's a question of people being graphics whores. In fact, I think it's been fairly obvious that most of the posters in this thread made their peace with the fact that the Wii U wasn't going to be as powerful as 720/PS4 long ago. I don't think hoping for Nintendo to make a graphical leap over the current gen consoles and into porting range with next gen is asking for too much, but releasing a machine in late 2012 that's comparable at best with hardware from 2005 is another thing entirely.
The question for me isn't just portability (because using hardware that supports modern shader technology will help greatly with that), it's incentive. Basically, what incentive would 3rd Parties have to lend AAA support to the Wii U long-term if it really is just circa 360 powerful?
If I was a developer that's the question I'd be asking myself. Early dev kits for the 720 have already been making their rounds, and the chips for the final dev kits were taped off a few months back. Next-gen hardware is coming, and soon. As a dev, would would make more sense: spending resources preparing for the inevitable graphical bump the 720 (and eventually PS4) will bring? Continuing development on current gen hardware and taking advantage of their established user bases? Or diverting resources to develop for a new console that won't have an established base, has no discernible advantage over current gen tech besides a tablet controller and extra ram, no proven online infrastructure, and will be completely obsolete when the other next gen consoles launch?
If what Arkam revealed is accurate (and I still want to believe it's not), I see very little incentive for 3rd parties to support Wii U past initial launch commitments. It also adds a bit of context to why Crystal Dynamics aren't bringing Tomb Raider to Wii U...
Exactly my point. I don't care about power but I do care about the games that the WiiU will receive.
To be fair, their reasoning for not bringing Tomb Raider..at launch, is simply because they're focused on the other versions and want to finish it for this year. Along the extra work on porting it, on top of the added tablet-functions.
“At this time no," Global Brand Director Karl Stewart said when asked if Tomb Raider was coming to Wii U. "When we started developing the game we made a conscious decision that it was all about building the game for a platform and making sure the game was specific to that platform.
"Given that we’ve been working on the game quite a while before Wii U was announced I think it would not be right to try and port it across. If we started building a game for the Wii U we would build it very differently and we would build it with unique functionality.”
"Given that we’ve been working on the game quite a while before Wii U was announced I think it would not be right to try and port it across. If we started building a game for the Wii U we would build it very differently and we would build it with unique functionality.”
Nothing sounded related to lowered specs or hardware, and more about time and them wanting to use the "unique aspects" (i.e. tablet?) of the Wii U.
You're using logic. Get out of here.
God, we really need to see or hear something new or else we're going to rip each other/ourselves apart soon. I think many in this thread were a little too vicious towards Arkam, since it challenges everything we wanted to believe. I just can't imagine where all this speculation will take us if we get nothing between now and E3.
ShockingAlberto
Member
IGN's wording is often suspect, but they've been two for two in the last few Nintendo hardware releases.
-Pyromaniac-
Member
It's funny, the last whole bunch of pages are a good study of forum behaviour when you really look at it. We get corroboration from many sources that the WiiU will be more powerful than the 360/ps3 by at LEAST 2x (if that measurement means anything to you), and people are excited but we all move on generally quick.
Then 1 guy comes out, one who admits the many possible holes in his own story but is offering what limited information he knows, and people are clinging to it like it's the new truth and are in full out freak out cycle (which consists of denial, then freak out, then acceptance, then justification). It's going to be a longgggggggg 3.5 months.
Why are you guys doing this to yourselves lol.
Then 1 guy comes out, one who admits the many possible holes in his own story but is offering what limited information he knows, and people are clinging to it like it's the new truth and are in full out freak out cycle (which consists of denial, then freak out, then acceptance, then justification). It's going to be a longgggggggg 3.5 months.
Why are you guys doing this to yourselves lol.
tkscz
Member
3X isn't difficult to pull off. If going by the ORIGINAL rumored specs, which were custom Power7 CPU with lots of eDRAM, custom Radeon HD 4870 GPU, with mulit-display functionality, and about a Gig of RAM, then it was already 3 maybe 4X the 360/PS3. For it to be only 1.5 - 2X it would have to run on MUCH less than that. Something like an early 4000 series GPU. A CPU about equal to the 360's and 512 MBs of RAM. If that was the case then it better be about $199.99 in price.
I read your entire post, just figured it's pretty big to throw in another post on the same page.
The Gflops don't really matter, The hard numbers don't really matter, the 4830 in the dev kit was underclocked, so you'd be closer to 600Gflops than 700Gflops, which would bring you to the 6570 very easily (624Gflops)
All my posts really say is that I think Wii U is 2x-3x more powerful if you are just talking about Gflops, 360 is 240 Gflops, so anywhere between an HD6570 and a HD6670 would give you a good hard target for those numbers if you assume that X720's customization doesn't add SPUs to the unit.
But in the end that rumor if true means there is nothing at all to worry about, because even if the X720 highly customizes the GPU from now until release, it will only end up about twice as powerful as the Wii U, and that is the PS2/GCN/Xbox generation. PS2 did fine for being roughly half as powerful as a Xbox.
Btw, you don't need to look at the numbers to really understand this, it simply means that the industry is throwing around multiplier numbers that don't mean a thing, and that Wii U and x720 will be inside porting range of each other.
While I am posting I should also bring up the fact that we currently get PC-PS360 ports, that is PC engine that scales over 10x the difference in power, no matter where Wii U ends up, it will have lots of ram so it should scale fine, though possibly at a lower resolution/playable frame rate.
Let alone the fact that Nintendo showed 360 footage at E3. I doubt they'd do that if they weren't confident that at the very least, the WiiU could reproduce those graphics.
LegendofJoe
Member
You're right, I still vividly remember the reaction when Matt Casamassina's revealed the ballpark technical capabilities of the Wii. I don't know if IGN has anyone on staff anymore with his connections, but I imagine they at least have access to information that the public isn't privy too.
-Pyromaniac-
Member
GDC be 2 weeks away, pretty soon. Hopefully Nintendo feels the need to drop lots of random info, I think they will.
I think the weirdest part was that he said the dev kit had a gig of ram which interesting because usually dev kits have double the ram of the final retail. I remember iherre saying that the dev kits his company was working with had at least 2 gigs which mean the final console had to have had at least 1 gig of ram. That's what makes me the most curious about these new developments.
blu
Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
You have some very skewed idea of the industry.
Carmack released a game on the idevices not long ago. Chair released two acclaimed games on the idevices not long ago. Neither Carmack nor Chair have released anything on the Wii. Do you want to know why? Because getting either id's or epic's current tech on the Wii would be too darn expensive (and it still would not be the same tech).
I've said time and again: WiiU can be as underpowered as an iphone, and it will still get better support from 3rd parties, just because it will use compatible tech and have better online infrastructure. Mark my words.
It's going to be up to whether devs working on Wii U games can utilize the controller to provide gamers with new, compelling experiences - and if Nintendo can effectively market it to the gaming public. If all those cards fall into place, then the Wii U could very well be a hit. Power doesn't sell consoles, only games do. It's been that way since Pong.
The Wii got non-gamers and former gamers into video gaming by making games accessible and fun for a wide audience. They expanded their focus to include a larger market and reaped the rewards shortly afterwards. Similarly, the Wii U expands the focus to include core gamers who are growing tired of the same old same old, whether they realize it or not.
So as far as why 3rd parties would even bother with it... Because of money. Now that they won't have to rewrite their game engines from scratch like with the Wii, it won't be too expensive to get their games on the system.
-Pyromaniac-
Member
my guess is we'll just see the same old demos of the smaller minigame style things, more details on online related stuff, and that's it. I'm guessing ANYTHING game related is saved for E3.
I hope not - not because I want to rush them announcing anything - but I don't want people spreading this inane bullshit anymore.
I hope we get some game announcements/footage/demos, else it's gonna be a hella long wait till E3.
There is a Nintendo Direct tonight at 2am PDT. could hear something there, like a name change. maybe they will call it X361 just to shut these rumors up.
-Pyromaniac-
Member
yeah but just imagine the potential gloriousness that could take place at E3 if Nintendo blows the lid off of multiple new partnerships for BIG games, show off mario or something else that looks very high end, moneyhatted a few things, people put in their places, people blown away, 505 errors. Could be amazing. Will be worth the wait.
hoping for some tidbit on wiiU at the end of it or something, but isn't it just wii/3ds related? None the less. They should just drop the specs on everyone.There is a Nintendo Direct tonight at 2am PDT. could hear something there, like a name change. maybe they will call it X361 just to shut these rumors up.
There is a Nintendo Direct tonight at 2am PDT. could hear something there, like a name change. maybe they will call it X361 just to shut these rumors up.
Tonigth's ND isn't supposed to be Wii and 3DS only?
Never give out hope! WE'RE GOING TO THE MOON THIS TIME
Yep.
-Pyromaniac-
Member
wednesdayton, believe.
I really hope so, because, well.... there's nothing to discuss about Wii.
I just recently read they're closing their Wii No Ma Channel in Japan so.... this ND
better bring something juicy to the table =P
You know, at this point I don't think the specs matter, the console could have anything from 480spu to 800spu and it wouldn't matter to the market, look at what they have been able to do with the ps360, plenty of games on there look fantastic, and I don't get the hype with Epic's new engine, I didn't think it looked beyond crytek's engine, certainly not a leap beyond it.
Really?
m.i.s.
Banned
It's really uncanny, but the commercial performance of a system is generally in inverse proportion to Gaf expectation. About everything on which Gaf has made a prediction, generally the reverse has happened.
And, yes, I do consider the Wii U just a sub-360 to be within the realms of possibility. And I don't care. As long as there are games like Galaxy and Mario Kart in 720/1080p that's enough for me (Mario Kart Wii is based on the GCN Double Dash engine from 2003. ie almost a decade ago). I would add the one proviso that the price had better be correspondingly lower. ie around the $250 mark.
This too.
You've got to laugh though. Almost 30,000 posts of fevered speculation spanning two threads and turns out Wii U could be sub-360 at worst or souped-up 360 at best!!
)Well, they revealed a new Wii game (Kiki Trick) on the last one and released it a few weeks later (game barely sold a thing in Japan).
Vermillion
Banned
I hope they change their minds and Young Justice: Legacy comes to Wii U. Shouldn't be hard to port the PS360 versions.
And actually, for 3DS too - just port the Wii version.
(God knows why they have a Wii and DS version when the game is coming out in 2013).
And actually, for 3DS too - just port the Wii version.
(God knows why they have a Wii and DS version when the game is coming out in 2013).
I said in my post you're referring to that the issue isn't going to be portability. The issue as I see it will be incentive.
There's incentive to develop games for idevices - there's a huge base and demand for them. Smartphone/tablet games are all the rage right now. That wasn't the case when the iphone first launched, and so it didn't get the kind of support it's seeing now.
The Wii U does not have that user base yet. My fear is that a weak Wii U won't ever have that kind of base or foster that kind of incentive when it'll have to compete not just with other next-gen consoles, but with current gen consoles. PS360 will be in the same power range, have gimmicks of their own, will be even cheaper than the Wii U, and will have established users bases of 60+ million when the Wii U launches.
It's all going to come down to that screen then. Because the sad truth is if the Wii U really is just 360 powerful, it isn't offering anything else. In fact, if we factor in the huge strides MS made with Live this gen, it'll be offering less at a greater price.
And then there's still the fact that other next gen consoles are coming. Eventually we're going to be in the period where 3rd party devs slow down their development of PS360 games to transition to the new hardware. Where will the Wii U be when that happens? And I'm talking about games, not sales. The Wii unfortunately proved that sales don't mean shit to 3rd parties if you're not providing them with adequate incentive to develop for your hardware. There's enough competition out there that is catering to them for them to make money elsewhere.
IceDoesntHelp
Banned
May I join you on said places? I find it hard to believe the Wii U isn't even as powerful as the 360.
Yes, even with confirmation that Arkam works at a studio
-Pyromaniac-
Member
New article, we sort of already knew this was happening but meh, more confirmation I guess:
so yeah, we already knew this for the most part but it looks like they aren't testing the waters with their legs, they're cannonballing in.
http://www.theverge.com/2012/2/21/2814253/nintendo-content-provider-meetings-wii-u
so yeah, we already knew this for the most part but it looks like they aren't testing the waters with their legs, they're cannonballing in.
Shin Johnpv
Member
Well yes, I've been saying it for awhile now. Since before anything about next gen was hinted at, I've been calling that next gen would be a PS2/GC/Xbox style gen. Where the 3 systems were much closer power wise. I've also said that with Nintendo using a modern GPU that ports wouldn't be a problem. I think we can fully agree on that.
My issue was more holding fast to the 6670 aspect of the rumor. That the way it was worded could be basing that on a lot of variables. That we shouldn't lock down on one aspect of that and make our predictions based on that.
I fully agree though that they're going to be with in range of each other. I've been saying that for some time now.
R
Rösti
Unconfirmed Member
If the Wii U is indeed weaker than Xbox 360, perhaps Nintendo is aiming to create a system with options for upgrades just like Nintendo 64 could be upgraded with the Expansion Pak (added 4 MB RDRAM) and the 64DD (has a 32-bit coprocessor clocked at 93.75 MHz). That way they can launch the system at levels below that of Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, but once the next generation consoles from Microsoft and Sony launch they can offer an inexpensive solution (or at least one that costs less than Xbox 720/PlayStation 4) to existing Wii U owners for them to experience similar, or even better, graphical experiences amongst other things.
The most sensible solution here would probably be to bring something like the 64DD and fit it under the console. It could have an external power supply and a separate cooling solution. By the time the other consoles are launched in 2013-2014 it shouldn't be too difficult to achieve this. How it would elevate Wii U's technical capabilities I don't know, but perhaps support for WQXGA (2560×1600) could be added, or an updated equivalence to HLSL Shader Model 5 with everything it brings in relation to compute shaders and atomic instructions.
With a nice price range (MSRP $150 - $199) it could perhaps add to Wii U what Kinect has added to Xbox 360 in terms of value for the customer. Imagine Microsoft and Sony touting potentially absurd clock frequencies and bus speeds at E3 2013 for Nintendo to just a few weeks before launch of respective competing system throw a press conference where they unveil this suggested beast of an add-on. It could certainly hinder the progress of Microsoft and Sony quite a bit. Now, I'm not, just like Arkam, a software engineer or anyone that deals with hardware or SDK development, so if this could be done efficiently I don't know. But Nintendo has obviously done something like it before, and the excellent architecture of Gamecube tells of quite a few tricks up the sleeves.
The most sensible solution here would probably be to bring something like the 64DD and fit it under the console. It could have an external power supply and a separate cooling solution. By the time the other consoles are launched in 2013-2014 it shouldn't be too difficult to achieve this. How it would elevate Wii U's technical capabilities I don't know, but perhaps support for WQXGA (2560×1600) could be added, or an updated equivalence to HLSL Shader Model 5 with everything it brings in relation to compute shaders and atomic instructions.
With a nice price range (MSRP $150 - $199) it could perhaps add to Wii U what Kinect has added to Xbox 360 in terms of value for the customer. Imagine Microsoft and Sony touting potentially absurd clock frequencies and bus speeds at E3 2013 for Nintendo to just a few weeks before launch of respective competing system throw a press conference where they unveil this suggested beast of an add-on. It could certainly hinder the progress of Microsoft and Sony quite a bit. Now, I'm not, just like Arkam, a software engineer or anyone that deals with hardware or SDK development, so if this could be done efficiently I don't know. But Nintendo has obviously done something like it before, and the excellent architecture of Gamecube tells of quite a few tricks up the sleeves.
we don't know for certain but have a good idea that its not. we all just have to wait until e3
No body is ready for WedNESday. Nintendo will smash us to little bits and laugh at the little bits before they snort them up and laugh some more. No amount of begging or praying will be able to stop this. It is destiny.
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