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Wii U Thread - Now in HD!

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Thread is way too technical

Not technical enough if you ask me :p


My take on this:

Wii U RAM is going to be 2GB total with 1.5 GB for games and 512mb for OS (I know the latest rumor was only 1GB for games but that was most likely the safe number Nintendo told them for launch titles.......so....nah)

Wii U EDRAM 32MB will help for full games displayed on both the Gamepad and TV at the same time.

Wii U CPU: First of all IBM said themselves that it's an all-new CPU http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/34683.wss so if it was based on the PowerPC 476 why didn't they say so?

If the CPU does in fact end up being based on the Power PC 476FP (or whatever version) it would still out perform the Xenon in the Xbox 360 even if it's clocked lower based on the OOE nature of the CPU and the fact that the Xenon is flat out 7 year old tech. Games made with the modern CPU OOE in mind will benefit greatly on the Wii U. http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=98&Itemid=1&limit=1&limitstart=9

Ports from Xbox 360 may not be using code that the Wii U CPU will like in the way it should therein leaving some of the cores "idle" when they could be doing something. Hopefully Third Parties who are porting from current gen HD systems will figure out how to use the Wii U CPU to the full so they won't find themselves thinking it's lacking when it's not at all.

The Wii U CPU should get the job done nicely.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
Three Wiis taped together, 1GB of RAM, and a hamster wheel GPU. Power level relative to sales of NSMBU.
 

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Uhhh.

It's speed (bandwidth here), not "efficiency".
Actually DDR3 is more efficient - it does more work per clock. Yes, it eventually ends up as higher BW, but also lower power draw at the same speeds.

The Wii U is almost certainly using DDR3. Which is comparable in speed to the GDDR3 in 360/PS3. Which makes sense, as everything else about the system is more and more appearing comparable to the PS360.
You mean Oban/ps4 won't be comparable to ps360 in any shape of form? Interesting.

GDDR5 is the "good stuff" used in the highest end PC cards of today. Nintendo probably felt they didn't need it, because the Wii U isn't that powerful. Of course, GDDR5 is much more expensive than DDR3.
Every BW-intensive scenario by today's standards can take advantage of the extra BW GDDR5 offeres. If nintendo 'felt' they needed edram, then they could've as well used GDDR5 instead. If they chose DDR3 + edram that is because they deemed that setup to better suit their cost/performance targets. Your 'because WiiU isn't that powerful' explanation is junior-high material.
 

ArynCrinn

Banned
Three Wiis taped together, 1GB of RAM, and a hamster wheel GPU. Power level relative to sales of NSMBU.

FACT!

and...a bundle that includes a Pikmin figurine which accesses additional content in Pikmin 3, for the price of $30. No more DD DLC, only figurines you buy to increase value as collectibles and additions to games! Source? Myself!
 

TheD

The Detective
Not technical enough if you ask me :p



If the CPU does in fact end up being based on the Power PC 476FP (or whatever version) it would still out perform the Xenon in the Xbox 360 even if it's clocked lower based on the OOE nature of the CPU and the fact that the Xenon is flat out 7 year old tech. Games made with the modern CPU OOE in mind will benefit greatly on the Wii U. http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=98&Itemid=1&limit=1&limitstart=9

Ports from Xbox 360 may not be using code that the Wii U CPU will like in the way it should therein leaving some of the cores "idle" when they could be doing something. Hopefully Third Parties who are porting from current gen HD systems will figure out how to use the Wii U CPU to the full so they won't find themselves thinking it's lacking when it's not at all.

The Wii U CPU should get the job done nicely.

Sigh.

OoOE rearranges instructions so that an instruction that needs to wait on something else is put aside in till what it is waiting for is ready, other instructions run in the mean time.

Programs do not need to be changed to take advantage of it and if Devs are saying the CPU is slow then it is slow.

Every BW-intensive scenario by today's standards can take advantage of the extra BW GDDR5 offeres. If nintendo 'felt' they needed edram, then they could've as well used GDDR5 instead. If they chose DDR3 + edram that is because they deemed that setup to better suit their cost/performance targets. Your 'because WiiU isn't that powerful' explanation is junior-high material.


GDDR5 costs a lot, If I remember right it costs about 15x as much as DDR3.

32MB of eDRAM would likely cost a fair amount less.

DDR3 on a 128bit bus + the eDRAM should be a fair bit behind a system using GDDR5.
 

The_Lump

Banned
Sigh.

OoOE rearranges instructions so that an instruction that needs to wait on something else is put aside in till what it is waiting for is ready, other instructions run in the mean time.

Programs do not need to be changed to take advantage of it and if Devs are saying the CPU is slow then it is slow.

Well, according to some reliable sources on this very thread, that's not always the case. I can't find the quote as I'm on my phone, but perhaps someone else can point you to wsippel's recent posts on the matter.

Bottom line was that in some cases, unless code is written specifically to take advantage of OoOE, it won't.

Edit: since been informed this is the wrong way around: I/O optimized code may not run run aswell on OoOE CPUs. Same point being made though really.

Also, to my mind no dev has said "the CPU is slow". The only similar quote I've heard was the Tekken dude saying the 'clock speeds were a bit low'. I could be wrong though so please correct me if need be.
 

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Sigh.

OoOE rearranges instructions so that an instruction that needs to wait on something else is put aside in till what it is waiting for is ready, other instructions run in the mean time.

Programs do not need to be changed to take advantage of it and if Devs are saying the CPU is slow then it is slow.
Actually, a program can stall an OOE pipeline, while running 'fine' on an in-order one. OOE is by far not as simple as you make it out be. I suggest you read up on speculative execution.

GDDR5 costs a lot, If I remember right it costs about 15x as much as DDR3.

32MB of eDRAM would likely cost a fair amount less.

DDR3 on a 128bit bus + the eDRAM should be a fair bit behind a system using GDDR5.
Behind in what exactly?
 
Why are we back onto 1.5GB of RAM again..? Didn't Ancel say it had a 'enormous' amount of RAM..? Sounds like at least 2GB to me. And what about this 'almost no limitations' business..? I was thinking about 2GB of DDR3 with 2GB of the 8GB onboard flash being used for swapspace. They'd have to use SLC instead of MLC I guess for the extra speed and accuracy needed but in theory it could be done, couldn't it..? Not too clued up on flash storage though so perhaps I'm wide of the mark..?

Ancel isn't the first developer to praise the amount of RAM so I can't see Nintendo not bunging an extra 512MB in myself.

So has anyone any thoughts on this..?

I was also thinking that this 'almost limitless' RAM theory could tie in with the news that Nintendo have something about the GPU patented.
 

1-UP

Banned
Three Wiis taped together, 1GB of RAM, and a hamster wheel GPU.

ZOMG, 4th sku confirmed!

wiiumvqor.png
 

TheD

The Detective
Well, according to some reliable sources on this very thread, that's not always the case. I can't find the quote as I'm on my phone, but perhaps someone else can point you to wsippel's recent posts on the matter.

Bottom line was that in some cases, unless code is written specifically to take advantage of OoOE, it won't.

This thread is full of the blind leading the blind!

OoOE is something CPUs do automatically!
No code has to be changed for it to work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Code running on 2 hypothetical CPUs that are 100% the same bar one has OoOE and one does not, will always be faster on the OoOE CPU!
 

wsippel

Banned
GDDR5 costs a lot, If I remember right it costs about 15x as much as DDR3.

32MB of eDRAM would likely cost a fair amount less.

DDR3 on a 128bit bus + the eDRAM should be a fair bit behind a system using GDDR5.
The problem with statements that broad is that they're hardly ever correct.


Well, according to some reliable sources on this very thread, that's not always the case. I can't find the quote as I'm on my phone, but perhaps someone else can point you to wsippel's recent posts on the matter.

Bottom line was that in some cases, unless code is written specifically to take advantage of OoOE, it won't.
It's mostly the other way around - in-order requires specific optimizations. Still, in the end, code optimized for iO won't perform that well on OoO chips and vice versa.
 

The_Lump

Banned
This thread is full of the blind leading the blind!

OoOE is something CPUs do automatically!
No code has to be changed for it to work!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Code running on 2 hypothetical CPUs that are 100% the same bar one has OoOE and one does not, will always be faster on the OoOE CPU!


Well I certainly wouldn't call wsippel or blu blind, as they seem to be well respected and rather 'in the know' about these things. Also read the same info on B3D so I'll stick to that opinion until proven otherwise.

Read blu' response to your previous post.

Edit: And the post above this one.

Thanks for explaining that/correcting me
wsippel! :)
 

japtor

Member
Well, according to some reliable sources on this very thread, that's not always the case. I can't find the quote as I'm on my phone, but perhaps someone else can point you to wsippel's recent posts on the matter.

Bottom line was that in some cases, unless code is written specifically to take advantage of OoOE, it won't.

Also, to my mind no dev has said "the CPU is slow". The only similar quote I've heard was the Tekken dude saying the 'clock speeds were a bit low'. I could be wrong though so please correct me if need be.
I think it's the other way around, similar result though. If the code is optimized specifically for in order CPUs (to reduce the bottlenecks there) then you might not see the performance increase you'd expect from moving to out of order.

Sort of a matter of efficiency, if the in order CPU is running code at like 90%* of its potential you're only going to gain so much by adding out of order. Whereas with regular code the in order CPU might be choking at 50%* while an equivalent out of order CPU could get it closer to that full potential again. This is why Cell/Xenon would suck as regular computer CPUs, raw power might be good but most computer code wouldn't be able to take advantage of it.

*BS numbers just for the example.
So has anyone any thoughts on this..?

I was also thinking that this 'almost limitless' RAM theory could tie in with the news that Nintendo have something about the GPU patented.
"Enormous" could be anything. Relative to 512MB which they've been working with for years, another 512MB to play with on top of that is a big deal, as would another 1-1.5GB.
 

The_Lump

Banned
I think it's the other way around, similar result though. If the code is optimized specifically for in order CPUs (to reduce the bottlenecks there) then you might not see the performance increase you'd expect from moving to out of order.

Thanks for explaining, wsippel says the same to. I've added an edit onto my original post. Same point can be made though, pretty much :)

This been posted yet?

http://andriasang.com/con2mg/dqx_demonstration_stage/

Wii U Dragon Quest X to be demoed at TGS.


Yep, already posted I believe. Exciting times!
 

TheD

The Detective
Actually, a program can stall an OOE pipeline, while running 'fine' on an in-order one. OOE is by far not as simple as you make it out be. I suggest you read up on speculative execution.


Behind in what exactly?

Just because it can does not mean that it will.

Devs would not be going around claiming the CPU is slow if simple stuff like that is the problem.



Having 32MB eDRAM for the GPU is not going to help with anything on the inbound side, the 20 odd GBs DDR3 can give you on a 128Bit bus will starve GPUs that are faster than what the 360 and PS3 have.
 

kitsuneyo

Member
You know how the Dragon Quest X CGI bits have those much more detailed and nicer looking character and scenery models? What's to stop those being used in the actual game on WiiU? Is that something developers can do pretty easily?
 

wsippel

Banned
Having 32MB eDRAM for the GPU is not going to help with anything on the inbound side, the 20 odd GBs DDR3 can give you on a 128Bit bus will starve GPUs that are faster than what the 360 and PS3 have.
That is not necessarily the case.
 

D-e-f-

Banned
I used to love ps3 but it seems Wii has all the rpgs and other fun games this generation so might pick this up since its bc with wii if i am not mistaken

? PS3 still as the better selection due to quantity.

Wii only really has a handful of RPGs, all the worthwhile ones being exclusively Japanese RPGs.


man, this is really really old!

Then say yes to a 3DS player for Wii U. :)

Why not just make 3DS eShop titles downloadable for Wii U?

Or like that in reverse:

ZOMG, 4th sku confirmed!

wiiumvqor.png

Redesign confirmed!

This been posted yet?

http://andriasang.com/con2mg/dqx_demonstration_stage/

Wii U Dragon Quest X to be demoed at TGS.

I think that part about the stage demo has actually not been posted for a change. We only knew there was new info coming. :)
 

japtor

Member
I think that part about the stage demo has actually not been posted for a change. We only knew there was new info coming. :)
Yeah all they said before was that they'd reveal details about the Wii U version, which could've meant anything (like just an announcement of features). Hopefully "demonstration" means an actual demonstration.
 

The_Lump

Banned
Just because it can does not mean that it will.

That wasn't the point though. The point was, it's not as definitive as you were making out.

Devs would not be going around claiming the CPU is slow if simple stuff like that is the problem.

Again, can you quote someone as saying "its slow"? I've tried to find that quote and can't. The only similar quote is the Tekken producer saying the clock speeds are "kinda low". Doesn't mean the CPU is 'slow'.


Having 32MB eDRAM for the GPU is not going to help with anything on the inbound side, the 20 odd GBs DDR3 can give you on a 128Bit bus will starve GPUs that are faster than what the 360 and PS3 have.

I understand your point, but again you're using pure speculation to back up your opinion as if its absolute fact. We don't know if its DDR3, we dont know the bus speed, we don't know too many things to begin to draw a definitive conclusion. It's fine to make these guesses, but maybe present them as such and not as concrete knowledge. :)
 

kitsuneyo

Member
I think that part about the stage demo has actually not been posted for a change. We only knew there was new info coming. :)

Yeah I didn't really put that across too well. The game and its hopefully improved graphics will definitely be on show. I'll edit my post.
 

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Just because it can does not mean that it will.
You're trying to take this argument to some transcendental levels, I see.

Devs would not be going around claiming the CPU is slow if simple stuff like that is the problem.
'Simple stuff like that'? You didn't take my advice to read up on speculative execution, did you?

Also, devs could be saying lots of things and be wrong about some (they're only human) but it's usually those who try to interpret them that are goofing up. For instance, if you have a fine-tuned Xenon code which takes advantage of the massive ALU throughput that CPU has, and you try to run that on anything of (a) a lesser clock, or (b) not-as-fat SIMD pipeline (or both (a) and (b)), you'd have a problem. Does that make that second CPU a 'slower one' per se, i.e. outside of this particular scenario? I don't think so. The second CPU could be an OOE monster, and it would still be slower in this case.

Having 32MB eDRAM for the GPU is not going to help with anything on the inbound side, the 20 odd GBs DDR3 can give you on a 128Bit bus will starve GPUs that are faster than what the 360 and PS3 have.
1. '20-odd GB/s'? A modest DDR3-1600 @128bit bus is 25.6GB/s, DDR3-1866 is 29.9GB/s, and state-of-the-art DDR3-2133 is 34GB/s.
2. edram BW can be in the many hundreds of GB/s, at latencies GDDR5 could not even dream about. You entirely lost me with that 'not going to help on the inbound side'.
 

wsippel

Banned
1. '20-odd GB/s'? A modest DDR3-1600 @128bit bus is 25.6GB/s, DDR3-1866 is 29.9GB/s, and state-of-the-art DDR3-2133 is 34GB/s.
2. edram BW can be in the many hundreds of GB/s, at latencies GDDR5 could not even dream about. You entirely lost me with that 'not going to help on the inbound side'.
Not to mention you're not limited to a 128bit bus anyway. POWER7 memory bandwidth is 128GB/s on DDR3 (two quad channel memory controllers).
 

onilink88

Member
If Monolith do anything, it might be something short like Disaster: Day of Crysis first, and then maybe a long JRPG afterwoods, although there's still that one piece of concept art from acouple of years ago with the castle.

Was that image relevant to anything currently in development, though? Or was it just a random one-off type deal? The image in question was highly, highly reminiscent of Diadem from Baten Kaitos. Problem is that BK, apparently, is six feet under. Their Wii U game is about, uh... see for yourself:


What I do know, though, is that they're working on at least three games (unless Cross Zone is done):

Monolith Tokyo (Xenoblade team): Wii U game (image above)
Monolith Kyoto: 3DS game (unknown at this point- hope it's Soma Bringer 2 :D)
Team Endless Frontier: Project Cross Zone
 

japtor

Member
Was that image relevant to anything currently in development, though? Or was it just a random one-off type deal? The image in question was highly, highly reminiscent of Diadem from Baten Kaitos. Problem is that BK, apparently, is six feet under. Their Wii U game is about, uh... see for yourself:



What I do know, though, is that they're working on at least three games (unless Cross Zone is done):

Monolith Tokyo (Xenoblade team): Wii U game (image above)
Monolith Kyoto: 3DS game (unknown at this point- hope it's Soma Bringer 2 :D)
Team Endless Frontier: Project Cross Zone
Crashed UFO? That looks like a...

Disaster

 
This lack of Wii U news is annoying. I really hope the direct and TGS give us some megatons, I really want to be excited about the Wii U but I'm starting to stop caring..
 

gamingeek

Member
Why is it so wrong to believe that Monolith will blow us away, or come close. The have gone on record in saying that they want their first HD game to be very impressive, to show that Japanese developers are just as good or better than western devs when it comes to graphics.

Would love if they could achieve this on Wii U
http://lvls.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/xenoblade-artwork-10.jpg
http://www.nintendo-insider.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/xenoblade-artwork-7.jpg
 

onilink88

Member
Crashed UFO? That looks like a...

Disaster


This is, by far, the best post in this thread. I'm blasting chocolate milk outta my nose here.

They better bring it over this time if that's the case ...

SB was great; the art direction was solid, it had breathtaking music, and its gameplay was incredibly addictive. Unfortunately, the writing, plot, and characters were on the underwhelming side. Didn't detract from the game too much, though, so I very much hope there's a sequel.
 

10k

Banned
My new source told me the Wii U will play video games. Take it with a grain of salt people, I'm just the messenger.

What are the chances of Nintendo keeping more RAM from the devkits instead of halving it? Like if the devkits have 3GB, Nintendo could go 2GB or2.5GB? Or is that not enough memory to debug?
 

D-e-f-

Banned
Soma Bringer was great; the art direction was solid, it had breathtaking music, and its gameplay was incredibly addictive. Unfortunately, the writing, plot, and characters were on the underwhelming side. Didn't detract from the game too much, though, so I very much hope there's a sequel.

Yea fortunately I will never know since I don't speak a word of Japanese and have to play my import copy by guessing what's going on :)

quality over quantity

Yea that's just it, there's even more quality due to higher quantity. It's really sad how few RPGs the Wii has gotten.
 
My new source told me the Wii U will play video games. Take it with a grain of salt people, I'm just the messenger.

What are the chances of Nintendo keeping more RAM from the devkits instead of halving it? Like if the devkits have 3GB, Nintendo could go 2GB or2.5GB? Or is that not enough memory to debug?

The comments from Ancel have made me think along the same lines. 1GB of RAM available to developers can't be seen by anyone in their right mind to be enormous. Not even 2GB imo.

Apparantly Bethesda said they're not sure about Wii U so no games from them.

I'm shocked and amazed.

Edit: beaten

They need to make Fallout 4 happen. A Pip-Boy in the palm of your hands...

*Drools*
 
Apparantly Bethesda said they're not sure about Wii U so no games from them.

I'm shocked and amazed.

Edit: beaten
Even after Reggie's Skyrim callout? :/

Nintendo really needs to do better... Bethesda's one of the western devs they should've been specifically targeting to incentivise and bring on board. Same for Valve, Rockstar N/SD, Irrational, etc. Megapubs like Ubisoft, EA or Activision are expected, but Nintendo always seems to get lazy/content and just stop there.
 

Mithos

Member
I'll wait six more days (and a few hours). If nothing is announced by then I'll go into full meltdown mode.

If by then at least two of the following have not been announced to be underway too Wii U:

Resident Evil 6, Dishonored, Farcry 3, Crysis 3, Bioshock Infinite, Tomb Raider, GTA V, Dead Space 3.

I think I'll might join you in that meltdown.
 
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