I think they just really want to share the architecture between the handheld and console so they don't have to change much when putting the same game on both.
That makes sense.
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Emily Rogers: NX Not Using x86 Architecture - Won't Blow Away Current Gen Consoles
- Thread starter dancrane212
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No. The actual game would be ON your handheld (downloaded or on a cart) tied to your account and with savegames in the cloud, so your devices can sync.
Guys, how about instead of being sad about the console, we be happy about the handheld? We could be looking at a portable powerhouse here. Zelda U, on the go, no compromises. MK9, on the go, better graphics than MK8. GCN VC on a handheld. It can run UE4, so maybe even a toned-down version of PS4's DQXI... Actually, screw consoles! Cancel the console, we don't need it! That handheld is fucking amazing on its own! Nintendo, please just make this gen you go handled only and save yourselves the bad press. And add an HDMI out to the handheld so people can stream it to Twitch or something.
3X? Preeeeetty sure that ain't right. The bump in RAM alone is at least 5X.
cartographer
Member
Do you see when you are corrected and then just run on to something else or does it not even register with you?
RAM is separate from the CPU.
Dark Cloud
Member
Dude, what's wrong with you? Calm down man lol. NX console and handheld would be tied together. They help sell each other. These are all just rumors anyways.
Long as the screen is good quality and the price is right I can see it being a good draw. ( Also makes me excited to see Pokemon models not held back anymore by the 3DS)
ARM will be fine from a performance perspective. Some are argueing that ARM will make it harder on 3rd parties / multiplat games.
X1... the Tegra X1 chip. Not the Xbox One.
BigTnaples
Todd Howard's Secret GAF Account
Well that sucks.
I just wish Nintendo would make some semi competitive hardware.
WiiU was the first Nintendo console I ever skipped, including the Virtual Boy.
Hoping NX wouldn't be the second, but it isn't looking good.
I just wish Nintendo would make some semi competitive hardware.
WiiU was the first Nintendo console I ever skipped, including the Virtual Boy.
Hoping NX wouldn't be the second, but it isn't looking good.
Both are fine. Each has its advantages. However, where they are the same is that both architectures are under active development and have a place in the market.
This means that both have ancillary support through software, fabrication and design houses. This is not something that can be said of PPC (or at least the version that could be used in a home console).
Or that x86 isn't some miraculous cure-all that's needed in order to be competitive.
One of my initial concerns about this idea was 'isn't the higher device going to be screwed over by Nintendo because they'll just make games based on their lower-end device and never the high one?'
cartographer
Member
I suggest not caring until they show what it is and people get a good look at what's it running.
Next week will be "NX handheld is not using Tegra." Who knows what it will be in two weeks.
LiquidSolid
Member
I'll give you two: Having their feet in both the console and handheld markets and their first party software.
Look at both the 3DS and Wii U libraries and imagine they were all playable on one hybrid environment, like Android or iOS. So you could play Pokemon on a console, Splatoon on a handheld or whatever. To me, that's a far more appealing prospect than just the Wii U with PS4/Xbone third party support.
Mediking
Member
Yikes....
That sounds cool, I guess. I guess if the NX handheld can pull off FF7 Remake AND on the console then I'll be fine. Like I would be happy if NX handheld can do Mass Effect: Andromeda on the go then the full amazing experience at home. That's what I was hoping Nintendo was trying to pull off.
Oh...lol.
dancrane212
Member
Handheld-only Nintendo is my nightmare future. If at some point that were the case I'd, at the very least, want a handheld with the same TV support the PSP Go had where I can drop the system into a TV dock, grab a controller and play.
It's just an example. I dunno how to really illustrate it better than that.
I don't really see the value in this. Wouldn't think essentially be a hybrid? But worse cos you'd have to buy two separate devices instead of one to get essentially the same end result.
Well, they might not be a world of difference, right?
If it's the same hardware and just upclocked because the other one can have a fan and a wall socket, it's not much of an issue, and the extra power would likely go to handling the resolution of a television.
Yeah, but in this scenario, you pay Nintendo twice.
shadow2810
Member
Another nail to the third party coffin before it even comes out if true.
Mostly more interested in the handheld part
The Abominable Snowman
Member
This would be awesome if true. Nintendo needs to sit console out for a gen and focus on services and handheld.
Too bad they would be taking my gaming budget for hardware instead of software where the real money is.
Netherscourge
Banned
NX is starting to feel like a buzzkill.
MrCunningham
Member
Well x86 is great because the PS4, Xbox One and PC are all based around this architecture and it would make porting games a very easy thing to do for third parties developers. ARM is also really well supported too as it is in the majority of mobile phones and tablets. The 3DS and PSP Vita use ARM CPU's as well. I really don't think ARM would be a big issue for most third parties or indie developers. All of the major engines support it.
I think X86 would be a little more preferable. But Maybe Nintendo could get away with throwing in a higher end ARM CPU.
ElectricBlanketFire
Member
But it just means that Nintendo's not utilizing the hardware as best they could, and it makes people go 'nah, I'll go for the cheaper option because I know the higher end model isn't worth it.' And if they're not utilizing it and not courting third parties to take advantage of it, they're really just trying to tank it so they can say to themselves 'gamers don't want expensive hardware to play games anymore.' It's a self-serving prophecy, and unfortunately a lot of companies do it, including Nintendo.
KingGreasy
Member
People are so dramatic. If it is ARM which most are assuming, she says "custom." It doesn't have to be a Tegra K1 or X1 where the K1 was a 28nm chip and the X1 a 20nm chip. Upcoming chips like the Snapdragon 830 are expected to be 10nm chips. The Tegra X1 at ~10w is a 512Gflops chip. The PS4 and Xbox One use towards 120w. A custom design most likely won't limit themselves to the power and temperature constraints of phone or tablet. They can fit a fan inside and heatsink with some fins.
Most game engines support ARM as seen in the support for Android and IOS games. LLVM and GCC both support ARM. Developers aren't writing their engines in assembly and they're not writing their own compilers or assemblers. ARM is mainstream. Most of the heavy lifting has been taken care of because of the prevalence of ARM in mobile devices. We're talking game developers not operating system developers. The hardware should have been abstracted well away so that devs wouldn't need to know specific implementation of some integrated circuit.
edit: Also everyone's assuming Nvidia. AMD has been working on ARM for years. ARM has been licensed out to a ton of companies. Even Intel has a license. Qualcomm is the biggest player but Samsung puts out quality and LG is supposed to have their own custom design eventually. There's all the Chinese ARM OEMs that use reference ARM cores and either PowerVR or Mali gpus. x86 is either AMD or Intel because VIA isn't doing much with their x86 license.
Most game engines support ARM as seen in the support for Android and IOS games. LLVM and GCC both support ARM. Developers aren't writing their engines in assembly and they're not writing their own compilers or assemblers. ARM is mainstream. Most of the heavy lifting has been taken care of because of the prevalence of ARM in mobile devices. We're talking game developers not operating system developers. The hardware should have been abstracted well away so that devs wouldn't need to know specific implementation of some integrated circuit.
edit: Also everyone's assuming Nvidia. AMD has been working on ARM for years. ARM has been licensed out to a ton of companies. Even Intel has a license. Qualcomm is the biggest player but Samsung puts out quality and LG is supposed to have their own custom design eventually. There's all the Chinese ARM OEMs that use reference ARM cores and either PowerVR or Mali gpus. x86 is either AMD or Intel because VIA isn't doing much with their x86 license.
Astral Dog
Member
ok,,,ish, about expected for Nintendo, hope its cheap for the masses this time.
oh boy
oh boy
TheGreatMightyPoo
Banned
Correct.
cartographer
Member
Emily, you reading this? You like to see Gaf burn, don't you?
Barry Burton
Member
This doesn't surprise me in the slightest, if true. I actually have been fully expecting NX to be closer in power to the Wii U than to the PS4. Nintendo is not going to compete directly with Sony and Microsoft, as much as fans want them to. They're going to keep doing their own thing.
If it actually is close to the XBO, then great. That'd be a lot more than I was expecting.
If it actually is close to the XBO, then great. That'd be a lot more than I was expecting.
What?
x86 is, by any reasonable measure, the most "old and busted" ISA in common use today (unless you're counting z/Architecture as being in common usage). The ISA is ten years older than ARM and about 15 years older than PowerPC. The complexities of using such an "old and busted" architecture are why it can't compete against ARM in the low-power segment, and its dominance in higher thermal envelopes is pretty much entirely down to a combination of legacy compatibility and Intel's massive R&D budget. And, for that matter, current chips like Skylake only manage to get the performance they do by translating x86 into low-level RISC microcode on the fly to avoid having to implement such an "old and busted" instruction set in full.
Well that's the thing, they might not have too focus on one or the other. If both run on the same architecture it would be no problem to make one game that works on both systems. Since both systems won't be super different and working in two separate dev environments and tools, they have one all encompassing one to easily port and share assets.
We could get the next Monster Hunter on their next handled and could very well be played on the home console too without added effort from the developer.
MrCunningham
Member
Yeah, something in between a PS4 and PS4K sounded nice. But it seems like Nintendo is just making another WiiU from a hardware point of view.
As Traktor said, it's 1TFLOP at FP16 and 500GFLOPS at FP32, the latter of which is the widely used metric.
In real-world terms ... http://www.pcworld.com/article/3006...he-ipad-pro-really-isnt-as-fast-a-laptop.html
Shield TV's GPU is doing pretty terrible. I mean, sure, it's well over a year old now and if the NX releases next year, it's safe to assume it'll use Pascal modules but ... can the jump be this big? From being beaten badly by a Surface Pro 4 tablet to equal the XBO in performance?
Astral Dog
Member
it should still be powerful to get ports, but more than that and you fight not having anything to attract consumers who already have an Xbox or PS4. have a high price (that definetly heped Wii U), or just still competing for scraps on the market led by Microsoft and Sony, the only way Nintendo gets a place is by having powerful hardware that guarantess ports but still doing their own thing.
Before Emily said the specs were "good" now she says Xbox ONE like,pure riddles
wonderful103
Member
This should probably be quoted for a new page. Judging by the responses thus far, it seems like it should be required reading.
Because it will be ARM instead of x86?
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