Support NeoGAF

[EatChildren]

Huh? Who is Chopper, and is this a WiiU or microsoft/sony rumor?

Posted only a couple of pages back, stating his source claims the Wii U is 'underpowered' compared to the other consoles.

 

[onipex]

I can believe that it will be underpowered because Nintendo doesn't want to go over a certain price. The controller will already be expensive so the system's power would have to take a hit or Nintendo will have to sell the console at a great loss.

Plus if selling the console at a profit means that they may have a chance to make Wii like profits vs waiting 3 or more years to make a profit than the Wii route is just better. Even if it ends up burning out faster again its just healthier for the company in the long run. With Nintendo adjusting how they release software and really going after third parties I doubt it would burn out as fast as the Wii anyway.

 

[Vinci]

The casual / hardcore discussion running through this page is painful to read. Jesus, people.

 

[AzaK]

I can believe that it will be underpowered because Nintendo doesn't want to go over a certain price. The controller will already be expensive so the system's power would have to take a hit or Nintendo will have to sell the console at a great loss.

Plus if selling the console at a profit means that they may have a chance to make Wii like profits vs waiting 3 or more years to make a profit than the Wii route is just better. Even if it ends up burning out faster again its just healthier for the company in the long run. With Nintendo adjusting how they release software and really going after third parties I doubt it would burn out as fast as the Wii anyway.

Well if Iwata's 3ds comments are anything to go by Nintendo are willing to take a loss and prioritise sales numbers over profit. They are also acutely aware of how the Wii worked out for them. Massive profits which skyrocketed their stock price followed by a precipitous decline because they just couldn't hold that value proposition as core 3rd parties ignored the system. Without solid, core franchise publisher support, it cannot sustain itself. The casual market is extremely fickle. So, you can bet that regardless of what final specs the Wii U has, Nintendo will ensure that it can compete.

 

[Ashodin]

I still think "underpowered" will be subjective - I'd wait until actual games are being shown off (read: NOT ports, unless it's BF3) before judging how grea tthey are. There is so much that can be done with consoles that PC has achieved, it's not even funny.

 

[Vinci]

Well if Iwata's 3ds comments are anything to go by Nintendo are willing to take a loss and prioritise sales numbers over profit. They are also acutely aware of how the Wii worked out for them. Massive profits which skyrocketed their stock price followed by a precipitous decline because they just couldn't hold that value proposition as core 3rd parties ignored the system. Without solid, core franchise publisher support, it cannot sustain itself. The casual market is extremely fickle. So, you can bet that regardless of what final specs the Wii U has, Nintendo will ensure that it can compete.

What evidence do we have to show this, out of curiosity? Or is it mostly based on a stereotype of what this 'casual customer' is like? 'Cause I don't see them behaving all that dissimilarly to the 'hardcore' market, outside of tastes. That is to say, I don't see anything that leads me to believe their appetite is different; I do, however, feel the current cooks are fairly poor at delivering the sort of dishes their taste demands.

I have always loved this judgement scenario: I don't understand these people, so there must be something wrong with them.

 

[ThoseDeafMutes]

Posted only a couple of pages back, stating his source claims the Wii U is 'underpowered' compared to the other consoles.

I just found it, and it was 17 pages back :/

 

[Grampa Simpson]

I just found it, and it was 17 pages back :/

Was there a post number?

 

[AniHawk]

Was there a post number?

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=32637564&postcount=10937

Whilst sort of under NDA, I spoke to someone within a major games pulisher here in the UK recently who has spent plenty of time with the Wii U hardware, and they are less than impressed. As a Nintendo fan, I was disappointed to hear him say that the machine is under-powered compared to the impending competition, and no-one but Nintendo will bother investing the sufficient resources to capitalize on the second screen optimally.

so, wii u will be the dreamcast of the generation at best, probably. and it will have problems with a second controller (despite nintendo forging ahead with it anyway?)

 

[Durante]

Amirite to assume that the power gap (if any) between WiiU and ps4/xb3 will be farrrrrr smaller than the grand canyon difference between the wii and ps3/xb360 ?

I wouldn't say "farrrr". It will most likely be smaller, and in particular there won't be a massive difference in basic capabilities like there was with Wii.

However, it could still well be the case that in terms of performance, WiiU will be closer to PS3 and 360 than PS4 and Xbox 3.

 

[Instro]

so, wii u will be the dreamcast of the generation at best, probably. and it will have problems with a second controller (despite nintendo forging ahead with it anyway?)

Er where does he say that?

 

[Vinci]

Whilst sort of under NDA, I spoke to someone within a major games pulisher here in the UK recently who has spent plenty of time with the Wii U hardware, and they are less than impressed. As a Nintendo fan, I was disappointed to hear him say that the machine is under-powered compared to the impending competition, and no-one but Nintendo will bother investing the sufficient resources to capitalize on the second screen optimally.

*shrugs* All I expected anyway.

 

[likeGdid]

so, wii u will be the dreamcast of the generation at best, probably. and it will have problems with a second controller (despite nintendo forging ahead with it anyway?)

I'm ready for the spiritual reincarnation of the VMU

 

[AniHawk]

Er where does he say that?

man did i totally misread that. i saw second screen as like, a second tablet, not the tablet itself.

 

[Thunder Monkey]

Posted only a couple of pages back, stating his source claims the Wii U is 'underpowered' compared to the other consoles.

Uhhh...

Nothing about that is a shock. The question is how underpowered?

Even then it wouldn't matter. If the Witcher can be ported on such a woefully underpowered system as the 360, the WiiU should be more than fine. The Witcher is damn near a generational leap in itself.

Engines scale very well now. From something as "weak" as a 360 all the way up to a modern PC.

 

[Instro]

man did i totally misread that. i saw second screen as like, a second tablet, not the tablet itself.

Ohh ok, I thought that might have been something that came up in a previous post of his or something. Thanks for clarifying.

 

[fabricated backlash]

The casual / hardcore discussion running through this page is painful to read. Jesus, people.

It's like people live in 2006. Or at least they never managed to move out of that time and are still angry at Wii Sports success, still chanting "motion controls are a fad - casual games are a fad"

The industry has grown extremely, the audience enjoying games has been diversified and it's for the better. But I see a lot of Nerds being angry that "normalos" are invading their sanctuary, and now they feel the need to belittle them as some sort of feeble retribution.

 

[lherre]

Revisiting this discussion, which version was reportedly underclocked?

V1 and V2 has the same problems with graphic card, is not that is "underclocked", the problem is that if you use all the "power" the system is unstable or freezes. But the hardware is there.

Yesterday I saw some info about V3 hw (latest) and is the same ... minor changes.

 

[MDX]

From what we know some developers have had WiiU dev kits since early 2011.
According to rumors, Microsoft is planning on shipping dev kits end of this year.
That gives WiiU developers about a full year to work on its hardware.

Im just wondering, if MS is planning on launching in 2012, what games are they going to show off? Xbox 360 games meant for 2012? Even if the hardware is more powerful, the developers will have had less time to do much with it.

At any rate, MS launching next year alongside the WiiU is a good thing for Nintendo. Because they wont have to worry about simply getting PS3/360 ports. They will be getting next gen games sooner.

 

[Neoriceisgood]

Im just wondering, if MS is planning on launching in 2012, what games are they going to show off? Xbox 360 games meant for 2012?

Wii U ports.

 

[Nuclear Muffin]

Whilst sort of under NDA, I spoke to someone within a major games pulisher here in the UK recently who has spent plenty of time with the Wii U hardware, and they are less than impressed. As a Nintendo fan, I was disappointed to hear him say that the machine is under-powered compared to the impending competition, and no-one but Nintendo will bother investing the sufficient resources to capitalize on the second screen optimally.

Exactly what I expected to hear. Even if it was as powerful as the Xbox 3/PS4, they would still not bother taking advantage of the Wii U screen and give the console table scraps for support.

It's going to be the Wii all over again (except that maybe this time it'll get more Japanese support)

 

[Thunder Monkey]

Exactly what I expected to hear. Even if it was as powerful as the Xbox 3/PS4, they would still not bother taking advantage of the Wii U screen and give the console table scraps for support.

It's going to be the Wii all over again (except that maybe this time it'll get more Japanese support)

Unless devs hate easy money there is no way it will be anything like the Wii. Underpowered in this day and age doesn't mean the same thing. All three hardware manufacturers are using tech based on the same paradigm.

If the Witcher can scale and still look good on a 360, there's no reason whatever they're working on for the Loop and PS4 won't scale to the WiiU.

I've never been a believer that publishers go out of their way to piss on Nintendo. Poor 3rd party sales and antiquated hardware that made porting all but impossible were legit reasons to either cease support (GCN) or not support fully (Wii).

This is nowhere close to the same situation. For one we have no idea how anything sells on the system, and we know that porting will be a lot easier.

 

[Nuclear Muffin]

Unless devs hate easy money there is no way it will be anything like the Wii. Underpowered in this day and age doesn't mean the same thing. All three hardware manufacturers are using tech based on the same paradigm.

If the Witcher can scale and still look good on a 360, there's no reason whatever they're working on for the Loop and PS4 won't scale to the WiiU.

I've never been a believer that publishers go out of their way to piss on Nintendo. Poor 3rd party sales and antiquated hardware that made porting all but impossible were legit reasons to either cease support (GCN) or not support fully (Wii).

This is nowhere close to the same situation. For one we have no idea how anything sells on the system, and we know that porting will be a lot easier.

That's not what I meant, I was talking about them supporting the Wii U tablet. I expect it to go largely unused (in any meaningful way) by western developers.

Maybe I should've said GCN all over again instead?

 

[Thunder Monkey]

That's not what I meant, I was talking about them supporting the Wii U tablet. I expect it to go largely unused (in any meaningful way) by western developers.

Maybe I should've said GCN all over again instead?

Nah, the Wiimote would have been more applicable.

Well I completely agree with that much at least.

We'll be lucky if they even use it in obvious ways.

 

[blu]

I wouldn't say "farrrr". It will most likely be smaller, and in particular there won't be a massive difference in basic capabilities like there was with Wii.

However, it could still well be the case that in terms of performance, WiiU will be closer to PS3 and 360 than PS4 and Xbox 3.

I believe I made a prediction somewhere in the small page numbers of this thread, which I can't be bothered to seek out now, so I'll just repeat it (and expand a tad):

Parameter-by-parameter, I expect WiiU to be roughly in the middle between the top parameters of ps360 and the top parameters of ps4loop.

 

[Bluemercury]

"Vita CPU is half as powerful as a Ps3!" (And more powerful than Wii U's, if its indeed just Xenon*1.5).

But if wii U is more powerfull than ps3 and 360...doesnt make sense

 

[fabricated backlash]

Anyone expecting 3rd parties to do anything creatively with a consoles input devices outside of some experimental titles is allways setting himself up for dissapointment.

The Wii was an early sign, but Move and Kinect just make it painly obvious that the bulk of 3rd party developers have no interest or no talent to create inventive UI designs.
Sure that would require them to actually invest in R&D to innovate when it comes to the way games are played. But 3rd parties are making quite a living by reskinning the same 5 genres with yearly iterations and some new technology.

You know that an industry is creatively bankrupt when most of the excitement around a game comes from it's engine rather than it's game design.


I would love to be proven wrong, some 3rd parties and Indie developers are still focused on gameplay rather than tech like every major 3rd party is doing.

 

[MDX]

I would love to be proven wrong, some 3rd parties and Indie developers are still focused on gameplay rather than tech like every major 3rd party is doing.

And if I were Nintendo, I would money-hat, either with publishing deals, or straight up start up cash, to get that young (or old) creative pool of indie game designers to go nuts with the tablet. Because most mainstream third parties will not simply go that extra mile to support innovation if they cannot reap the $$$ right back.

That is why Nintendo had no choice but to introduce the controller even when their hardware was not really ready. They had to give those third parties time to contemplate ideas for the controller.

 

[Donnie]

Posted only a couple of pages back, stating his source claims the Wii U is 'underpowered' compared to the other consoles.

That doesn't really tell us much. GameCube could have been described as underpowered compared to XBox, but it was easily powerful enough. Nobody is expecting WiiU to be as powerful as XBox 3 ect, so underpowered in comparison is expected. What matters is the specifics of it, how much less powerful.

 

[Jocchan]

So as I said before that memory can't be less than 1 gb, the kits have at least 2 gb (is higher of course because this is the lower value of the range).

Are we talking RAM + VRAM? Unified memory pool or not?

 

[Ormberg]

Has this been posted?

Acer Heading to Cloud with iGware Acquisition

Reuters reports that the world's second largest PC maker, Acer Inc., plans to purchase Silicon Valley-based cloud computing firm iGware for $320 million in cash and stock. Acer will also shell out an additional $75 million performance-based payout to iGware as part of the deal. This acquisition will reportedly be the fifth-largest Taiwanese buyout of a U.S. company ever, trailing behind Acer's acquisition of Gateway for $761.5 million back in 2007.

...

Although its simple website doesn't reveal anything about what goes on under its roof, iGware provides cloud software and infrastructure tools that support more than 100 million consumer devices worldwide, including Nintendo game consoles. Acer is expected to integrate iGware into its cloud software and platform as Acer Cloud Technology Co. after completion of the deal by late September. An actual Acer Cloud product is slated to launch sometime during 2012.

But because Nintendo is one of iGware's major clients, both parties are supposedly in talks over a potential cooperation after the acquisition. Nintendo is supposedly in favor of the deal and plans to shell out a $20-30 million service fee to Acer every year after the deal is signed. Yet some analysts aren't thrilled with the acquisition or Acer's potential involvement with the Japanese gaming company.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/cl...ong-Nintendo-Acer-Cloud-Technology,13112.html

I haven't heard about iGware before, but being located in Silicon Valley - they might be cool?

Anyone venture a guess if this is a good deal by Nintendo?

 

[wsippel]

I know that one of the IBM chip designers working on the Wii U CPU shifted to a 32nm VLSI project (GPU integration) a few months ago. Seems related, as IBM usually tries to keep the console teams seperated during development. I guess it's possible Nintendo dropped the plans to go with two discreet chips and a CPU at 45nm in favor of a 32nm SoC project, or that the 32nm VLSI isn't integrating CPU and GPU, but GPU and I/O controller instead. Either way, if Wii U related, we're probably looking at a 32nm GPU designed by AMD, IBM and Nintendo, and considering the timeline, I don't think there's any remotely final GPU to put in devkits yet.

 

[BurntPork]

Uhhh...

Nothing about that is a shock. The question is how underpowered?

Even then it wouldn't matter. If the Witcher can be ported on such a woefully underpowered system as the 360, the WiiU should be more than fine. The Witcher is damn near a generational leap in itself.

Engines scale very well now. From something as "weak" as a 360 all the way up to a modern PC.

Yeah, but they'll need to do that to work on PS4 and XB3 after two years. The gap in power might cause the graphics to be downgraded too much for third-parties to bother. Also, I highly doubt that Epic will put UE4 on Wii U.

I know that one of the IBM chip designers working on the Wii U CPU shifted to a 32nm VLSI project (GPU integration) a few months ago. Seems related, as IBM usually tries to keep the console teams seperated during development. I guess it's possible Nintendo dropped the plans to go with two discreet chips and a CPU at 45nm in favor of a 32nm SoC project, or that the 32nm VLSI isn't integrating CPU and GPU, but GPU and I/O controller instead. Either way, if Wii U related, we're probably looking at a 32nm GPU designed by AMD, IBM and Nintendo, and considering the timeline, I don't think there's any remotely final GPU to put in devkits yet.

Huh, is that so? Maybe there's hope that Nintendo will use a Turks (480SPs) based GPU now.

 

[DCKing]

I know that one of the IBM chip designers working on the Wii U CPU shifted to a 32nm VLSI project (GPU integration) a few months ago. Seems related, as IBM usually tries to keep the console teams seperated during development. I guess it's possible Nintendo dropped the plans to go with two discreet chips and a CPU at 45nm in favor of a 32nm SoC project, or that the 32nm VLSI isn't integrating CPU and GPU, but GPU and I/O controller instead. Either way, if Wii U related, we're probably looking at a 32nm GPU designed by AMD, IBM and Nintendo, and considering the timeline, I don't think there's any remotely final GPU to put in devkits yet.

Could be good or bad news. Are you sure this isn't about PS4 or Xbox 720 though?

 

[wsippel]

Has this been posted?

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/cl...ong-Nintendo-Acer-Cloud-Technology,13112.html

I haven't heard about iGware before, but being located in Silicon Valley - they might be cool?

Anyone venture a guess if this is a good deal by Nintendo?

iGware is another Wei Yen company, so their involvement with Nintendo isn't surprising at all. Wei Yen led Project Reality (N64) at Silicon Graphics, founded ArtX (Flipper, Hollywood), was a member of the board at ATI and MoSys (1T-SRAM), heads iQue (Nintendo's Chinese distributor), and founded BroadOn (Starlet, Wii DRM) and AiLive (Motion+). I think he was involved in the Matrix Semiconductors/ Macronix deal as well, which grants Nintendo exclusive access to extremely high capacity ROMs. If you want to know where Nintendo is heading, follow his trail.

Could be good or bad news. Are you sure this isn't about PS4 or Xbox 720 though?

Quite sure, yes. Like I wrote, IBM keeps the teams completely seperated during development.

 

[Thunder Monkey]

Yeah, but they'll need to do that to work on PS4 and XB3 after two years. The gap in power might cause the graphics to be downgraded too much for third-parties to bother. Also, I highly doubt that Epic will put UE4 on Wii U.

The gap in power won't mean anything.

If the Witcher can run well on a 360 when it was made for hardware a generations removed, I doubt there will be any trouble getting the engines to run on the WiiU even if they weren't intended for it.

 

[Ormberg]

iGware is another Wei Yen company, so there involvement with Nintendo isn't surprising at all. Wei Yen led Project Reality (N64) at Silicon Graphics, founded ArtX (Flipper, Hollywood), was a member of the board at ATI and MoSys (1T-SRAM), heads iQue (Nintendo's Chinese distributor), and founded BroadOn (Starlet, Wii DRM) and AiLive (Motion+). I think he was involved in the Matrix Semiconductors/ Macronix deal as well, which grants Nintendo exclusive access to extremely high capacity ROMs. If you want to know where Nintendo is heading, follow his trail.

Thanks, that was a very interesting bit of information. I'll read up on it.

Regarding the move from 45 to 32 nm, that is intriguing. I would have thought that by now, the specs would be finalized and well known, at least to Nintendo and perhaps a few others.
Perhaps it is all according to plan, and the 45 nm was the closes architecture that was available at the time.
Will be interesting to see how all this pans out. And wasn't there a deal with some network company just recently announced? Broadcom? Or is Broadcom old news?

 

[FiveMinuteHero]

I was wondering how powerful will the Wii U be... considering in terms of graphics power Nintendo seem to be 1 generation behind...

Nintendo Wii = PS2
Nintendo 3DS = PSP
Nintendo Wii U = Xbox 360/PS3?

 

[BurntPork]

The gap in power won't mean anything.

If the Witcher can run well on a 360 when it was made for hardware a generations removed, I doubt there will be any trouble getting the engines to run on the WiiU even if they weren't intended for it.

You're forgetting something VERY important. Witcher 2 runs at 1080p+ at 60FPS with AA and high-end DX11 effects on PC, while the 360 version is 720p (or even less, since I'm not really sure) with no AA at 30FPS. A situation like this would have Wii U running the game at SD resolutions on the equivalent of lowest settings on PC. And gets even worse than that. What happens to 600p CoD? We might end up seeing Wii U games that run at sub-480p! The gap is power really does matter and it will cause ports to sell so horribly that they'll stop coming after a year or two.

Nintendo Wii = PS2

Ha ha, WHAT

 

[Thunder Monkey]

I was wondering how powerful will the Wii U be... considering in terms of graphics power Nintendo seem to be 1 generation behind...

Nintendo Wii = PS2
Nintendo 3DS = PSP
Nintendo Wii U = Xbox 360/PS3?

They've been a generation behind for a generation in the console arena.

I honestly expect the WiiU to be somewhere in-between the PS3 and PS4.

In the handheld space they are following their standard generations.

GBC = NES
GBA = SNES
DS = N64
3DS = GCN

You're forgetting something VERY important. Witcher 2 runs at 1080p+ at 60FPS with AA and high-end DX11 effects on PC, while the 360 version is 720p (or even less, since I'm not really sure) with no AA at 30FPS. A situation like this would have Wii U running the game at SD resolutions on the equivalent of lowest settings on PC. And gets even worse than that. What happens to 600p CoD? We might end up seeing Wii U games that run at sub-480p! The gap is power really does matter and it will cause ports to sell so horribly that they'll stop coming after a year or two.

You really are crazy my friend.

Worry when it happens, not if.

 

[Gaborn]

I was wondering how powerful will the Wii U be... considering in terms of graphics power Nintendo seem to be 1 generation behind...

Nintendo Wii = PS2
Nintendo 3DS = PSP
Nintendo Wii U = Xbox 360/PS3?

Umm... no. You do realize the GameCube was significantly more powerful than the PS2 and basically closer to the XBox than the PS2 in terms of power, right? And since the Wii is more powerful than the Gamecube...

 

[FiveMinuteHero]

I seriously hope they drop the wii-with-a-screen-remote idea.

 

[BurntPork]

You really are crazy my friend.

Worry when it happens, not if.

This isn't an "if." This is what will happen. You're in serious denial of you think there's still even the slightest chance of Wii U being the "PS2 of next-gen."

 

[Thunder Monkey]

I seriously hope they drop the wii-with-a-screen-remote idea.

That stupid Wiimote attachment?

If you're talking about that... I don't think it will ever see the light of day.

This isn't an "if." This is what will happen. You're in serious denial of you think there's still even the slightest chance of Wii U being the "PS2 of next-gen."

There will never be a PS2 again.

And it is an "if" until it happens. At that point it becomes a did.

 

[Mithos]

And no, not a single one of the current-gen ports will sell even one Wii U.

I'm holding off picking up a few current-gen games that's out or coming out, to pick them up with Wii-U as "complete/dlc-packed on disc" versions of the game in late 2012

 

[BurntPork]

There will never be a PS2 again.

And it is an "if" until it happens. At that point it becomes a did.

I'm talking about relative power, not sales. I'm not that stupid. >_>

I'm holding off picking up a few current-gen games that's out or coming out, to pick them up with Wii-U as "complete/dlc-packed on disc" versions of the game in late 2012

Yes, but you would buy a Wii U for Nintendo games either way, so you're not buying Wii U for those games.

 

[FiveMinuteHero]

That stupid Wiimote attachment?

If you're talking about that... I don't think it will ever see the light of day.

I am talking about the Wii U screen controller.

 

[PetrCobra]

I'm holding off picking up a few current-gen games that's out or coming out, to pick them up with Wii-U as "complete/dlc-packed on disc" versions of the game in late 2012

That's exactly my intention. The more current-gen ports the merrier for me, I'm going to buy them all if they are not crippled in some way

 

[Gaborn]

I am talking about the Wii U screen controller.

Why do you want to drop it?

 

[Thunder Monkey]

I'm talking about relative power, not sales. I'm not that stupid. >_>

You're still chicken littling about something we are only speculating on.

We don't know what kind of power is under the hood of even the WiiU, let alone the Loop. If its even a half step from the PS3, you're still looking at something that should (if the engines are built to be scalable) play all of the other two consoles games. With compromises sure. But 720p and 30fps isn't a huge burden to bear. Sure hasn't hurt the 360.

I am talking about the Wii U screen controller.

Then I'd say you're up shit creek.

That kind of seems to be the "hook" Nintendo is using this gen. I'm not completely sold either, but that's mainly because I love the Wiimote.