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Eurogamer: NX = portable w/ carts, detachable controllers, Tegra, TV Out, no BC, Sept

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ggx2ac

Member
When did he say the NX was a hybrid? I thought he reported the NX consisted of at least two parts and one of them was mobile? This was why we all thought there would be a NX console and a NX handheld.

I posted about this a couple of days ago. Notice how he changes the wording from last year's article to the most recent one.


http://m.neogaf.com/showpost.php?p=214331604

The following doesn't specify Nvidia although, they're important with regards to the hybrid rumours.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/nintendo-swings-to-loss-1469604309

Written by TAKASHI MOCHIZUKI, July 27th, 2016

A person familiar with the matter said NX would be a handheld-console hybrid that would be compatible with its own smartphone games.
A Nintendo spokesman declined to comment on the details of NX.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/nintendo-begins-distributing-software-kit-for-new-nx-platform-1444996588

Written by TAKASHI MOCHIZUKI, October 16th 2015

The exact shape of the NX hardware isn’t yet clear. People familiar with the development plans said Nintendo would likely include both a console and at least one mobile unit that could either be used in conjunction with the console or taken on the road for separate use. They also said Nintendo would aim to put industry-leading chips in the NX devices, after criticism that the Wii U’s capabilities didn’t match those of competitors.

The dock!
 

Oddduck

Member
The wording of the October 15th Wall Street Journal article makes it sound like the mobile unit is packaged with the console.

But perhaps I'm reading it wrong.
 

Neoxon

Junior Member
But it doesn't mention a Sony portable. That likely means that the portable from the other thread is NX, which means that NX has a 7-inch screen? Team 540p looking weak.

By the way, using the Shield Tablet K1 as a starting point I came to the conclusion that 450-520 GFLOPS may be possible in a 7-inch tablet that draws no more than 5.5W for the whole unit. I used the K1 because it's easier to find exact GPU efficiency differences that way.
At the same time, going with 720p & above would result in games that may not look as impressive from a visual standpoint.
 

Noi_

Banned
The wording of the October 15th Wall Street Journal article makes it sound like the mobile unit is packaged with the console.

But perhaps I'm reading it wrong.

tbh I honestly think this is way more likely than trying to fit a high powered console into a handheld
 

antonz

Member
If we consider Nintendo has viewed a Gamepad sized Handheld as something they would do I would suggest a 6" screen would probably be about where Nintendo cuts it off at.
 

Vena

Member
But it doesn't mention a Sony portable. That likely means that the portable from the other thread is NX, which means that NX has a 7-inch screen? Team 540p looking weak.

By the way, using the Shield Tablet K1 as a starting point I came to the conclusion that 450-520 GFLOPS may be possible in a 7-inch tablet that draws no more than 5.5W for the whole unit. I used the K1 because it's easier to find exact GPU efficiency differences that way.

The user you were talking with thought the item couldn't be the NX because he believed the NX has a 7" screen. The leak has nothing to do with a 7" screen but a PSP-like portable.

Streamlined WiiU Gamepad ~=~ PSP-like handheld.

I could see it.
 

MuchoMalo

Banned
Where did the 7 inch screen come from?

S...Seven inches?

OMFG

GIVE ME IT NOW NINTENDO!!!!!!!

Edit: Checked the thread. Nowhere does it say 7 inches. Liar.

Someone said it in that thread I think. I'll check again. Either way, I was previously thinking ~6 inches.

At the same time, going with 720p & above would result in games that may not look as impressive from a visual standpoint.

720p is fine for something 2-3x faster than Wii U, especially when it has to connect to a TV screen anyway. Do you really want sub-HD on your TV?

The user you were talking with thought the item couldn't be the NX because he believed the NX has a 7" screen. The leak has nothing to do with a 7" screen but a PSP-like portable.

Streamlined WiiU Gamepad ~=~ PSP-like handheld.

I could see it.

Oh. I should go back to grade school and learn to read.

... That said, as much as I hate the idea of giving Digitimes credit they did say 5" to 7" screen, so it could be regular and XL. Ugh.
 

ggx2ac

Member
The wording of the October 15th Wall Street Journal article makes it sound like the mobile unit is packaged with the console.

But perhaps I'm reading it wrong.

Remember we're talking about a dev kit, it could have changed this last year and he got info as he mentioned saying the device is a hybrid.
 

Oddduck

Member
Remember we're talking about a dev kit, it could have changed this last year and he got info as he mentioned saying the device is a hybrid.

I should clarify that I don't think NX is a traditional console.

I'm simply saying that WSJ has never changed their story on NX being a hybrid system.
 

Neoxon

Junior Member
720p is fine for something 2-3x faster than Wii U, especially when it has to connect to a TV screen anyway. Do you really want sub-HD on your TV?
Wouldn't the dock help scale the game up? This is assuming that the NX would run at a higher clock speed while docked (since battery won't be an issue).
 

MuchoMalo

Banned
Wouldn't the dock help scale the game up? This is assuming that the NX would run at a higher clock speed while docked (since battery won't be an issue).

I'm not at all convinced that such a mode exists. I think it'll be the same both on battery and in the dock.
 

Neoxon

Junior Member
I'm not at all convinced that such a mode exists. I think it'll be the same both on battery and in the dock.
But one has to consider that this thing is gonna be marketed to both console players & handheld players. This is supposed to be Nintendo uniting their two sides of gaming rather than catering to the handheld side & telling the console side to fuck off. Allowing the NX to run faster while docked would be a way to appease the console side of things. Remember, this is a hybrid, not just a handheld. Why even have a dock at all if it's just a glorified HDMI Out?

That said, I don't expect the jump to be massive, but just enough to run games at a respectable resolution for TVs.
 

ggx2ac

Member
But one has to consider that this thing is gonna be marketed to both console players & handheld players. This is supposed to be Nintendo uniting their two sides of gaming rather than catering to the handheld side & telling the console side to fuck off. Allowing the NX to run faster while docked would be a way to appease the console side of things. Remember, this is a hybrid, not just a handheld. Why even have a dock at all if it's just a glorified HDMI Out?

That said, I don't expect the jump to be massive, but just enough to run games at a respectable resolution for TVs.

Right now, we don't have information about a docked mode. Someone stated you could just up the resolution no problem in docked mode and still use the same assets. Maybe, we don't know.

That's why I said a few times not to look at power as the hybrid, I said that this is a portable that can do local multiplayer at home like a home console and a home console that can act as a portable.

We have to wait and see if Nintendo does utilise the SCD to make the console power docked mode happen.
 
October 15th, 2015

“The exact shape of the NX hardware isn’t yet clear. People familiar with the development plans said Nintendo would likely include both a console and at least one mobile unit that could either be used in conjunction with the console or taken on the road for separate use. ” — Wall Street Journal

Source: Wall Street Journal



July 27th, 2016

“A person familiar with the matter said NX would be a handheld-console hybrid that would be compatible with its own smartphone games.” — Wall Street Journal

Source: Wall Street Journal
Maybe the first time he was talking about the mobile unit being the NX and the "console" unit is the SCD/dock?
 

Neoxon

Junior Member
Right now, we don't have information about a docked mode. Someone stated you could just up the resolution no problem in docked mode and still use the same assets. Maybe, we don't know.

That's why I said a few times not to look at power as the hybrid, I said that this is a portable that can do local multiplayer at home like a home console and a home console that can act as a portable.

We have to wait and see if Nintendo does utilise the SCD to make the console power docked mode happen.
Fair enough
 

psyfi

Banned
I love that it's been almost a month since the leak and still no word from Nintendo. Seriously, I love it. They go at their got dang own pace.

Edit : And how the hell am I still the second highest poster in this thread? lol I've barely posted in the past two weeks

Edit 2 : whoa I'm not a junior anymore
 

ggx2ac

Member
Fair enough

I forgot, that I could have things the other way around.

Apparently as someone stated. It's possible that the games are already being developed in docked mode and that apparently the NX will change the resolution and down clock the GPU when it enters portable mode by use of the operating system. Someone else stated that though so I can't explain how it works, and I assume as long as there is only one set of assets that this could make sense.
 

Roo

Member
I love that it's been almost a month since the leak and still no word from Nintendo. Seriously, I love it. They go at their got dang own pace.

They better knock it out of the park when they reveal the system because between this, Neo, PS4 Slim, Xbox S and all the VR stuff the attention will spread too thin in the coming months.
 

J@hranimo

Banned
They better knock it out of the park when they reveal the system because between this, Neo, PS4 Slim, Xbox S and all the VR stuff the attention will spread too thin in the coming months.

If there's anything to knock it out of the park, it's definitely gotta be that launch lineup. It's the reason why we're seeing that March 2017 release! They gotta come swinging if they wanna impress for 6 months in-between everything else you mentioned.
 

Roo

Member
If there's anything to knock it out of the park, it's definitely gotta be that launch lineup. It's the reason why we're seeing that March 2017 release! They gotta come swinging if they wanna impress for 6 months in-between everything else you mentioned.

Yeah, forgot to say that they should do it from a software perspective as the hardware itself won't look as impressive as the rest.

Unless they come up with an amazing gimmick but eh..
 

ggx2ac

Member
Quoting myself here.

Apparently as someone stated. It's possible that the games are already being developed in docked mode and that apparently the NX will change the resolution and down clock the GPU when it enters portable mode by use of the operating system. Someone else stated that though so I can't explain how it works, and I assume as long as there is only one set of assets that this could make sense.

What would sound more plausible? The above was one scenario that was mentioned to me whereas another scenario I always thought is that the NX will be 720p or 768p constantly in portable mode and docked mode only because I'm not expecting 1080p docked mode for AAA western games because that means the NX would be more powerful than an Xbox One.

Hence why I've only been mentioning recently that if the SCD will be used, that it would act as the docked mode for the NX to give 1080p resolution on the TV.

However I also mentioned that the SCD has wireless capabilities so the extra power can work for the NX in portable mode too which sounds great.
 

zoukka

Member
Eh NX won't cap out at 720p on your TV. They would have no way to explain that to consumers when some Wii U games were 1080p.
 

ggx2ac

Member
Eh NX won't cap out at 720p on your TV. They would have no way to explain that to consumers when some Wii U games were 1080p.

That's why I said I'm not expecting 1080p AAA western games otherwise NX would be more powerful than Xbox one, I could see 1080p for cheaper budget games and mobile.

_____________

Edit:

Let's try another scenario. Thankfully we have a multiplatform game coming out in the form of Dragon Quest XI. The NX version will most likely be a port of the PS4 version due to the Unreal 4 engine. The question is, how much different will the version differ?

Are we really expecting parity with the PS4 version at 1080p?

I could imagine there is parity as long as the NX version is 720p/768p.

If not, then at 1080p something has to be reduced whether it's framerate or visual effects.
 

Roo

Member
Well, if that's indeed how it works then handheld mode and "dock mode" on NX will work exactly the same as PS4-Neo will do once Neo is released.

They basically have to pack the high (enhanced) and low (native handheld) resolution assets into the same discs er-- cartridges.
The system will load whatever assets are necessary depending on what mode you're playing on.

I assume there will be games that won't go beyond 720p due to the system's primary nature (a handheld) but once it's docked I assume 1080p games shouldn't be a problem.
 

ggx2ac

Member
Well, if that's indeed how it works then handheld mode and "dock mode" on NX will work exactly the same as PS4-Neo will do once Neo is released.

They basically have to pack the high (enhanced) and low (native handheld) resolution assets into the same discs er-- cartridges.
The system will load whatever assets are necessary depending on what mode you're playing on.

I assume there will be games that won't go beyond 720p due to the system's primary nature (a handheld) but once it's docked I assume 1080p games shouldn't be a problem.

We haven't heard how (or that I can't remember) Sony plans to distribute PS4/Neo games. Does having two sets of assets take up much space on a Disc? Or would Sony just give the base PS4 game and you have to download the Neo assets since the game gets installed anyway?
 

jdstorm

Banned
Pardon my ignorance, but why would a game being rendered at say 720p need to render a 720p asset as opposed to just rendering a 1080p asset at 720p?
 

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
There are two follow-up blog posts (here and here), which I'd argue are actually the more interesting ones, as they demonstrate how, even when operating ostensibly at the same precision, two devices can behave in very different ways depending on various aspects of their implementation (rounding modes and subnormal numbers being his two examples). This is particularly pertinent to the use of FP16 in graphics, as implementation of things like rounding and subnormals can vary a lot from one mobile GPU to another, and they could mean the difference between a pixel shader producing accurate results or not.
Indeed about the bolded part - and that's where most of the IEEE754 'futureproofness' stems from. I just missed those two parts. So nice for bringing those up!
 

Roo

Member
We haven't heard how (or that I can't remember) Sony plans to distribute PS4/Neo games. Does having two sets of assets take up much space on a Disc? Or would Sony just give the base PS4 game and you have to download the Neo assets since the game gets installed anyway?

- Neo-only or PS4-only games are not permitted (remember that Neo can still run unenhanced titles - developers are simply prohibited from locking out audiences of either console).

- All games you purchase, whether via disc or from the PlayStation Store, should offer both PS4 and Neo functionality with no extra costs associated in running titles on a different console.

- All new titles with Neo support use unified packages that run on both platforms. The CPU binary is identical, while three GPU binaries (shared, PS4-specific and Neo-specific) are all contained in the same package.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/d...ion-4k-neo-and-the-original-ps4-will-co-exist

I assume it'll be on a game per game basis. If you can fit both modes into a single disc then you're good to go.
If they're too big, however, will need a day 1 patch with whatever amount of data couldn't fit on disc.

However they do it, developers can't ship their game without both modes available.


Edit: In Nintendo's case, I don't think they'll have any problem as most of their games barely go beyond 10GB*

*with a few exceptions, of course.
 

ggx2ac

Member
Pardon my ignorance, but why would a game being rendered at say 720p need to render a 720p asset as opposed to just rendering a 1080p asset at 720p?

I also mention 1366 x 768 or 768p as a possible resolution because it's been mentioned that it scales to 1080p more closely at 2x resolution than 720p does.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/d...ion-4k-neo-and-the-original-ps4-will-co-exist

I assume it'll be on a game per game basis. If you can fit both modes into a single disc then you're good to go.
If they're too big, however, will need a day 1 patch with whatever amount of data couldn't fit on disc.

However they do it, developers can't ship their game without both modes available.

That's why it's important to know if devs have been making two sets of assets or not but we haven't heard about that or different performance modes for the dock.
 
I wonder if Nintendo was also waiting for the Olympics to end to announce the NX reveal date? Funny how it ends with them getting some nice promotion and it ends on Sunday before the day NVidia is doing their hot chips presentation.
 

Roo

Member
That's why it's important to know if devs have been making two sets of assets or not but we haven't heard about that or different performance modes for the dock.

Exactly. Until we know if the dock does actually anything, it's useless to speculate whether or nor devs are working with two sets of assets.
 

Mr Swine

Banned
I don't think you need different assets if NX runs games at 540 in handheld mode and 1080 in docked mode. It would require too much space on the cartridge to do that. I do think they will adjust the LOD to be more aggressive in the handheld mode
 

Malus

Member
I wonder if Nintendo was also waiting for the Olympics to end to announce the NX reveal date? Funny how it ends with them getting some nice promotion and it ends on Sunday before the day NVidia is doing their hot chips presentation.

hqdefault.jpg
 

ckfy63a

Member
Japan is at 4:00 pm at the moment. Don't expect any announcement for the rest of the day.

Do we have any precedent for announcement times of this nature? For instance, I think the most recent Nintendo Direct announcement was made around 9pm local time (Japan). We don't know anything about the format of the reveal, so it really could come at any time, unless I'm missing something.
 
A guy I know that knows things actually knows nothing but I still hope for this week to be the week beacuse you know I'm starting to feel kinda strange since that guy doesn't even exist yet it's sitting besides me.
 
FYI, usually Nintendo Directs are announced around 8 am-9am Eastern Time. That's about 9 pm- 10 pm Japan time.

Also, if someone could clarify the Wii U Event was announce 9am or 10 am Eastern back in 2012? Of course this was for the live event and not a Nintendo Direct. Still times for announce my are close it would appear.

So, if anything we'll hear about the reveal date in 5-6 hours at the earliest. If they wait for NVidia then of course it'd probably be an extra day.
 
Do we have any precedent for announcement times of this nature? For instance, I think the most recent Nintendo Direct announcement was made around 9pm local time (Japan). We don't know anything about the format of the reveal, so it really could come at any time, unless I'm missing something.

The reveal would be a bit different from Direct as I think it is a live stage event, so invitations have to be delivered to the media in advance of the event. I assume they will send them out in office hour. The media should have already received the invitations if Nintendo have sent them out.

Of course, these are my assumptions. Invitations can still be sent by NOA instead of NCL. If this is true, we may hear something when the Americans start their work.
 
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