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GameXplain: Is Zelda: BotW on Switch Smoother in Handheld Mode? Direct Comparison,

it's almost as though different people view things differently ��

No place for subjectivity there.

It's a portable console you can plug into your TV, not a home console.
I feel like people saying it's a hybrid/home console are just trying to make it sound more powerful that it truly is.

It's a very powerful portable console, that's all.
The hardware is the same when in portable mode or home console mode, just working at higher/lower frequencies.
 
Seems to almost reach it?

You really don't know what you're talking about?

Come back here when the switch can run something that looks like Ryse at 900p30 and we can talk.

Or even battlefield 4 at 720 between 40-50 fps.


There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding on the part of many of these people rushing in to defend the power of this thing.

Handheld mode is fine. No one is really complaining about that. Yeah, it's probably fine power for a handheld. It's got the power of a $200 tablet. Great.

The issue is docked mode and the entire idea behind this console. Docked mode should have offered more since this is clearly marketed as both a home console and a handheld. Every single piece of marketing shows this thing being played on a tv first and then picked up and taken with you.

The dock simply upclocking the gpu is not enough. It should have been more.

Does anyone see the possibility of Nintendo making a new dock that has its own dedicated CPU/GPU down the line? Would it be possible with the current USB C connector Bus speeds to act as bridge between the two? Before we knew the real breakdown I had originally thought the dock would have something like that
 
Does anyone see the possibility of Nintendo making a new dock that has its own dedicated CPU/GPU down the line? Would it be possible with the current USB C connector Bus speeds to act as bridge between the two? Before we knew the real breakdown I had originally thought the dock would have something like that

Possibly. They do have that supplemental computing device patent.
 
Erm... Wii U is 4 years old with already old tech. Your logic is completely flawed.
You didn't answer that post's question.

And? So you're saying that consoles have expiration dates?

It's still a console, it was a console when Bayonetta 2 was released, when 3D World was released and still left a lot of people really impressed. Read my other posts, in the end my conclusion is that with technology advancing, it will get hard to classify one from the other given how capable portable technology has become.
 
Possibly. They do have that supplemental computing device patent.
I mean obviously that would make development a little more annoying since Devs would have to hit 3 performance levels (portable, dock, new Dock) but I'm just hoping that Nintendo has a way to boost the power with out making a whole new switch, because for handhelds they have always been fond of upgrades.
 
I mean obviously that would make development a little more annoying since Devs would have to hit 3 performance levels (portable, dock, new Dock) but I'm just hoping that Nintendo has a way to boost the power with out making a whole new switch, because for handhelds have always been fond of upgrades.

Devs would just need to use/make scalable engines. It's not an issue on PC with games usually having three or four presets along with all the individual graphics and performance options.

It's the norm now anyway with PS4/Pro, Switch Handheld/docked, and X1/Scorpio this fall. Having a third preset isn't a big deal if the games are using scalable engines.

In any case, a big part of my waiting a while on Switch is seeing how it sales and if anything like this ends up happening to give a better solution for us console-only folk who don't care about handhelds.

My guess is nothing happens unless Switch sales struggle. If it's a hit they have no reason to mess with new Skus etc.
 
Feels good to not care about graphics as much as some people. I honestly think BotW looks fantastic. I'm at the point where graphical enhancemens don't mean nearly as much to me as how much fun I'm having with a game.
 
Devs would just need to use/make scalable engines. It's not an issue on PC with games usually having three or four presets along with all the individual graphics and performance options.

It's the norm now anyway with PS4/Pro, Switch Handheld/docked, and X1/Scorpio this fall. Having a third preset isn't a big deal if the games are using scalable engines.

In any case, a big part of my waiting a while on Switch is seeing how it sales and if anything like this ends up happening to give a better solution for us console-only folk who don't care about handhelds.

My guess is nothing happens unless Switch sales struggle. If it's a hit they have no reason to mess with new Skus etc.

If it's a hit it is way more likely Nintendo will release a Switch 2, with beefier internals but same in every other way. If it's a flop they will want to try something completely different. Again.
 
Feels good to not care about graphics as much as some people. I honestly think BotW looks fantastic. I'm at the point where graphical enhancemens don't mean nearly as much to me as how much fun I'm having with a game.

Thread is about performance, which is important for gameplay. Can't speak for others but I'd gladly sacrifice resolution or effects to keep gameplay smooth and responsive. Since the GameCube it's something I've come to expect from Nintendo games.
 
Thread is about performance, which is important for gameplay. Can't speak for others but I'd gladly sacrifice resolution or effects to keep gameplay smooth and responsive. Since the GameCube it's something I've come to expect from Nintendo games.

You nailed it.
 
Does anyone see the possibility of Nintendo making a new dock that has its own dedicated CPU/GPU down the line? Would it be possible with the current USB C connector Bus speeds to act as bridge between the two? Before we knew the real breakdown I had originally thought the dock would have something like that

It's rumored. More specifically by that Foxcon leak. If something like that exists I hope they announce it at E3 or something.
 
CEMU obviously wont run this at 1080p 60FPS the moment its up and running but its gonna be hilarious that an emulated Wii U game is gonna become the definitive way to play BoTW.
 
Devs would just need to use/make scalable engines. It's not an issue on PC with games usually having three or four presets along with all the individual graphics and performance options.

It's the norm now anyway with PS4/Pro, Switch Handheld/docked, and X1/Scorpio this fall. Having a third preset isn't a big deal if the games are using scalable engines.

In any case, a big part of my waiting a while on Switch is seeing how it sales and if anything like this ends up happening to give a better solution for us console-only folk who don't care about handhelds.

My guess is nothing happens unless Switch sales struggle. If it's a hit they have no reason to mess with new Skus etc.

See that's the thing even for myself, I'm buying a switch but don't care about the portability at all. To me this is a Wii U replacement and with the best version of Zelda being on switch now and Mario and splatoon 2 coming I decided to just jump in now and play Zelda on switch. In the long run I wouldn't mind a $100 dock upgrade to add more power but I do worry about them making a 1080p screen with better specs in 2 years time

It's rumored. More specifically by that Foxcon leak. If something like that exists I hope they announce it at E3 or something.

I don't know if it would be that soon and if it were that would likely piss off most of the early adopters. I do feel that down the line it will be necessary for them to bump the power up I just hope they can do it through a dock add on and not force people to buy a whole new console again.

CEMU obviously wont run this at 1080p 60FPS the moment its up and running but its gonna be hilarious that an emulated Wii U game is gonna become the definitive way to play BoTW.

True, though I don't know if that's fair to say, as emulators usually outpace the original consoles and in time out perform even HD remasters in some cases
 
CEMU obviously wont run this at 1080p 60FPS the moment its up and running but its gonna be hilarious that an emulated Wii U game is gonna become the definitive way to play BoTW.

Won't locking it at 30fps be preferable to avoid glitches from the doubled framerate ?
 
Won't locking it at 30fps be preferable to avoid glitches from the doubled framerate ?

Not all games have such glitches, we won't really know with BotW until it's out and being worked on.

Regardless, CEMU at 1080p30 is how I plan on playing the game. As soon as that's viable I'll be all over it.
 
Not all games have such glitches, we won't really know with BotW until it's out and being worked on.

Regardless, CEMU at 1080p30 is how I plan on playing the game. As soon as that's viable I'll be all over it.

That's what I wanted to wait for as well.
I hate the fact that Nintendo first party are constantly gimped by hardware, I just hope my 4790K and GTX 770 2GB will be enough to run the game smoothly.
 
Not all games have such glitches, we won't really know with BotW until it's out and being worked on.

Regardless, CEMU at 1080p30 is how I plan on playing the game. As soon as that's viable I'll be all over it.

I haven't kept up with CEMU myself, but how long do you estimate it will take for the game to run properly on PC?
 
That's what I wanted to wait for as well.
I hate the fact that Nintendo first party are constantly gimped by hardware, I just hope my 4790K and GTX 770 2GB will be enough to run the game smoothly.

complains about gimped hardware

has 2 GB GPU

just teasing you ��
 
I haven't kept up with CEMU myself, but how long do you estimate it will take for the game to run properly on PC?

My guess is that they will get it running in the first two weeks and then tune it from there. They are running a Patreon and the donations will skyrocket if they manage that.
 
Maybe the game was designed and optimized for the Wii U in the sense that it relies heavily on the 32mb eDRAM, which might indicate they do not have some exotic memory pool added in the Switch. Maybe they were able to overcome the differences in handheld mode and when docked the difference in bandwidth utilization was simply to much to overcome it unless they rewrite the entire graphics pipeline, something they may not have had the time to do. I only think this because I find that for the Wii U this game had to been heavily optimized to squeeze everything out of the thing so now trying to slap that into another architecture might be very hard. So some Wii U ports have better success than others as a result. Maybe the Switch can handle parity but increasing the graphical demands requires more dev time such as docked mode which is why we initially seeing Splatoon at 720p. So it may not be indicative what the Switch is capable of until we see Switch exclusive games.

I have also come to think that a more powerful dock is not a route they would aim for. I feel it kinda doesn't make sense in their DNA, only benefits docked and we are only holding onto the idea for it being logically viable and their SCD patents. But I feel they will go the route of focusing on increasing the main unit in same vein as the 3DS.

What I see being possible is:
-An XL with bigger battery, screen, cooling solution, and upping the speed of current Chip
or
- Everything the same except using a new chip with new fab leading to more efficiency and thus able to boost power without changing anything else.
 
Wow, yeah, that footage looks much more solid. The hell, Nintendo?
Yeah let's not turn this into something that it isn't. The 12S version on the showfloor had the same kind of drops. In fact, they were more severe in the preview build than in the final copy according to all those who tried the game.

900p and 20fps on a flagship console... What year is it?

What is this post.

What part of "these drops are the exception" you don't get lol

what resolution does the handheld mode run at? even with the tiny comparison screens, it looks super blurry.

Offscreen footage. Looks super crisp on the screen.
I expect Wii U 1st party level graphics in 720 @ locked 60 fps (for non open world) or 30 (for open world games) in a system I can play on the L train. which - to me - is a dream come true.

WiiU_SM3DW_10.15.13_Scrn25.png

Odyssey looks much better than that, so you're good.
 
The fact that it starts chugging when Link starts walking through the tall grass makes me think this is likely a CPU-bound issue to do with processing the movement of all those grass stalks. Is the rumored Boost Power only being activated in handheld mode? That doesn't make sense, but I don't know how else to explain the performance difference. But it also could explain why we've seen a decrease of the lush fields of grass since the E3 trailer.
 
The fact that it starts chugging when Link starts walking through the tall grass makes me think this is likely a CPU-bound issue to do with processing the movement of all those grass stalks. Is the rumored Boost Power only being activated in handheld mode? That doesn't make sense, but I don't know how else to explain the performance difference. But it also could explain why we've seen a decrease of the lush fields of grass since the E3 trailer.

That's not the reason and they didn't decrease anything. Not every area in the game is supposed to be a giant field covered in grass.

We don't know why there are these drops, maybe the area simply isn't as optimized as the rest of the game for some reason. People just keep ignoring that everyone who's playing the game said that they're very rare, because a video that shows the problem highlights one of them. It's ridiculous.
 
That's not the reason and they didn't decrease anything. Not every area in the game is supposed to be a giant field covered in grass.

We don't know why there are these drops, maybe the area simply isn't as optimized as the rest of the game for some reason. People just keep ignoring that everyone who's playing the game said that they're very rare, because a video that shows the problem highlights one of them. It's ridiculous.

Okay fair point, I've stayed away from any of the recent preview footage so I hadn't seen that area.

But I don't see anywhere on your video where it says it's running in handheld or TV mode.

To the point of it being rare, this is a Wii U game; if the Switch can't at least do a solid 30fps @ 900p after a year of optimization, then something is strange. Either BotW was very optimized for the Wii U architecture, or we're already seeing the limits imposed by some aspect of the Switch hardware design.
 
I think it's as simple as handheld mode has a lower resolution so it has a lower render load. GPU has cuda cores, so maybe the grass movement is handled with that.

People just keep ignoring that everyone who's playing the game said that they're very rare, because a video that shows the problem highlights one of them. It's ridiculous.
It wasn't rare when I saw it played in Switch docked mode in person. Frequent drops. This was at a Nintendo event where it was playing all day, so maybe it overheated.
 
Okay fair point, I've stayed away from any of the recent preview footage so I hadn't seen that area.

But I don't see anywhere on your video where it says it's running in handheld or TV mode.

To the point of it being rare, this is a Wii U game; if the Switch can't at least do a solid 30fps @ 900p after a year of optimization, then something is strange. Either BotW was very optimized for the Wii U architecture, or we're already seeing the limits imposed by some aspect of the Switch hardware design.

Heh. It's not a year of optimization, it's almost a year of development while also finishing the Wii U version.

Mario Kart 8D is running in 1080p 60fps with no drops, but the MK team didn't have to finish the game on Wii U. I'd say that's an indication of something when it comes to how the docked Switch can run Wii U games. That's without considering Fast RMX and what Shin'en has been saying about the new version of the game.

What i'm saying is that yes, these dips are in the game, but ultimately, none of us actually knows what's causing them, so it's a bit annoying to see all these armchair engineers shitting on the game (and on the Switch itself) and flat out ignoring what every reviewer who's playing the game said in their articles (that the frame rate is great all around and these drops, being so rare, aren't something that can in any way influence the enjoyment of the game). And that's including gamexplain themselves.

I think it's as simple as handheld mode has a lower resolution so it has a lower render load. GPU has cuda cores, so maybe the grass movement is handled with that.

It wasn't rare when I saw it played in Switch docked mode in person. Frequent drops. This was at a Nintendo event where it was playing all day, so maybe it overheated.

That was version 12S. According to previews, there are still some drops in the final game but frame rate is much better than in the showfloor build.
 
"900p 20fps".

Well, quite a few years too early evidently.

I wish the Switch was a traditionnal home console, we would have had awesome performance, while waiting an additionnal generation for the mobile chips industry to allow less compromises.
Uhh

That was the Wii U.
 
Mario Kart 8D is running in 1080p 60fps with no drops, but the MK team didn't have to finish the game on Wii U. I'd say that's an indication of something when it comes to how the docked Switch can run Wii U games. That's without considering Fast RMX and what Shin'en has been saying about the new version of the game.

What i'm saying is that yes, these dips are in the game, but ultimately, none of us actually know what's causing them, so it's a bit annoying to see all these armchair engineers shitting on the game (and on the Switch itself) and flat out ignoring what every reviewer who's playing the game said in their articles (that the frame rate is great all around and these drops, being so rare, aren't something that can in any way influence the enjoyment of the game). And that's including gamexplain themselves.

I haven't seen any technical comparison of MK8 and BotW, so I have no idea of the horsepower MK needs vs. Zelda. They certainly have different rendering requirements though, as one is an open world game.

But I hope you're not lumping me in with "armchair engineers shitting on the game", because that's not the case. I'm buying the game after all, but I see no reason not poke and prod at it. It's the first big title on a new console platform. I'll disagree with you that the fraterate drops "aren't something that can in any way influence the enjoyment of the game", because that's a subjective conclusion you can't unilaterally decide for everyone else.
 
I haven't seen any technical comparison of MK8 and BotW, so I have no idea of the horsepower MK needs vs. Zelda. They certainly have different rendering requirements though, as one is an open world game.
Sure, which is why Mario Kart is running at 60fps. Zelda docked isn't just running at a lower resolution compared to MK8D though, it's also less stable than on the 720p handheld screen, despite a 2.5x clock increase which should be more than enough to run the game at 1080p just like MK. I was thinking that maybe they increased draw distance compared to the handheld mode, but there's no proof of that and the issue seems unrelated anyway. Maybe it's a bandwidth thing that they didn't have time to find workarounds for, or maybe they didn't optimize the Plateau as well as the rest of the game when docked. I even suggested that maybe it's running at the enhanced handheld clockspeed (384mhz), which may not be enough to have a perfect experience all the time in 900p, or that it's still the streaming issue John mentioned in the DF article, but there's no proof of any of this either. Which ultimately leads to my original point that we have no clue of what's going on, so we shouldn't blame the hardware so quickly.

But I hope you're not lumping me in with "armchair engineers shitting on the game", because that's not the case. I'm buying the game after all, but I see no reason not poke and prod at it. It's the first big title on a new console platform. I'll disagree with you that the fraterate drops "aren't something that can in any way influence the enjoyment of the game", because that's a subjective conclusion you can't unilaterally decide for everyone else.

Of course not, but just look at the thread and you'll find many lol
 
CEMU obviously wont run this at 1080p 60FPS the moment its up and running but its gonna be hilarious that an emulated Wii U game is gonna become the definitive way to play BoTW.

Emulation is great and all, but original hardware will always be definitive to me.
 
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