• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Shin'en Interview on WiiU Hardware: GPU "several generations ahead of Current Gen"

I'm not quite sure that using a screen for a Wii game that doesn't look any better than your average PS2 game is gonna help, no matter how big the file is, because that's completely irrelevant to their statement that the WiiU's GPU is a lot more advanced than current gen's.
So unless they put out something that looks much more advanced, they'd better not make statements about GPU capabilities. Even if their game fits on an N64 cartridge.

GPU generations are not a direct exponential curve of raw power.

Their statement is hardly controversial.
 

Serenity

Member
Read the interview. He answered it.
They achieved their goals for the first game and didn't bother to go further for a launch game. Their next games will dig much deeper.


But it was running at 1080p and they had to dial it back to run their effects. Doesn't seem very convincing to me. Its not like they made some huge open world game. I'm not buying it. We shall see if they deliver. Thanks for the response though.
 

khaaan

Member
Man, I wish I knew enough about computer architecture to have a discussion about this. Most of the bolded part in the link flew over my head. I'm looking forward to seeing the next 3D Mario and Zelda U.
 

AkiraGr

Banned
I want to see results. Simple as that. Nothing shown so far is characteristic that is worthy of latte being labelled "several generations ahead of current gen". Unless of course they're considering Wii as the base.



Good for laughs, thanks.

Yes I also find some post here very amusing, from people that keep preaching still about 8g gddr5 RAM but I can support my arguments with facts.

So all this talk about the "low" power of the Wii come from developers that NEVER made a game about the Wii U, all others that did work on a title like Criterion praised the system power.

“The Wii U has had a bit of a bad rap – people have said it’s not as powerful as 360, this, that and the other… Hopefully we’ll go some way to proving that wrong.”

“Nintendo don’t speak about that, it’s not their core focus at all but they did their ‘Iwata Asks’ about the hardware and it talks consistently about how they got to keep it quiet with low power consumption, and they totally did that… but what they haven’t really championed is how they delivered something that could do this as well [he points to the 50-inch Panasonic playing host to Most Wanted U]… It’s possible. It’s work. You have to think about it and put time and craft and effort and whatever else into it but you have to do that for everything that’s worth doing in this business… I think people should either go all-in or not bother.”

The Wii U’s GPU and CPU are both highly customized chips, and Criterion feels that developers can get more out of it than they have. Time will tell if they are right, but Need For Speed for the Wii U is looking mighty impressive thus far.

I find it very fun also that people have double standards about what they are quoting from the developers community about the Wii U Shi'en at least they develop games and their work is their proof, what DICE, Insomniac, did develop for the Wii U?

A big fucking nothing. But fanboys make their quotes their banners, yes mate good laughs keep up the good fight. GG are experts to talk about graphics and their opinion matter more than shi'en because developers like shi'en are Nintendo fanboys?!

Great deduction logic but I forgot this is NEOgaf.
 

Oersted

Member
This thread is all about "Shinen never really developed outside Nintendo plattforms ( I know, not really true since they are from PC Demo scene)" and posters who never really played a Shinen game.
 
Still majority of GAF has the illusion that the Wii U GPGPU or CPU are weak. This guys code to the metal with there games on the Wii or Wii U. Middle ware engines are not tailored for exotic architecture that is the Wii U. Industry is working on middle ware engines that's why Wii U power is not visible at the moment.

Also according to this guys the middle ware engines need to be tailored for the Wii U that means more money on developing time that third parties are not willing at the moment to invest.

Wii U IS powerfull not Ps4 or Xbone level but close.

post-6493-Jennifer-Lawrence-okay-reactio-4AOZ.gif
 
they're not close to the power levels of the PS4.

you can have a chip that's several generations ahead of current gen, but that does not mean it's extremely more powerful.

it's like having a kepler based GTX 630 and saying it's several generations ahead of a GTX 280. yeah it is architecturally more advanced and 3 generations ahead, but it's still a weak chip.

it's the same thing for the wii u. it's easily more advanced architecturally since current gen is from 05 level tech and many advancements have been made, but it's still a weak chip.


the wii u is definitely more powerful than current gen, but it's in the "ps3" situation where you have to spend a bunch of time with it to learn how it works. that's another hurdle for 3rd party devs for next gen especially since the big boys have an extremely similar gpu/cpu setup with the only diff being ram architecture and the number of CU's avail.

big n chose the stupid route in preserving full B/C with the original Wii and that gives them a funky architecture to work with. they should have opted for a brand new simpler architecture that would be easy to port to and from xbone/ps4
 

Hermii

Member
I never said Wii U's GPU wasn't powerful or anything, I'm just saying that the statement about it being 'several gens' ahead is downright inane. It's simply not, it won't even be as powerful as it's competitors.

Its not insane, its what we have known for a long time. GPU generations, not console generations. It has a much more modern GPU and btw that in itself says nothing about flops or anything like that. It has DX 10.1 + equalient features, it has a modern shader arhitectures, better gpgpu features and so on.
 

StuBurns

Banned
I'd like to see all the similar looking downloadable games that were available at the launch of last generation.

Not that it's anything close to a fair comparison, given Nintendo have a generation of development pipeline advances on their side. And not that the WiiU being less powerful was even my point, or even my belief. I was just joking that it's very far from even being a good looking game.

Of course the WiiU is more powerful than the other two, it came out seven years later, how could it not be?
 

ivysaur12

Banned
I'm not quite sure that using a screen for a Wii game that doesn't look any better than your average PS2 game is gonna help, no matter how big the file is, because that's completely irrelevant to their statement that the WiiU's GPU is a lot more advanced than current gen's.
So unless they put out something that looks much more advanced, they'd better not make statements about GPU capabilities. Even if their game fits on an N64 cartridge.

Is this going to be the new "looks like an N64 game"?
 

Ydahs

Member
It'll be interesting to see Shinen's upcoming Wii U games. IIRC, they build their own game engines, so it's likely their games will be running on one of the most optimized third party engines available for the Wii U.

Most other Wii U games out now are running off engines built around the 360's architecture so this will likely be the first "next-gen" engine runnable on WiiU. Considering most of the other next-gen engines are unportable or just not worth the investment, it may be one of the few new engines we see for the Wii U.
 
I never said Wii U's GPU wasn't powerful or anything, I'm just saying that the statement about it being 'several gens' ahead is downright inane. It's simply not, it won't even be as powerful as it's competitors.
It is several gens ahead. power doesn't define GPUs easily cause you can range from low-end mobile to high-end desktop in the same GPU generation.
 
Replies in this thread don't disappoint.

Pretty eager to shit all over anyone who has nice things to say about Wii U, huh?

Shin'en is great, and I hope they continue to pump out gem after gem.
 

LeleSocho

Banned
Are you guys now using the "GPU gen" excuse?
Even if we count that like gpu gens at the very best the difference is 2 since X360's gpu is a R520/R600 hybrid and the wiiu's gpu isn't better than a R700 so even if we use that metric there's nothing "several" about this.
 

liger05

Member
I'm not qualified to say whether this is correct but I do find it funny that somehow this is automatically assumed as BS but when someone from EA said the wii u is less powerful than the 360 his praised for speaking his mind.
 

Drencrom

Member
Its not insane, its what we have known for a long time. GPU generations, not console generations. It has a much more modern GPU and btw that in itself says nothing about flops or anything like that. It has DX 10.1 + equalient features, it has a modern shader arhitectures and so on.

Yeah, just read it was GPU gens and not console gens. And I said the statement was inane, not insane :p
 

The Technomancer

card-carrying scientician
I'm not quite sure that using a screen for a Wii game that doesn't look any better than your average PS2 game is gonna help, no matter how big the file is, because that's completely irrelevant to their statement that the WiiU's GPU is a lot more advanced than current gen's.
So unless they put out something that looks much more advanced, they'd better not make statements about GPU capabilities. Even if their game fits on an N64 cartridge.

I'd like to know what kind of PS2 you had that could do textures and reflections like that.
 

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
Trashing Shin'en because they've been focused on Nintendo devices is lowbrow fanboy wars talk.

They've proven for years that they understand how to extract performance from hardware. I think it's a safe bet they also know how these things called PCs work. So they're familiar with technology.

The real argument to be extracted from the interview is debating whether Nintendo's hardware strategy was a true mistake or not because it appears the system may indeed be quite capable, but hostile towards the median standards for 3rd party development.

We've been seeing proof of that so far, with quick and dirty ports not running well, MT Framework apparently badly ported to the system, etc. Even developers using it as an excuse to not work with Wii U (Frostbite drama, etc)
 

B.O.O.M

Member
Yes I also find some post here very amusing, from people that keep preaching still about 8g gddr5 RAM but I can support my arguments with facts.

So all this talk about the "low" power of the Wii come from developers that NEVER made a game about the Wii U, all others that did work on a title like Criterion praised the system power.



The Wii U’s GPU and CPU are both highly customized chips, and Criterion feels that developers can get more out of it than they have. Time will tell if they are right, but Need For Speed for the Wii U is looking mighty impressive thus far.

I find it very fun also that people have double standards about what they are quoting from the developers community about the Wii U Shi'en at least they develop games and their work is their proof, what DICE, Insomniac, did develop for the Wii U?

A big fucking nothing. But fanboys make their quotes their banners, yes mate good laughs keep up the good fight. GG are experts to talk about graphics and their opinion matter more than shi'en because developers like shi'en are Nintendo fanboys?!

Great deduction logic but I forgot this is NEOgaf.

-_-
 

tipoo

Banned
“The Wii U GPU is several generations ahead of the current gen."
Lol, do they know what "several" means?

x1k series
2k series
3k series
4k series

Even at the lowest estimate of the GPU generation in the Wii U that counts, I would say. Add two more if it's closer to the 6k series. Says nothing about power, just feature set.
 

SmokyDave

Member
daaamn

look at all that Salt in this thread!

Gotta love Shin'en's magic
I don't understand why people see 'salt' in these threads. The Wii-U has numerous multiplats that run worse than PS3/360 games and the launch titles on PS4 and 720 will probably be more technically impressive than anything released on the Wii-U. There's no room for 'salt' as some nice words from Shin'en don't magically make great looking games appear. If you want to see 'salt', wait for a graphically impressive Wii-U game to come along. One that clearly blows the last gen stuff into the weeds. By then we'll be in the next gen and the cycle will continue regardless.

Edit: I'm with you on the last bit though, they're an extremely talented bunch.
 
Nintendo has been good to them, so they are saying nice things. Not that they aren't true. What is 360 API similar to? DX9? WiiU is probably like DX10.1+some custom extensions. Now shader count is another story...
 
Shin'en are fucking awesome, but I can't help but feel they're overselling things somewhat. It's obvious that the Wii-U is no powerhouse in comparison to the consoles it's going to go up against. Hell, it's struggling to top the last gen stuff and often falls behind.

But they explain exactly why in the quote in the OP. Moreso than PS360 it requires a processor-optimized design approach. Most ports were just projects with devs saying "oh hey, more RAM. Just shove it in there and get it running." It's not worth re-writing that much code just for an extra 5 fps and some added stability.
 
Yes I also find some post here very amusing, from people that keep preaching still about 8g gddr5 RAM but I can support my arguments with facts.

So all this talk about the "low" power of the Wii come from developers that NEVER made a game about the Wii U, all others that did work on a title like Criterion praised the system power.



The Wii U’s GPU and CPU are both highly customized chips, and Criterion feels that developers can get more out of it than they have. Time will tell if they are right, but Need For Speed for the Wii U is looking mighty impressive thus far.

I find it very fun also that people have double standards about what they are quoting from the developers community about the Wii U Shi'en at least they develop games and their work is their proof, what DICE, Insomniac, did develop for the Wii U?

A big fucking nothing. But fanboys make their quotes their banners, yes mate good laughs keep up the good fight. GG are experts to talk about graphics and their opinion matter more than shi'en because developers like shi'en are Nintendo fanboys?!

Great deduction logic but I forgot this is NEOgaf.

Hilarious. Good work attacking the community by "forgetting this is NEOgaf".

You seriously believe that DICE or Insomniac did not try to develop for Wii U? This is hilarious because its like saying who are these guys to say Wii U is x-times powerful than current/nextgen consoles when they haven't even developed for next gen?

Alright then.
 
Better hardware doen't show better results? So upgrading a PC is kind of pointless right? oh...



I chose like the second screen that showed up in my google search because gaf yould asterisk out the URL of the first one. If you think the pic is not representative of the game, post one of your choice.



But they are tech wizards! How can this be?

1) ...What? Wii U's GPU is factually multiple generations ahead of PS360. Read the thread, please.
2) No, I'm sure you can easily find a better one.
3) ...Just read the interview.
 

The_Lump

Banned
Are you guys now using the "GPU gen" excuse?
Even if we count that like gpu gens at the very best the difference is 2 since X360's gpu is a R520/R600 hybrid and the wiiu's gpu isn't better than a R700 so even if we use that metric there's nothing "several" about this.

Several just means more than two. So unless you're being particularly pedantic, Shin'en aren't exactly lying here.
 

Blades64

Banned
Yeah I probably shouldn't have put that in the title on 2nd thoughts...

Was hoping this wouldn't turn to shit and would attract some new discussion that doesn't get swallowed up in the GPU/CPU specific threads.

Yup. As you can see, many here have already taken the comment our of context. Why is it that people sooo want to see the Wii U crash and burn is beyond me...
 

The Technomancer

card-carrying scientician
Hilarious. Good work attacking the community by "forgetting this is NEOgaf".

You seriously believe that DICE or Insomniac did not try to develop for Wii U? This is hilarious because its like saying who are these guys to say Wii U is x-times powerful than current gen consoles when they haven't even developed for it?

Alright then.

I doubt that they tried to seriously develop for it, yes. And I'm not sure I specifically blame them if they're focused on other platforms and didn't want to invest the time and money
 
Are you guys now using the "GPU gen" excuse?
Even if we count that like gpu gens at the very best the difference is 2 since X360's gpu is a R520/R600 hybrid and the wiiu's gpu isn't better than a R700 so even if we use that metric there's nothing "several" about this.
two is several. Xbox 360 is a DX9 level part Wii U is a DX 10.1 level part. That's two generations. Which is technically several.

Also its not an excuse. Its clearly what they meant. When talking about a gpu's generation you are clearly talking in gpu generations.
 

NotLiquid

Member
I guess it's safe to say that Shin'en threads have pretty much become a litmus test for pointing out the people who aren't versed in tech. Nothing they've said is factually wrong, it's just a matter of twisting the narrative, which goes both in terms of overestimating and underestimating just what they mean.
 
So let me get this straight, when guys who work on the frostbite engine say the system is weak, they're full of shit. But when these guys say the system is powerful, they know what they're talking about?

Sooner or later you people are going to have to come to grips with what the WiiU is and what it is not. May as well be sooner.
 

SmokyDave

Member
But they explain exactly why in the quote in the OP. Moreso than PS360 it requires a processor-optimized design approach. Most ports were just projects with devs saying "oh hey, more RAM. Just shove it in there and get it running." It's not worth re-writing that much code just for an extra 5 fps and some added stability.
I dig that, but ultimately very few people are going to put in the necessary work so it's almost moot. Things might get even worse once we transition to multiplats with the PS4/720 as primary targets.
 

Mlatador

Banned
I'm not quite sure that using a screen for a Wii game that doesn't look any better than your average PS2 game is gonna help, no matter how big the file is, because that's completely irrelevant to their statement that the WiiU's GPU is a lot more advanced than current gen's.
So unless they put out something that looks much more advanced, they'd better not make statements about GPU capabilities. Even if their game fits on an N64 cartridge.

With the Jet Rocket screen I am refering to the Poster who said Shinen don't know anything about tech, which clearly is a wrong statement.
 

Neo C.

Member
But it was running at 1080p and they had to dial it back to run their effects. Doesn't seem very convincing to me. Its not like they made some huge open world game. I'm not buying it. We shall see if they deliver. Thanks for the response though.

Again, it's a launch game. Just look at their former games and you know how much they are capable of.
 

The_Lump

Banned
Nintendo has been good to them, so they are saying nice things. Not that they aren't true. What is 360 API similar to? DX9? WiiU is probably like DX10.1+some custom extensions. Now shader count is another story...


It's possible for a GPU to be a generation ahead, but with a lower shader count though isn't it? Or isn't it? (I don't know)
 
When they make something that can't be done on 360/PS3, then these words will likely have more weight. I've played Nano Assault Neo quite a bit, and it doesn't seem like anything outside the scope of 360/PS3 titles.
 
Wow. This thread is already great. One should use words like "generation" carefully. Especially when it comes to WiiU. Dark Forces are just waiting to be unleashed.
 
I expect every game on Wii U shown this E3 to look substantially better than GoW 3/A, TLoU, Uncharted 2/3, GeoW 3/J, and halo 4. If not I'm calling bullshit.
You could already call BS, because even Killzone 4 dont look substantially better the Killzone 3. And thats on more powerful hardware.
 

gngf123

Member
Nintendo has been good to them, so they are saying nice things. Not that they aren't true. What is 360 API similar to? DX9? WiiU is probably like DX10.1+some custom extensions. Now shader count is another story...

The graphics API the WiiU uses is based around OpenGL 3.3 IIRC. In terms of DirectX, it's somewhere half way between 10 and 11.

The WiiU GPU is actually fairly decent as far as I know, not nearly as bad as what some people believe it is.
 

stuminus3

Member
You seriously believe that DICE or Insomniac did not try to develop for Wii U?
DICE and Insomniac and anyone else willing to try could pull off some serious magic on the WiiU... if there was any reason for them to do so. Which is the real tragedy. These pissing matches about what the WiiU GPU can and can't do are irrelevant. Nintendo's biggest problem isn't technology.
 
Top Bottom