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[Papacheeks]

Wii couldn't have had successful demonstrations or a good ad campaign without a killer concept and killer games that delivered on that concept.

We simply can't know what would have happened had Nintendo not suddenly dropped the "motion gaming revolution" in mid-2009 (bar Skyward Sword) to double down on 3D Mario, retro revivals, and whatever Other M was.



You're making two mistakes here:

The first mistake is to assume that communication is an issue. Nintendo has communicated very clearly about what all of their new games and their hardware has to offer from an actual experiential standpoint. The problem is that there's very little that people care about that's going on with their hardware or their games. They'd have to resort to lying about their products to communicate them in ways that would make them sell.

The second mistake is to apply the word "demographics" to Nintendo. When Nintendo is successful, it is because they are not operating based on the premise of "demographics." They are doing exactly the opposite: thinking about making experiences that are not based on appealing to demographics.



"Hardware gimmicks" are what got them into the game console market in the first place.

NES didn't use the mainstream Atari-style controller. It used a kiddie "gamepad" with arrow-like buttons instead! SNES sold itself on flashier graphics and more sophisticated controls, as did N64.

Game Boy used a monochromatic screen that actually wound up distinguishing the hardware rather than diminishing it. Later they added color to the screen.

N64 Was not huge success for Nintendo. Gamecube was not a huge success for NIntendo, Wii U was not a huge success for Nintendo.

Those systems issues were not the software or for the most part the controller(Wii U it was). It was the image of the console itself. Which is what I'm talking about. "Wii Play together showed a family given Wii motes by Miyamoto and playing Wii sports.

I am not making a mistake with anything. It's you who is not understanding how products are sold and how communication to the consumer is key in relaying information about the product to the consumer so they see value in buying so product.

Which is why the Wii sold so hard, the concept was sound, and the software they had at launch sold that concept. Then once that was sold, people starting buying Nintendo first party more, hence the giant sales for mario kart. It was bundled and demoed with the Wii remote inside the wheel.

People at that shit up.

Wii U's issue is not the software for the most part, it's the perception of value for the console. Which comes from not communicating what the console was, who it was for, and what it offered for the price.

And to your last bit, I specifically chose those consoles in my last post because they had issues N64 using cartridges pissed developers off And released games at much slower pace(as in 1 -2 releases a year), Gamcube's color scheme+design, mini disc usage, Plus it had toy like marketing.

And I don't have to explain Wii U.

If they don't have the annually best selling multiplat games (FIFA, COD, AssCreed, NBA 2k etc.) with competitive ports they can only compete for the "second console to own". Thus it needs to be cheap.

Only games they need to have on their system are maybe sports, and racing games for multiplats. My original statement was to pull a sega dreamcast. Have your own line of sports games like dreamcast had with 2k. Have your own curated library of games that are exclusive but for a more broader audience.

Add in your first party, and exclusive third party games and you've got a great library of diverse software, on top of downloadable and services like a Classic Nintendo game service that you charge for.

 

[blu]

What about those Android rumors?

I don't see much value in android proper. It's not like nintendo will want to have anything to do with android marketplace. And below that, android is linux kernel with some specific drivers and HAL. That might be of use to nintendo, but I would not call that android anymore (case in point: FirefoxOS uses that, and it's not an android in any shape or form).

 

[Trevelyan9999]

Thanks Blu for your help in the understanding of all this tech talk.

I was reading up on a few things, how about this scenario:

NX Console APU: AMD Semi-Custom design based on Cortex-A72 Quad Core 2.5Ghz(can it go 8 core?)and AMD Vulkan 8GB GDDR5 or DDR4?

Help me out guys

 

[AzaK]

Yes. And OS-wise, that could complicate things for nintendo. But I expect them to adopt some open-source OS as the foundation (read: either linux or *bsd). Perhaps even an open-source-based toolchain (e.g. llvm), apple/sony-style.

Hmm, that would be sad for the simple reason that I would be hoping Nintendo would go for a "buy once, play on all devices" angle, a-la Apple and iOS. I guess they could go for a universal binary but that just increases testing, cartridge sizes, download times etc.

Are there any benchmarks comparing Zen to A57 or 72?

 

[LegendofLex]

N64 Was not huge success for Nintendo. Gamecube was not a huge success for NIntendo, Wii U was not a huge success for Nintendo.

An interesting thing about all three of these consoles: the most telling difference the hardware offered to their games compared to games on previous Nintendo consoles was the quality of the 3D graphics.

Those systems issues were not the software or for the most part the controller. It was the image of the console itself. Which is what I'm talking about. "Wii Play together showed a family given Wii motes by Miyamoto and playing Wii sports.

None of which would have been possible without Wii Remotes.

I am not making a mistake with anything. It's you who is not understanding how products are sold and how communication to the consumer is key in relaying information about the product to the consumer so they see value in buying so product.

Sure, but you can "communicate the value to the customer" perfectly and it doesn't make a lick of difference when your product has very little real value.

That's I think the starkest difference between Nintendo's successful consoles and their failed ones; the successful products were the ones whose values were aligned with the needs of a diverse range of consumers, and therefore the ones that consumers were actually compelled to want.

Their unsuccessful products prioritized features that most of their consumers did not value as highly, in particular powerful 3D graphics (N64 and GameCube were both beaten handily by PlayStation despite N64 offering a "superior" 3D gaming experience overall, 3DS's 3D effect seems to have had a negative effect on sales, and Nintendo games in HD has predictably only gotten hardcore Nintendo fans excited). Prioritizing 3D graphics is like poison to Nintendo.

Which is why the Wii sold so hard, the concept was sound, and the software they had at launch sold that concept. Then once that was sold, people starting buying Nintendo first party more, hence the giant sales for mario kart. It was bundled and demoed with the Wii remote inside the wheel.

People at that shit up.

Again, this indicates a very different problem than a "communication" problem. It indicates a vision problem.

Wii U's issue is not the software for the most part, it's the perception of value for the console. Which comes from not communicating what the console was, who it was for, and what it offered for the price.

Nintendo was very clear about communicating what the console was from the get-go. Iwata was talking about "how game systems are defined" and "our new home platform" (he said this at least 3-4 times by my admittedly distracted count) that will provide "deeper game experiences" and "wider appeal for gamers than Wii" when he announced Wii U. The goal of Wii U was to provide experiences "for all gamers," according to Iwata. The entire conversation referred to Wii in the past tense several times.

When Wii U was revealed, this was the message: It's a new console from Nintendo with a touch screen controller.

Lots of people may say "but it wasn't even clear it was a new console!" Remember that Satoru Iwata never said Wii U was a new controller; he said there was a "new controller for Wii U." They even created a new logo for Wii U, which they hadn't done with any Wii-branded accessories up to that point.

You can use the touch screen controller to see different things than you see on the TV.

"Look! I can see the golf ball at my feet when playing Wii Sports: Golf!"
"Look! I can try to catch the baseball once you hit it in Wii Sports: Baseball!"
"Look! I can sneak up on you by moving my character around using a screen you can't see!"
"Look! I can get a sense of my environment using this touch-controlled map!"
"Look! I can switch between items without a menu with a quick gesture on the touch screen!"

After the controller was done being shown, we got confirmation that it was an HD platform, something that Wii was not. And we began to see the initial games take shape in 2012, including a new Mario game, a new Pikmin game, a new IP from Platinum Games, and a bunch of "hardcore" third-party titles like Assassin's Creed that people had been saying were missing from Nintendo platforms.

Oh, and it's compatible with Wii Remotes, and they're offering games like Wii Fit and Nintendo Land to get people interested in their new concept while letting them continue to use their Wii controllers. Even Pikmin still supports a Wii Remote and Nunchuk scheme!

Sure, it wasn't as many games as we knew about for Wii, and the games weren't as exciting. But isn't that the problem?

The idea that Nintendo themselves never made it clear that Wii U was a home console, that they never talked about or showed who they designed it for, or that they didn't show you what you were buying into is a pure myth.

Their marketing campaign sucked, but it sucked because there was no killer concept to communicate. Even now, there's really no killer concept to communicate; you could, in fact, have made Splatoon without the GamePad, and it turns out people don't really care that much about asymmetric multiplayer or seeing stats on a second screen.

Their attempt to reach a wider audience that included more hardcore gamers as well as casual failed because you literally can't design a console that simultaneously meets the need of customers with hardcore expectations and those of less needy casual gamers. (Notice that PS4 and Xbox One are characterized by extreme success stories for new hardcore games but not much else.)

Their games lineup failed because frankly it wasn't even as good as their last games lineup and they were charging more for it on top of that, not because no one knew what games they were making. They even came out about two months in to clarify a whole metric ton of games that were in development.

 

[Papacheeks]

.

That's a lot to go through, but I'll give it my best shot.

I can't even comprehend that you are omitting that the Wii U wasn't mis-communicated, and mis-branded? It's reveal confused retailers, and even more so their marketing for consumers made them think for the longest time it was an add on.
And that lies in them showing Wii motes in commercials. Also add in not being able to have 2 Wii U tablets made the whole concept half ass. Add in that there is evidence of them making last minute changes on the console before it's reveal.

The only people who bought Wii U are hardcore Nintendo fan's and some casual family consumers.
If that were not true Wii u would have sold a lot more. The whole brand had issues with it's naming scheme, it's playing scheme, and how you were suppose to enjoy it with one cool controller, and a bunch of Wii motes.

Add in that developers didn't want to use the control scheme for the games, and Nintendo's ignorance with HD and you get the Wii U.
There game out put though was solid, I will admit is not as creative as previous that also I agree on was a issue. But the quality of the titles were fine, and games like splatoon show they can think outside the box.

I'm not going to get into a dragged on conversation about N64 and what not. There are tons of articles ones I'v posted in this and in previous threads from 1997 that talk about N64's issues.
Same with gamecube which to me was a step in the right direction for them, but had issues with it's branding, marketing and I would say look. Too many different colored versions. And they were more associated to pokemon and gameboy advance schemes to really sell to the PS2, xbox crowd.

If what your saying about their failed consoles and successful is true, why is the PS4 so successful? I would say because it's message on what it is, what it offer's and who it's for is clear from the get go. SO 399 for a console seems like great value for the audience it was communicated to during E3.

I have yet to see that done by Nintendo.

Wii U didn't have any of those clear, and to an extent neither did gamecube. Issues Nintendo has are with communicating their product to the target demographic or making it appealing to a much broader one. Add in their ignorance to conform to media standards for developers, and their unwillingness to work with western developers. The ones they do work with usually don't get their game promoted in the same light as Nintendo First party.

Which was the case with Platinum Games.

 

[LegendofLex]

I can't even comprehend that you are omitting that the Wii U wasn't mis-communicated, and mis-branded? It's reveal confused retailers, and even more so their marketing for consumers made them think for the longest time it was an add on.

Of course it was misbranded. Aside from the console's visual design, supporting Wii Remotes, and receiving a few token Wii-branded games, Wii U really doesn't have much association to Wii from a product values standpoint.

But you can't honestly look at the way Nintendo communicated the product and say "wow, yeah, it's really not clear Wii U is a new console."

And that lies in them showing Wii motes in commercials.

Really?

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/pr/12383/nintendo-details-wii-marketing-campaign

A different kind of video game system demands a different kind of marketing effort. That's why Nintendo is moving to unprecedented lengths to let people see, feel and experience the unparalleled new Wii™ system, created to be easily used by anyone. Nintendo's multimillion-dollar marketing campaign spotlights that Wii is the only new video game system every member of a household can enjoy.

Gaming for the masses is seen in every element of the marketing campaign, from an online social-networking community and sampling events in average people's homes to urban "gaming" hours, retail midnight madness events, a multi-city music tour and extended hands-on opportunities in malls nationwide. Across the country, men and women, young and old, experienced and not, are getting their hands on Wii and helping usher in a new generation of video gamers.

Already Nintendo's viral efforts have paid off. In a 24-hour period in early November, Wii served as the centerpiece of a multipart South Park episode, appeared on the front page of The Wall Street Journal, made People magazine's Style Watch gift guide issue, was featured in an NPR report about hot holiday gifts and had a BusinessWeek feature note: "industry execs and analysts are already calling a winner: Nintendo's Wii." And all of this before the system has even launched.

"Our plan to market Wii broadly with hands-on experiences continues to pay off," says George Harrison, Nintendo of America's senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications. "Wii introduces new ways to play to expand both the appeal of games and the audience of gamers, and our marketing campaign is central to that."

Also add in not being able to have 2 Wii U tablets made the whole concept half ass.

How would Wii U being even more expensive actually make it more appealing?

Add in that there is evidence of them making last minute changes on the console before it's reveal.

Sure, but this is evidence of a lack of clear product values in the first place, not clear product value communication.

The only people who bought Wii U are hardcore Nintendo fan's and some casual family consumers.
If that were not true Wii u would have sold a lot more. The whole brand had issues with it's naming scheme, it's playing scheme, and how you were suppose to enjoy it with one cool controller, and a bunch of Wii motes.

I seriously doubt Wii U would have possibly done so badly if it had games people want to play. See: Xbox One, with its equally horrendous name, its problems with Kinect, and the media buzz about it being a restrictive console. A couple years later, and it's not doing fantastic, but it's no Wii U.

Add in that developers didn't want to use the control scheme for the games

The entire point of the Wii U controller having those buttons was so that this couldn't possibly be an excuse anymore.

and Nintendo's ignorance with HD and you get the Wii U.

I seriously doubt Wii U isn't selling well because of "Nintendo's ignorance with HD," given that Nintendo 64 and GameCube didn't sell well despite Nintendo's ingenuity with 3D.

There game out put though was solid I will admit is not as creative as previous that also I agree on was a issue. But the quality of the titles were fine, and games like splatoon show they can think outside the box.

Solid games outputs sell systems.

I'm not going to get into a dragged on conversation about N64 and what not. There are tons of articles ones I'v posted in this and in previous threads from 1997 that talk about N64's issues.

Same with gamecube which to me was a step in the right direction for them, but had issues with it's branding, marketing and I would say look. Too many different colored versions. And they were more associated to pokemon and gameboy advance schemes to really sell to the PS2, xbox crowd.

Sure, but when Nintendo can sell systems without "selling to the PS2 and Xbox crowd," then rating a system based on its ability to sell to the PS4 and Xbox One crowd seems kind of...odd, doesn't it? Shouldn't Nintendo be able to attract new customers who aren't part of the PlayStation and Xbox crowd? Isn't that their kind of audience?

If what your saying about their failed consoles and successful is true, why is the PS4 so successful? I would say because it's message on what it is, what it offer's and who it's for is clear from the get go. SO 399 for a console seems like great value for the audience it was communicated to during E3.

I have yet to see that done by Nintendo.

There is a pretty big market for hardcore hardware and hardcore games, and Sony has been able to cannibalize enough of Xbox's market by focusing on the major things hardcore gamers want to gain a strong footing. They also have good relationships with third party publishers that enables them to have goodwill with hardcore gamers.

The fact that the hardcore market isn't a good one for Nintendo doesn't mean it can't be a good one for anyone else. But anyone who thinks Nintendo will ever be successful by literally tearing their entire brand (which is built on moving away from old standards and creating new ones) to pieces so they can get a piece of the hardcore pie through standardized hardware and, ultimately, standardized software, doesn't really value Nintendo or its brand.

Nintendo's best path forward isn't to become a fourth hardcore box that also plays Nintendo games. It's to find a barrier that keeps people from playing [console] games and to create new hardware and new genres to bring those people to gaming.

No amount of "communication with customers" will have fixed the fact that Wii U actually itself was a barrier to console gaming and that it offered hardware and genre experiences that only appealed to hardcore Nintendo fans.

 

[Kouriozan]

Mario FPS

Spoiler

It's Paper Mario Sticker Star.

 

[Vena]

Its weird having two completely different discussions going on with one being so much larger/longer per post than the other.

From the picture of Zen painted so far, Zen is unlikely to be suitable for mobiles. A72 is the best nintendo can go with there for the foreseeable future (read: before we get details of Qualcomm's Kryo).

Ahh okay. Then A72/Zen split would make sense to me in this configuration. It'd be a bit of a pain in the neck from an OS point of view, but it would certainly be streamlined well with Vulkan APIs from a development point of view (unless I am mistaken).

I am quite hungry for just a little more info to start trying to put this puzzle together. I want to say/believe that Vulkan is a real possibility given everything we've seen/heard of the SDK demos' troubles on PC (as Occam's Razor would say and that being a very simple solution). Adopting Vulkan as the API would also make a lot of sense in a scenario where we end up with Zen/A72 but it also makes perfect sense in a pure A72 environment or A53 or A57. It also ties up the sudden entry of Nintendo into Contributor status for Khronos (outside of potential WebGl interests).

Given Tamaki's info, I still err on the side of saying that Zen is unlikely since "we're not aiming to beat the PS4" really doesn't leave me with the impression of "its not our goal, but we're packing Zen cores to achieve our actual goal of world domination new ways to play".

 

[Trevelyan9999]

Its weird having two completely different discussions going on with one being so much larger/longer per post than the other.



Ahh okay. Then A72/Zen split would make sense to me in this configuration. It'd be a bit of a pain in the neck from an OS point of view, but it would certainly be streamlined well with Vulkan APIs from a development point of view (unless I am mistaken).

I am quite hungry for just a little more info to start trying to put this puzzle together. I want to say/believe that Vulkan is a real possibility given everything we've seen/heard of the SDK demos' troubles on PC (as Occam's Razor would say and that being a very simple solution). Adopting Vulkan as the API would also make a lot of sense in a scenario where we end up with Zen/A72 but it also makes perfect sense in a pure A72 environment or A53 or A57. It also ties up the sudden entry of Nintendo into Contributor status for Khronos (outside of potential WebGl interests).

Given Tamaki's info, I still err on the side of saying that Zen is unlikely since "we're not aiming to beat the PS4" really doesn't leave me with the impression of "its not our goal, but we're packing Zen cores to achieve our actual goal of world domination new ways to play".

Great thought and I agree. In general Nintendo is not a company like Sony always aiming for the highest specs as their goal, but if getting the best CPU/GPU will help them achieve their goals of regaining market share, having more cross-platform games and the best version so people would truly want to choose Nintendo first; then having the industry leader in tech would definitely help them do this. They already said early this year that they are done with trying to pursue casuals. Makes sense to undercut the competition now and be disruptive.

 

[Nostremitus]

How much power would a quad core 16nm Zen processor use and how much heat would the console need to dissipate? How would hyperthreading affect those temps?

 

[AzaK]

How much power would a quad core 16nm Zen processor use and how much heat would the console need to dissipate? How would hyperthreading affect those temps?

From here

the Zen based processors will feature a maximum TDP of 95W

I guess that's for the top end 8 core version @ 14nm apparently.

 

[Nostremitus]

From here


I guess that's for the top end 8 core version @ 14nm apparently.

Thank you.

They are hyperthreaded right? So the 8 core 16 thread version is 95W?
That's honestly impressive.

and 14nm? I thought it was 16, even better.

 

[Ansatz]

How can you make a game and make it evolve or innovate while still being recognizable as it?

I think Metroid Prime it's the perfect example. It took the whole "essence" of the Metroid Series and transformed it into an experience that can barely be classified as a FPS. They kept most if not all of what the Metroid series is, but added their own and not even a completely new control scheme, but a completely new way of experiencing the world and essence of what a Metroid game is.

Metroid Prime was also critically acclaimed per its innovation and was well received by new and old players alike.

The complete opposite of Metroid is the Mario (main) series. The Mario series have not really gotten a real innovation since their jump to 3D. We have gotten more of the same with new/better graphics and more than one player (New Super Mario Bros series), or an improved formula (Mario Galaxy and both New Land/World games), but nothing really strikes as an innovation. Mario has evolved, but not innovated in a long, long time.

How can you attract new people to your games when you can say "It's a Mario game with new some levels" or "It's a Zelda game with a new gimmick" and not be that far from the truth?

This is especially troublesome when you consider those are the main reason people buy your console for, especially with the 3rd party support they're lacking.

What you're describing is essentially a new IP, at least that's how I see it.

Galaxy 2 is a direct sequel that you could argue is stale, although even then it's a difficult case because it came out 2.5 years after the original and was more of an extension with new ideas/mechanics than simply repetition. The point is if you are going to make a direct sequel, look at Galaxy 2, but yeah it's more of the same in a sense.

The Galaxy -> 3D World transition is the opposite of a direct sequel. It's a completely different game structure, the only similarity is that both are defined as 3D platformers. They are nothing alike, and if you swapped out the Mario universe for something else, you wouldn't be able to tell that this was supposed to be a sequel to Galaxy.

I can't control how other people perceive Nintendo sequels, but this is how I feel personally. I am aware that alot of people think Skyward Sword is "more of the same but with a new gimmick" even though I completely disagree with them, but then the only conclusion is that Zelda isn't for them.

 

[KratosEnergyDrink]

The mainstream perception is driven by millions spent on marketing campaigns. Except for the rare cases (like Minecraft) that are just like hitting gold when digging, the rest are very well prepared campaigns in today's world.

At least this is what marketing companies would like you to think...

There is no real evidence that big marketing campaigns could really change the mainstream perception of a product or a company permanently. Of course you can catch some attention when you spend money in advertising, and more attention if you spend more money. It could be a good thing to draw attention for a new product but it could be a miss too. Microsoft spend billions on advertising for Windows phones, but it never bought them a meaningful market share.

The only advertising that evidently really works is permanent advertising for a product for many years, and in that case the content of the advertising has almost no matter. A simple picture of the product would likely have the same success as an elaborated multi million dollar concept. Of course, there are rare cases where an outstanding advertising really made product successful but they are as rare as minecraft or Tetris or Wii success stories. A big marketing campaign can shorten the life of a product if it is already successful, because people get quicker tired of it.

The biggest success of the marketing companies is that they succeeded in getting people to believe that they can really control the mainstream perception.

All this blabla only means this: No one can change the perception of the mainstream, there are far to many variables involved in that. Something that is cool now could be lame tomorrow, no company could control this fact.

 

[Log4Girlz]

Thanks Blu for your help in the understanding of all this tech talk.

I was reading up on a few things, how about this scenario:

NX Console APU: AMD Semi-Custom design based on Cortex-A72 Quad Core 2.5Ghz(can it go 8 core?)and AMD Vulkan 8GB GDDR5 or DDR4?

Help me out guys

Hahahaha

 

[Trevelyan9999]

Hahahaha

Thanks man, I appreciated that.....


I guess I should have rephrased the question, Blu what do you think?

 

[Vena]

Thanks man, I appreciated that.....
I guess I should have rephrased the question, Blu what do you think?

Vulkan is not a graphics card. Its an API (ie. software) made by the Khronos group. So:

NX Console APU: AMD Semi-Custom design based on Cortex-A72 Quad Core 2.5Ghz(can it go 8 core?)and AMD Vulkan 8GB GDDR5 or DDR4?

Is not a thing. A72 (or Zen) can be paired with all sorts of GCN GPUs or PowerVR.

 

[brainchild]

I take it there have been no actual updates on the original report since the clarification on 'industry-leading' chips?

Impressive legs on this thread if true. I mean, we already have an NX speculation thread, which is basically what this thread has become.

 

[butalala]

I take it there have been no actual updates on the original report since the clarification on 'industry-leading' chips?

Impressive legs on this thread if true. I mean, we already have an NX speculation thread, which is basically what this thread has become.

This thread took the wild, unbridled speculation of the Twilight Princess HD thread and refined it, focusing it on something more concrete and yet nearly untethered from reality at the sametime.

 

[whipihguh]

I take it there have been no actual updates on the original report since the clarification on 'industry-leading' chips?

Impressive legs on this thread if true. I mean, we already have an NX speculation thread, which is basically what this thread has become.

If I recall, the NX speculation thread got shut down since there was nothing really to discuss beyond the vague rumors that existed at that point. Funnily enough, this thread showed up a week later for people to speculate about the NX again. It'll probably much have longer legs than the other one, especially if we get some more leaks about it's power (probably unlikely, but still).

 

[jhmtehgamr20xx]

Both Microsoft and Apple invest lots of millions into their product. You knew that you need an iPhone because Apple made sure that you hear and see it every damn day everywhere. Xbone's turnaround was just correcting some negative PR on the back of the already running huge marketing campaign. Microsoft invests a lot of money in 3rd parties exclusivity of all kinds, because they know this is what drives that target population. Do you honestly see Nintendo willing an capable to do what Microsoft does?



The mainstream perception is driven by millions spent on marketing campaigns. Except for the rare cases (like Minecraft) that are just like hitting gold when digging, the rest are very well prepared campaigns in today's world.

Unless Nintendo invents a new type of device (Wii like) there is no other way to change perceptions about such a well establish brand like Nintendo.

They already have. Bayonetta. Wonderful 101. Xenoblade. Those are three pretty big examples.

Also consider that just because MS puts up the money, doesn't mean every publisher is going to take it. I'm sure they could have easily outbid Sony for SFV or put up a more lucrative bonus into whatever package they'd of offer to help Ono's team make it happen (say, full access to Azure servers), but they still wouldn't have gotten the game.

Reason being? Japan, Eastern Europe, Asian, Latin, Middle East and African markets are big (or in some cases, growing) scenes for fighting games, and the PS4 is beating XBO handily in pretty much all of them.

There's no value in intentionally limiting your product to a distant 2nd-place system (speaking WW here), especially when most of the community for that game is on the other console. Yes it's a bit of Catch-22 but the situation stands.



Another day, another part. I'll save any further uploads 'till early next week. Gonna need to redesign the top and front some to match the back and sides, and just streamline some things more cohesively.

Also got some ideas for a controller but it's nothing super-crazy. I don't think Nintendo needs another Wii U situation in the controller department :S

 

[Scum]

I still say trying to revive "mid-tier" development is the way to go with third parties. It would have to be incentivized, of course, because those mid-tier games disappeared for a reason, but as i've said before, a lot of franchises have gone belly-up in the last decade because of the endless arms race of the biggest games.

More than being family-friendly, Nintendo's publishing strategy is to offer a unique spin on something for everyone (Sony and Microsoft also pursue the "something for everyone" strategy, to be fair, but even their tentpole games focus on excellence in their chosen genre, rather than uniqueness). That's what they need to encourage from their partners; stuff that stands out and covers all kinds of bases.

Most definitely. NCL should have done this with ZombiU & Rayman Legends and made those titles their own. Hopefully they'll have the sense/incentives/moneyhats in place for titles like these this time round....

 

[Pokemaniac]

They already have. Bayonetta. Wonderful 101. Xenoblade. Those are three pretty big examples.

Xenoblade is completely first party.

 

[Roo]

Xenoblade is completely first party.

The Wonderful 101 is also a Nintendo IP not Platinum's

 

[Josh5890]

Another day, another part. I'll save any further uploads 'till early next week. Gonna need to redesign the top and front some to match the back and sides, and just streamline some things more cohesively.

Also got some ideas for a controller but it's nothing super-crazy. I don't think Nintendo needs another Wii U situation in the controller department :S

I just had an inspiration from looking at your designs. Now this is a one in a million but what if Nintendo included a charging dock on the NX console for the handheld. Something along the lines of the original Famicom. Probably too expensive to manage but I think it would be cool to be able to sync and charge your handheld by just putting it on top of the console. It would look cool on display as well.

 

[Terrell]

Great thought and I agree. In general Nintendo is not a company like Sony always aiming for the highest specs as their goal, but if getting the best CPU/GPU will help them achieve their goals of regaining market share, having more cross-platform games and the best version so people would truly want to choose Nintendo first; then having the industry leader in tech would definitely help them do this. They already said early this year that they are done with trying to pursue casuals. Makes sense to undercut the competition now and be disruptive.

Well, Sony isn't exactly that company anymore, either, by necessity alone. Modesty in hardware seems to be the name of the game now.

Xenoblade is completely first party.

I'd give up on reminding people of that, it never seems to sink in, with people preferring to "other" it and Monolith when discussing Nintendo instead of admitting that Nintendo does, in fact, make attempts to diversify its first-party studios and its lineup.

An interesting thing about all three of these consoles: the most telling difference the hardware offered to their games compared to games on previous Nintendo consoles was the quality of the 3D graphics.

Which *drumroll* was poorly communicated to consumers.

Let's look at the Gamecube example that people bring up. In a time when Microsoft and Sony were literally rubbing their high-megahertz spec sheet wangs in everyone's faces, Nintendo just quietly blips their specs out in essentially a press release, the numbers look low and an assumption is clearly made that Nintendo was "embarrassed" by their "paltry" specs, and their games value art style above really showing off what the hardware can accomplish with brute force, which can't combat the assumption. Couple that with another proprietary game media solution, a certain colour choice and being a year behind their biggest competitor who already had a strong market lead and... yeah.

The N64 suffered a similar issue, with cartridges seen as a relic of the previous generation in a time where CD-ROMs and their multimedia strengths finally had their day in the sun and ruled the roost in gaming, with NoA being able to get out in front of it by offering something neither CD-ROM console could get close to in the form of Goldeneye and keep it relevant in the West for a time.

And Wii U, for all of its other glaring faults, suffered a similar fate, made worse by the fact that it had a worse value proposition than either of the consoles previously mentioned.

When we discuss Wii U, there's no doubt that both of you are correct: you can't polish a turd, as the saying goes, but to be quite frank, Nintendo barely even tried to. So it suffered from BOTH of the things the 2 or you are bickering about.

I think the issue is that offering a compelling product is actually easier than fighting back against brand misconceptions, so your debate opponent takes that to mean that one holds a greater value than the other.

I believe that both need to be in lock-step with each other to be able to achieve a success.

 

[Trevelyan9999]

Vulkan is not a graphics card. Its an API (ie. software) made by the Khronos group. So:



Is not a thing. A72 (or Zen) can be paired with all sorts of GCN GPUs or PowerVR.

Thank you, thank you. For some reason I thought Vulkan was a computing/graphics solution, but thanks for clarifying. All these different products AMD is working on is nuts....

So the Zen is more of an unknown vs the A72 at this point correct?


Well for the GPU, if they are going for just a tiny bit better than PS4, they could put an R9 270 equivalent in the APU. If Nintendo wants more future proof stuff, I would hope they would put at least an R9 380 (not sure if Nintendo would go so far as a R9 390).

 

[Pokemaniac]

The Wonderful 101 is also a Nintendo IP not Platinum's

Yeah, but the post was specifically about funding third parties. The IP may belong to Nintendo, but it was still Nintendo funding a third party to make the game.

 

[Vena]

The Wonderful 101 is also a Nintendo IP not Platinum's

I think what he meant is that Monolith Soft is a first party developer. The others are not.

 

[Litri]

Thank you, thank you. For some reason I thought Vulkan was a computing/graphics solution, but thanks for clarifying. All these different products AMD is working on is nuts....

So the Zen is more of an unknown vs the A72 at this point correct?


Well for the GPU, if they are going for just a tiny bit better than PS4, they could put an R9 270 equivalent in the APU. If Nintendo wants more future proof stuff, I would hope they would put at least an R9 380 (not sure if Nintendo would go so far as a R9 390).

I'm betting on an improved R7 as the one being used in the "Kaveri" APUs.

 

[Mpl90]

Yes. And OS-wise, that could complicate things for nintendo. But I expect them to adopt some open-source OS as the foundation (read: either linux or *bsd). Perhaps even an open-source-based toolchain (e.g. llvm), apple/sony-style.

Ok, so, while Vulkan, going by Vena's post, can be used flawlessly on different architectures, would those problems be that significnt in terms of cross-buy/accounts working on all devices/OS functions shared/games as a whole working across systems? Or would adopting an open-source OS foundation as you say (Nikkei said Nintendo was going to use Android, obviously they'd use it as a foundation/extremely customed, making it unrecognisable for normal users) solve them well enough?

 

[AmyS]

Yeah, Vulcan roughly the equivalent of DirectX12, or rather, maybe just Direct3D 12. And Vulcan absorbed AMD's own Mantle API, I think. Remember Mantle? It was all the rage in late 2013 and most of 2014..

I don't have anything to add about the idea that AMD's new Zen CPU architecture may or may not have been a candidate for Nintendo's hardware. At least there are a number of solutions to beating Jaguar CPU performance, as the bar is pretty low.

 

[Pokemaniac]

Ok, so, while Vulkan, going by Vena's post, can be used flawlessly on different architectures, would those problems be that significnt in terms of cross-buy/accounts working on all devices/OS functions shared/games as a whole working across systems? Or would adopting an open-source OS foundation as you say (Nikkei said Nintendo was going to use Android, obviously they'd use it as a foundation/extremely customed, making it unrecognisable for normal users) solve them well enough?

The big issue that you have with using different architectures on the handheld and console is that an executable compiled for one of them won't Just Work on the other. Outside of straight emulation, which is highly unlikely to be feasible, there are basically two ways to work around this. The first is shipping games as "fat binaries", which effectively means they would be shipping a separate executable for each architecture. This solution is relatively easy to implement, but it makes things more rigid, and could cause compatibility issues down the line.

The other solution is to ship games not as machine code, as is done now, but as architecture agnostic bytecode. This method is less likely to cause issues with compatibility, but it will require more work to implement, and, depending on how they implement it, will require either lengthening install times to compile the bytecode to machine code, or taking a performance hit and using JIT compilation. I suspect Nintendo would take the former approach, since it makes more sense for a game console.

Android currently uses a combination of these two methods, but the specific details of their implementation (Java distributed as bytecode, native code as fat binaries) would mean that things would probably lean pretty heavily towards purely fat binaries in practice if used for a game console. Overall, I'd say Android isn't particularly well suited supporting a game platform, and that Nintendo would probably be better off either doing their own *nix distro or building off the custom work they did for 3DS and Wii U.

 

[KingSnake]

They already have. Bayonetta. Wonderful 101. Xenoblade. Those are three pretty big examples.

Only Bayonetta and W101 are 3rd parties as already mention. And none of those fit the "pay big money to 3rd parties to cater the mainstream gamers". Nintendo does finance some games to diversify the portfolio, but nothing that attracts too many new potential owners.

Also consider that just because MS puts up the money, doesn't mean every publisher is going to take it. I'm sure they could have easily outbid Sony for SFV or put up a more lucrative bonus into whatever package they'd of offer to help Ono's team make it happen (say, full access to Azure servers), but they still wouldn't have gotten the game.

Reason being? Japan, Eastern Europe, Asian, Latin, Middle East and African markets are big (or in some cases, growing) scenes for fighting games, and the PS4 is beating XBO handily in pretty much all of them.

There's no value in intentionally limiting your product to a distant 2nd-place system (speaking WW here), especially when most of the community for that game is on the other console. Yes it's a bit of Catch-22 but the situation stands.

For being a distant 2nd place Microsoft does a damn good job to keep itself quite above the sales from the past generation (launch aligned). Fighting against the cool kid on the block, because they lost the initial battle of PR. But they get the sales because they are fighting for each exclusive thing, for each big seller out there.

Nintendo can't afford to do that, unfortunately, not at that level.

And as someone mentioned they are trying to get more studios to diversify the portfolio, but until now they failed in delivering games in the genres that sell to the mainstream. They compensate somehow with Splatoon, but that was too little to late for Wii U.

Yes, they are still producing their usual wonderful games, but that doesn't seem to be enough nowadays for a success story.

No big sport game, the big open world game comes almost unnoticed close to the death of the console (although they have a very good one close to launch - Lego City Undercover - but they utterly failed in promoting the best Lego game out there), no big first person shooter, no Minecraft.

I don't really see that tackled in any way with NX.

 

[AzaK]

Only Bayonetta and W101 are 3rd parties as already mention. And none of those fit the "pay big money to 3rd parties to cater the mainstream gamers". Nintendo does finance some games to diversify the portfolio, but nothing that attracts too many new potential owners.

For being a distant 2nd place Microsoft does a damn good job to keep itself quite above the sales from the past generation (launch aligned). Fighting against the cool kid on the block, because they lost the initial battle of PR. But they get the sales because they are fighting for each exclusive thing, for each big seller out there.

Nintendo can't afford to do that, unfortunately, not at that level.

And as someone mentioned they are trying to get more studios to diversify the portfolio, but until now they failed in delivering games in the genres that sell to the mainstream. They compensate somehow with Splatoon, but that was too little to late for Wii U.

Yes, they are still producing their usual wonderful games, but that doesn't seem to be enough nowadays for a success story.

No big sport game, the big open world game comes almost unnoticed close to the death of the console (although they have a very good one close to launch - Lego City Undercover - but they utterly failed in promoting the best Lego game out there), no big first person shooter, no Minecraft.

I don't really see that tackled in any way with NX.

This is the one that really shows me that Nintendo just does not get it at all. To ignore (I assume that if they really tried they could have got it) the most popular fucking game on the planet just boggles the mind.

Nintendo just does not have the cache that it once had with gamers. In fact it hasn't for a few consoles now, it's just taken this long for them to hit rock bottom.

 

[sfried]

I don't have anything to add about the idea that AMD's new Zen CPU architecture may or may not have been a candidate for Nintendo's hardware. At least there are a number of solutions to beating Jaguar CPU performance, as the bar is pretty low.

What would be considered a powerful non-Intel CPU? I hear people talke about how the PowerPC days of IBM are over.

 

[TheOnlyOneHeEverFeared]

Wait is this confirmed to be a console and a handheld now?

 

[Lupin the Third]

Wait is this confirmed to be a console and a handheld now?

From what we can glean, it's both. "Brothers," if you will. We suspect they'll let you play versions of the same games as one another, a la iOS/Android devices. The WSJ article specifically says the SDK reportedly provides both console and handheld devices.

 

[KingBroly]

Wait is this confirmed to be a console and a handheld now?

NX is supposed to be a development platform for gaming, where developers can put said games on various Nintendo-based gaming devices that share the same architecture.

 

[jeffers]

Wait is this confirmed to be a console and a handheld now?

In the article it says there's a portable device and some home device

 

[Litri]

What would be considered a powerful non-Intel CPU? I hear people talke about how the PowerPC days of IBM are over.

There's no real equivalent to Intel. AMD has had and still has a perfomance deficiency (5-10% max.) compared to Intel for the past 4-5 years. The closest to Intel would be any of the AMD FX desktop processors (steamroller architecture) but I take you don't expect any of those to be inside NX, do you? ;-)

 

[Pancakes R Us]

From what we can glean, it's both. "Brothers," if you will. We suspect they'll let you play versions of the same games as one another, a la iOS/Android devices. The WSJ article specifically says the SDK reportedly provides both console and handheld devices.

Here's to hoping for cloud saves. Given it's Nintendo we're talking about, it may be a bit much to ask for though.

 

[Nightbird]

NX is supposed to be a development platform for gaming, where developers can put said games on various Nintendo-based gaming devices that share the same architecture.

It's been said many times, but this is such a genius idea. There will be no installbase reset because of the nature of the development platform.

How many times did we hear the excuse that there simply not the Installbase at Nintendo in order to port some games? This reason will be a thing of the past now, and this is good for both, developers and users

 

[James Scott]

We can agree that there could be more than 2 form favors for the NX right? I'd like to see a more traditional handheld and then a pro handheld.
Exactly as it sounds, maybe the same guts but maybe a better battery and a more chunky design kind of like the gamepad.
That would likely be too big for the traditional handheld audience but if someone wants a more controller like experience they'd go for that.
What do you guys think?

 

[Davey Cakes]

I wouldn't be surprised if we saw more than two form factors.

In fact, I made the point awhile ago in this thread but given how Nintendo has done handhelds in the past, they may be able to pull off some sort of "micro" form factor, similar to what happened with the GBA, but updated.

Kind of like how Apple Watch is an extension of the iPhone. Maybe Nintendo will allow some sort of wearable device that lets you play certain games or run certain apps from the NX handheld. Or it could just be its own independent device, like an iPod Nano, with more limited functionality.

The whole idea of "form factors" besides just console and handheld is an interesting change for Nintendo and I'm curious as to what they're cooking up.

 

[10k]

We can agree that there could be more than 2 form favors for the NX right? I'd like to see a more traditional handheld and then a pro handheld.
Exactly as it sounds, maybe the same guts but maybe a better battery and a more chunky design kind of like the gamepad.
That would likely be too big for the traditional handheld audience but if someone wants a more controller like experience they'd go for that.
What do you guys think?

The Nintendo Go is the handheld.

The Nintendo GoPro is like a gamepad sized handheld

The Nintendo is the home console.

I can see it.

 

[James Scott]

Wait is this confirmed to be a console and a handheld now?

We know Iwata was planning on making them be the equivalent to the iPhone and iPad. Not that they are a phone and a tablet, but two systems with different specs running the same games and apps

The Nintendo Go is the handheld.

The Nintendo GoPro is like a gamepad sized handheld

The Nintendo is the home console.

I can see it.

Probably not at launch, maybe a year from then. They can take any feedback from the system and fix it. Maybe have that one be bundled in with the console at a slightly higher price.
I'm a bit worried about consumer confusion but I hope it turns out fine

 

[SuperHans]

I don't see the point if Nintendo don't release a home system with 8GB of Memory and a CPU with 8 cores/threads. If they want 3rd parties it has to happen.

Problem is they love small machines and low wattage and low cost. You can't have all that and match the current systems. Technology hasn't moved on enough. Even if they use a smaller node it won't bridge the gap enough (and will increase cost).

 

[James Scott]

I wonder if it's possible for Nintendo to get any game from the NX handheld and output in at 1080p 60fps on the console without any additional work.
The devs could then consider putting in any extra effort into polishing the game and adding extra effects.
I'm interested in seeing more mid tier games, especially running at 1080p 60fps.
Building games with both systems in mind could result in some pretty cool games even if they are not as impressive as Ps4 games.
Art styles that upscale well should be prioritized as well. I imagine something like Yokai Watch would look great on the portable and in HD. And for Nintendo, going for something like Wind Waker would likely be better than something like TP