MrNyarlathotep
Banned
Nintendo is the only console manufacturer whose business model DOES make sense.
GI.biz: "Wii U less powerful than PS3, Xbox 360, developers say"
- Thread starter Hoo-doo
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Nintendo is the only console manufacturer whose business model DOES make sense.
Mr. B Natural
Member
Do yourself a favor and never ever ever put money in stocks or bonds or anything.
So, because Nintendo has lots of money, they should and should want to throw it away by releasing an expensive, technologically impressive console? That's how they got their money in the first place, right...making the same mistake back to back and not learning from them? Not repeating history that was in their favor?
Look, what happened with the Wii affected Nintendo's decision making in the future (and the decisions of their competitors as well). What happened with the Gamecube, DS, Gameboy, Virtual Boy, etc all affected Nintendo's next move in the chain. If you think the 3ds 100 dollar price drop didn't make them reconsider the specs (thus price) of the Wii-U then you're insane. It sealed the deal if they were on the fence about pushing the price boundary that they set for themselves. They experimented and they learned with the 3ds and Wii. They didn't experiment and forget.
Even if you used to print money, or still do, everybody is once bitten twice shy in this industry. Safe bets are best bets. Nintendo doing a tablet console is pretty much that, and in terms of pricing, they heard the public loud and clear and the fans wont have to repeat themselves.
Now, in conclusion, what Nintendo can make for 250 or 300 bucks (while still profiting) is not something I can answer, but that's what you're going to be getting come november. A guess a lot depends on the cost of a tablet with the functionality they need, which I don't think is cheap (but maybe it is). And the 4ds will not be 250 either...and for the same reason the WiiU is not going to be 400+ bucks, even if they considered that after the success of the Wii and they thought they could push their luck/were invincible.
Plinko
Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
While I don't believe this console will be less powerful than the 360/PS3 (based on several comments by non-anonymous developers), I don't see why people would consider this to be incredibly unusual for Nintendo.
They did it for the DS and handily won that sales war with PSP.
They did it for the Wii and handily won that sales war for 5 years with MS/Sony.
They did it for the 3DS and are handily winning that sales war.
They clearly have shifted their paradigm.
They did it for the DS and handily won that sales war with PSP.
They did it for the Wii and handily won that sales war for 5 years with MS/Sony.
They did it for the 3DS and are handily winning that sales war.
They clearly have shifted their paradigm.
Nintendo is not doing a Tablet console...
It's a home HD console with a Tablet controller that has a screen that may or may not be used depending on programmer's intent... basically to act like a home component of a DS or that Game Boy Advance idea
Your main viewing window will always be your main big TV, not the screen on the Tablet controller
It's a home HD console with a Tablet controller that has a screen that may or may not be used depending on programmer's intent... basically to act like a home component of a DS or that Game Boy Advance idea
Your main viewing window will always be your main big TV, not the screen on the Tablet controller
Plinko
Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
To be fair, though, the streaming to the tablet is going to be their main selling point with this console. In the groups I've done research with, I was blown away by how impressed people actually were with that idea.
They didn't mess anything up. As far as what they got from that generation, they were the undisputed leader.
They still have problems with third parties though, but that's something that has to be fixed backstage with their polices on how they treat their partners; not from simply making a powerful console.
Yeah I'm sure being outsold 3-4:1 on the home consoles market after being a clear worldwide leader for 2 generations doesn't count because their OI was fine. We're talking mistakes here, and the N64 and the gamecube were, on many levels. If it weren't for their handheld sales (for which they pretty much had a monopoly) and cash machines like Pokemon, they'd be pretty much fucked after the NGC.
That graph is quite idiotic to be honest. It adds profits from n64, gamecube with their gameboy line. If those were divided i'm not so sure their home consoles would have been that much of a money maker, especially compared to ps1 and ps2.
I'm sure it will, but you ain't getting HD and surround sound on that controller... why let a perfectly good HDTV and surround sound setup go to waste? This thing is not really a true portable system like a 3DS or Vita, it has a limited range
Then the hardcore Nintendo fans shouldn't get so excited when innuendo after innuendo points to the Wii U being 360/PS3 level hardware and not a next gen system like PS 4 or MS 3.
Not only is it the direction all the smoke is blowing, it makes perfect sense. Small, low wattage, cheap, and healthy profit margins from day 1. Nothing about any of these rumors is "maddeningly stupid" at all. It's called reading the tea levels and preparing yourself for reality. Not sure why some of the biggest Nintendo fanatics in the world are so blinded by this.
Not singling you out at all. Just using it as a springboard to address the group stuck in the reality distortion field.
MrNyarlathotep
Banned
Personally, I find the rumours in the OP that the Wii-U is less powerful than current gen consoles nonsensical.
Rumours that it is more powerful, but by a linear factor in line with modern die shrinking processes and GPU advancements completely plausible, but worse? Sounds like uninformed bullshit to be honest.
CoffeeJanitor
Member
Makes sense to me that it would be a little bit more powerful, at least GC to Wii jump if not a bit more.
They'd obviously have less money to throw around, but I'm pretty sure even the Gamecube was a profitable affair overall. Not saying it wasn't a failure in many ways, but it didn't lose money and they wouldn't have been "fucked" without the handhelds.
PS1 and PS2 weren't as profitable as you'd think. Wii likely beats them both combined in this respect.°°ToMmY°°;36625261 said:
A jump from GC to Wii would be like a jump for Wii to being less than 360/PS3 still
Duane Cunningham
Member
I think it's worth pointing out that the most powerful console never wins.
Master System was more powerful than the NES.
N64 was more powerful than the PS1.
Gamecube AND XBox were more powerful than the PS2.
360 and PS3 are more powerful than the Wii.
Lynx, Game Gear, TurboExpress and Game.com were all more powerful than the Game Boy.
Wonderswan Pocket and NeoGeo Pocket were more powerful than the Game Boy Color.
PSP was more powerful than the DS.
Vita is more powerful than the 3DS.
Master System was more powerful than the NES.
N64 was more powerful than the PS1.
Gamecube AND XBox were more powerful than the PS2.
360 and PS3 are more powerful than the Wii.
Lynx, Game Gear, TurboExpress and Game.com were all more powerful than the Game Boy.
Wonderswan Pocket and NeoGeo Pocket were more powerful than the Game Boy Color.
PSP was more powerful than the DS.
Vita is more powerful than the 3DS.
Winning isn't everything (we don't personally see those profits, we're not those companies) ... it's about bragging about who has the most high-tech toy for years to come, and that is Charlie Sheen style Winning right there
H_Prestige
Banned
I don't think Nintendo looks it at that way. It just means their handheld's profits were large enough to mask two mediocre product lines. If the wii had continued the downward trajectory from the n64/gc, they'd have to seriously look at their home console side of the business. They wouldn't just hop onto microsoft excel to make a graph like that and say "hmm, I guess everything's ok, move along folks!"
You, oh. Oh my god. Yes, this! Mario platformer with art as lovely as Wario Land Shake It would be amazing on so many levels.
I really, really doubt that. PS2 is an absolute monster, both HW and SW sales-wise.
CoffeeJanitor
Member
I meant a Wii-like jump from 360-PS3. So in between.
Zoramon089
Banned
Because they're two completely different situations you're comparing.
1. Consoles =/= handhelds. Consoles have a better "perceived value" and can stand to be more expensive than handhelds. Obviously, there are extremes like the PS3 but this is usually the case
2. Nintendo vastly overcharged for the 3DS based on E3 hype for the device. There was no "mistake" with the hardware and I'm fairly sure the 3DS HW actually improved because of dev input.
Basically, the 3DS doing badly at $250 was the result of charging a bit more than they could reasonably get away with so if anything they've learned THAT lesson. That hype doesn't necessarily correlate to people being willing to spend a lot more on a device. Unless you're Apple I guess
Jokeropia knows what he is talking about.
I think he's probably right actually. Nintendo made an absolute mint off of Wii without having to spend too much on R&D.
I should add that I'm not sure what to believe about WiiU anymore. I still would be pretty disappointed if they went out of their way to make it less powerful than PS360, given that's exactly what you'd have to do.
AceBandage
Banned
Yeah, but was it really in the ballpark of the emotion engine.. and I guess I can't really say much about PS1, because I think they had that design locked down for quite a while. Both were pretty unique/new designs on the hardware front.
Nintendo did probably spend quite a bit on the controller tech.
Thunder Monkey
Banned
We know it's a definite that the Wii was more profitable than the PS2. PS1 era numbers become iffier to nail down, but with the PS2 it's true. Sony made just over $2 billion on the whole venture.
Nintendo made more than that level of money for three years in a row. Hell they had a couple of quarters that almost amounted to Sony's PS2 total.
That's with both DS and Wii money tossed in. Considering home consoles and their software on average costs more than handheld it's reasonable to say that the number was almost a 50/50 split between the two.
AceBandage
Banned
Why would they need to do this? Do you really think devs care about unnamed sources?
I don't think they need to considering these quotes.
THQ: WiiU is just a lot more powerful than current HD consoles it does 1080p very easy.
Epic: It will do things current HD consoles simply can't do, it's going to be a powerful box.
Crytek: WiiU devkits are very powerful,the specs are very good
Vigil Games: We had the game at the same level as high end pc version in a matter of days and a few lines of code got the game up and running on tablet in 5 mins.
EA: Wii U is not a transitional platform, it is a true next generation system.
Yeah, "developers say" is not strong in the evidence department is it. Anyway, we probably won't know much about the specs leading into E3 at all. This is going to be a long 2 months on GAF.
I'm dying here.
Its pretty small actually.
Agent X
Member
Wait, what was that you said at the beginning?
As I mentioned in another thread a few days ago (when someone implied the same thing), that's not entirely correct. In the vast majority of cases, the "winning" console in a generation actually was also the most powerful console at the time of its release.
Not much larger than the Wii.
The Wii U won't have an internal hard drive. It will likely have an external power brick. Also, it won't have GC ports like the Wii does.
Still, it's relatively small.
TAS
Member
Funny you should mention that..I've been playing with penny stocks for six months now and made more money than the average person makes in a year.
No one said Nintendo is going to release an uber expensive and powerful console ala PS3. But at the same time, they are not going to release a simple WiiHD. This will be a powerful console that will run circles around current home consoles.
Incorrect. Nintendo dropped the price of the 3DS because they got greedy and priced it way too high to begin with. $249 was an outlandish price for the machine--considering the Vita is the same price and blows it away technologically. That's why sales suffered initially and Nintendo learned from their hubris and priced it accordingly.
Well let's see..the last console they built from the ground up was the little marvel called GameCube. It was priced at $199 and could produce visuals that rivaled the more powerful and expensive Xbox at 1/3 the physical size. So for $250-$300, I think it's logical to assume they are going to make one hell of an impressive console.
Is the internal drive thing confirmed? I thought the 8GB of flash memory thing was just a rumor?
H_Prestige
Banned
So Nintendo's original plan was to sell the 3DS at a loss? And they only changed it to $250 because of e3 hype?
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