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[aeolist]

Even if WiiU's GPU will support DX11 features, I still think Nintendo should have gone with more thab a 400-500Gflops GPU. 800Gflops would have been good. 1Tflops would have been perfect.
But now, they won't have multiplateform that push Xbox-PS4.

If they support DX11 then that's realistically all they need for multiplatform support. Porting should be easy and visual quality will be comparable to turning down the settings on a PC game while giving the same essential experience.

The only real questions are whether third parties will even bother with the minimal effort and whether customers will buy if the games are there.

 

[FyreWulff]

Give such games the sort of enhancements we should be seeing from PS360->WiiU ports (like improved textures, lighting, resolution, AA), and I don't think the difference would be very great.

People are also assuming the PS4 and 720 would be in exact parity with each other as well. We only had a noticable amount of parity this generation because Sony scrambled and bolted another 256MB on top of the PS3.

 

[test_account]

People are also assuming the PS4 and 720 would be in exact parity with each other as well. We only had a noticable amount of parity this generation because Sony scrambled and bolted another 256MB on top of the PS3.

That was Microsoft. The Xbox 360 was suppose to have 256MB RAM to begin with.

 

[GhostTrick]

If they support DX11 then that's realistically all they need for multiplatform support. Porting should be easy and visual quality will be comparable to turning down the settings on a PC game while giving the same essential experience.

The only real questions are whether third parties will even bother with the minimal effort and whether customers will buy if the games are there.

This is not a GPU fonctionnality only.
Star Wars 1313 runs on UE3. Does it mean iPhone will get it ? No. It's also about the GPU power (also CPU and other things). So maybe Wii U will support same shaders, same gpu fonctions. But will it support intensive things ? Clearly no. For exemple, imagine UE4 will be on both PS4/Xbox3 and Wii U. Wii U will shares the same engine, but it doesn't mean that Wii U will handle the same use of the engine.

 

[ozfunghi]

I've gotten my hands on Disaster and I'm glad it wasn't localized.

That basically neuters your stance regarding FF4. Not only do i feel sorry for you for thinking a game you don't like shouldn't be localized (maybe if Reggie gets sacked, you could step in) but Disaster was far from a bad game. In fact, it was a fresh approach on a "core" game, tailored to beginning and casual gamers, with a bit from everything and not too hard, yet enjoyable. And exactly this is the reason why FF4 got dropped, because the controls, while innovative, were not mainstream enough.

 

[aeroslash]

Even if WiiU's GPU will support DX11 features, I still think Nintendo should have gone with more thab a 400-500Gflops GPU. 800Gflops would have been good. 1Tflops would have been perfect.
But now, they won't have multiplateform that push Xbox-PS4.

Yeah, that's bad. I had hoped for a more powerful GPU

 

[FyreWulff]

That was Microsoft. The 360 was suppose to have 256MB RAM to begin with.

I thought the MS one was Epic getting them to add more EDRAM. The PS3 having split RAM due to them bolting it on later.

 

[Gamer @ Heart]

That was Microsoft. The 360 was suppose to have 256MB RAM to begin with.

So was the PS3 by early accounts. That is one reason why its split between awesome ram and lame because it was last minute. Microsoft gave epic a choice, they chose RAM, Sony followed suit.

 

[test_account]

I thought the MS one was Epic getting them to add more EDRAM. The PS3 having split RAM due to them bolting it on later.

I dont know about the EDRAM, but the Xbox 360 was suppose to have 256MB RAM to begin with at least. The EDRAM on the Xbox 360 is like 10MB i think, so it is not like this would make a huge difference.

PS3 has 256MB RAM for the GPU and 256MB RAM as main memory. I think it was designed like this from day one.

So was the PS3 by early accounts. That is one reason why its split between awesome ram and lame ram. Microsoft gave epic a choice, they chose RAM, Sony followed suit.

So the PS3 was suppose to have 128MB RAM for the GPU and 128MB RAM for the main memory? Do you have any source to this, i havnt heard about this before, always interesting to read about this i think. I know that the PS3 was suppose to use a 2nd CELL CPU to be used as a GPU, but i think that idea was scrapped very early.

 

[aeolist]

This is not a GPU fonctionnality only.
Star Wars 1313 runs on UE3. Does it mean iPhone will get it ? No. It's also about the GPU power (also CPU and other things). So maybe Wii U will support same shaders, same gpu fonctions. But will it support intensive things ? Clearly no. For exemple, imagine UE4 will be on both PS4/Xbox3 and Wii U. Wii U will shares the same engine, but it doesn't mean that Wii U will handle the same use of the engine.

Yeeaaaahhh... that's what I just said. If Wii U is DX11 it'll support UE4 and all the effects it uses, just at a lower level. If Epic bothers to port the engine and if third parties bother to port their games they will run but they won't look as nice.

 

[Linkhero1]

That basically neuters your stance regarding FF4. Not only do i feel sorry for you for thinking a game you don't like shouldn't be localized (maybe if Reggie gets sacked, you could step in) but Disaster was far from a bad game. In fact, it was a fresh approach on a "core" game, tailored to beginning and casual gamers, with a bit from everything and not too hard, yet enjoyable. And exactly this is the reason why FF4 got dropped, because the controls, while innovative, were not mainstream enough.

I'm not sure I'm following you. Are you saying that Disaster wasn't localized because it was a "core" game tailored towards new gamers and FF4 didn't get localized because it wasn't?

The reason both were dropped because NoA probably didn't feel as if they would do well over here. As a gamer, I disagree with their decision, but I can't blame them for thinking that. Nintendo is a business first and foremost, so they tend to do what's in their best interest first. We come in second, sadly. I just don't believe those two titles are all that great to be honest and would have probably bombed in NoA. I was angry about Xenoblade and Last Story, but it seems like we'll be getting those. The point I'm trying to make is that if NCL felt that Reggie's decision was incorrect they would have corrected him and released those titles here. Both NCL and NoA are to blame for the failed localization of those titles. I'm just not as angry as much because I'm getting the games I actually wanted localized.

 

[GhostTrick]

Yeeaaaahhh... that's what I just said. If Wii U is DX11 it'll support UE4 and all the effects it uses, just at a lower level. If Epic bothers to port the engine and if third parties bother to port their games they will run but they won't look as nice.

Again. It will totally depends of the game itself. I don't think they have a magic box that set graphical level on "low" or "high"
If Wii U can't handle CPU things or other... there'll be no ports at all. Or really cheaps port.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

I don't think they have a magic box that set graphical level on "low" or "high"

That's EXACTLY what UE4 has. It's just not a 'magic box', it's a compile setting.

 

[GhostTrick]

That's EXACTLY what UE4 has. It's just not a 'magic box', it's a compile setting.

Then we have to wait and see. But I doubt that games on PS4/720 using UE4 and being really horsepower demanding would run on WiiU. Or as I said: cheap port.

 

[lefantome]

On Xbox 360 even titles ported from Xbox(and the original xbox was significantly more powerful than ps2) showed its next gen capabilities: I mean kameo and Perfect Dark.
PGR3 looked awesome and COD2 was a pc port non comparable with old gen games.

I can see only worse looking games on Wii u. Things will change (if developers want to put some efforts in wii u development) but we can't expect a big leap.

 

[aeolist]

Then we have to wait and see. But I doubt that games on PS4/720 using UE4 and being really horsepower demanding would run on WiiU. Or as I said: cheap port.

Games that heavily use physics/animations/other heavily CPU limited operations in such a way that turning them down/off wouldn't be possible will not run on Wii U.

I really don't think there will be many of those games next gen.

 

[kswiston]

How much more powerful was the original Xbox compared to the PS2? I know that this generation's relative power parity between the 360 and PS3 was not the case in past generations.

 

[MrNyarlathotep]

Games that heavily use physics/animations/other heavily CPU limited operations in such a way that turning them down/off wouldn't be possible will not run on Wii U.

I really don't think there will be many of those games next gen.

Entirely depends what they're being used for.

Here's a side by side comparison of Arkham city running on PC with and without PhysX.

 

[Vic]

Some of you guys are kidding yourselves if you think that 3rd parties will shaft the Wii U like they did with the Wii. Won't happen.

 

[Diablos54]

Some of you guys are kidding yourselves if you think that 3rd parties will shaft the Wii U like they did with the Wii. Won't happen.

Given what we know so far and Nintendo's recent history with 3rd parties, you can't blame people for thinking this.

 

[schuelma]

Some of you guys are kidding yourselves if you think that 3rd parties will shaft the Wii U like they did with the Wii. Won't happen.

We'll see. if EA and Activision show up, I'll think decent/mediocre support is coming, which would still be a step up from Wii.

 

[Shadow of the BEAST]

wiiu will get meningful ports aslong as 360 is a valid platform.

after that its going to dry up quick.

 

[evilromero]

We'll see. if EA and Activision show up, I'll think decent/mediocre support is coming, which would still be a step up from Wii.

EA and Activision also supported the Wii. What are you talking about?

 

[aeolist]

We'll see. if EA and Activision show up, I'll think decent/mediocre support is coming, which would still be a step up from Wii.

Activision was on the Wii which was a lot more difficult in terms of ports. CoD is going to be on Wii U without a doubt.

EA is a big question mark.

 

[Vic]

Given what we know so far and Nintendo's recent history with 3rd parties, you can't blame people for thinking this.

The Wii U is probably the most third-party friendly system ever made by Nintendo (or any other console manufacturer for that matter.) It shouldn't have any difficulty getting ports like the Wii or in a lesser extent the Gamecube.

 

[Zenaku]

What we really need to ask ourselves is, would this really be a problem?

Even now, at the end of a generation, the number of development teams that create huge budget games is only a small percentage of the industry, and the percentage getting every last drop of power out of the consoles is even smaller.

The Wii U should be powerful enough to create games that outclass the likes of "The Last of Us" and "Halo 4" in every way (poly count, textures, ai, etc), so realistically, how many studios would look at that and say "that's not enough"?

Games tailored for the hardware will look amazing. Ports of said games to PS4/Xbox3 will look amazing. If Nintendo can successfully position Wii U as the main platform for multi-plat titles for 95% of developers, then all the worry of "they can't get ports!" will be meaningless.

 

[Gravijah]

The Wii U should be powerful enough to create games that outclass the likes of "The Last of Us" and "Halo 4" in every way (poly count, textures, ai, etc), so realistically, how many studios would look at that and say "that's not enough"?

do you uhm... forget that this is the gaming industry we're talking about?

 

[Diablos54]

The Wii U is probably the most third-party friendly system ever made by Nintendo (or any other console manufacturer for that matter.) It shouldn't have any difficulty getting ports like the Wii or in a lesser extent the Gamecube.

It shouldn't, but I'm sure 3rd parties would find some sort of an excuse if they don't get the sales they want during the early stages of the Wii U's life.

 

[ozfunghi]

I'm not sure I'm following you. Are you saying that Disaster wasn't localized because it was a "core" game tailored towards new gamers and FF4 didn't get localized because it wasn't?

Kind of. From what i heard NOA wanted FF4 to have SH:SM-like controls. Mainstream, straight forward, IR pointing for the flashlight. FF4 didn't do that, it had you tilting the controller IIRC, which added to the awekward atmosphere of the horror theme. Exactly these controls were praised by reviewers such as EDGE. Disaster basically WAS a mainstream game with a "core" theme. It used the wiimote like most minigames would. I can understand why a seasoned gamer would dislike that, but it served its purpose. Also funny NOA would show that game during E3 and refuse to publish it later on.

 

[marc^o^]

Deep look into Wii U preview builds at E3: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-vs-wiiu-e3-2012

 

[Persona7]

Some of you guys are kidding yourselves if you think that 3rd parties will shaft the Wii U like they did with the Wii. Won't happen.

I remember comments like this back before the gamecube came out. "they won't shaft us like they did with the N64!"


Then I saw the same comments right before the wii came out.

 

[Shadow of the BEAST]

What we really need to ask ourselves is, would this really be a problem?

Even now, at the end of a generation, the number of development teams that create huge budget games is only a small percentage of the industry, and the percentage getting every last drop of power out of the consoles is even smaller.

The Wii U should be powerful enough to create games that outclass the likes of "The Last of Us" and "Halo 4" in every way (poly count, textures, ai, etc), so realistically, how many studios would look at that and say "that's not enough"?

Games tailored for the hardware will look amazing. Ports of said games to PS4/Xbox3 will look amazing. If Nintendo can successfully position Wii U as the main platform for multi-plat titles for 95% of developers, then all the worry of "they can't get ports!" will be meaningless.

thats what people said about the wii.

if wii looks as good as re4 im happy. in hind sight re4 type of graphics where hardly average on wii.

because re4 was made by some of the best in industry. same with games like the last of us.

the best teams will not be working on wiiu. they will be working on next gen platforms where they are challenged and an audience that appreciate their work.

and no wii u is not going to be the leading platform for next gen development. Wiiu is comparable to 360 not 720.

If you lead on wiiu your product will not be competitive on the next gen consoles. Its going to look bad.

wiiu is to 720 what wii was to 360. A generation behind.

 

[mugurumakensei]

Deep look into Wii U preview builds at E3: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-vs-wiiu-e3-2012

Um, Rayman Legends was 60 fps and so was pikmin 3. Are they using videos to judge framerate?

 

[schuelma]

EA and Activision also supported the Wii. What are you talking about?

Not with non gimped versions of their top franchises.

 

[lwilliams3]

This is not a GPU fonctionnality only.
Star Wars 1313 runs on UE3. Does it mean iPhone will get it ? No. It's also about the GPU power (also CPU and other things). So maybe Wii U will support same shaders, same gpu fonctions. But will it support intensive things ? Clearly no. For exemple, imagine UE4 will be on both PS4/Xbox3 and Wii U. Wii U will shares the same engine, but it doesn't mean that Wii U will handle the same use of the engine.

But here is the thing: The Wii was unable to run UE3 at all. The Wii couldn't even use some of the features from UE2.5 compared to the Xbox1 This was not due to just power, but due to the older shader system architecture that the Wii inherited from the Gamecube. From the ways are looking now, the Wii U should be able to at least run UE4-lite. Downporting by removing a few features is alot better than third party developers requiring a completely different engine to run on the system like what happened with the Wii.

In other words, even at the worse case, downporting games to the Wii U will not be nearly as problematic as it was to downport to the Wii.

 

[dr. apocalipsis]

I think everyone is overlooking a crucial point: Bus bandwith.

To render at 1080P 60fps you will need 256bit+GDDR3 or maybe 128bit could be enough with GDDR5. I'm pretty sure high cost will discard 256 bit bus.

So only hope is Nintendo using GDDR5. It's cheap, so it could be possible.

 

[Death Dealer]

PS3 has 256MB RAM for the GPU and 256MB RAM as main memory. I think it was designed like this from day one.

FyreWulff is obviously confused.

 

[KingFire]

So is it Wii 1.5?

 

[FyreWulff]

Not with non gimped versions of their top franchises.

I'll give Activision credit, the later CoDs mostly just missed out on DLC. They even went to the trouble of writing their own patching solution.

Um, Rayman Legends was 60 fps and so was pikmin 3. Are they using videos to judge framerate?

welcome to eurogamer

 

[Diablos54]

the best teams will not be working on wiiu. they will be working on next gen platforms where they are challenged and an audience that appreciate their work.

Shocking headline! Non existent Wii U owners don't like games!

And if their best teams don't work on the Wii U, they can't really complain if their B/C tier efforts don't sell as well. But you can bet they will complain.

 

[Vic]

I remember comments like this back before the gamecube came out. "they won't shaft us like they did with the N64!"


Then I saw the same comments right before the wii came out.

I don't remember people saying that, but I can imagine it happened. Unlike this gen, every consoles will be in the same threshold when it comes to their capacities and one big change is that Nintendo gets to launch their console one whole year before anybody else. The Gamecube and Wii both came out one year after the first console of the gen came out. This little fact is a big difference compared to previous gens.

Edit: Hell, just checked on Wikipedia and even the N64 came out one year after the PSX!

PSX: 1995 -> N64: 1996
PS2: 2000 -> NGC: 2001
360: 2005 -> Wii: 2006

 

[Linkhero1]

Kind of. From what i heard NOA wanted FF4 to have SH:SM-like controls. Mainstream, straight forward, IR pointing for the flashlight. FF4 didn't do that, it had you tilting the controller IIRC, which added to the awekward atmosphere of the horror theme. Exactly these controls were praised by reviewers such as EDGE. Disaster basically WAS a mainstream game with a "core" theme. It used the wiimote like most minigames would. I can understand why a seasoned gamer would dislike that, but it served its purpose. Also funny NOA would show that game during E3 and refuse to publish it later on.

Well hopefully I get a chance to play Fatal Frame 4 some day. Sounds like a fantastic game.

 

[AlStrong]

Um, Rayman Legends was 60 fps and so was pikmin 3. Are they using videos to judge framerate?

They're using 1080i60 footage (they say so). They already measured 60fps for two of the games, so I'm not sure why it'd be any different for Pikmin if it were 60fps unless Nintendo only limited its output to 30fps. As for Rayman, the conference segment must have been recorded at 30fps whilst they didn't mind using 60fps footage for ME3 and Darksiders 2 then (odd decision if true). *shrug*

I haven't really followed the framerate discussions for the two games you mention; do you have links?

 

[kswiston]

Games tailored for the hardware will look amazing. Ports of said games to PS4/Xbox3 will look amazing. If Nintendo can successfully position Wii U as the main platform for multi-plat titles for 95% of developers, then all the worry of "they can't get ports!" will be meaningless.

Wii U will never be the lead platform on multi-plat titles. Nintendo has never been great at sharing their development tools with other developers like Microsoft (or even Sony) have. I don't think it is a coincidence that Nintendo games tend to look so much better than everything else on their systems. Also, I am sure that Microsoft systems will continue to be the easiest to develop for if you are a development studio who started as a PC developer (like many of the major western development studios).

 

[Diablos54]

Wii U will never be the lead platform on multi-plat titles. Nintendo has never been great at sharing their development tools with other developers like Microsoft (or even Sony) have.

Actually, I'm pretty sure this has changed with the Wii U. They're giving out a lot of free middleware to developers, and I think they're even giving out their own engine (NintendoWare).

 

[evilromero]

Not with non gimped versions of their top franchises.

I still contend third party efforts will be gimped on the Wii U. I hope I'm wrong. I would love to see unique support for multiplatform titles.

 

[CoffeeJanitor]

Ps3 and Xbox 360 are going to sell dozens of millions combined in the next 2-3 years.
They have social games and peripherals and will cost less money.

As showed by the fast decline of Wii and the bad launch of 3ds(still a commercial failure despite the huge sales) the casual gaming is in decline.
Kinect was a success but not comparable to the wiimote.


Also does this wiipad have the same appeal of the wiimote?
I don't think so, surely is more complicated to use.

What? lol

All this did was confirm that GAMES SELL CONSOLES. There were no games for 3DS. The Wii was getting no games.

 

[wsippel]

Actually, I'm pretty sure this has changed with the Wii U. They're giving out a lot of free middleware to developers, and I think they're even giving out their own engine (NintendoWare).

From what I managed to gather in the last few days, NintendoWare isn't really an engine. I always thought it was, but it seems to be closer to something like DirectX, with some additional nuts and bolts that would typically be part of an engine. And there is no NintendoWare for Wii U (yet).

 

[stupidvillager]

Deep look into Wii U preview builds at E3: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-vs-wiiu-e3-2012

So basically it sounds like they are saying Arkham City looks as good or better than PS360, yet many here say it looks worse. Are we back to the "PS360 games look worse than PS360 games."

 

[marc^o^]

So basically it sounds like they are saying Arkham City looks as good or better than PS360, yet many here say it looks worse. Are we back to the "PS360 games look worse than PS360 games."

The preview build could have been old and there's still time to polish it before release. Eventually it should look good.