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[JasoNsider]

This is a good point.

But if it's only 2 or 3x the power of PS360 then many devs will still abandon it. I don't totally buy the argument that improvements in graphics scaling methodologies will save the Wii U.

Graphics (defined as shaders, lighting, and polygon count) might be scaled down relatively easily...but physics is incredibly important, as well as seamless, complex worlds. And these 2 things are MUCH harder to scale, and you lose gameplay elements and the emotional sense of immersion when you remove or reduce them.

Sure, Bethesda could remove half the trees, half the rocks, two thirds of the grass and most of the wildlife from Skyrim 2 in order for it to run on Wii U's 1.5 GB of RAM, but I doubt they would since that would take a huge amount of effort, not to mention a large part of the soul of Skyrim (the complex world) would be lost.

And what about games where physics are very important? Would it be very fun to play a Wii U version of Bioshock or a Valve game where only a small percentage of the objects are physics enabled? This could ruin games where physics is an integral part of the gameplay...and physics will likely be a huge thing next gen.

No, devs will not abandon it if it's only 2-3x more powerful. See my post. That multiplier is higher than any of you guys realize. And physics simulations are not the biggest worry with this. Don't worry, devs will be happy as hell if we get 2-3 times what we have now.

In the pipelines I've been involved with or worked next to, getting 2-3 times the capibility of a 360 or PS3 would be good enough. Artists and devs together are working their ass off to fill what we already have. We're going to have to optimize our stuff no matter how much power you throw our way, but filling a pipeline 2-3 times bigger than what we have currently is still doable. Now 10x...that is laughable and, again, people should really think about the meaning behind the numbers before they throw them out.

 

[lunchwithyuzo]

The 360 has sold exceptionally well?

It didn't before being kept in mind for development. 360 sold terrible upfront.

 

[TekkenMaster]

No, devs will not abandon it if it's only 2-3x more powerful. See my post. That multiplier is higher than any of you guys realize. And physics simulations are not the biggest worry with this. Don't worry, devs will be happy as hell if we get 2-3 times what we have now.

In the pipelines I've been involved with or worked next to, getting 2-3 times the capibility of a 360 or PS3 would be good enough. Artists and devs together are working their ass off to fill what we already have. We're going to have to optimize our stuff no matter how much power you throw our way, but filling a pipeline 2-3 times bigger than what we have currently is still doable. Now 10x...that is laughable and, again, people should really think about the meaning behind the numbers before they throw them out.

10x doesn't refer to a 10x leap in every graphical factor. It means a 10x leap in overall processing power as defined by the CPU, amount and type of RAM, bus widths, read/write speeds, etc.

It doesn't mean that a game will require literally 10 times the graphical detail.

 

[EatChildren]

It didn't before being kept in mind for development. 360 sold terrible upfront.

Right, but it managed to establish a large market share prior to the Wii and PS3 launch and offer a significant generational leap of hardware performance. It was a clean slate for developers and the perfect platform to build your 'next generation' games on.

Because I don't think the Wii U will be able to compete with the XboxNext and PS4 I don't think they'll be able to take advantage of a similar situation. I think the Wii U will be home to far too many ports of 360 and PS3 titles for people to really give a shit about it. I don't think people will see it as a platform a generation ahead, with a new generation of games.

Unless, of course, Nintendo plays their cards right for once. And for my sake, I hope they do.

 

[-Pyromaniac-]

Right, but it managed to establish a large market share prior to the Wii and PS3 launch and offer a significant generational leap of hardware performance. It was a clean slate for developers and the perfect platform to build your 'next generation' games on.

Because I don't think the Wii U will be able to compete with the XboxNext and PS4 I don't think they'll be able to take advantage of a similar situation. I think the Wii U will be home to far too many ports of 360 and PS3 titles for people to really give a shit about it. I don't think people will see it as a platform a generation ahead, with a new generation of games.

Unless, of course, Nintendo plays their cards right for once. And for my sake, I hope they do.

that's what I been saying!

 

[JasoNsider]

10x doesn't refer to a 10x leap in every graphical factor. It means a 10x leap in overall processing power as defined by the CPU, amount and type of RAM, bus widths, read/write speeds, etc.

It doesn't mean that a game will require literally 10 times the graphical detail.

Yes, so 10x the speed could net you an arguable double in detail from what we have in PS3/360.

How is that not sufficient or unrealistic. Wii U will probably have that. Hell even the Japanese Garden demo, which will be surpassed in a game for sure in some time, is indicating we're on that track.

 

[FreeMufasa]

This is a good point.

But if it's only 2 or 3x the power of PS360 then many devs will still abandon it. I don't totally buy the argument that improvements in graphics scaling methodologies will save the Wii U.

Graphics (defined as shaders, lighting, and polygon count) might be scaled down relatively easily...but physics is incredibly important, as well as seamless, complex worlds. And these 2 things are MUCH harder to scale, and you lose gameplay elements and the emotional sense of immersion when you remove or reduce them.

Sure, Bethesda could remove half the trees, half the rocks, two thirds of the grass and most of the wildlife from Skyrim 2 in order for it to run on Wii U's 1.5 GB of RAM, but I doubt they would since that would take a huge amount of effort, not to mention a large part of the soul of Skyrim (the complex world) would be lost.

And what about games where physics are very important? Would it be very fun to play a Wii U version of Bioshock or a Valve game where only a small percentage of the objects are physics enabled? This could ruin games where physics is an integral part of the gameplay...and physics will likely be a huge thing next gen.

Something I just thought of. What if the PS4 & Xbox 3 aren't equal in power?

Not like PS2 and Xbox 1 kind of difference but one that's pretty substational. Would fuck the gen up if WiiU, PS4 and XBox 3 are all on different playing fields. I wonder if Sony and MS come together to agree on these sort of things. Likely pressure from devs though.

 

[TekkenMaster]

Yes, so 10x the speed could net you an arguable double in detail from what we have in PS3/360.

How is that not sufficient or unrealistic. Wii U will probably have that.

You really think Wii U will have 10x the speed of PS3 and 360?

 

[bgassassin]

My guess is 4GB internal, 4GB SD card bundled, internal used for mainly system and channel functions. Basically I think the Wii -> Wii U progression will be like the DSi -> 3DS progression, except legacy releases (WiiWare, Virtual Console) will probably be playable off external memory.

Well the rumored amount was 8GB. If there was anything truth to that, I could just as easily see that being bumped up before launch.

I still think it's weird that Nintendo outright called the Wii CPU "PowerPC CPU", whereas the Wii U CPU is listed as "Power-based microprocessor". While PowerPCs (and PowerENs) are all "Power-based", "Power" and "PowerPC" are two distinct product lines.

I had a recent discussion about this and honestly to be even more nitpicky (since IBM is), I pointed out that "Power" is the brand in general while "POWER" and "PowerPC" are the actual lines under "Power". They didn't use "POWER" (e.g. POWER7) so it can be assumed that the CPU is wide open for anything. This is part of the reason why I said I don't think the CPU would be easily identified as one of the lines once it's finished.

Nintendo would be incredibly stupid if they release a console only 2 to 3 times as powerful as the PS360.

here's my reasoning:

Let's say they release the Wii U in June 2012 (which is now looking less likely).

Either 720 or PS4 is very likely to launch some time in 2013, most likely Fall 2013.

So at the *most* Nintendo would have a 1.5 year head start on their competition.

Now if Sony/MS synchronize their generations and have significantly more power than the Wii U, every developer will use the 720/PS4 as their lead console when designing games.

If 720/PS4 are the regular 10 to 12x jump in power from the 360/PS3, then next gen will be a repeat of this one as Wii U will seldom get big third party titles. Developers won't want to spend the effort to release significantly stripped down versions of their titles for the Wii U, just as they didn't want to spend time and money creating downgrades for the Wii.

If that were the case, "significantly stripped down" IMO wouldn't be possible till late in Wii U's life span once devs maximize PS4/Xbox3. By then we'll be looking forward to Nintendo's new console. I still don't expect that much a huge jump due to cost. With memory, I'm expecting 3GB max with larger amounts of eDRAM for the GPU. Both Sony and MS have used eDRAM in the past

If I weren't a mod (this is the second time I've said this...) I'd ban bet my account that the Wii U is only ~2-3x more powerful than the Xbox 360/PlayStation 3. It's going to be leapfrogged, just like the Wii, but the PS4 and XboxWhatever. I firmly believe this and no amount of 'bu bu bu' speculation and rumour mongering has me convinced otherwise.

And yes, it will screw them again, just like it did on the Wii (engine scalability might save them somewhat).

I would have taken it, but how would this even be proven? Basing it on launch games would be asinine. We'd probably have to wait till PS4/Xbox3 have matured some to really see Wii U's power properly tested. I understand not feeling convinced by others, but you're working off of just as much assumption as the rest of us.

Man, I want Skyward Sword so bad, but I don't have a Wii.

I don't know if I should just get a used one now, or wait for a Wii-U? Thing is, there's no way I'm buying a Wii-U at launch if it's over $250...

You might need to prepare not to get one at launch. But I would like to know why you want that as a target?

 

[Mastperf]

Yes, so 10x the speed could net you an arguable double in detail from what we have in PS3/360.

How is that not sufficient or unrealistic. Wii U will probably have that. Hell even the Japanese Garden demo, which will be surpassed in a game for sure in some time, is indicating we're on that track.

The WiiU isn't going to be 10x the power of the 360 and ps3.

 

[Bluemercury]

People forget that the thing must include the wii u tablet controller and at least a wiimote plus.+ nunchuck.....the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

 

[EatChildren]

I would have taken it, but how would this even be proven? Basing it on launch games would be asinine. We'd probably have to wait till PS4/Xbox3 have matured some to really see Wii U's power properly tested. I understand not feeling convinced by others, but you're working off of just as much assumption as the rest of us.

I know. The only assumptions I came make are off exactly the same information, rumours and speculation everybody else is heard. But for these reasons I believe Nintendo will continue to take the relatively conservative stance with the Wii U, compared to what Microsoft and Sony deliver. I don't expect it to be quite as bad as the Wii was (comparatively), but I do think it will be worse than the PS2 was.

We'll just have to wait and see.

 

[Mastperf]

The 3ds gives me reason to believe that "good enough" is still good enough for Nintendo.

 

[Dreamwriter]

I hate to keep bringing this up, but relative system power will mean very little in the next generation. 99% of games wont come close to maxing out system power of the weakest next-gen system, and those that do tend to be first-party or platform exclusives anyways. When the Wii-U is capable of rendering Uncharted 3 and Gears of War 3 at 1080p, 60 fps, basically developers will be able to do whatever the heck they want, and will be limited MUCH MUCH more by development budget than system power.

Here's a good example of what I'm talking about: way back at the PS3 launch, Square made one of the few real PS3 demos that were actually being rendered realtime by the system: it was an amazing Final Fantasy VII demo. But when asked about it, the producer at Square who would be in charge of that game, were they to remake it, said it probably wouldn't ever happen. And the reason he gave was that the characters and world were too detailed - to make a full game at that quality would require a team of 300 people 5 years. That's a $75,000,000 budget, assuming an average salary of $50,000 a year. The only reason they were able to do what they did for the demo, was because they had already been doing super-high-detailed versions of some of those characters and environments for their CGI movie. So here we are with a system clearly powerful enough to do what the developer wanted, but a budget that's just too high. And that's just a PS3. Unless game developers as a group significantly raise their budgets next-gen, they aren't going to be limited by system power on even the weakest next-gen console.

 

[-Pyromaniac-]

I know. The only assumptions I came make are off exactly the same information, rumours and speculation everybody else is heard. But for these reasons I believe Nintendo will continue to take the relatively conservative stance with the Wii U, compared to what Microsoft and Sony deliver. I don't expect it to be quite as bad as the Wii was (comparatively), but I do think it will be worse than the PS2 was.

We'll just have to wait and see.

Throw in the fact that Sony and MS might be competition, but you better believe when it comes down to next consoles, they'll work to isolate Nintendo as much as possible in any way they can. They'll do that by releasing later once again throwing off Nintendo's timeline (though self imposed), and by being much stronger.

Nintendo pretty much has to ACE the wii-u not to fall into the same traps.

 

[bgassassin]

the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

Based on?

I know. The only assumptions I came make are off exactly the same information, rumours and speculation everybody else is heard. But for these reasons I believe Nintendo will continue to take the relatively conservative stance with the Wii U, compared to what Microsoft and Sony deliver. I don't expect it to be quite as bad as the Wii was (comparatively), but I do think it will be worse than the PS2 was.

We'll just have to wait and see.

I understand that view. My only problem in all this has been with the blatantly ignorant people who have put it down and act like the first dev kit will be the final console. It'd be like playing on a PS3 and Xbox360 with the first dev kit specs I pointed out earlier.

 

[IsntChrisL]

People forget that the thing must include the wii u tablet controller and at least a wiimote plus.+ nunchuck.....the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

You can rest easy knowing that it will not come with a Wiimote and nunchuck. The goal will be to keep prices down. Giving away a controller most already have won't do that.

 

[JasoNsider]

The WiiU isn't going to be 10x the power of the 360 and ps3.

Yes, and nobody has even defined what that means to be 10x more powerful. If you give me only double the ram I can (really, really loose example here) get you double the amount of textures or detail. That's literally 2x RAM = 2x fidelity (I'm being very loose on the calc as I know some other dev's going to try and correct this presumption but it's ballparking to get a point across ) 10x CPU? More cores? More vram?

People love throwing around numbers like wild but at the end of the day they have to realize that computer power is not such an easy thing to figure out...there are so many factors at play. Even this generation people say PS3 is more powerful than 360 on paper, but when you start crunching the code, it doesn't always appear that way.

And the most important aspect of all - doubling pipeline = doubling bandwidth in a workflow = a ton more effort on the development side. Most studios out there today are now properly set up to give you double the fidelity we have now (though many are going to feel it hard on the engineering portions in the first couple years I imagine).

Wii U will be wicked powerful enough, don't worry.

 

[Bluemercury]

You can rest easy knowing that it will not come with a Wiimote and nunchuck. The goal will be to keep prices down. Giving away a controller most already have won't do that.

i dont agree, if they dont include the wiimore + in there, then you can forget games compatible with it....

 

[Smiles and Cries]

the only real hurdle for 3rd Party support for Wii was the lack of HD it could not get direct ports of major multiplatform games

I don't think the WiiU has to prove itself with sales to get these games this time around unless Nintendo gimped the amount of RAM or something

What HD series are you guys most looking forward to that the Wii missed out on?

I would want a RED DEAD and other Rockstar games

 

[DrM]

Based on?

Probably on 'OMG tablet controller will be 80+ €/$ and that means 160 $ for rest of the hardware DOOOOM'

 

[IsntChrisL]

i dont agree, if they dont include the wiimore + in there, then you can forget games compatible with it....

Normally, I'd agree with this, but with the heavy emphasis already being placed on using the Wiimotes too, it shouldn't be lumped in the same category as an accessory introduced years into the console's life. You can bet PS2 owners would be hooking up old PS2 controllers to the PS3 as secondary controllers if there was a built in option.

 

[Daschysta]

...

The wii of all things would have gotten tons of ports, even being so weak in the hardware front if it had just included HD. The Wii-U will get plenty of 3rd party support. You guys act like the devs are part of a cabal determined to shun nintendo despite the userbase.

If anything Iwata has made it very clear that they realize that the casual audience has largely moved on via their approach with the 3DS, which has an amazing library of games coming out on it, including basically every significant selling game in japan. They are listening to 3rd parties more, and realize that the wii has floundered since the casuals moved to facebook/smartphone games. Essentially that the wii/ds strategy can't be replicated, why would they not release a powerful system like they always had pre-wii? They have FAR FAR more cash and revenue than they had following the N64, and the cube was a beast. The hardware should be very very competent.

 

[Übermatik]

I'm a bit tired of people using the "n* more powerful than y" argument. Could we be more specific? CPU clockspeeds? Total memory? GPU capabilities regarding shaders? VRAM? Etc. etc.

 

[lunchwithyuzo]

Right, but it managed to establish a large market share prior to the Wii and PS3 launch and offer a significant generational leap of hardware performance. It was a clean slate for developers and the perfect platform to build your 'next generation' games on.

Because I don't think the Wii U will be able to compete with the XboxNext and PS4 I don't think they'll be able to take advantage of a similar situation. I think the Wii U will be home to far too many ports of 360 and PS3 titles for people to really give a shit about it. I don't think people will see it as a platform a generation ahead, with a new generation of games.

Unless, of course, Nintendo plays their cards right for once. And for my sake, I hope they do.

Eh, not really. Before PS3 & Wii launched, the 360 userbase was about 5-6 million worldwide, and was routinely being outsold by PS2 in basically every region. What did play into 360's favor though was being first to market and Microsoft's exceptional tools and support (and money) playing a big part in wooing 3rd parties initially. I think there was also this notion early on that devs would build on 360, then move over to PS3 when it launched and took over, though PS3 stumbling led many to move wholly into multiplatform development (with 360 usually leading).

And don't get me wrong, I'm not at all saying Wii U is in the same position 360 was. But I'd also say Wii U is in a pretty different position from what Wii found itself in, and it's basically guaranteed to get heavy 3rd party support thanks to both ease of porting and today's multiplatform minded development industry. I think it's going to be rough sailing for ports upfront, like with PS3's early days, but if Nintendo and developers handle things well Wii U should be able to establish a sustainable market for ports. Wii U won't have to "prove itself" like PS3 didn't though for much the same reasons, another target platform spreads risk and grows audience.

 

[marc^o^]

I think the Wii U will be home to far too many ports of 360 and PS3 titles for people to really give a shit about it. I don't think people will see it as a platform a generation ahead, with a new generation of games.

Wii U has 2 objectives:
1. sell to current wii owners
2. sell to non wii owners

Objective 1 is the easiest one. First, Nintendo fans will buy Wii U. They love the franchises and they have the peripherals for it already. Based on key software sales, we can assume they are over 30 millions of them. Add to this group PS3/x360/PC owners who also bought a wii, for a few games. Multi console owners will still exist. At last, the WiiFit/Wii Sports crowd. How many of them will follow? 10-20 millions? That's the tough question. Lots have a balance board, Nintendo will play this chord. How useful the tablet will be beyond gaming will be a key question. And of course Nintendo will have to demonstrate they have the next big thing. They'll need a new killer app.

Objective 2 is a bit harder. Did SD, no online, motion gaming made buying the wii a no go for a segment of people? Will better 3rd party support and the 2 screen set up innovation prove enough to regain this crowd that was on the fence? One thing is sure, things are looking better. Then, they are new entrants: children who currently own a DS with Pokemon and Mario Kart, and who will get their first console in the next holidays. Overall you can add 10-20 millions of potential buyers in this 2nd group.

So overall you have a potential market just as big as it is this gen. Nintendo doesn't need to come up with the most advanced technology (remember the GameCube). From what I've seen what they have with Wii U will be good enough.

Simpler than that (but is it?) Nintendo will have to provide new gaming experiences, that make people laugh, be surprised or entertained.

 

[zink120]

I'm a bit tired of people using the "n* more powerful than y" argument. Could we be more specific? CPU clockspeeds? Total memory? GPU capabilities regarding shaders? VRAM? Etc. etc.

Most peoples don't event understand what more powerful really mean ... So asking for specific thing is useless.

Ex : RAM --> how many person are saying that, since DDR3 is cheap, the next consoles should have a lot of them .... without thinking of speed and size on the main board.

The CPU can be at 3.2 GHz, but the front size bus, the number of core, the cache, etc. all have a impact.

In my opinion, you are asking something useless to the discussion because powerful cannot be describe without being really specific and we don't have those information to be specific.

 

[Dreamwriter]

...

The wii of all things would have gotten tons of ports, even being so weak in the hardware front if it had just included HD. The Wii-U will get plenty of 3rd party support. You guys act like the devs are part of a cabal determined to shun nintendo despite the userbase.

Just a bit of clarification, I doubt it was the HD, it was more the lack of support for OpenGL and shaders. The Wii was just too different to develop for. Not underpowered, but different. If it had had those, it would have gotten ports of most games even without the HD, because those games had to be developed to work with SD anyways, as not all gamers have HDTV's even now. But without those, it just cost a lot of money to make a Wii version of a game, as it would have a very different code base from the other two systems.

 

[Übermatik]

Most peoples don't event understand what more powerful really mean ... So asking for specific thing is useless.

Ex : RAM --> how many person are saying that, since DDR3 is cheap, the next consoles should have a lot of them .... without thinking of speed and size on the main board.

The CPU can be at 3.2 GHz, but the front size bus, the number of core, the cache, etc. all have a impact.

In my opinion, you are asking something useless to the discussion because powerful cannot be describe without being really specific and we don't have those information to be specific.

"Wii U Speculation thread"

But yes, I agree people over use the phrase too much.

 

[blu]

No, devs will not abandon it if it's only 2-3x more powerful. See my post. That multiplier is higher than any of you guys realize. And physics simulations are not the biggest worry with this. Don't worry, devs will be happy as hell if we get 2-3 times what we have now.

In the pipelines I've been involved with or worked next to, getting 2-3 times the capibility of a 360 or PS3 would be good enough. Artists and devs together are working their ass off to fill what we already have. We're going to have to optimize our stuff no matter how much power you throw our way, but filling a pipeline 2-3 times bigger than what we have currently is still doable. Now 10x...that is laughable and, again, people should really think about the meaning behind the numbers before they throw them out.

42.

 

[bgassassin]

I hate to keep bringing this up, but relative system power will mean very little in the next generation. 99% of games wont come close to maxing out system power of the weakest next-gen system, and those that do tend to be first-party or platform exclusives anyways. When the Wii-U is capable of rendering Uncharted 3 and Gears of War 3 at 1080p, 60 fps, basically developers will be able to do whatever the heck they want, and will be limited MUCH MUCH more by development budget than system power.

Here's a good example of what I'm talking about: way back at the PS3 launch, Square made one of the few real PS3 demos that were actually being rendered realtime by the system: it was an amazing Final Fantasy VII demo. But when asked about it, the producer at Square who would be in charge of that game, were they to remake it, said it probably wouldn't ever happen. And the reason he gave was that the characters and world were too detailed - to make a full game at that quality would require a team of 300 people 5 years. That's a $75,000,000 budget, assuming an average salary of $50,000 a year. The only reason they were able to do what they did for the demo, was because they had already been doing super-high-detailed versions of some of those characters and environments for their CGI movie. So here we are with a system clearly powerful enough to do what the developer wanted, but a budget that's just too high. And that's just a PS3. Unless game developers as a group significantly raise their budgets next-gen, they aren't going to be limited by system power on even the weakest next-gen console.

I agree with this. Costs in areas beyond hardware are going to be a big factor this coming gen that will impact a lot of designing with games. I saw Carmack mention this as well. And a balance has to be struck with the cost to create a game vs what it sells at. I don't think people are willing to buy $80 games that are that high to make up for development costs.

Probably on 'OMG tablet controller will be 80+ €/$ and that means 160 $ for rest of the hardware DOOOOM'

That would be the feeling I'd get from that post.

 

[Bill Rizer]

I just hope 720p @ 60fps in all Nintendo first and second parties games. STOP.
Ah, and a decent online structure.

 

[Azure J]

People forget that the thing must include the wii u tablet controller and at least a wiimote plus.+ nunchuck.....the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

I will never understand why people keep citing this as if it's some mandate set in stone. PS360 is old hat and using it as a metric to say where Wii U stands in overall ability just reeks of willful ignorance or pessimism. Just by virtue of what we know of the system already plus some hints here and there by GAFfers in this topic, it is already expected to be more capable than both systems, full stop.

(Edited the 2X figure because the below really says everything that needs to be said on using arbitrary numbers to illustrate this point.)

Yes, and nobody has even defined what that means to be 10x more powerful. If you give me only double the ram I can (really, really loose example here) get you double the amount of textures or detail. That's literally 2x RAM = 2x fidelity (I'm being very loose on the calc as I know some other dev's going to try and correct this presumption but it's ballparking to get a point across ) 10x CPU? More cores? More vram?

People love throwing around numbers like wild but at the end of the day they have to realize that computer power is not such an easy thing to figure out...there are so many factors at play. Even this generation people say PS3 is more powerful than 360 on paper, but when you start crunching the code, it doesn't always appear that way.

And the most important aspect of all - doubling pipeline = doubling bandwidth in a workflow = a ton more effort on the development side. Most studios out there today are now properly set up to give you double the fidelity we have now (though many are going to feel it hard on the engineering portions in the first couple years I imagine).

Wii U will be wicked powerful enough, don't worry.

Wonderful post.

 

[Jorok Goldblade]

People forget that the thing must include the wii u tablet controller and at least a wiimote plus.+ nunchuck.....the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

People forget that the XBOX 720 must include the Kinect controller and at least an XBox360 pad + headset.....the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

 

[TekkenMaster]

I hate to keep bringing this up, but relative system power will mean very little in the next generation. 99% of games wont come close to maxing out system power of the weakest next-gen system, and those that do tend to be first-party or platform exclusives anyways. When the Wii-U is capable of rendering Uncharted 3 and Gears of War 3 at 1080p, 60 fps, basically developers will be able to do whatever the heck they want, and will be limited MUCH MUCH more by development budget than system power.

Here's a good example of what I'm talking about: way back at the PS3 launch, Square made one of the few real PS3 demos that were actually being rendered realtime by the system: it was an amazing Final Fantasy VII demo. But when asked about it, the producer at Square who would be in charge of that game, were they to remake it, said it probably wouldn't ever happen. And the reason he gave was that the characters and world were too detailed - to make a full game at that quality would require a team of 300 people 5 years. That's a $75,000,000 budget, assuming an average salary of $50,000 a year. The only reason they were able to do what they did for the demo, was because they had already been doing super-high-detailed versions of some of those characters and environments for their CGI movie. So here we are with a system clearly powerful enough to do what the developer wanted, but a budget that's just too high. And that's just a PS3. Unless game developers as a group significantly raise their budgets next-gen, they aren't going to be limited by system power on even the weakest next-gen console.

I thought that most 360/PS3 developers have been creating their textures and 3D models at significantly higher resolutions than is ultimately displayed in the game?

If what I've read about these development practices is true, then next gen games should look significantly better just by plugging in these higher res textures and higher polygon count character/environment models.

 

[Dreamwriter]

People forget that the thing must include the wii u tablet controller and at least a wiimote plus.+ nunchuck.....the console wont be much more powerfull than the ps3, thats for sure....

People forget that the Playstation must include a CD drive...the console won't be much more powerful than the Genesis, that's for sure...

 

[Dreamwriter]

I thought that most 360/PS3 developers have been creating their textures and 3D models at significantly higher resolutions than is ultimately displayed in the game?

If so those would be some really super wasteful stupid developers.

 

[ThatObviousUser]

I just hope 720p @ 60fps in all Nintendo first and second parties games. STOP.
Ah, and a decent online structure.

I'm moderately sure the main Wii U Mario will be 1080p and 60fps. I'm fairly certain developers won't have any trouble pulling off 720p at any fps on this rumored hardware.

^ airmchair hardware analyst that really doesn't know crap

Decent online, now that's the big question...

If you ask me, I think we might see 16 GB of flash memory built in. Not a ton, but not very little, and the specs sheet confirms USB hard drive compatibility, so storage won't be an issue if they're forward thinking with the firmware (which I'm pretty sure they were with the 3DS, as opposed to the Wii's hotpatching of SD downloaded game play support.)

In the current handheld race, Nintendo is the clear victor as far as storage goes over Sony (2 GB internal memory + bundled 2 GB SD card vs. no internal memory and no bundled, proprietary, outrageously expensive memory card.) So for storage we probably won't have to worry.

This whole wild west thing though... I hope they clear that up soon.

 

[Shin Johnpv]

. But for these reasons I believe Nintendo will continue to take the relatively conservative stance with the Wii U, compared to what Microsoft and Sony deliver.

I still don't understand how people can see how much money Sony, and MS somewhat have lost this generation, pursuing huge jumps in power, and expect them to do the same next generation.

I mean shit Sony lost all the profits of the PS1 and PS2 gens combined, pursuing a super highend system, that still graphically doesn't run circles around the 360, nor did it get them leading hardware sales which would lead to amazing software sales to actually make money. Do people still really think Sony is going to go for another round of it?

I can honestly see Sony taking a more conservative route, and really they need to. The PS1 and the PS2 were not crazy power houses, they formed the right balance of power and affordability with great software. Repeating the PS3 is not what they need to do.

Plus all the rumors have MS going with an APU design from AMD. If that's true, chances are it's not going to be a huge jump either.

I really think people need to temper their expectations from both Sony and MS next gen.

 

[ThatObviousUser]

As for comparing all the next consoles, I think one telling factor is that they'll all support the same resolution. And really, it was the resolution gap that killed cross-platform development for the Wii, I feel. The Wii was much weaker of course, but if it had been given an HD resolution output the specs would have had to have been bumped up a bit to support that well, too (especially knowing Nintendo's knack for balanced systems.) If it was HD, Wii might have truly been this gen's PS2.

But basically that applies to the upcoming generation, because I feel no matter the difference in RAM or GPU (aside from some insane, quantum differences), Wii U will get a healthy amount of cross-platform support. Also as mentioned, the engines developers have invested in this gen will merely be ramped up and tweaked for the next gen (probably) because the resolutions are the same. They won't have to start from scatch like many developers did this gen (and I believe that thankfully, the bloodflow of developers closing down will by stymied next gen because of this. HD did a number on development budgets and sales-to-profit, now it's time to re-invest that into the next generation.)

And as Shin Johnpv said, it's also somewhat probable Microsoft and/or Sony will scale back. It depends on a lot of things but I think Wii U will be better off third-party wise than the Wii was, but of course I don't have a crystal ball and I was wrong about how the Wii would work out.

 

[guek]

I mean shit Sony lost all the profits of the PS1 and PS2 gens combined, pursuing a super highend system, that still graphically doesn't run circles around the 360, nor did it get them leading hardware sales which would lead to amazing software sales to actually make money. Do people still really think Sony is going to go for another round of it?

kinda. I think sony is pretty incompetent in general.

Nintendo has had their fair share of dumb decisions in the past as well, but I really think sony is a pretty poorly run company. I think they've lost significant ground in all their markets in the last 10 years and have no idea how to fix their problems.

 

[snesfreak]

The PS4 won't be a console, it'll be a holodeck.
Literally, Sony comes and builds a holodeck in your house.
Only $599,999.99 US Dollars.
Nintendo is doomed.

 

[bgassassin]

This whole wild west thing though... I hope they clear that up soon.

Honestly, I've seen nothing to really indicate that.

I still don't understand how people can see how much money Sony, and MS somewhat have lost this generation, pursuing huge jumps in power, and expect them to do the same next generation.

I mean shit Sony lost all the profits of the PS1 and PS2 gens combined, pursuing a super highend system, that still graphically doesn't run circles around the 360, nor did it get them leading hardware sales which would lead to amazing software sales to actually make money. Do people still really think Sony is going to go for another round of it?

I can honestly see Sony taking a more conservative route, and really they need to. The PS1 and the PS2 were not crazy power houses, they formed the right balance of power and affordability with great software. Repeating the PS3 is not what they need to do.

Plus all the rumors have MS going with an APU design from AMD. If that's true, chances are it's not going to be a huge jump either.

I really think people need to temper their expectations from both Sony and MS next gen.

And there is always the remote possibility that MS does what they did with the 360. Announce a month before E3 with a launch later that year, this time to try to steal Nintendo's thunder. At first I considered a second RRoD situation, but I think they've learned from that. Something like that would affect the amount of power it could have.

 

[Zoramon089]

Right, but it managed to establish a large market share prior to the Wii and PS3 launch and offer a significant generational leap of hardware performance. It was a clean slate for developers and the perfect platform to build your 'next generation' games on.

Because I don't think the Wii U will be able to compete with the XboxNext and PS4 I don't think they'll be able to take advantage of a similar situation. I think the Wii U will be home to far too many ports of 360 and PS3 titles for people to really give a shit about it. I don't think people will see it as a platform a generation ahead, with a new generation of games.

Unless, of course, Nintendo plays their cards right for once. And for my sake, I hope they do.

So now one underpowered console means they've never been technologically comparable with the competition? *Rolls eyes*

 

[ThatObviousUser]

Honestly, I've seen nothing to really indicate that.

That's why I hope they clear it up.

 

[defferoo]

I still don't understand how people can see how much money Sony, and MS somewhat have lost this generation, pursuing huge jumps in power, and expect them to do the same next generation.

I mean shit Sony lost all the profits of the PS1 and PS2 gens combined, pursuing a super highend system, that still graphically doesn't run circles around the 360, nor did it get them leading hardware sales which would lead to amazing software sales to actually make money. Do people still really think Sony is going to go for another round of it?

I can honestly see Sony taking a more conservative route, and really they need to. The PS1 and the PS2 were not crazy power houses, they formed the right balance of power and affordability with great software. Repeating the PS3 is not what they need to do.

Plus all the rumors have MS going with an APU design from AMD. If that's true, chances are it's not going to be a huge jump either.

I really think people need to temper their expectations from both Sony and MS next gen.

The Vita next to the PSP begs to differ. It shows that Sony still pushes the envelope in terms of horsepower. Oh, smartphones are starting to run dual-core CPUs and dual-core GPUs? well, let's make a handheld with quad-core CPU and GPU. It's tough to predict what Sony will do next-gen, if they don't use Cell technology, the PS4 CPU will be very different from the PS3. I just hope the WiiU is powerful enough so that the average consumer can't tell the difference between it and the other two consoles.

 

[Shin Johnpv]

As for comparing all the next consoles, I think one telling factor is that they'll all support the same resolution. And really, it was the resolution gap that killed cross-platform development for the Wii, I feel. The Wii was much weaker of course, but if it had been given an HD resolution output the specs would have had to have been bumped up a bit to support that well, too (especially knowing Nintendo's knack for balanced systems.) If it was HD, Wii might have truly been this gen's PS2.

It wasn't the lack of supporting 720p, or 1080p that stopped devs from supporting the Wii. Because running something at a lower resolution isn't a problem. It was the lack of modern shaders, the fact that everything had to be re-coded from scratch basically, is what hurt the Wii. If it was using a modern GPU, even staying at SD resolutions, it would have gotten more big 3rd party titles. Having to start the game over from almost scratch is what killed Wii 3rd party support.

The Wii-U isn't going to have this problem, it has a modern GPU in it. It may end up a weaker GPU than what MS or Sony use, but it still supports all the same features. Since nothing major has been added to GPUs that the RV700 line couldn't do. (remember the rv700 line has a tesselator)

 

[ItWasMeantToBe19]

I'm going with the Xbox 3 only being slightly more powerful than the 360 and the PS4 being way more powerful than the PS3 then third-party support gets split between PS4 and Xbox3/WiiU with the Xbox 3 versions being superior like how Xbox versions were superior to PS2 versions. This is a complete guess, but I think Sony is still obsessed with power whereas Microsoft wants to do casual games and nongaming services that probably need a cheaper console to succeed.

 

[Shin Johnpv]

The Vita next to the PSP begs to differ. It shows that Sony still pushes the envelope in terms of horsepower. Oh, smartphones are starting to run dual-core CPUs and dual-core GPUs? well, let's make a handheld with quad-core CPU and GPU. It's tough to predict what Sony will do next-gen, if they don't use Cell technology, the PS4 CPU will be very different from the PS3. I just hope the WiiU is powerful enough so that the average consumer can't tell the difference between it and the other two consoles.

I don't think the Vita begs to differ anything. The Vita benefited from the huge amount of R&D and development that has gone into the mobile market. They're using all off the shelf parts and nothing exotic or super custom like the Cell.

I would be REALLY surprised if Sony launched another 500 - 600 dollar machine next gen. It would be suicide if they did IMHO.

We'll see how Vita does when it comes out, I think 250 bucks is too much for any hand held gaming device.

 

[Azure Dream]

The PS4 won't be a console, it'll be a holodeck.
Literally, Sony comes and builds a holodeck in your house.
Only $599,999.99 US Dollars.
Nintendo is doomed.

This would be great, except when the safeties inevitably fail like they always do.