Topic: Switchmas Eve Rumors and Speculations Thread

[ShyGuy]

I honestly wouldn't have a problem with Nintendo cheaping out if it meant an inexpensive console. $199 NX console with controller, no game.

[ThePerm]

I still feel like I only got a Wii U recently. I didn't get it at launch, I got it the following March. I say the biggest problem with Wii U was it was called Wii U. I don't know how many people I ran into that thought it was just an extra controller for Wii.  If it releases in 2017 I actually would prefer if they didn't rush it to market. I would rather it have games ready.

Hopefully, there will be a lot of games ready because there wasn't much for Wii U last year and there isn't much known this year. Nintendo has had plenty of time to make NX games. On the other hand I've become a slow burner of games. I have a huge back catalog of games to play. I have gamecube and wii games to play even. Although, I really don't think I'll get anywhere with Killer 7.

[MagicCow64]

I'm not going to read the awful-looking wallpost from that fellow, but I was mainly objecting to the Gamefaq-level "fanboy" talk. Christ, out of good faith I would like to think that anyone posting here is not doing so on that level. Dragging up nonsense Sega era stuff really has no bearing on this conversation.

I am once again chagrined at the level of pessimism on this Nintendo-focused site. I am not sanguine at all about the general state of the hobby (must be nice to give a **** about VR), but I'd like to think that Nintendo has another season in them.

[ThePerm]

I'm not going to read the awful-looking wallpost from that fellow, but I was mainly objecting to the Gamefaq-level "fanboy" talk. Christ, out of good faith I would like to think that anyone posting here is not doing so on that level. Dragging up nonsense Sega era stuff really has no bearing on this conversation.

I am once again chagrined at the level of pessimism on this Nintendo-focused site. I am not sanguine at all about the general state of the hobby (must be nice to give a **** about VR), but I'd like to think that Nintendo has another season in them.

I'd say more skepticism than pessimism. I just hope they don't do something incredibly whacky this next generation. I thought Wii U was good, but technologically it waas eclipsed by the competition in the realm of graphics. Ideally, I just want  improved Wii U. I still think the Wii U is blue ocean. I don't want Nintendo to swim in the same red ocean as the competition, but I certainly don't want them to swim in the brown or yellow ocean, I'm not sure what green ocean would imply.

[supermario2k]

I've read before as well that despite the fact that the WiiU is pretty similar similar to the 360 in raw specs, there's custom voodoo going on that allows Nintendo to deploy impressive lighting and whathaveyou without eating into main computational tasks. This would track with certain WiiU games looking very good despite the last gen baseline (and I assume ZeldaU will be duly impressive, Xenoblade with better art). I'd expect a similar scenario if the NX ends up being close on paper to the Xbone. Nintendo will be able to punch above that weight even if third parties don't bother learning the special sauce recipes.

They say this every generation, that Nintendo's hardware "limitations" can be easily overcome by magic that only Nintendo possess. It's a myth perpetuated by fanboys that don't accept reality. I remember endless discussions on how The Conduit supposedly looked better than Halo 3 and Gears of War. Sega fanboys said the same thing about the ill-fated Saturn, that nobody could program the thing properly. 30 years latter and we know this was false. The machine was hard to program for but it was also VERY WEAK hardware to begin with.

And how many years have the competition spent swimming in red ink?

Well let's see, you are comparing Sony, a company that invested billions into cell phones, computers, televisions, car audio, tech gadgets, smart tv apps, motion controls, VR, Spider-Man 3, and a whole bunch of other ****, to a company that ONLY invests as much money as they have to stay afloat?


Yeah okay Sony was in dire financial trouble but it was NEVER because of the Playstation brand. You do realize that the PS3 was only unprofitable for a couple of years, and most of that was marketing and focusing all the attention on using Blu Ray to kill off HD-DVD, or did you forget that Sony and friends had to spend 18 months throwing millions of dollars at Blu Ray to get it to the place it is?

Nintendo hasn't always cheaped out on specs, but they have always cut something gamers and developers considered essential to cut costs. Even with NES and SNES they did this but they were able to MASK that by using chips in the cartridges. Something they can't exactly do anymore can they? Maybe that is why they want to bring the carts back to bring back the FX chips to give them an edge?

This is one of the worst revisionist Sony fanboy in Mario clothing post I've ever read. Its filled with so many levels of misinformation. I think you need to read the video game industry death thread to even get a picture of how badly Sony was doing during the ps2 and ps3 years. Sure Sony sold a lot of ps2s, and right before ps4 launched finally picked up its ps3 sales, but they were making consoles and selling them at a loss for almost a decade and it was putting a big hole in their pocket so they could propogate the new video format. That being said... I'm glad they got over that hump and are doing well again.

To say Nintendo is living check to check to stay afloat is ridiculous. The company has existed since the 1800s. They save their money and don't spend it. Nintendo could survive several failed consoles.

read this article
http://www.dailytech.com/Report+Nintendo+is+Second+Most+Valuable+Company+in+Japan/article9040.htm

Nintendo did extremely well during the last generation. They sold millions and millions and millions of consoles with a high profit margin which set them up for the next few decades. As soon as Wii got in last years drought mode it was back to negative nancy Nintendo hate.

Fact is despite with Wii U apparently dead I would still rate it better than Wii. I got really well made games from Nintendo and a bunch of good 3rd party games. It's done pretty well to get me to keep playing.

and Saturn wasn't 30 years ago. I was 11 not 2. I can also tell you it was developers talking about that **** and not fanboys. Fanboys who had internet were rare. We all read magazines. Playstation was a piece of **** and so was Saturn. The idea of a video accelerator was new and was barely developed. The previous generation of hardware's focus was how many colors you could put on the screen, and how many sprites and layers could be handled.
Early Saturn games look better than early Playstation games. If they had released Shenmue on Saturn it would have surpassed  many n64 games

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foZUcPQAMvg

but Saturn's sold like **** because the Sonic game never came out. I remember looking at Toy's R Us ads and seeing thing the Sonic Xtreme adds only to have the date pushed back until it got cancelled.

also watch this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_OchOV_WDg

Well I didn't say Nintendo wasn't doing well financially. I was kind of saying it doesn't matter how much money Sony LOSt they still sold the most consoles and had the most games made.

Funny you call me a Sony fanboy, when I used to HATE playstation. Wanna know when I changed my mind, when I saw the damn Wii for what it was.

[ThePerm]

As far as being a Sony fanboy it's how you worded your compare/contrast paragraph. You imply financially Nintendo can't keep afloat, and then you say Sony was never having problem with the ps3 brand and then in the next sentence you say "ps3 was only unprofitable for a couple of years"

Even if you weren't a Sony fanboy, you seem like some sort of anti-nintendo troll or plant. I used to have a friend whose whole job was to troll games forums. So, its not out of the realm of possibility. Your name and avatar are so counter your stance on games that it seems to be sheep's clothing. You just seem to be the biggest downer on these forums with the most skewed/misinformed perspective.

We have Iansane who is really negative, but brings up good points based on sound logic. He has the information clear, he sometimes differs in opinion. Actually, I'm probably closer to an Ian than a Bill Aurion.
with Ian, over the years he has had a reputation for being really negative. He makes excellent posts however. Really thought out. He gets criticism for his negativity, but at least he has his **** together. His biggest problem this generation was he didn't have a Wii U and he would talk **** about it, and its hilarious how now that he has one, he is really warming up to it.

Then we have you whose information is all screwed up. At least with Iansane he's been around here for the last 10-15 or so years. He's been responding to the same articles and topics as I have.

This whole talk has made me want to make a documentary about n64 - early ps3 era. Ian would be a good pundit.

[Ian Sane]

I'm trying to think what sort of lower price Nintendo console I would personally be okay with.  I suppose if I could get a PS4 and NX for the price of a launch price PS4 that would be okay.  For the most part I would get both the third and first party titles I want.  Though I don't really know how different such a console would be from the Wii U.

And I actually want Nintendo to use the better hardware.  One thing that is really exciting about the new Zelda for example is we get to see what Nintendo will do with the series with HD level hardware.  We stuck around the same level for over ten years.  Skyward Sword doesn't really feel any "bigger" than Wind Waker for example.  Zelda stuck with this Gamecube level scale while the rest of the industry was expanding the scope of how just plain huge a videogame adventure could be.  Nintendo is very talented so why wouldn't I want to see what they could do with the improved hardware?  You can complain that modern AAA games are all generic but that's the whole point!  A truly talented and creative developer like Nintendo was not participating!

A negative aspect of Nintendo being more niche and less culturally relevant is that they have less of a positive influence on videogames as a whole.  A console like the Wii U that is off most people's radar is another generation of tomorrow's game developers with little to no Nintendo influence.  Pick whatever popular PS4 game you don't care for and THAT is the influence of tomorrow's devs.  If few buy Nintendo consoles then few are being influenced by Splatoon or Captain Toad or Pikmin 3 or whatever.

[nickmitch]

I think Nintendo tried to make SS feel "bigger" in the opposite way they made WW feel "bigger".  They made SS small but dense, and WW big but spaced out.  Neither technique was perfect, but I think they can find the middle ground with better hardware.

Ian makes a great point about the importance of Nintendo's influence.  Splatoon won the Game Award for best shooter (over COD and Halo, IIRC), but you're not really seeing that many new shooters trying to be different.

[Adrock]

Your consumer-focused mentality is understandable, just obscenely unreasonable.

Why is it unreasonable to expect that if company B wants to compete with company A they have to at the very least match company A's product?

You know goddamn well that isn't what I meant. You quoted one line in that entire post, cutting out the surrounding content that put it into context. Get the **** out of here with your straw man bullshit.

It is unreasonable to expect and demand powerful hardware without accepting the responsibility of having to pay a premium for said hardware.

Nintendo should at the very least offer a PS4 comparable product at the same price point.

Jebus, man... Emily Rogers' sources put NX right between PS4 and Xbox One which is exactly what you're stating here. I merely added that Nintendo really should not try to market a $400 console. $300 is the bar (if Rogers' sources are correct, $300 is probably NX's MSRP), and that's pushing it because PS4 will likely be $300 or less by the time NX launches. Do you really want to see how ugly it will get if Nintendo launches $100 or more above the competition mid-generation?

You might not think it is fair or that Nintendo has no other option but that's just how it is.  If Sony was selling supercomputers for 10 cents then that becomes the consumer expectation: 1 supercomputer for 10 cents and anyone that can't compete with that is left out in the cold.

That's a terrible analogy. That isn't a sustainable business model which was my first point. Had Sony continued on the path PS3 was originally on, Nintendo could have just waited until Sony put itself out of business. And NX at $400 like PS4 was at launch isn't going to work either because no one is going to buy it at that price for reasons that have been stated so many times before.

[Ian Sane]

Your consumer-focused mentality is understandable, just obscenely unreasonable.

Why is it unreasonable to expect that if company B wants to compete with company A they have to at the very least match company A's product?

You know goddamn well that isn't what I meant. You quoted one line in that entire post, cutting out the surrounding content that put it into context. Get the **** out of here with your straw man bullshit.

It is unreasonable to expect and demand powerful hardware without accepting the responsibility of having to pay a premium for said hardware.

Nintendo should at the very least offer a PS4 comparable product at the same price point.

Jebus, man... Emily Rogers' sources put NX right between PS4 and Xbox One which is exactly what you're stating here. I merely added that Nintendo really should not try to market a $400 console. $300 is the bar (if Rogers' sources are correct, $300 is probably NX's MSRP), and that's pushing it because PS4 will likely be $300 or less by the time NX launches. Do you really want to see how ugly it will get if Nintendo launches $100 or more above the competition mid-generation?

You're the one making these assumptions about Nintendo charging $100 more.  If the PS4 if $300 by the time the NX launches then why can't Nintendo make something on par with that and charge the same price?  And if the NX is $300 and so is the PS4 and the NX is LESS powerful despite costing the exact same price how is that going to go over?  The console comes out years later and sells for the same price point but can't match up?  Why would you assume that consumers would give Nintendo slack if on DAY ONE they're already busting out excuses and compromises like they've been doing for the last 20 years?

Assume no one gives a **** about Nintendo at best and are openly hostile towards them at worst because that's not far off.  How does Nintendo win these people over with an okayish effort with lots of "please understand"s?  They have to make a strong first impression so there can be no intentional compromises or "eh, that's good enough" attitude.  Nintendo never goes all in, always has some little compromises and cut corners, and seems to expect that people will cut them slack.  You need leverage to get people to cut you slack and Nintendo coming off a dud console has none.  We got all the same little excuses and compromises on the Cube as well and the N64 was a much more successful console than the Wii U and no one cut them slack or put up with their nonsense then.  A big chunk of the userbase had written them off and Nintendo made no real effort to try to win them back.  They wheeled out a new console that was pretty good but not great and it didn't catch on.

So if you don't care about Nintendo, or maybe outright dislike them, is a new console that is not quite able to match the competing consoles that came out years before going to win you over?  Are you going to feel that Nintendo has changed and is not going to continue to do all the annoying things that probably turned you off of them in the first place or are you going to think "they're slacking on the hardware again" and ignore them?  When Nintendo is criticized for going with underpowered hardware how they go out and do exactly that again and expect that to go over well?  If it's XB1 level then at least it isn't a gen behind but it's still playing into the hands of their critics.

[ThePerm]

I imagine the price of the console will be based on a pretty simple equation. Every system Nintendo has released has cost whatever $200 dollars was worth in 1998 increased by inflation..

[ShyGuy]

According to the CPI Inflation calculator, 200 in 1998 is now the same as $293.57, so $299.

Off topic, but jeeze, a near 50% inflation rise in 18 years? No wonder my consumer buying power is less...

[Kairon]

We have our launch price!

Actually, I was wondering about if there were separate console and handheld units at launch, if there could be some retailer bundles where you get both at once and pay like $500.

[Stogi]

We have our launch price!

Actually, I was wondering about if there were separate console and handheld units at launch, if there could be some retailer bundles where you get both at once and pay like $500.

That's what I was thinking. So essentially you'd get two controllers, a console and a handheld.

And I'd brand it all the same. I can't overstate how important that is. People need to know from the get-go that these two systems mesh with each other. No more DS and no more Wii. It needs to be _____ home system and _______ portable system.

[Wah]

Your consumer-focused mentality is understandable, just obscenely unreasonable.

Why is it unreasonable to expect that if company B wants to compete with company A they have to at the very least match company A's product?

You know goddamn well that isn't what I meant. You quoted one line in that entire post, cutting out the surrounding content that put it into context. Get the **** out of here with your straw man bullshit.

It is unreasonable to expect and demand powerful hardware without accepting the responsibility of having to pay a premium for said hardware.

Nintendo should at the very least offer a PS4 comparable product at the same price point.

Jebus, man... Emily Rogers' sources put NX right between PS4 and Xbox One which is exactly what you're stating here. I merely added that Nintendo really should not try to market a $400 console. $300 is the bar (if Rogers' sources are correct, $300 is probably NX's MSRP), and that's pushing it because PS4 will likely be $300 or less by the time NX launches. Do you really want to see how ugly it will get if Nintendo launches $100 or more above the competition mid-generation?

You're the one making these assumptions about Nintendo charging $100 more.  If the PS4 if $300 by the time the NX launches then why can't Nintendo make something on par with that and charge the same price?  And if the NX is $300 and so is the PS4 and the NX is LESS powerful despite costing the exact same price how is that going to go over?  The console comes out years later and sells for the same price point but can't match up?  Why would you assume that consumers would give Nintendo slack if on DAY ONE they're already busting out excuses and compromises like they've been doing for the last 20 years?

Assume no one gives a **** about Nintendo at best and are openly hostile towards them at worst because that's not far off.  How does Nintendo win these people over with an okayish effort with lots of "please understand"s?  They have to make a strong first impression so there can be no intentional compromises or "eh, that's good enough" attitude.  Nintendo never goes all in, always has some little compromises and cut corners, and seems to expect that people will cut them slack.  You need leverage to get people to cut you slack and Nintendo coming off a dud console has none.  We got all the same little excuses and compromises on the Cube as well and the N64 was a much more successful console than the Wii U and no one cut them slack or put up with their nonsense then.  A big chunk of the userbase had written them off and Nintendo made no real effort to try to win them back.  They wheeled out a new console that was pretty good but not great and it didn't catch on.

So if you don't care about Nintendo, or maybe outright dislike them, is a new console that is not quite able to match the competing consoles that came out years before going to win you over?  Are you going to feel that Nintendo has changed and is not going to continue to do all the annoying things that probably turned you off of them in the first place or are you going to think "they're slacking on the hardware again" and ignore them?  When Nintendo is criticized for going with underpowered hardware how they go out and do exactly that again and expect that to go over well?  If it's XB1 level then at least it isn't a gen behind but it's still playing into the hands of their critics.

Girls, Girls you're both fabulous,
not as much as me though!

[Evan_B]

There are obviously people who do give a **** about Nintendo, Ian. That includes yourself, despite your hate-hate relationship persona.

[Adrock]

You're the one making these assumptions about Nintendo charging $100 more.

The only assumption I've made about Nintendo charging more is that it'd be a bad idea. Nintendo isn't in a good enough market position to do so.

If the PS4 if $300 by the time the NX launches then why can't Nintendo make something on par with that and charge the same price?

Come on, man. That's what I've been saying. Again, Kimishima has already stated that NX will not sell at a loss so no razor and blade business mode. And again, Emily Rogers' sources put NX between Xbox One and PS4 which are generally on par with each other. PS4 is a little more powerful and the games have slightly better frame rates and textures, but the differences are negligible for most games unless you're looking at a Digital Foundry comparison. That said, I expect a NX to be priced similarly to PS4 and Xbox One when it launches unless Sony and Microsoft decide to undercut Nintendo at the last minute. They can slash the price, and Nintendo really can't.

And if the NX is $300 and so is the PS4 and the NX is LESS powerful despite costing the exact same price how is that going to go over?

Depends on how much less powerful. Better than Xbox One but worse than PS4? I don't think it'd matter. Obviously, NX would be able to handle multiplatform games then the question is a matter of whether Nintendo can convince publishers to support NX which is the same exact problem as if NX was more powerful than PS4.

[BlackNMild2k1]

I didn't read most of what's being said in here, and I'm not apologizing for that, but I just wanted to chime in on this.

If the PS4 if $300 by the time the NX launches then why can't Nintendo make something on par with that and charge the same price?

Yields. (1 of likely several reasons)
PS4 has had years to push yields and get price points down. Nintendo would be on a new chip, and even though they may have decent yields... it's still a new chip at new chip pricing.

.........I will now lurk back into the shadows.

[ThePerm]

For a new chip it would still could be more powerful that ps4.  We have to take into account profit margin from the supplier, and also a few other things making parts cheaper for the board. Board and price optimization is an art.

My assessment is NX will be to PS4/XBOXONE what Wii was to Gamecube. Better, but not super better.

Does anybody find it unusual the ps4 and xbone use a graphics processor labeled GCN? If anyone remembers ATI designed the Gamecube chips and that was their big project. When AMD took over ATI the ATI people became the upper management. Nintendo may have put Wii U out and planned to suspend it to take advantage of a future ATI processor upgrade cycle.

Maybe what will separate nx from the ps4 and xboxone will be its cpu, which could be a radically different design. They might stick with IBM for their processor. IBM has been making all sorts of new processors and memory upgrades
lately.

its all speculation though, we won't know until later, and it will likely still be secret when the console is released.

[supermario2k]

As far as being a Sony fanboy it's how you worded your compare/contrast paragraph. You imply financially Nintendo can't keep afloat, and then you say Sony was never having problem with the ps3 brand and then in the next sentence you say "ps3 was only unprofitable for a couple of years"

Even if you weren't a Sony fanboy, you seem like some sort of anti-nintendo troll or plant. I used to have a friend whose whole job was to troll games forums. So, its not out of the realm of possibility. Your name and avatar are so counter your stance on games that it seems to be sheep's clothing. You just seem to be the biggest downer on these forums with the most skewed/misinformed perspective.

We have Iansane who is really negative, but brings up good points based on sound logic. He has the information clear, he sometimes differs in opinion. Actually, I'm probably closer to an Ian than a Bill Aurion.
with Ian, over the years he has had a reputation for being really negative. He makes excellent posts however. Really thought out. He gets criticism for his negativity, but at least he has his **** together. His biggest problem this generation was he didn't have a Wii U and he would talk **** about it, and its hilarious how now that he has one, he is really warming up to it.

Then we have you whose information is all screwed up. At least with Iansane he's been around here for the last 10-15 or so years. He's been responding to the same articles and topics as I have.

This whole talk has made me want to make a documentary about n64 - early ps3 era. Ian would be a good pundit.

Well I am sorry you feel that way but screw you. First of all I usually post in gest you should fucking know that by now dude I been posting the same way for over a god damn decade. Second of all, I love Nintendo, I just don't give them a free pass and I hate how you have to include their handheld in the discussion. We are not talking about the success of the COMPANY we are talking about the success of the MACHINE.
SONY might have been unprofitable as a company but all of their Playstation consoles sell to the market's expectations, Nintendo does not, how is that not sound logic it's a god damn fact!

[Evan_B]

If market expectations result in unprofitable business practices, the. I'm not sure I want to live on this planet anymore.

[Ian Sane]

There are obviously people who do give a **** about Nintendo, Ian. That includes yourself, despite your hate-hate relationship persona.

Of course there are but that's probably around the size of the Wii U userbase and if Nintendo can't attract beyond that existing userbase why even replace the Wii U?  For the last 20 years the view of Nintendo consoles from the perspective of those outside the Nintendo fanbase is that they're for kids and Nintendo fans (and casuals during the Wii years) and if you're not in those groups there is no point in owning one.  Nintendo needs to break beyond that.  The other guys just make videogames consoles for people that want to play videogames.  That's what Nintendo needs their consoles to be... unless they truly feel that kids and Nintendo fans can support them by themselves but I think the Wii U shows that isn't the case.

[ThePerm]

part of the branch autonomy thread highlights something that needs to be addressed. Nintendo wants to make its consoles in ways that would revitalize the Japanese game market. This does not work world wide, and in fact the sales were also mostly foreign. Hopefully NX is branded well in North America, and NOA gets a stronger ability to broker deals to get games made.

[NWR_insanolord]

A closer link between the handheld and console versions would help them both in Japan and in the west. It consolidates software support, strengthening the library of each model.

[Kairon]

It goes without saying that Nintendo needs to sell more hardware than the Wii U, but the deeper question is to what end?

If Nintendo was like any other company, then it'd simply be to make more money. Not that Nintendo will say "no" to more money, finances are a HUGE driving force behind their thinking.

Instead, I propose that if Nintendo wants to succeed in the role that some proscribe to them, that of a game maker who is influential through innovation, uniqueness, and high quality, then a larger market presence is naturally required so that they can create conditions for that innovation not just for themselves, but for other game makers, and so that they can reach an audience who will be inspired and carry on those values in their own work elsewhere.

Now the problem would be defining at what level they might achieve that. "Somewhere between the bottom console and total world domination" is simply too broad a range to be useful. The Wii U was obviously too small relative to its market and environment, Nintendo's ability to exercise its values are constrained under those numbers. Likely the GameCube's userbase and demographic reach is likely too small as well.

What about the N64, and it's 33 million units shipped versus the PlayStation's 120 million units shipped? If the Wii U enjoyed a similar marketshare in this generation it would have sold.... about 14 million units... so maybe not? Yet the N64 and its software library was highly influential in so many ways despite the userbase ratio it experienced.

Perhaps there's a magic number at some point, like 35 million consoles, at which the user base is large enough in gross terms that marketshare might be irrelevant. That's a low mark to hit fiscally, obviously Nintendo's money counters want to sell more than that and return to Wii-like levels of profitability.

But for the sake of argument, IF Nintendo could make oodles of money at 35 million hardware units sold, AND garnered visible-if-not-complete third-party support, would 35 million hardware units sold give it enough of a platform to freely exercise their ambitions, make the games they want, and inspire a whole new generation of players?

To be clear, its likely that anyone at Nintendo who proposed a plan to sell only 35 million hardware units over the life of the NX would be fired on the spot. But aside from the strictures of ambition, would that number be enough to achieve the specific goals we proscribe to them, and if not, what? Keep in mind that the current gen of home consoles (Wii U, PS4, XBox One) have only sold around 72 million hardware units cumulatively up to this point.