Topic: SPECIAL: Takeshi Shimada's GDC 2007 Presentation

[TheYoungerPlumber]

You can talk about Takeshi Shimada's GDC 2007 Presentation here.  

[UltimatePartyBear]

Very interesting.

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Since the game often only expects one among a handful of words to be spoken, they also implemented a ranking system—the voice sample is compared against all words, and if one of the two closest matches is the correct answer, the answer is considered correct.

That explains why almost anything you say sets off the "glasses glasses" thing on the title screen.  I had taken that as a sign that the voice recognition was fairly primitive.  I'm glad to see that I was wrong.

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He also noted that his group is working on easy-to-incorporate fur-shading middleware....

That makes me wonder what Nintendo needs the fur-shading code for, exactly.  Is it like the voice and handwriting recognition, in that they know it'll be useful someday, or is it already being used in a game?  I'm drawing a blank on what game it could be for.  It's too early for me.

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NCL is also looking into the utility of text-to-speech for Wii.

That makes a microphone attachment seem all the more likely.  Hooray!

I was always under the impression that Nintendo didn't share much in the way of middleware with third parties.  Is that something they've changed recently, or was the reputation undeserved?

[TheYoungerPlumber]

Uuuuh, no, text-to-speech means a computer reading text out loud.  No microphone required there.  Personal predictions: fur-shading would be for Nintendogs/Nintencats on Wii and text-to-speech would be for Animal Crossing on Wii.

[TeamQJ]

Hello, just thought I'd give you the courtesy of letting you know that I used your article as the source for my article over at QJ.NET's Wii and Nintendo DS sections. Your coverage of Shimada's talk was an eye-opener, and I just had to write about it.

I waste so much of my daily life playing Brain Age, so I was really impressed to learn that the development team was able to get the game done in only a few months.

And the news of more middleware and development environments for the Wii is good news. You know how people sometimes criticize the Wii as being just a fad - well, the Wii won't be "just" a fad if good games continue to be made for it, and efficient game development tools should help that along. It's nice to see even MORE forward thinking and clear foresight from Shimada's team, don't you agree?

- Max F.  

[UltimatePartyBear]

Crap.  I read that backwards.  Told you it was too early.

[MegaByte]

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Originally posted by: PartyBear
Very interesting.
That makes me wonder what Nintendo needs the fur-shading code for, exactly.  Is it like the voice and handwriting recognition, in that they know it'll be useful someday, or is it already being used in a game?  I'm drawing a blank on what game it could be for.  It's too early for me.

Perhaps they are working on libraries for their TEV unit, so that we will actually see third parties start using shaders.

Anyway, sounds like an interesting talk (a little more technical than the other Nintendo talks), and wish I could have been there as well as... the other place I was.

[Djunknown]

Very impressive. This man should make more public appearances.

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and wish I could have been there as well as... the other place I was.

Sounds like you were going to let something slip. Its okay we won't tell anybody in person

Well, we won't tell anybody else