Topic: Wii U Must Support An Equivalent of Direct X 11/Open GL 4.2

[Hyawatta]

If you look up the specs for any next-generation game engine you will see that there is at least one thing they all have in common, Direct X 11/Open GL 4.2 support. The only other major commonality seems to be a focus on multiprocessor (around 20 processors) support. Rallying support for an equivalent of Direct X 11/Open GL 4.2 functionality is likely much more feasible than asking Nintendo to add a 20-core processor to the Wii U.

If the Wii U releases without support for an equivalent of DirectX 11/OpenGL 4.2, then it would be in a similar situation as the 3DS releasing without a second slide pad. Except I don't think an expansion would be able to fix it.

It seems fairly obvious that the next generation development efforts are based around DirectX 11/OpenGL 4.2 functionality (Feel free to include any engines that I may have left out):

Epic Games' Unreal Engine 4
id Software's id Tech 6
Crytek's CryENGINE 4
DICE's Frostbite 3
Techland's Chrome Engine 6
CD Projekt's RED Engine 2
Capcom's MT Framework 3
Square-Enix's Luminous Engine
Valve's Source Engine

I can’t emphasize enough how critical this is. As long as the Wii U can support DirectX 11/OpenGL 4.2 level functionality and features, it should be able to compete with the new systems that Microsoft and Sony will eventually release. Of course the Wii U can run ports of games developed for the PS3 and 360, but the Wii U's ability to run the next-gen engines, at their full capability, will secure its position as a viable console for developers to release their future multiplatform games onto during the upcoming generation of consoles.

If the Wii U can handle the next-gen game engines that require a DirectX 11/OpenGL 4.2 level of functionality and features, then it will enjoy the multiplatform support that the PS3 and 360 had. If the Wii U cannot run the next-gen engines, then it will suffer from having a similar level of multiplatform support that the Wii had.

[ThePerm]

or something, whether it supports it or not it will have processors beefier then a ps3's, and a ton more ram according to what devs say. Will it support it? Maybe, Maybe not. It won't be like the Wii though,  what it will be is first out of the gate though. Epic has mentioned they are pleased with the system specs though so, that is some sort of indication. Also, cross id support off from the beginning. id doesn't share its engines anymore. If they want to port something they can though. Also, Valves source engine already runs on ps3 and xbox 360...its not a next gen game engine.

[Ceric]

Correct me if I'm wrong but, I'm fairly sure Nintendo normally supports OpenGL.

[ThePerm]

yeah, im betting it supports one of the newer ones out of the box, and Im also betting it can always firmware update openGL.  OpenGL is just an API, its the middle man in the graphics pipeline. Or at least thats how i seem to understand it.

also is there a reason why this was posted on every nintendo forum?

[Ian Sane]

If Nintendo is going to really **** something up on the Wii U, this will be it.  This is strictly a third party support issue and Nintendo is just utterly oblivious at how to appeal to third parties.  Last gen's third party support was a disaster because the industry was moving in the direction of multiplatform support and Nintendo designed the Wii to be the exact opposite of that.

There is also another factor in play here.  All but two of those engines listed are Western.  Nintendo is oblivious to anything outside of Japan.  Miyamoto and Iwata have probably never heard of the Unreal Engine because nobody in Japan uses it.  Who in NCL's hardware design team is going to note that Unreal Engine needs to be supported?  The xenophobia issue is something that affects most Japanese companies so I'm not just picking on Nintendo here.  They actually pay more attention to the West then a lot of other Japanese companies but they still are always thinking with the Japanese market in mind.  Twilight Princess is a big success here but less so in Japan so they're all disappointed.  The American sales meant nothing.  You list off all the big games that use Unreal Engine and they'll shrug them off as American games that have no sales potential in Japan.

[ThePerm]

seriously, this shouldn't affect the system at all. Even if Nintendo only supported OpenGL 3.0 thats like saying

Imagine OpenGL is a spoken language, and your an English speaking company, but your boss speaks russian, but speaks it with the hippest new slang.

and it has to be translated into English which will the instruct employees on how to do their operations, you have to hire an interpreter. One of the interpreters(interpreter 1) is pretty good with the new slang, while the other one(interpreter 2) knows some recent slang, but is missing out on some of the newer lingo. Interpreter number 2 was hired first and he has a contract so he'll have to do. to begin with who knew about interpreter 1 because he is still just a noob? He's only been working since august 8th. Now the company won't start production till the end of 2012 so theres still time to decide if interpeter 2 is going to stay with the company or whether to switch to the more qualified interpreter 1. Either way it is still possible to make all the products with interpreter 2 as long as some extra work is done as it isn't really a big deal. Also, not to mention the fact that interpreter 1 might be more versed in the slang then even the boss, which could confuse the boss for a couple of months.

Either way i see ATI as handling this one anyhow.

[Ceric]

I think a more apt example would be if 1 translator knew Russian and a bit of the industry.  While Translator 2 knew Russian and was steeped in the terminology and nuances specific to your industry.  In general Translator 1 is fine but less mistakes be made and you be capable of more with Translator 2 because they could give it to you at the granularity  you needed.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Well, to my knowledge, what this basically boils down to(I'm sure I've posted this before) is that Wii U's GPU needs hardware support for advanced Tessellation.

I believe that was the major difference between DX10/OGL3.x & DX11/OGL4.2.

Another feature that the Wii U must have hardwired is Global Illumination. Mix that with your advanced Tesselator (both built in features) and Wii U should be a beast of a machine that produces results good enough to stand up to anything that Xbox720/PS4 can produce... atleast well enough to receive a port.

Hardware Tessellation & Global Illumination mixed in with all the other effects boosted by a factor of 3 will make for more realistic graphics beyond what is seen on today's machines.

Fortunately for us, the Zelda demo @ E3 showed some impressive lighting and that was only coming from a 1st gen pre-alpha Dev Kit. It should only get better from there, especially since it's kinda rumored that Nintendo has been tweeking the stats UP with each subsequent dev kits due in part by feedback from Dev's on the kind of things they are trying to accomplish with the hardware.

My guess is (based on a recent comment) that EA has been pushing for speced out PC ports @ 1080p to NxtGen machines, BF3 specifically. If Wii U can achieve that, then I think they will be more than alright.

[MegaByte]

I am a little worried about this. GC and Wii use GX, something similar to OpenGL, but it's not real OpenGL, so any middleware has to be rewritten (and the fixed-function TEV units make things even more difficult, which is why most middleware-based software looks like crap).

The 3DS uses OpenGL ES 1.1 (the mobile version) plus custom shaders, rather than the more modern OpenGL ES 2.0, which means middleware programmers again will have to make a customized version.

If the Wii U is based on the R700 series of chips as reports have suggested, that would indicate support for DirectX 10.1 SM 4.1 (only Microsoft actually uses DirectX)/OpenGL 3.3 - several revisions back. Still, supporting OpenGL and programmable shaders is already a huge leap from what they have now. They'd have to make big changes to silicon to support new features (with any reasonable speed), and trying to tack those on defeats the cost benefit of going with older tech in the first place.

[Chozo Ghost]

Hopefully the developers have been putting pressure on Nintendo about this, and more importantly hopefully Nintendo has given them what they asked for.

[NWR_insanolord]

The specific tech it supports isn't as important as whether developers are happy with what it does, and so far the system has gotten a lot of positive reactions from developers who never had anything nice to say about the Wii.

[Hyawatta]

also is there a reason why this was posted on every nintendo forum?

I hope that Nintendo employees read through these forums to help get an idea of what the consumers want from the Wii U. There are some critical issues that, if we can address them now, may save Nintendo some trouble down the line. Imagine if the 3DS forums made a big deal about adding a second circle pad, and then the system actually released with them at launch because of the points made on the forums. Let's do this for Direct X 11/Open GL 4.2 support for the Wii U. A man can dream can't he?

[MegaByte]

The specific tech it supports isn't as important as whether developers are happy with what it does, and so far the system has gotten a lot of positive reactions from developers who never had anything nice to say about the Wii.

I partially disagree with this because what looks nice to the developers now (bringing things up a little further than the current status quo) may not look so nice once they are actually developing on it and each system is competing for their development resources. And remember, most things we've heard from developers so far are either Nintendo-approved and/or from a limited set of people based on early access or second-hand knowledge.

[Stogi]

I haven't read all the posts but didn't the team that is making Darksiders 2 say that it took no time to get it running on Wii U. Doesn't that confirm some sort of continuity?

[MegaByte]

It means that the hardware generally supports whatever PS3/360 supports. This discussion is about supporting more advanced features than that.

[Stogi]

Ahh so this discussion is basically if Nintendo is going to future proof the Wii U?

My guess is 'kinda'. I posted my theory in another thread but basically what it boiled down to is Nintendo will be the weakest of the next generation consoles, but their generation won't last as long as Sony's or Microsoft's. They will be able to once again leap frog their competition midway into their lives....if they wanted to.

The hardest years for Nintendo will be the first few years of NextBox and PS4's lives. If they can future proof it just enough that games can be easily downscaled, then they do not have a problem.

But honestly, I do not think Nintendo cares what the competition is doing or going to do. They don't have to support anything. What they need to focus on is selling their gimmick (in the positive connotation). A second screen is an awesome idea. If they can flesh it out (hopefully with support for multiple Tablets) and bring out another Wii Sports, they will be just fine.

[ThePerm]

also is there a reason why this was posted on every nintendo forum?

I hope that Nintendo employees read through these forums to help get an idea of what the consumers want from the Wii U. There are some critical issues that, if we can address them now, may save Nintendo some trouble down the line. Imagine if the 3DS forums made a big deal about adding a second circle pad, and then the system actually released with them at launch because of the points made on the forums. Let's do this for Direct X 11/Open GL 4.2 support for the Wii U. A man can dream can't he?

they don't. They are Japanese, and NOA isn't a develper, they are a warehouse with a marketing department.  Even if a 1st party subsidiary said something theres only a 40% chane NCL will listen. We're luck retro said something, otherwise there would be no nunchucku.

also im pretty sure anyone could write a shareware(for developers) bridge program that understands opengl 4.2 if opengl 4.2 isn't supported. Some resources would have to be used to run it(unless someone pre-"renders" the code. I'm guessing most openGL stuff isn't too different. Its software middleman code. Whats important is what the hardware can do. I guess it all boils down to how lazy developers get, but converting code is something that can be automated. So if it isn't included theres an easy fix, but it likely will.

[Ceric]

also is there a reason why this was posted on every nintendo forum?

I hope that Nintendo employees read through these forums to help get an idea of what the consumers want from the Wii U. There are some critical issues that, if we can address them now, may save Nintendo some trouble down the line. Imagine if the 3DS forums made a big deal about adding a second circle pad, and then the system actually released with them at launch because of the points made on the forums. Let's do this for Direct X 11/Open GL 4.2 support for the Wii U. A man can dream can't he?

they don't. They are Japanese, and NOA isn't a develper, they are a warehouse with a marketing department.  Even if a 1st party subsidiary said something theres only a 40% chane NCL will listen. We're luck retro said something, otherwise there would be no nunchucku.

Hey, They also have a Translation Service.

[ThePerm]

lol, yeah the middlemen is going to scower the internet and bring issues up. No, for NCL to read that and care they would have to do it first hand. Translators only translate the things the client is interested in.

[MegaByte]

also im pretty sure anyone could write a shareware(for developers) bridge program that understands opengl 4.2 if opengl 4.2 isn't supported. Some resources would have to be used to run it(unless someone pre-"renders" the code. I'm guessing most openGL stuff isn't too different. Its software middleman code. Whats important is what the hardware can do. I guess it all boils down to how lazy developers get, but converting code is something that can be automated. So if it isn't included theres an easy fix, but it likely will.

There is a reason that you have to wait for new graphics card lines to get new OpenGL features -- the older hardware either can't do it, or isn't optimized to do it with usable speed. You can't magically enable it in software. There is no easy fix.

[ThePerm]

Megabyte, i figure at best that Nintendo always uses custom chips, and they dont use OpenGL or DirectX, as you said above they use GX which is designed for their custom cards. While not being the same has allowed it to have features that are not openGl compliant, it basically is always like a pretty cousin of OpenGL. Judging from Nintendo's history in implementing these things they always create chips that have weird features that are really cool and helpful. So it always takes some work to get things running, but it is usually capable if doing most if not all features hardware wise.
The GPU of the Wii U is supposed to be similar to a radeon r770 gpu, which is in the 4000 series, open gl 4.2 is supported by the Radeon 5000 series and the Wii U is a custom chip, So, its likely it can handle it. at worst it will use an open GL 3.3 equivelent. Looking it up 3.3 has the same functionality of 4.0 but for chips designed for 3.2. As always everything not included can be done in software and ran by the cpu with some work.

the thing that trumps this is that ps3 and xbox 360 don't support open GL 4.2, and all indications are that their successors won't be out till 2013, unless something changes at e3. This means Nintendo will have the lead system on the market. Developers are more apt to release games on a new more powerful platform even if its not they're favorite platform, so likely there will be some good middle-ware written by the time the newer systems come out. Its the advantage Ps2 had by being first. When ps4 and Xbox720 come out it will have the most market share. Not only that based on current announcements I think the perception of Nintendo, and  Wii U will be pretty positive after next years e3. The games they are pushing are popular with the "mature" crowd. There will be more. Nintendo hasn't even passed out the money hats yet, and likely next year is when we'll know about the Nintendo titles and the secret 3rd party titles that will make an impact.

[MegaByte]

The thing is, Nintendo's previous GPU was originally designed before OpenGL/DirectX were standardized on consoles. It wouldn't make much sense nowadays to create custom a custom API or major custom extensions -- if they were adding something like tessellation, it would be easier to just use a more modern chip design since that's not something you can just tack on as a separate piece. There are major pieces of 4.0 missing from 3.3, and that doesn't even consider 4.1 and 4.2 (this includes things that make non-graphics stuff like physics work better). Also, the customization for the Wii GPU involved embedding a security and I/O component -- it didn't add any major graphical features. If the leaked specs are correct, by the time the Wii U comes out, it will actually be 3 PC generations behind in graphics (as opposed to 6 with the Wii).

[BlackNMild2k1]

One thing you can't forget is that the HD5000 & HD6000 are both based on the initial design of the HD4000 series. So a fully customized HD4000 based chip could end up more like an HD5000 or HD6000 than anything in just the HD4000 series.

and like I said before, to my understanding(calling it limited would be an overstatement), the biggest difference between the 4000 series and the 6000 series are advanced Tessellators... well actually tessellators at all I think, and that is the major new feature for DX11, so if they add support for advanced Tessellators to the GPU then Wii U really shouldn't have much to worry about, especially not with a 1+yr lead on the competition who won't have any new features to add that the Wii U couldn't also do in some capacity.

[MegaByte]

Like I said, if they were going to add that stuff, then they would have based the chip off the newer designs, not the HD4000 series. It's a pretty safe bet that those features will not be included. Keep in mind that nowadays, you have an entire industry helping to develop these standards... everything was still fragmented the last time Nintendo worked on a new GPU design, so custom stuff was a given. It is not anymore (custom stuff still has a place in mobile due to things like power constraints, but those should eventually evaporate).


What they are probably talking about when they mention customization is the embedded co-processor that the Wii had, the necessary interface to whatever memory system Nintendo chooses to use, the number of shader cores, and possibly something to make the wireless screen transmission more efficient (if that isn't handled elsewhere). If you look at the other consoles, the memory interface and the number of cores are essentially the only things that are customized.

[ThePerm]

Well, if they can get a cheaper price with the same functionality then thats the goal. Doing some round about deals with making custom chips is a good way to get performance at lower costs.  Wii isn't a good example because it was a glorified gamecube, but gamecube was able to be made at low cost with comparable power to the xbox, and with features that weren't in graphic cards yet.