Messages

26

Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii Successor and Glassess Free 3D: How Will It Work?

« on: August 09, 2010, 05:42:38 PM »

That's not true.  Solid State memory like flash and SSD type things are WAY more durable than regular Hard Drives.

That's why new laptops are starting to come with them exclusively.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii Successor and Glassess Free 3D: How Will It Work?

« on: August 09, 2010, 05:25:08 PM »

No it's disc-based because of that large disc drive that's in it.  Whether VC or WiiWare games use it is immaterial.

I'm actually worried that Nintendo may end up having to keep the disc drive for BC in the Wii successor.  And if they do, they should try as hard as they can to hide it off to the side like they did with the GC controller ports.  They wouldn't want their customers jamming the carts that will hopefully be the new medium into the Disc Drive, which will have a bigger presence on the front of the system.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii Successor and Glassess Free 3D: How Will It Work?

« on: August 09, 2010, 05:04:36 PM »

The interface is fine.  It will get tweaked and improved but I'd be surprised if they spent much time on it.  It's not really an important part of the system anyway.  If anything, it should be made as streamlined as possible so that getting to the game is quick and easy.  Maybe even have an option to bypass the Menu altogether like the DS has, so you only access the menu when you feel like it.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii Successor and Glassess Free 3D: How Will It Work?

« on: August 06, 2010, 10:44:11 PM »

Though, wouldn't this still cost more to manufacture than whatever type of disc that Sony and Microsoft's next machine will likely use? It may not be very much more, but more is more.

I'm banking on it reducing in price so much that it's negligible, and that 8-16 GB is somewhat of a plateau for what games really need as far as capacity, with a special 32GB Square Enix Option (the 32 GB one will be more expensive, and thus should only be used for the most epic of epics. But even so would dramatically drop in price by the end of next year.)  I mean of course, they could come out with a new disc that holds 200 GB but what would be the point?

While higher capacity is neat on paper, you don't actually "feel" the higher capacity when you play a game, do you?  It's just sort of a fact you see on the back of the box or on a Press release.  But what you DO feel is the loading times.  If Nintendo is able to get a 16GB cart that's affordable by the end of next year, they'll have a distinct advantage, IMO, because your average consumer will notice the reduced loadtimes a lot more than they'll notice capacity.  This isn't the N64 days where the disc medium has almost ten times the capacity.

Think of it like the DS vs. the PSP   When the DS started out, the starting size of the Cards was something like 8-64 MB, later expanding as high as 512 MB, though not many games used it.  This was vs. 1.9 GB that the PSP offered day one.  The reason that PSP media lost was due to a critical misunderstanding of the types of games required for handheld devices.  Loading times are a no-no, as well as the power consumed by it being reliant on an electric motor.

However, it is my opinion that these are not just problems on a handheld, but game problems in general.  If Nintendo were to offer a solution that presented HD games at 60 fps (due to falling GPU compnent prices) with a starting capacity of 8 or 16 GB and have them load instantaneously, it would definitely make a larger impact on consumers than more numbers on a spreadsheet.

And so I could see third-parties complaining about the higher cost of it.

Two things, one good and one bad.

Good: I am of the opinion that third parties will accept a cart standard, seeing as they have no problem with the DS's or 3DS.  That could be because of Nintendo's dominance and the "When in Rome" mentality, butit's not liek they are pining for loadtimes and discs on the handheld front.

Bad:  It is entirely possible that Nintendo could make a console that suits every need and has no flaw, and certain third parties would still complain (suspiciously very publicly and loudly)about whatever it is that they will complain about next gen, be it "carts," "kiddy," "casual," Nintendo-fanboys-only-buy-Nintendo-games, they're Japanese, etc.  so it wouldn't really be in their best interest to kowtow to certain third parties who probably won't develop for them, ever, under any circumstance.  Better to bring something that would please current and potential customers and revolutionize game functionality and hope a high userbase will work this time around.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii Successor and Glassess Free 3D: How Will It Work?

« on: August 06, 2010, 05:40:36 PM »

Oh I agree.  Retail's not going anywhere until manufacturers figure out a way to digitally distribute their consoles.  WalMart and GameStop and whoever else are not going to sell the rope that hangs them so they will at best be biased against DD-only system and at worst demand the manufacturer pay them a "tribute" based on how much money they expect to lose from never seeing those customers again.

And download codes inside a game box are indeed the worst consumer product ever imagined.  It's all the worst parts of physical media and all the worst parts of DD all in one idiotic idea.  Gone is the convenience of not leaving your home, gone is the instant gratification of a physical game!  If the next consoles use DD and have that as their means of retaining retail space, the low-information consumers are going to be confused and/or angry.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Wii Successor and Glassess Free 3D: How Will It Work?

« on: August 06, 2010, 04:48:04 PM »

That analyst is retarded and so is anybody else who expects Nintendo to "32X" their own userbase with some kind of mild increase in specs or abilities.

I'm gonna ignore all the jabber about how it's Nintendo's fault they've got bad third party support because they had the audacity to innovate controls and because third parties can't sell anything on Wii due to their own horrible reputations.  We've had this argument before, and that was the losing side, mainly because all competitors are now aping said controls and a certain Wall of Shame made it plain as day that third parties, even the major ones, flooded the Wii market with crap which hurt their own positions and reputations.  Unless Nintendo pointed guns at their heads and said "make garbage or I'll shoot you," then that's on them.

Anyway about the Wii successor...

A whole back I made a link between something Iwata said at E3 2006 about load times:

I am busier, busier than ever and if I have to wait 30 seconds or 40 seconds or more for a game to load, often, I get frustrated. And sometimes, I just can not wait. And now that I know I can instantly stop or start playing my DS by just closing or opening the top, I think I am spoiled.

This got me to thinking that the next console will ditch discs in favor of a cartridge or specialized SD card that ranges from 8-32GB, which will have a "large enough" capacity for all those mega epics and HD art assets, yet be small enough so that developers can use only what they need.  Solid State ROMs like that are falling in price rapidly, as evidenced by Nintendo's use of a card that has a 2GB maximum capacity at launch for the 3DS.  The sizes I propose should be cheap enough to buy in bulk in one and a half years.

But, that got me to thinking about loading speed in general, and how Nintendo could design a console that completely eliminates all forms of loading times, by utilizing both carts/cards and a 16, 32, or (hopefully cheap enough by then) 64 GB Solid State drive as the storage solution (This is already what the Wii has, really.  It's just really tiny.)  This allows for lighting fast read/write speeds compared to Hard disk and a generally more pleasant user experience as they never need to see a loading bar again.

Now sure, the size will be considered rather "puny" in 2011-2012 when I'm sure the PS4 and Xbox 3 will be looming with the possible promise of 2 terabyte hard drives to support a push for digital distribution.  But Nintendo will not abandon retail models just yet.  IN fact, if they remain the only video game console in retail stores that also sells games, they would have a significant advantage.  Imagine walking into a Walmart/Gamestop and walking up to their case or wall of games and seeing that only 3DS and Wii2 games are even on the shelf, despite the Xbox 3 and the PS4 also being sold in the same store.  Who will Walmart and Gamestop like more?  A console that, once sold, basically guarantees you will never see that person again, or a console which ensures more foot traffic and sales?

This actually leaves their competition in somewhat of a pickle.  They could go full DD get the benefit of saving money on retail products, but then they would cede a gargantuan retail market to a competitor.  If they try a hybrid approach, they'll find it's actually more expensive than picking either one exclusively.

All the sundry aspects like the CPU, GPU, RAM, and internet connection can be beefed up accordingly.  You can walk into a computer store and buy components that run rings around the CPU and GPUs of the Xbox 360 and PS3 for half the price they paid for them.  That's raw technology for you.  The Internet "experience" or whatever can be made to grab the best elements of Xbox Live, ditch the worst parts of Xbox Live and Wi-Fi Connection, and offer it free of charge.  All of these will be upgraded in order to find that point where these abilities are "good enough" for your average consumer.

The controller will definitely have whatever advancements they make on Motion Plus already included, as well as possibly included into the nunchuck.  I'm wondering if they should include a "classic controller" in the box or try to convert the Wiimote itself into something more "standard."  Either way would be acceptable.

But, the main feature of the console should be speed of access.  Do whatever you can to eliminate load times from the equation.  Have a console that's quiet, rugged, and durable thanks to no moving parts, and have games load almost instantaneously.  That will be a killer draw for the console.

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TalkBack / Re: Capcom Posts Dramatic Drop in First Quarter Income

« on: July 30, 2010, 05:11:44 PM »

By this logic, why on earth are there so many threads being so excited about how powerful the 3DS is? The hypocrisy is sickening.

How is this hypocritical?  Last time I checked the 3DS wasn't "HD" by any stretch of the word, or however you would apply that to screens so small.  It is "3D," and the graphical fidelity is impressive, and Nintendo obviously isn't going to charge more than $200 for it. that's plenty enough of a reason to be excited.  It's 2010, bro.

Besides I think more of the excitement was about the games being announced in coalition with "good enough" specs of the 3DS.  It's not like how the PSP was in 2004 where the specs were nice but all the games sucked and the prospects were bleak.

Oh, and didn't Nintendo just post a big decline too? Obviously that's also because they are dedicating all their dev dollars to the 'HD Systems'.

I think it's them dedicating all their dev dollars to R&D of Next generation consoles and 3-D enabled handheld gaming devices, as well as manufacturing costs of the latter.  Nintendo's Q1 loss is nothing to excuse as a loss, but in context with the last five years?  Peanuts.  And they are still projected to post a $3.something billion profit.  Even if it's only half of that it'll still be more than MS or Sony ever made in a year.  Comparing Nintendo's rare Quarterly loss vs. years of institutionalized losses at Sony and MS, as well as developers like EA, is pretty darn specious.

As for "HD development" costing more, I'll stick with BlacknMild's assessment.  The developers were the ones to claim that in 2006, even saying that they could make comparable games in scope, gameplay and design, and obviosuly not as good graphics, for significantly less than HD games.  Of course they took that to mean Wii games get shoestring budgets and rookie devs and PS360 games regularly crease the $60 million budget (even going over $100 million for a few.)

But you can't say HD assets and development, requiring more manpower and work hours, adds NO cost to development.  In fact, that's sort of what the Topic is about.  Capcom is saying that their sales have remained the same, but they've lost almost all profit, and it's all due to two high profile HD games that bombed hard.  Why?  Because they cost much, much more money to make than similar Wii bombs like Spyborgs and Zack and Wiki.

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TalkBack / Re: Capcom Posts Dramatic Drop in First Quarter Income

« on: July 29, 2010, 07:29:24 PM »

I think the two biggest factors in the near 100% drop in Profit is Lost Planet 2 and Dark Void.  Lost Planet was already mentioned, but even Capcom would like to forget Dark Void.  That was one of the biggest flops this generation.  And it also had an enormous budget that spanned years of development time.

As for HD development being a large factor in lowered earnings... yes and no.  NOW HD development is considerably easier than it was in 2005.  But the massive investment that graduating to High Definition required in those years has not been monetized enough to make up for it, resulting in all of the pain of being a trailblazer, but none of the benefit.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Nintendo 3DS Discussion

« on: July 29, 2010, 05:12:44 PM »

If they want a competitive advantage they'll need to release it sooner than an entire year and half from now.

I think November is likely and March 2011 is the definitely "by this time" date.

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TalkBack / Re: Aonuma: 3D Technology is Perfect for Zelda

« on: July 29, 2010, 02:02:38 PM »

They're great old games to be sure, but when you're launching your new hardware I do expect to see new games from their maker.

If everybody here is done being a worrywort filled with mindless nerd rage, they might want to actually look at the games Nintendo has announced for the 3DS and notice precisely 2 out of 9 are "ports" and the rest are new games, either in their series or completely new like Steel Diver.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Official Wii Sales Thread

« on: July 29, 2010, 12:46:54 PM »

I highly doubt more people downloaded the game than bought it physically.  That's the sort of spin Sony and Konami would try if they had the numbers to back it up (and is actually the spin IGN used.  I wonder if they would feel different if it were a DS title?  I know Pachter would.)  Since they didn't, they obviously don't.

Metal Gear is one of those games that the fans and consumers like to buy physically.  That it flopped that badly is pretty damning in comparison to the rest of the series.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Metroid Other M

« on: July 28, 2010, 06:25:18 PM »

I think I was referring to you talking about "posturing" and "touching."  That's what that's all about, being able to convey a scene without dialogue (of which there is some).  You know that black guy is her friend because he's all smiley.  You know that Chris Cooper looking fella is distrusting because he won't make eye contact.  it's like Noh theater, where nobody has any idea what's being said (including the Japanese audience,) but can fgure out what's going on just by the action.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Official Wii Sales Thread

« on: July 28, 2010, 12:18:13 PM »

I don't think Sin and Punishment 2 is the bigger bomb for June.  That's definitely Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker.  This is a big time series with a game that had a gigantic budget and Sony advertising (with that twerp Marcus) and it only sold about 50k.  It sold less than Metal Gear Acid and The Twin Snakes in its first month, and those games had zero advertising.

It's expected failure was probably the driving reason for that new Metal Gear game being on the 3DS and the possibility of it never being a Sony exclusive game again.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Metroid Other M

« on: July 28, 2010, 11:51:51 AM »

I'm not sure it's a good story if you can guess all of it just from a trailer...

From an intertextual standpoint, you can pretty much guess how any plot is going to go from a trailer if you've read enough fiction or seen enough movies.

Only if the trailer shows all the important clues, especially if there's going to be some twists that change the direction of the story and aren't standard fare.

I think my point is: How many plotlines are even possible with a game like this?

1. Everything goes swimmingly, bad guy defeated, see you next mission.
2. Things go poorly, everybody except Samus is dead, Samus beats Mother Ridley Prime (whoever), see you next mission.
(Comedy option) 3. #1 or #2, but it's all a dream/simulation Samus is having during her coma in Metroid Fusion, see you next mission.

That's why there are only the two masks in the happy/sad drama logo.

The trailer also tells me that I really dislike Japanese storytelling.

That's not "japanese."  It's just using blocking and actor position to emote the feel of the scene so that the meaning can be conveyed without words.  It's used in silent movies all the time.  Imagine you are deaf and playing the game, or you are a kid who doesn't fully understand English.  How do you know Link's a good guy?  Because he's all in green and has that determined look on his face.  How do you know Ganondorf's a bad guy?  Because he's wearing mostly black and is scowling an evil smile (and usually whenever he meets Link he's got him in a chokehold or he's throwing magic at him.)

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Metroid Other M

« on: July 28, 2010, 03:19:41 AM »

I'm not sure it's a good story if you can guess all of it just from a trailer...

From an intertextual standpoint, you can pretty much guess how any plot is going to go from a trailer if you've read enough fiction or seen enough movies.

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TalkBack / Re: Kuju Lays Off Headstrong Chief, Moves Away from Wii

« on: July 25, 2010, 09:38:27 PM »

I get what Kytim's saying.

The short answer as to why the 3DS is going to get better third party support is that third parties seemed to have arbitrarily decided to make strong games for the 3DS before it's released.  They're ditching the usual "wait and see" crap like they did with the DS and Wii and making sure they have competitive product in the stores on or near day one.  The long answer involves two primary reasons including the long term health of the various third parties and Nintendo's current financial status.

One reason for this is that, while much hay can be made from the usual whine that only Nintendo games can be sold on Nintendo systems, it doesn't take a genius to figure that's usually because Nintendo makes the better games on said systems.  While this can be useful when you need to write off a system (Nintendo or otherwise) that isn't performing very well, when you ignore a bonafide hit that ends up being the best selling game system of all time because of a preconception, you look like a fool to both gamers and your finance department.  Considering the 3DS is the next system after the best selling system of all time, it's pretty much guaranteed to get a healthy userbase right out of the gate, especially considering their closest competition from Sony seems sluggish to respond or reluctant to participate, and the next competition from Apple seems rather unexciting at this juncture (despite Matt Cassamassina's input.)  One of the things that crippled third parties on the Wii and on the DS initially was the fact that they did not make very good games consistently and mostly tried to cash in on what they perceived as a "casual wave" as evidenced in the "Third Party Wall of Shame" thread here:

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/forums/index.php?topic=30478.0

This gave them pretty bad reputations, as the Wii itself is definitely not an unprofitable platform (just ask Nintendo,) but it can be a prohibitive environment when all 75 million Wii owners think developers that are not Nintendo make junk, and rightly so.  Conversely, if a similar wall were created with the third parties' current 3DS offerings, and consumers were to see this on the shelf accompanied by other high quality titles, then third parties have a decisively better chance to be more relevant to a large userbase.

The second reason for the third party boom is that Nintendo's got a lot more money this time around and is in a better position to give "incentives" for third parties to make games on their handhelds as opposed to their competition, as Sony's game division (and Sony itself) is in dire straits through repeated losses and thus is less inclined to offer incentives, Microsoft seems uninterested in the handheld space at this time, and Apple seems to be unable to turn touchscreen-only micro-transaction games for cellphones and Tablet Macs into real market movement.

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General Gaming / Re: Microsoft's Xbox Kinect - Nov 4th 2010

« on: July 22, 2010, 03:18:52 PM »

I don't think BnM made that graph.  If he did he would have included a second move which is required for some single player games.

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General Gaming / Re: Sony getting hit Hard lately

« on: July 21, 2010, 06:52:27 PM »

What the hell?  Who were you talking to?

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: What are your most-played Wii games?

« on: July 19, 2010, 12:00:44 PM »

Is that confirmed to be true, or is that conjecture?

In either case, how is that a flaw when comparing Mario Kart Wii vs. Mario Kart DS and 64?

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: What are your most-played Wii games?

« on: July 19, 2010, 11:44:10 AM »

Mario Kart DS and Mario Kart 64 are MUCH better Mario Karts. The Wii game is flawed beyond belief with its horrible item system. I should be in first place and still have the opportunity to obtain a star, lightning bolt, or red shells! But this game is designed to NEVER let you get that.  Ridiculous.

What Mario Karts can you get a lightning bolt or a star in first place?

46

TalkBack / Re: Nintendo 3DS Takes Piracy Prevention 'A Step Further'

« on: July 19, 2010, 06:03:52 AM »

There are perfectly legitimate reasons people use homebrew; it's not all piracy. I choose not to to update my Wii to the newest firmware because the imported games I own would be rendered completely unplayable by the loss of homebrew functionality. Because of this, Nintendo is losing money: there are several VC and WiiWare games I'd buy if I had access to the Shop Channel.

Let's be honest here.

Now let's put ourselves in Nintendo's shoes.  You have to find a way to combat piracy.  By being soft you lose potential sales to software pirates, by being hard you lose potential sales of homebrew users who have access to piracy materials but only deigned to put Linux on the Wii or something.

If you were Nintendo, which would you surmise is the greater number of lost sales?

Now I'll concede the point that not all software pirates are "lost sales."  Some are just greasy pirates forever.  But in the true interest of being honest about such things, we have to be honest that "homebrew" is basically piracy tools with a very minuscule number of benign applications, which usually get trumped up when Nintendo needs to get serious about piracy.  Don't kid yourselves.

Now picture you are Nintendo thinking about the next DS model and Kotaku just posted a step-by-step guide to copying DS games and playing them with a flash cart (which they did.)  What's the solution?

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TalkBack / Re: Nintendo 3DS Takes Piracy Prevention 'A Step Further'

« on: July 18, 2010, 03:51:12 PM »

UncleBob believes the best defense is a good offense.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Nintendo 3DS Discussion

« on: July 18, 2010, 11:17:36 AM »

256 MB might be a bit much for the 3DS RAM (although considering the higher requirements for 3-D processing, it's possible that more RAM than usual could be necessary.)

I'd expect something between 128 and 256 MB, considering Nintendo never really uses standardized numbers (Like how the GC and Wii both have weird numbers like 43 MB and 88 MB of RAM, and it's all spread out over the console to the areas that need it).

I wonder if they'll still use that MoSys 1T-SRAM that they've used since the GC.  It's pretty good stuff, although more expensive than the usual RAM, mainly due to it's low-power consumption.  I'm thinking they will for precisely that reason, but I wouldn't expect something beyond 256 MB at the absolute max, which is sort of overkill for the kinds of stuff that the 3DS will play.

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TalkBack / Re: Nintendo 3DS Takes Piracy Prevention 'A Step Further'

« on: July 18, 2010, 07:27:54 AM »

There's already precedent for software manufacturers dictating how and when you can use their products.

Steam by default requires you to be online to play games because it verifies them on launch.  They somehow get to regulate what you do with a machine that isn't even their product.  If your argument is that the data involved is not a good, but rather a service like Steam, then it can be argued that the whole "software" part of the hardware/software relationship is a service, meaning that the devices actual intended use (running software) is a service itself, which a company can stop without prior notice as is their right (you can seek redress, but that burden is on you, not the company.) 

So the "good" is just the machine itself and thus it is only required to exist and manipulate electricity, and the carts which receive electricity.  The "service" is the non-good data in the machine itself and the data on the card and subject to the provider's whim to let you access (as is the case with Steam), and while illegal to stop it for false reasons, the onus is on the affected party to seek redress, which the content provider is banking on nobody doing out of intimidation of taking on a large company or realizing they'd have to admit to piracy at the outset and would immediately lose said lawsuit.

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TalkBack / Re: Nintendo 3DS Takes Piracy Prevention 'A Step Further'

« on: July 17, 2010, 08:40:12 PM »

Well, maybe if Nintendo designed a better user interface, one which didn't do things like restrict which save data cold be copied, and if they had more games with user-created features, people wouldn't have a need to hack...

People would hack stuff just because they can.  Rationalizing it doesn't prove any point.  Some guys will hack it just to put Linux on it for the hell of it.