Official Nintendo E3 Press Conference Thread

[akugami]

Bullshit. They said that about the wii and it just wasn't true. People still want graphics, and theres so much room for improvement. People don't know what they want until it's shown to them. Everyone is saying this gen is good enough, and then everyone goes ape shit over the BF3 demo, which was running on a high end PC, surpassing today's consoles.

So when the real next gen is shown, and people see graphics and physics like they've never seen before, it's going to matter, like it always has, and always will. Its night and day between the 360 and the wii, and it'll be night and day between the xbox 3 and wiiu.

I think you need to go back and see what Nintendo was saying about the Wii. They were saying that with more SDTV's than HDTV's at the time of the Wii's release (and in the near future at the time) that they felt a console displaying 480p was the correct choice for economic reasons and because consumers would not be able to take full advantage of the increased graphics until HDTV's were more prevalent.

Do you want to see the real next generation? Go look at PC video cards. Also look at the games out now or in the near future that makes use of the top end video cards. Now imagine them at best in 1920x1080 on an HDTV, or even 1280x720 in many cases due to the constraints of the TV set. An example is to look at Far Cry 2 and then Far Cry 3. While there are differences, most of the time, Joe Gamer won't care about the differences or just won't notice them much while gaming. This is not going to be the large jump in graphics that we saw when going from a PS2/Xbox to the PS3/360.

I'd wager good money that while there will be differences and if we look for them we can spot differences, it is not going to be a major jump from the current gen consoles (excluding the Wii) to the next gen of consoles. We're now at a point where I can say that graphics are good enough where gamers, not fanboys, won't notice the difference. The next major leap is going to be true photo-realism and that ain't happening next gen. Because graphics won't change by leaps and bounds above the current consoles the next gen of consoles will be about gameplay and great games.

am i the only one who is worried when he reads “proprietary high-density optical discs."

TBH IMO unless the next gen consoles can be used as a DVD/BR player they fail. the PS4 will and id bet MS will license it as well they would be stupid not to

Not really worried about it. While being able to play Blu-Rays is nice I would not count on it. That'd require a license and Nintendo didn't pay to enable such features on the Wii and I don't see them doing so on the Wiiu.

Incidentally, Wii U is more retarded of a name than Wii. I love you Nintendo but please have your marketing team lay off the crack.

Reggie just mentioned in an interview that the footage shown of the 360/PS3 ports were 360/PS3 footage.

LOL

/facepalm

yea now imagine if you then turned on your ps3 to play and it was now cell shaded and looked like an 80's disney cartoon with colors and blue skies everywhere ... that wouldn't turn you off in the slightest?

Yes and no. The issue is the game itself and how it is designed. A game like Zelda: Wind Waker works because of how it was designed and also how the game world is set. A game like Jet Set Radio also works well in cell shading. Contrast that with a nitty gritty game like Band of Brothers or a game like Resistence: Fall of Man. Doesn't work as well. A great game will still be a great game even if it was cell shaded.

I'm taking bets on who will copy the Wii U's controller first...Sony or Microsoft?

Considering that the PS4 and XBOX720 have been in development for at least 2 years, how hard would it be to add a touch-screen controller to the package when they are 24 months from launch?

Nintendo will still likely capture the sales crown for the next generation. Having 12 months lead time and the 2012 holiday season without any other new consoles to deal with is an unbeatable advantage.

How hard? Probably not hard at all from a hardware standpoint. They (both MS & Sony) could probably knock out a prototype in a month. However, designing it as a cohesive whole is probably going to take longer and if the rumors prove true and there's no PS4 or new Xbox until 2014 then they have plenty of time to work on it.

Note the half-assed (relatively speaking) motion controls built into the PS3's Sixaxis controller. That was clearly a knee-jerk reaction to the Wii's controller and most developers only made a half-hearted attempt at integrating it into their games.

If you're referring to the next generation having trouble differentiating themselves from the current generation, then I would disagree with that statement. The benchmark for where we expect console/desktop graphics to be is actually seen elsewhere, and that would be in the theaters. Essentially, the goal is to get closer to more realistic effects used in movies without the insanely long render times and hardware.

That's not my argument. My argument is that there isn't going to be a huge leap in graphics when comparing the PS3/360 to the PS4 and new Xbox. The reasons are we are limited by current technology and also because of financial reasons. We don't have the technology to economically release a games console that can do what's in the movies in real time. Hell, even movies need server farms to render their stuff frame by frame. I'm not even sure they do it in real time. That is our goal but it's just not possible at the time.

Some of the guys here are expecting leaps and bounds in graphics technology but looking at what's coming out from nVidia and AMD...I'm not seeing it. I think the jump from the current gen of consoles (again excluding the Wii) to the next gen of consoles will be smaller than what we've been used to.

*EDIT*

Sorry for how long the post turned out but I hate when people post 3 or 4 consecutive posts in reply to others. It's a quirk of mine.

 

[jpeyton]

Wonder if WiiU will be backwards compatible with GCN games/controllers still.

Yes it will.

 

[finbarqs]

what about n64 and SNES?

 

[BD2003]

I think you need to go back and see what Nintendo was saying about the Wii. They were saying that with more SDTV's than HDTV's at the time of the Wii's release (and in the near future at the time) that they felt a console displaying 480p was the correct choice for economic reasons and because consumers would not be able to take full advantage of the increased graphics until HDTV's were more prevalent.

Do you want to see the real next generation? Go look at PC video cards. Also look at the games out now or in the near future that makes use of the top end video cards. Now imagine them at best in 1920x1080 on an HDTV, or even 1280x720 in many cases due to the constraints of the TV set. An example is to look at Far Cry 2 and then Far Cry 3. While there are differences, most of the time, Joe Gamer won't care about the differences or just won't notice them much while gaming. This is not going to be the large jump in graphics that we saw when going from a PS2/Xbox to the PS3/360.

I'd wager good money that while there will be differences and if we look for them we can spot differences, it is not going to be a major jump from the current gen consoles (excluding the Wii) to the next gen of consoles. We're now at a point where I can say that graphics are good enough where gamers, not fanboys, won't notice the difference. The next major leap is going to be true photo-realism and that ain't happening next gen. Because graphics won't change by leaps and bounds above the current consoles the next gen of consoles will be about gameplay and great games.

First off, it has nothing to do with resolution. Wii wasnt a powerful 480p system, it was a weak system, period. Its not like that Wii can do what the 360 can do, just at a low res. Its not even close. Their reasoning was that people dont care about graphics, and they were right for some people, but dead wrong for the core crowd. The third parties couldnt build their current gen games for the system. The system has been all but abandoned even by nintendo themselves.

And you havent seen those next games because no one is really pushing the bar on the PC like they used to, because the PC aint the platform it used to be. Crysis 2 doesnt even support DX10 like crysis 1. All youre getting is ports. Consoles are driving the tech story, and thats where the money is, thats what the games are primarily built for. Its not that it cant be done, its that no one is doing it yet.

When consoles are as powerful as current high end PCs, which would be the traditional bar for a next gen console, it will not be a minor difference. Battlefield 3 is a glimpse of that. Even crysis was a glimpse of that a few years ago. When those consoles are built, and when the games are built for them, you will not have to pull out a magnifying glass to notice the difference. It will be a significant jump in realism.

People will care, like they always have. The wii is proof that they do, and the wii U will prove it again. Mark my words.

 

[Ross Ridge]

Yes it will.

Do you have a source for this? The official specs don't mention GameCube games or controllers.

I could see GameCube games as virtual console downloads through the online store, but GameCube controller support looks very unlikely at this point.

 

[BD2003]

Do you have a source for this? The official specs don't mention GameCube games or controllers.

I could see GameCube games as virtual console downloads through the online store, but GameCube controller support looks very unlikely at this point.

The main controller has more than enough buttons that it doesnt need to.

 

[bart1975]

I hope you can use the new wii controller on the pc. Imagine the possibilities of this thing with some hacks.

 

[Ross Ridge]

The main controller has more than enough buttons that it doesnt need to.

Yah, that's beside the point.

 

[zerocool84]

I have a feeling the screen resolution on the controller is going to be qHD 960x540 since they said it's a 16x9 display so they keep the correct aspect ratio on the TV and controller so nothing will look out of proportion. It won't be a high res display to keep costs down.

 

[Spoooon]

People will care, like they always have. The wii is proof that they do, and the wii U will prove it again. Mark my words.

I care about fun, then graphics. Which is not to say that you're saying certain people only care about graphics. But to discount a system or whatever simply based on how much horsepower it has is ridiculous.

I've put in a solid 50 hours on Terraria on the PC. Similar amounts on various games on the Wii, and similar amounts on varied games on the 360 and PS3. Graphics are certainly a nice plus, but if the game isn't any fun, f-it.

I think on the PS3, Demon's Souls got the most play time out of me. I don't recall thinking the graphics were particularly awesome or anything, I just thought that it was as challenging and fun as Etrian Odyssey for the DS.

My opinion. 😀

 

[darkswordsman17]

Looks ok, but does nothing to really get me excited about it. I'd take a Vita over it right now. Looks like more of the new Nintendo, which I'm not a big fan of. I'm not optimistic about it since they're not open about price or specs.

 

[Queasy]

Looks ok, but does nothing to really get me excited about it. I'd take a Vita over it right now. Looks like more of the new Nintendo, which I'm not a big fan of. I'm not optimistic about it since they're not open about price or specs.

Well considering that it likely is not going to release until later in 2012, there's no reason for them to go into the spec details at this point, much less the price. They can save some of that for next E3 or other trade shows.

 

[Queasy]

Do you have a source for this? The official specs don't mention GameCube games or controllers.

I could see GameCube games as virtual console downloads through the online store, but GameCube controller support looks very unlikely at this point.

It has four USB 2.0 ports so GameCube controller support seems unlikely without some kind of adapter. The Wii Classic Controller and Classic Controller Pro will work though.

 

[Doppel]

People will always care about graphics. Nintendo hasn't had them in over a decade, which is why Nintendo knows it appeals more to casual gamers than core. Iwata admits as much. And it's why the debate comes up over and over and the fanboys over and over defend it, an argument not raised over the PS or Xbox for obvious reasons.

 

[zerocool84]

People will always care about graphics. Nintendo hasn't had them in over a decade, which is why Nintendo knows it appeals more to casual gamers than core. Iwata admits as much. And it's why the debate comes up over and over and the fanboys over and over defend it, an argument not raised over the PS or Xbox for obvious reasons.

The only Nintendo system that didn't have top of the line graphics when it came out was the Wii. I love top end graphics, more than most people, I didn't spend $400 on a gfx card last year to have crappy graphics but graphics alone don't make something better. If I had to choose between good gfx or good gameplay, it'd be good gameplay 100% of the time.

 

[Tristicus]

This thing's controller is f**king ridiculous. Looks about as comfortable to hold as a honey badger. The only people who play Nintendos are kids and fat middle aged women anyway. Looking forward to the next release from Sony or MS.

Honey badger don't give a shit, honey badger just uses the controller without complaining that sly little fuck.

 

[Powermoloch]

drawing on the WIIU caught my attention lol :awe:

 

[AstroManLuca]

People will always care about graphics. Nintendo hasn't had them in over a decade, which is why Nintendo knows it appeals more to casual gamers than core. Iwata admits as much. And it's why the debate comes up over and over and the fanboys over and over defend it, an argument not raised over the PS or Xbox for obvious reasons.

This is totally wrong. The GameCube had fine graphics. Obviously not as good as the Xbox but it was at least as good as the PS2, and actually somewhat better IMO (for the games that actually took full advantage of the GCN's capabilities like Resident Evil 4).

It looks like Nintendo is sticking to their gameplay and price are more important than graphics philosophy. They'd better hope MS and Sony take a good long time to release new consoles. The longer it takes, the longer Nintendo could potentially be on par with them graphics-wise and thus might be able to get some big multiplatform games. Once the PS4/Xbox 720 come out, all the third parties will flock to them and Nintendo will once again be all about first party games.

 

[darkswordsman17]

Well considering that it likely is not going to release until later in 2012, there's no reason for them to go into the spec details at this point, much less the price. They can save some of that for next E3 or other trade shows.

I wouldn't say no reason. Personally, it tells me one or both of two things. They actually don't know the specs (I'd like to hope its this one, but I've learned to stop hoping for the best as far as Nintendo goes), or its another lame duck as far as performance goes and they don't want people to know it.

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/06/08/wii-u-third-party-sizzle-reel-composed-of-360-ps3-pc-footage/

It makes sense they can't show off actual game footage from the hardware, but that's pretty disingenuous of them to show off footage from other systems.

 

[akugami]

First off, it has nothing to do with resolution. Wii wasnt a powerful 480p system, it was a weak system, period. Its not like that Wii can do what the 360 can do, just at a low res. Its not even close. Their reasoning was that people dont care about graphics, and they were right for some people, but dead wrong for the core crowd. The third parties couldnt build their current gen games for the system. The system has been all but abandoned even by nintendo themselves.

The Wii was a weak system only when compared to the PS3 and Xbox 360. It's not really a bad system. And what's this graphics loving "core crowd" you're talking about? Sounds just like the "hardcore" crowd talked about in one of the Game Overthinker podcasts.

And you havent seen those next games because no one is really pushing the bar on the PC like they used to, because the PC aint the platform it used to be. Crysis 2 doesnt even support DX10 like crysis 1. All youre getting is ports. Consoles are driving the tech story, and thats where the money is, thats what the games are primarily built for. Its not that it cant be done, its that no one is doing it yet.

When consoles are as powerful as current high end PCs, which would be the traditional bar for a next gen console, it will not be a minor difference. Battlefield 3 is a glimpse of that. Even crysis was a glimpse of that a few years ago. When those consoles are built, and when the games are built for them, you will not have to pull out a magnifying glass to notice the difference. It will be a significant jump in realism.

People will care, like they always have. The wii is proof that they do, and the wii U will prove it again. Mark my words.

It's a fact that with the rising costs of development that developers will make their games multi-platform. That means that no game will be as optimized for any one platform. This also means that some game engines are probably scaled back a bit to cater to consoles. But let's get to the chase, a DX9 game can look as good as a DX10 game. Enough to say that there are effectively no major difference. How the game was designed and the art direction is more important with current mid to upper level PC graphics, Xbox 360, and PS3.

I know I mentioned Far Cry 2 and 3 (same thing with Crysis 1 & 2) and it's not like there are zero differences. The environment does look better and more realistic. But does it look better enough that gamers will truly notice? Maybe in still shots and when they're doing nothing else but I'd assume people buy games to play them and you're really not going to notice it much running around shooting things up.

Will you need a magnifying glass to tell the difference between the PS3 and PS4 in terms of graphics? No. If you're paying attention solely to graphics and you were explicitly doing a graphics comparison you will notice. Will it look so much better that general gamers, even those who are enthusiasts notice a huge difference? No. I don't think so. Battlefield 3 actually helps prove my point. The Xbox 360 and PS3 are good enough graphically that the next generation of consoles will have to compete on enabling new types of gameplay and not graphics.

 

[BD2003]

I guess we'll see who's right in three years. Nintendo made that argument and lost once already. No one else has a dead and abandoned platform and is scrambling to show something new. Its always been fine to be slightly underpowered, but a generation behind has never worked for anyone, even nintendo.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

it really was not that big of a deal at all back when dreamcast did this with the 2k series back in the day. this is one of those things that people think is so awesome in concept but in reality just isn't used much.

most people don't even realize that madden has had the ability to call your play hiding it from your opponent for probably a decade now.

A. that little joke of a VMU was barely functional in comparison to what is offered here

B. while you can hide which play you call in Madden and even change things up with audibles, this is only something two really good players can benefit from. With plays on the U controller it passively levels the playing field a bit between more novice players and experienced players who could gain unfair advantages by knowing all the little tricks

C. that doesn't get around the possibility of going even further and literally drawing up completely unique plays

 

[Born2bwire]

A. that little joke of a VMU was barely functional in comparison to what is offered here

B. while you can hide which play you call in Madden and even change things up with audibles, this is only something two really good players can benefit from. With plays on the U controller it passively levels the playing field a bit between more novice players and experienced players who could gain unfair advantages by knowing all the little tricks

C. that doesn't get around the possibility of going even further and literally drawing up completely unique plays

You know what I just thought of, being able to create plays on the fly using the touchscreen on the controller.

Or just use it to augment your Madden impersonation.

EDIT: Well you actually just said what I was thinking. That'll teach me to read the entire post first.

 

[BD2003]

I wouldn't say no reason. Personally, it tells me one or both of two things. They actually don't know the specs (I'd like to hope its this one, but I've learned to stop hoping for the best as far as Nintendo goes), or its another lame duck as far as performance goes and they don't want people to know it.

http://www.joystiq.com/2011/06/08/wii-u-third-party-sizzle-reel-composed-of-360-ps3-pc-footage/

It makes sense they can't show off actual game footage from the hardware, but that's pretty disingenuous of them to show off footage from other systems.

The takeaway is that it's going to look basically the same, or a little worse since it has to render two screens at once. If it was even slightly more powerful, they would make sure everyone knew it. They have nothing to gain, but they may have something to hide. Countless third party devs and execs have been asked the same thing, and they all give the same answer: it's competitive.

Today's third party games are almost identical between platforms, and that will probably continue here.

 

[Macamus Prime]

What the fuck is the Wii U suppose to do; make me ditch my 360 and PS3, so I can play current gen (soon to be last gen) games on a next gen platform?

What happens to 3rd party support when the Xbox 3 and PS4 comes out with something much more powerful? Also, showing me PS3 and 360 footage of the game your system will play is not a good sign.

And the controllers - what are they going to cost me? $79? $99? $129? What about the system? $399,... so again, I can play a game available on a $200 to $300 system (PS3/360)??

The Wii was a BIG mistake for me to purchase. Mario Galaxy 1 & 2 are the only games I enjoy. There isn't anything else I care to play on it. I frankly should have waited until the Wii became dirt cheap (like it will soon) and pick up SMG 1&2.

In fact, that is what I will do with the Wii U. No way in hell will I buy it when it 1st comes out. And, just so the Wii-tards don't jizz on themselves about how I am bashing "their" system, the same will apply to the PS4 and Xbox 3 - I will wait,... especially since the 360 had the RRoD and the PS3 came out at $600.

Aside from some games I've been looking forward to, E3 this year was pretty shitty. New system announcements are no longer "shit in your pants" exciting. I look forward to new games. But, current gen (Wii/360/PS3) has left such an awful taste in my mouth;
- $60 games that last for 5 hours
- Pay more to play online (for the 360) or have really shitty support for the "free" online environment (Wii friend codes and PS3 getting fisted by hackers)
- DLC

I've passed my willingness to spend day 1 / launch money on video games anymore. It is not worth it to buy hardware & software I know will drop in price.