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Louisgod posted:All your other points aside, this isn't correct: Miyamoto said recently he wanted to include HD in the Wii but the install base of HD compared to SD was low and they didn't think the transition from SD to HD would be as quick as it was, which they said was due to the cheap prices of HD televisions. Regardless, they had the foresight to see HD would be important but made a judgement call probably based on what Japan owned at the time. That, and if I remember, they tried to get HD running on the Wii but it overheated the system due to the size and it would've increased the price. Seriously. Thinking it was common belief in 2006 that cheap HDTV's were right around the corner is revisionist history. Its not like anyone knew that a bunch of South Korean tech companies heavily subsidized by their government and led by ex-Sony engineers was going to lead to a shitload of cheap HDTV's being produced in the following years.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:01
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Toady posted:A "Pokemon MMO" could be as basic as a PVP dueling hub where friends group up for instanced single-player sessions or join existing groups through matchmaking. Nintendo's ability to maintain such an online service seems unlikely, but the stubborn resistance some have against the very idea comes off as downright autistic in a world dominated by online multiplayer. PvP centric hubs (which Pokemon already has they're just not well implemented) are not what most people think when they think MMO. I think there is a lot of room within Pokemon to expand online content, i.e. wander around zones with friends, actual chat, maybe multi-player specific gyms, but I don't think making the default state of Pokemon anything like an MMO is going to work well at all.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:02
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Quest For Glory II posted:I don't know anyone in the real world who refers to console generations by a number. They just call Xbox 360 'current-gen' and Xbox One 'next-gen'. And to those people, Wii U is 'current-gen'.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:04
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flyboi posted:To back up the fact that Nintendo had this kind of foresight but terrible execution the Gamecube digital AV port actually has 3D capabilities as well as digital 5.1 surround but it was never implemented. I'm going to bet the lack of adoption of component on Gamecube played a big role in Nintendo's choice of not going HD on the Wii. Didn't they go with Pro Logic 2 instead of 5.1 to avoid royalty fees or something? Also, it's possible they included the capability to do 3D on the Gamecube because it was cost effective and to have just in case but who knows, but HD on the Wii would've had a significant cost impact along with having to redesign the hardware.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:09
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In all seriousness, I think that Wii U could have survived off of saving money on components IF THEY DIDN'T GO WITH THE GAMEPAD. If they left the specs the way they were, but launched the system with a different name, and packaged it with redesigned Wiimotes, I think it would have done a lot better. A LOT better. They could have priced it at $199/$250 and made a profit per unit (the Gamepad costs $80 per unit to manufacture, according to CNN Money). I just think that the gamepad sinks the whole thing because it's a contradiction in philosophy to what Nintendo had preached for nearly 8 years, which was to make things simple and accessible for everyone. You go from a Wiimote and motion control, to a game controller with a screen that has 16 pushable things on it (17 if you include the screen itself). My parents are never going to buy a Wii U, they're never going to be able to grok it. But they can pick up a Wiimote and instantly understand Wii Tennis. You swing and the character swings. Motion control was supposed to be the remedy for people like them to having to learn which button does what, which is a significant obstacle for people who are not glued to a game controller all their life. And though Wii U supports Wiimotes, the primary control method is taking everything back to "press this button to do this, press this button to do this" and their eyes just glaze over. The 7th Guest fucked around with this message at 18:20 on Aug 9, 2013 |
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Aug 9, 2013 18:17
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Barudak posted:PvP centric hubs (which Pokemon already has they're just not well implemented) are not what most people think when they think MMO. Logging into a persistent hub world where players group up to do instanced PvE content is the typical WoW session. There's nothing fundamental to Pokemon that prevents the implementation of a persistent online multiplayer component. It's more that Nintendo sucks at online services and wants real-world contact between players in order to mimic card games. But I'm not convinced by "It would be bad because I said so" arguments.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:28
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Isn't the XBox One name equally confusing though?
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Aug 9, 2013 18:38
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If this isn't next gen, I don't know what is.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:38
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Astro7x posted:Isn't the XBox One name equally confusing though? People have agreed the XBox One is a terrible name. This is largely why it's led to the nickname XBone.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:39
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Quest For Glory II posted:In all seriousness, I think that Wii U could have survived off of saving money on components IF THEY DIDN'T GO WITH THE GAMEPAD. If they left the specs the way they were, but launched the system with a different name, and packaged it with redesigned Wiimotes, I think it would have done a lot better. A LOT better. They could have priced it at $199/$250 and made a profit per unit (the Gamepad costs $80 per unit to manufacture, according to CNN Money).
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Aug 9, 2013 18:41
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Sir John Feelgood posted:If this isn't next gen, I don't know what is. Stephen Totilo sporting next gen jorts.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:43
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Quest For Glory II posted:In all seriousness, I think that Wii U could have survived off of saving money on components IF THEY DIDN'T GO WITH THE GAMEPAD. If they left the specs the way they were, but launched the system with a different name, and packaged it with redesigned Wiimotes, I think it would have done a lot better. A LOT better. They could have priced it at $199/$250 and made a profit per unit (the Gamepad costs $80 per unit to manufacture, according to CNN Money). It's pretty easy to see their thinking though with regard to the gamepad, especially when you consider how tablets have more or less become the forefront for living room entertainment, so trying to push the gamepad as both a pseudo tablet and device people use for their console gaming was a smart move was sunk to poor execution, poor advertising and brand confusion. Oh, and lack of software. I think their intent with including all those buttons was to attract the hardcore audience again and am also curious how things would've turned out if they just released a new Wii with updated remotes instead of the gamepad.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:45
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Sir John Feelgood posted:If this isn't next gen, I don't know what is. I'd worry about someone snatching the console all unsecured like that but pfft, it's a WiiU.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:47
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"Woah cool. Didn't know you could do that with the Wii." "Actually, it's Nintendo's new cons--" "Well, see ya."
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Aug 9, 2013 18:49
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Famous TV Dad posted:Seriously. Thinking it was common belief in 2006 that cheap HDTV's were right around the corner is revisionist history. Its not like anyone knew that a bunch of South Korean tech companies heavily subsidized by their government and led by ex-Sony engineers was going to lead to a shitload of cheap HDTV's being produced in the following years. I bought my first widescreen HDTV in 2006. It was 37" and cost me about $1100. Not exactly chump change, but not a shitload of cash either.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:49
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Almost Smart posted:I bought my first widescreen HDTV in 2006. It was 37" and cost me about $1100. Not exactly chump change, but not a shitload of cash either. Yes well, anecdotal accounts aside, it would've been hard to predict the surge of HD monitors and TVs, especially with the foreboding economic issues so your point is lost.
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Aug 9, 2013 18:57
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Astro7x posted:Isn't the XBox One name equally confusing though? Confusing in the expectation of 'sequential numbering for each generation', but as far as consumer electronics go it's not horrible. HTC's flagship phone is the HTC One. 'Xbox' itself has always sounded a little clunky/xxtreme to me, but it's established brand at this point. However, I would argue a key difference is that the Xbox One looks appreciably different from 360s that most people will look at it, whereas the Wii U looks like a slightly rounder Wii sitting horizontally. Combined with the fact that Microsoft is actually willing to advertise their new console, I don't think a significant number of people will be confused, at least any moreso than the number that get confused anytime a new generation launches. Famous TV Dad posted:Seriously. Thinking it was common belief in 2006 that cheap HDTV's were right around the corner is revisionist history. Its not like anyone knew that a bunch of South Korean tech companies heavily subsidized by their government and led by ex-Sony engineers was going to lead to a shitload of cheap HDTV's being produced in the following years. Actually, I'm pretty sure most people in 2006 were thinking "cool, I'll pick one up an HDTV in a couple years when they're cheaper." At least that was the common refrain from everyone I talked to. Expecting prices for new technologies to drop over the course of a few years isn't some outrageous notion. Plus, you could argue that HD consoles themselves were a driver for HDTV adoption. Another anecdote, but I purchased my first HDTV a little after buying a PS3, specifically to play games in HD and watch blurays. The Illusive Man fucked around with this message at 19:07 on Aug 9, 2013 |
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Aug 9, 2013 19:00
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Louisgod posted:It's pretty easy to see their thinking though with regard to the gamepad, especially when you consider how tablets have more or less become the forefront for living room entertainment, so trying to push the gamepad as both a pseudo tablet and device people use for their console gaming was a smart move was sunk to poor execution, poor advertising and brand confusion. Oh, and lack of software. I think their intent with including all those buttons was to attract the hardcore audience again and am also curious how things would've turned out if they just released a new Wii with updated remotes instead of the gamepad. I don't see how a "New Wii" would have been a great sell. Would have likely created even more confusion than we already have. I loving love the Gamepad. I really do. I think it's being grossly underutilized by developers INCLUDING Nintendo. There's so much you can do with it. It does feel like the next step in gaming and I won't be surprised to see the little touchpad that Sony is having on the PS4 used better by developers. The problem for me comes down to software. They blew their load on launch. There was what, 20 games out on launch? Now there's like 30 games out and 20 of them came out on launch. They needed to have a consistent roll out of games. I would have been fine with five games at launch if it meant next month I'd have another five games to choose from, and then another five games, and so on until we started to get a roll out of several games. Instead it has been a big long wait for all of those Indie games to finish developing, as Nintendo's indie guy said there should be 20-30 games at Christmas. So it'll be the same loving thing as launch. I honestly like my Wii U but yeah, there has been a ton of problems with how it was executed and how it was released. My biggest issue is that Nintendo started conceiving the Wii U in 2008 and by 2011, only had two games ready for launch: Nintendoland and New Super Mario Bros. U. gently caress earthquakes and HD ready, that isn't enough. Four years to prepare a console and all you have ready by release is two games. It might have honestly been better for Nintendo to delay Skyward Sword and release it simultaneously on Wii and Wii U like they did with Twilight Princess. Changing the name and marketing it better is one thing. Nintendo just didn't seem ready at all with this. They made the same mistakes they made with the 3DS and it looks harder to rebound this time.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:02
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Yeah Louis, I think it was pretty easy to predict HDTV adoption would continue to grow and grow rapidly. I think that's why Microsoft and Sony made HD consoles in the first place.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:02
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Louisgod posted:It's pretty easy to see their thinking though with regard to the gamepad, especially when you consider how tablets have more or less become the forefront for living room entertainment, so trying to push the gamepad as both a pseudo tablet and device people use for their console gaming was a smart move was sunk to poor execution, poor advertising and brand confusion. Oh, and lack of software. I think their intent with including all those buttons was to attract the hardcore audience again and am also curious how things would've turned out if they just released a new Wii with updated remotes instead of the gamepad. I'd have preferred an improved Remote design with better accuracy and more analog input options; at least then people would know what to do with it rather than having to deal with yet another alternative control scheme.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:06
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Louisgod posted:It's pretty easy to see their thinking though with regard to the gamepad, especially when you consider how tablets have more or less become the forefront for living room entertainment, so trying to push the gamepad as both a pseudo tablet and device people use for their console gaming was a smart move was sunk to poor execution, poor advertising and brand confusion. Oh, and lack of software. I think their intent with including all those buttons was to attract the hardcore audience again and am also curious how things would've turned out if they just released a new Wii with updated remotes instead of the gamepad. Paper Jam Dipper posted:I don't see how a "New Wii" would have been a great sell. Would have likely created even more confusion than we already have. quote:I loving love the Gamepad. I really do. I think it's being grossly underutilized by developers INCLUDING Nintendo. There's so much you can do with it. It does feel like the next step in gaming and I won't be surprised to see the little touchpad that Sony is having on the PS4 used better by developers. I actually think the Gamepad is less flexible to design for than the DS second-screen, from a viewing angle standpoint. You cannot put anything demanding on the Gamepad screen because the eye has to move back and forth from a TV to the Gamepad, whereas the DS's screens are both in eyesight at all times. And the asynchronous element of designing for a Gamepad and Wiimotes is just about impossible to balance. Nintendoland's games are not balanced at all, and for games like NSMBU and Rayman Legends, no one wants to be the Gamepad user in multiplayer, because they're reduced to babysitting rather than playing the game. The 7th Guest fucked around with this message at 19:17 on Aug 9, 2013 |
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Aug 9, 2013 19:09
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greatn posted:Yeah Louis, I think it was pretty easy to predict HDTV adoption would continue to grow and grow rapidly. I think that's why Microsoft and Sony made HD consoles in the first place. Yes everyone could see that HDTV's would become the eventual standard, but adoption rate was not a certainty at all. If not for the factors I previously mentioned it could have been slowed considerably by the 2008 crash.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:21
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greatn posted:Yeah Louis, I think it was pretty easy to predict HDTV adoption would continue to grow and grow rapidly. I think that's why Microsoft and Sony made HD consoles in the first place. Easy to say now but not so much in 2005 when they were more than likely finalizing hardware. All I'm saying is predicting trends of electronics isn't as cut and dry as you're making it out to be (HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray, 3D TVs, 4k resolution), especially with how quickly it happened. Quest For Glory II posted:I can see their thinking too, but from a consumer perspective, the benefit of a tablet is that it's NOT chained to an external box and you can take it everywhere with you. An $80 cost for a 720x480 resistive tablet that only streams output from an external box is.... I'm not gonna say it's false advertising, but what even is it? And from a "people who don't normally game" perspective, it's a tablet that offloads the most important functions to the buttons that said people have no interest in learning, even in Nintendoland. I've read the tablet is more in the $150 range, even for as "cheap" as it comes across. I'm with you though on all the other points.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:21
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Quest For Glory II posted:I said if they gave it a new name, not called it something confusing. So you wanted Nintendo to come up with a new console that still uses Wii remotes but they don't call it a Wii? Quest For Glory II posted:I don't think it's being underutilized, I think that the Nintendo DS has been out for how long now? 8 years? And the dual screens have been used to about as much effectiveness as the Wii U's second screen has. We're now on the second iteration of the DS and developers are still using it the same way, using it as a map, using it as a menu, using it to show your inventory, using it as a control method. Yes, and most of that poo poo is uncreative as gently caress. Developers are lazy within reason. Game costs are rising and that seems to kill the incentive to be creative for most developers. That's why I'm glad there's indie game developers getting Unity engines so maybe they can start being creative. The touch screen has a ton of effective uses. Even the practical ones like removing screen clutter or menus or double screen play is loving awesome and well appreciated. But the fact nobody has released a simulation or RTS for the Wii U yet annoys me as a gamer. I'd love to play an Ogre Battle on the Wii U.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:22
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Paper Jam Dipper posted:So you wanted Nintendo to come up with a new console that still uses Wii remotes but they don't call it a Wii?
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Aug 9, 2013 19:24
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Paper Jam Dipper posted:So you wanted Nintendo to come up with a new console that still uses Wii remotes but they don't call it a Wii?
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Aug 9, 2013 19:26
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Quest For Glory II posted:Well I mean what would be confusing about calling it Wii 2? People understand new iterations. When I worked at Walmart around 2006 we had Playstation, PS2 and PS3 games for sale. Customers still brought games back all of the time because Final Fantasy X isn't working on their Playstation and they got this new Call of Duty (3 came out on PS2 and PS3) game and it ain't working on their PS3. People are stupid. It was easier in the cartridge days because obviously the SNES game won't work on the NES, the cartridge won't fit. Also the boxes were shaped completely different. Now everything is on discs and the boxes are all shaped the same so people who buy the games for other people mistaken it all of the time. They should have went with a completely radical name to anything out today. There's a Playstation NUMBER and an X-Box NUMBER so Nintendo was right in not going with a digit but selling maybe the Nintendo N-JINN or something dumb like that would have made it clear this wasn't a Wii and it was a new console.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:30
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Wii 2 would have been a fine name. 'U' doesn't automatically suggest 'next iteration' to most people, and combined with only seeing the tablet, it's easy to think it's just a peripheral.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:31
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Quest For Glory II posted:I don't think it's being underutilized, I think that the Nintendo DS has been out for how long now? 8 years? And the dual screens have been used to about as much effectiveness as the Wii U's second screen has. We're now on the second iteration of the DS and developers are still using it the same way, using it as a map, using it as a menu, using it to show your inventory, using it as a control method. And that includes Nintendo, who is using it as a map (Animal Crossing), and using it to show your inventory (Zelda Link Between Worlds). It sucks that with the 3DS being 3D, all the action is on the upper screen and off the touch screen. Dream Team at least uses the second screen in an interesting way.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:33
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Paper Jam Dipper posted:Yes, and most of that poo poo is uncreative as gently caress. Developers are lazy within reason. Game costs are rising and that seems to kill the incentive to be creative for most developers. That's why I'm glad there's indie game developers getting Unity engines so maybe they can start being creative. I don't think Unity on Wii U is going to be a real driver of unique gamepad experiences at all. The big deal with Unity on Wii U is to allow indie studios who already made titles on Unity to port their stuff to Wii U. Given the small size of the Wii U audience, it's probably not going to be used for Wii U-centric development at all, especially when the key to being a successful indie developer seems to be "publish on as many platforms as is reasonable".
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Aug 9, 2013 19:37
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Paper Jam Dipper posted:They should have went with a completely radical name to anything out today. There's a Playstation NUMBER and an X-Box NUMBER so Nintendo was right in not going with a digit
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Aug 9, 2013 19:42
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I think he's saying if all the consoles have numbers it's kinda clusterfucky and to the uninformed maybe could cause confusion because higher number = more betterer. A better name wouldn't be awful, something edgy and radical like Wii Next might have worked (although maybe not THAT name). But I think Wii 2 also would have conveyed the point equally well.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:47
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Quest For Glory II posted:Uh, you've lost me here. Have you worked in retail? The first year of any console there is confusion. The only time I didn't see it when I worked was Gamecube and Wii because they were different names. Gamecube also used a darker colour scheme to the Wii usually (black/purple vs. white/silver). X-Box went from black/green to white/green but the fact it was just adding three digits meant games got returned because people purchased the wrong version. It was even worse, as I said, between PS/PS2/PS3. You have to think outside of you as a gamer who buys games all of the time and into the mind of an aunt who doesn't play games and has to buy one for her nephew or niece. It's especially confusing when a game like Call of Duty 3 comes out on X-Box, X-Box 360, Playstation 2 and Playstation 3. After the old console is abandoned this doesn't come up anymore but in the first year, yeah you're going to get poo poo like people having to be told which game is a Wii and which game is a Wii U. Same thing happened with DS and 3DS. But it rarely ever happened between Gameboy Advance and Nintendo DS or Gamecube and Wii. Totally different names is the best way to distinguish a new product.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:48
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Anything that clearly connotes a new iteration would be better. Wii 2, Wii HD, Wii Advance, pretty much anything other than a random letter. Even dropping "Wii" would be fine, they could have rode on being "the company that made the Wii" without outright reusing the name. Supercar Gautier fucked around with this message at 19:51 on Aug 9, 2013 |
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Aug 9, 2013 19:49
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Supercar Gautier posted:Anything that clearly connotes a new iteration would be better. Wii 2, Wii HD, Wii Advance, pretty much anything other than a random letter. Agreed. If they were so stuck on having "Wii" sound like "We" and U sound like "You" they should have just called it the Nintendo U.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:51
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The WiiU also looks too much like a Wii. They should have made it look just like Buddy Holly.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:55
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Louisgod posted:Didn't they go with Pro Logic 2 instead of 5.1 to avoid royalty fees or something? Also, it's possible they included the capability to do 3D on the Gamecube because it was cost effective and to have just in case but who knows, but HD on the Wii would've had a significant cost impact along with having to redesign the hardware. They went with Pro Logic 2 because it didn't need extra parts or extra licensing. If you look deep into the registers for the gpu within the system itself you can see the features sat dormant forever but never used. Recently though some stuff was unearthed such as the schematic for digital audio here that pulls the digial audio data from pins 21 & 22 on the digital av cord: http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=av:nintendogcda Also as you can see in the YAGCD (Yet Another GameCube Document) the hardware register existed for 3D stereoscopic display. Rumor is that they had a fully working "3D" Luigi's Mansion before the GC launched but they never released it due to issues with sickness in testing or something. http://emu-docs.org/GameCube/General/yagcd/chap5.html#sec5.3 (DLR register)
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Aug 9, 2013 19:57
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greatn posted:The WiiU also looks too much like a Wii. They should have made it look just like Buddy Holly. A Kirby statue where you insert your game in Kirby's belly.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:57
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Of course there are returns from people who bought the wrong thing. How do you think The Asylum Films stays in business by making poo poo like Atlantic Rim? But that applies to software box confusion, and that no doubt happens a lot with multiplatform titles. Nobody looked at the Playstation 2 and said "Is this an accessory for a Playstation?" It had a completely different, bigger and bulkier form factor from the Playstation. People this very day are looking at a Wii U and saying "This is an accessory for the Wii". The name is bad and the marketing is bad.
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Aug 9, 2013 19:58
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Paper Jam Dipper posted:A Kirby statue where you insert your game in Kirby's belly. They could have used a modified version of their Earthbound marketing campaign... "THIS CONSOLE SUCKS"
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Aug 9, 2013 19:59
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