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- JoshHendo, on 10/12/2007, -11/+84Firstly, the Wii isn't a cube.
- Bioshocker, on 10/12/2007, -9/+51It's weird that this even needs saying. When Intel says "all your programs can still run on our Core 2 chips", people don't run into the streets saying "OMG CORE2 IS JUST A PENTIUM3!!1". This is just the same thing.
- Paroparo, on 10/12/2007, -6/+44This is pretty much what everyone who read it and weren't looking for reasons to bash Nintendo immediately figured out.
- shrewduser, on 10/12/2007, -8/+31sure, the article is logical and succinct, but its still written as a rebuttal to trolls... and when has logic ever worked against them? they'll just shrug this off and latch onto another imagined flaw, trawling forums and bulletin boards day and night making sure everyone knows which console is best.
- SkeletaLlama, on 10/12/2007, -3/+26Miyamoto IS Nintendo.
- SkeletaLlama, on 10/12/2007, -4/+25Miyamoto made everything Nintendo is known for:
donkey kong, mario, yoshi, luigi, pikmin, zelda, f-zero, mario kart, wave race, starfox, kirby, metroid and nintendogs.
I repeat: Miyamoto IS Nintendo. When you think about a Nintendo character or game, the odds are Miyamoto either invented it or produced the game. - Durinthal, on 10/12/2007, -2/+20Yeah, I think he's the guy that created Pikmin.
..and Zelda.
..and Mario. - cjschmidt, on 10/12/2007, -4/+20Teaboy was responding to JoshHendo's comment, noting that the GameCUBE wasn't actually a geometric cube itself. Although he could have put it more eloquently, I will admit.
- mrgreen4242, on 10/12/2007, -6/+22Only if you go by just units sold. If you measure profit made as a benchmark for success (which is much more accurate, imo) the GameCube was #1.
- NikoKun, on 10/12/2007, -1/+17I think a lot of people don't understand the power of the word 'architecture' when talking about consoles.
Depending on how good the architecture for that console is designed, and how well all the chips work together in this design... THATS what really determines a consoles power.
You can have all the greatest specs in the world, the biggest numbers, but if ur technology isn't all made to work together specifically with the other parts in the console... its just gonna be a piece of junk.
When they say its just like a gamecube, I think they mean more that they followed the same/ or similar design architecture for the Wii as gamecube had. Doing this makes it easier to dev for, because its already familiar. This isn't to say they haven't added power boosts, but the powerboosts are minor and help, but not as much as a solid architecture does.
Lets compare to PS3 for a minute... The Cell chip... Probably the worst choice for a game system in history... Its an all-purpose chip, for all purpose tasks. The Cell was designed for everything, computers to digital cameras, and other various electronic devices. Doesnt' matter how powerful it is, PS3 can never reach a full potential, unless the chip would have been specifically designed to work with the rest of the PS3.
So even if Wii is weaker, and even if it has lower graphics... It has more potential, and it certainly has more quality. Wii games will run a lot better, faster and probably have better load times and frame rates. It will be easier to develope for and cheaper for Devs from day one, making the games for Wii better and more plentiful. The Wii will be a graphical increase when compared to Gamecube... enough of one to warrent buying the new system, mark my words...
Point being, don't forget our friendly word architecture. lol - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -8/+20I think this article would have been better off without the 1337 sp33k. Also, the author calls the gamecube a failure. Well, even though it came in 3rd place for home consoles, I could hardly call the gamecube a failure.
- betterth, on 10/12/2007, -5/+15According to www.gametunnel.com (?) the GameCube represented 13% of all 5th Gen console sales. (Xbox, PS2, etc). They count the Dreamcast as one of that generation, and it would be the biggest failure.
And it's important to remember that while the Xbox (narrowly) outsold the Gamecube, Nintendo never had a red quarter (no or negative profit) and Microsoft had over a $2 Billion USD loss on the xbox. - CGreen, on 10/12/2007, -4/+13Gumpei Yukoi made Metroid ya arse.
- SkeletaLlama, on 10/12/2007, -7/+16Cube still sold almost as many units as Xbox worldwide. The gap between the two isn't that large. Not like the gap between SNES and Genesis or DS and PSP.
- bleaknik, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Actually, the Cell processor that Sony is using in the PS3 has been designed to handle floating point operations very well--IBM has been working to modify the Cell processor for general purposes, particularly for database read/writes.
The Cell in the PS3 would handle database operations very poorly, but it can handle multimedia intensive applications very well. Typically, games fall into that multimedia category.
However, that does not mean that the PS3 is really optimized for game performance either--other factors play into this one... primarily other components of the system such as the System Bus, the Optical Drive, and the Video Card.
The Gamecube had exceptional graphics [for anyone who disagrees, look how crappy RE4 looked on the PS2] for many reasons--and it wasn't just the processor alone. If I recall correctly, Rogue Squadron 3 holds the highest _real-time_ polygon count of that generation--even outdoing the X-Box with it's very general purpose processor, relatively potent graphics card, and 37 pound chassis. - Antialias, on 10/12/2007, -3/+11betterth,
It's quite a bit more than AA. From what I've read, the new GPU offers a lot more support for newer shader technologies. Also, even if it was the exact same hardware feature wise, it's running at 2-3 times the original clock speed. So with just the clock speed we should see better physics, better AI, and a host of other improvements. - Wratherin, on 10/12/2007, -4/+11At 23r17i05o42n
Because everyone knows that sitting at your computer, one hand on your keyboard, one at the mouse while staring at the screen is so much cooler. And sitting two feet from the T.V. while pressing 13 buttons in three tenths of a second, man that just makes you a stud muffin. - Trickeralexx, on 10/12/2007, -7/+13"The Nintendo Wii is NOT the Game Cube."
obvious ?? - AzraelKans, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6I understand the point, But I was expecting an OFFICIAL response, not some rant from a blog.
And by the way let me sum up the blog response.
"IS NOT!" NAH AH!
PS3 AND XBOX 360 SUXXORS ANYWAY!
IS NOT ABOUT SPECS IS ABOUT THE GAMES!
NINT3NDO FOR3V3R
Gee, thanks for clearing that up.
Btw, Miyamoto said the truth, the Wii is a beefed up gamecube, we already knew that, I mean seriously who didnt knew that? Didnt we got a hint when we learned they were using actual "modified" gamecubes in the e3 demos?
So what? people are going to buy them anyway. The motion sensor is unique and cool plus is cheap as dirt.
So relax. bad timing in Miyamoto's comment, but other than that, nothing to see here, move along. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -15/+20Really!??!?! I though they just changed the case and controller port location.... -_-
- TheTankengine, on 10/12/2007, -5/+10Eh, nothing really special about this article. Just says what everybody already knows. PS3 has a 7-core Cell processor, X360 has a 3-core PPC processor and the Wii is about 30% faster than the GCN. Specs aren't everything.
1 month and 2 weeks from today, I will be swinging my katana in Red Steel. Anyone else as excited as I am?! - jmdajr, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7A little defensive are we?... carry on
- fahrvergnuugen, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7"Name one thing that has always sucked for PC gaming"
What is "Jeopardy!"? - IdanE, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8The guy has a point - Wii is to GC what a P4 was to a P3. The GC was designed around a G3 CPU design, and that has been updated (I assume to something that revolves around the G5) but still has all the original features. also, I'm guessing that, since ATI designed moth the GC and the Wii graphics chip, they kept the same features but added several more (I assume that some pixel/vertex shaders were thrown in, and lots of discrete lightsources, opposed to the GC's paltry 4 or 8 concurrent sources). It's like saying that My Core2Duo running with an X950 is pretty much a pentium 4 with a Radeon9600 in it. Same same, but different.
Oh, and on the bright side - Wii will probably have FULL GC compatibility due to this fact, and, if PCs are any indication, GC games will most likely have better fluidity on Wii and a general rise in framerate (for GC games) is probably a given. - NeoTechni, on 10/12/2007, -7/+11"First: Nintendo Wii IS the game cube.
Second: Nintendo Wii IS NOT the game cube.
Next up: Nintendo Wii is the PS3!"
First: Leonard Nimoy IS NOT Spock
Second: Leonard Nimoy IS Spock
Third: Leonard Nimoy IS also Scotty - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7Yeah, exactly. My first thought was "who the hell cares?" The whole point of the Wii is the motion-sensitive peripherals. It's a console designed specifically around waving, jerking, and aiming controls. Who the hell cares what the actual hardware is like? That's not at all why people are gonna buy it.
As for the people who are NOT gonna buy it... guess why that is: it's because they don't want a console designed around waving, jerking, and aiming controls. Period. I assure you, the fact that the hardware of the Wii is not up to par with the other next-generation consoles doesn't matter to the people who aren't interested in this console -- they aren't interested because they don't want to play with the wand controller. - teamparadox, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Consider the fact that the Wii uses the EXACT same CPU and GPU as the Gamecube just with higher clock speeds, also consider that you can use the Gamecube Dev kits for Wii games I think its safe to say the Wii is a suped up Gamecube.
Thats not a bad thing, the Wii isnt about graphics, its about gameplay. Why do people keep insisting the claim about Wii being a upgraded GCN is false when the specs clearly show thats exactly what it is?
Ive also never seen anyone say the Wii sucks just because of its hardware like this article states. If people are saying that they are morons and have missed the point of the Wii entirely. - TheZorch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3An ATI spokesman said that "there is no reason why the Wii cannot output to HDTV with the graphics chipset it is using." Just because the hardware of the Wii is similar to the GCN doesn't make it a GCN. It has a much faster version of the same processor used in the GCN, more memory, a DVD drive which can also accept GCN discs, and a new-generation GPU from ATI.
It was a smart move by Nintendo who finally realized that backward compatiblity was key in today's consoles. This is a lesson that Microsoft had to learn with the XBox 360. They stil don't have it right after all this time, there are still lots of original XBox titles that don't run on the 360. Sony pioneered backward compatibility in consoles with the PS2 (you could argue the Atari 7800 was the first but remember it required an add-on to play 2600 games).
The Wii-mote and Nunchuk controller will breath new life into an industry which has seen very little innovation beyond better graphics. Cool visuals do not make a game. Why do you think Retrogaming is so popular these days, because many of today's game with incredible graphics just don't have the fun-factor and replay value of the classics. Now there are new philosphies emerging on how to make a great game. Valve pioneered one approach with the Half-Life franchise, the developers of Bioshock has an idea which is very intriguing, Wil Wright has Spore, and let not forget simple but incredibly addictive games like Geometry Wars.
The Wii has the potential to bring out the innovative juices in developers and I for one look forward to seeing what they come up with for this system. - TheGrizah, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Isn't Halo a really bad FPS?
- Odjn, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I like how this article came from a blog, not Miyamoto himself retracting or restating or clarifying what he said. Because it came from a blog doesn't make it reasonable to assume this is correct in its assumptions. Miyamoto's quote still stands as it was before people tried to re translate him.
- bking, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4NewChar, I played it extensively at E3, during a press pre-show, and again just two days ago.
"Wii games will run a lot better, faster and probably have better load times and frame rates."
Load times are just as fast, if not faster than gamecube. Framerates are fine.
"It will be easier to develope for and cheaper for Devs from day one, making the games for Wii better and more plentiful."
Every designer I've talked to says it's by far easiest to design for.
Quit assuming that people are making assumptions. - yasth, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Also Sony ended up making more on total PS2 line sales. They may have taken a loss at times on the console, but they more then made up for it in branded accesories, and of course the licensing fee for games. Never taking a loss on the inital required part of your business model isn't exactly something to be proud of, a small loss would quickly be made up, and getting the console into the home is important. (Once a console is in the home, all buying decisions come out to $50 for game for console already owned, or $Price of Console + $50, not exactly (multiple wanted games on a console can reduce the per game price delta), but close enough.
Nintendo refuses to lose money on consoles because they couldn't absorb the losses with as much glee as MS or Sony can. They also were selling consoles for a lower price already so the benefit is lessened (the lowest price leader generally gets most of the price concious shoppers, and increasing the gap gets less then one would think). Still a bit more loss taking at key times could probably have pushed the big N past MS. - Bioshocker, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7No, betterth, it really is. Miyamoto's point is that it's binary compatible, but a bit faster. Kinda like "any platform change", as you put it. Sure it might not be an almighty leap to cutting edge, but the point is that when he was saying "it's just a Gamecube", he meant it in the same way you would say "it's just a PC" when referring to either a Pentium3 or a Core2.
- mfshadow, on 10/12/2007, -6/+9Good God. Here's the deal: If the games are fun, you buy the system and enjoy yourself. If the games suck, you don't have to buy it and are free to play something else. Who really, honestly gives a rat's ass what the wii is or isn't? I'm a gamer, but I'm literally embarassed by all the measurebators clogging the internets tubes. Get over yourselves and your petty 'needs' for entertainment goods and start thinking about something that's actually important in this world.
- Dominatus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Uhhhh no.
The stupidity on digg amazes me sometimes....
The PS2 is not a beefed up PS1, at all. Not even close. It's completely different.
The reason the PS2 can natively run PS1 games is because it has a PS1 core as it's I/O processor, in other words, the PS2 uses a PS1 to interface with memory cards and controllers and what not.
Don't just make up stuff when you have no idea what you're talking about. - DarkJC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"Well, technically, the PS3 is also an upgrade to the PS2."
No, it's not. You're confusing things. The Wii has the same architecture as the Gamecube. A Gamecube game will compile in the Wii compiler tools, with no changes needed. Same hardware architecture, just better. The PS2 -> PS3 changed almost everything. New processor architecture (emotion engine to Cell), etc etc. A PS2 game will not compile in the PS3 Dev tools. At the moment the only way for them to acheive backwards compatibility is to include the PS2 hardware in the PS3. Same thing with the XBox360. They went from a 700 mhz Intel Celeron to 3 3.2 Ghz PPC cores. Big change in architecture, and that's why they're having troubles with backwards compatibility as well.
So in terms of architecture, the Wii is a gamecube, just better. Just like your PC with Core 2 Duo is your PC with a Pentium, just better. - AzraelKans, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3The answer is: "because the PS3 actually has free online multiplayer"
Question: Why is Question one completely wrong? - DarkJC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3"The PS2 didn't have to emulate PS One games because at the core it was just beefed up PS One hardware that could easily play backward compatible games."
Wrong. The PS2 shipped with the PS1 hardware inside it as well, to enable full backwards compatibility, because they couldn't come up with a decent software emulation mode. The PS2 is hardware is completely different from the PS1. - EtherGnat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4"means they're not 100% confident that the Wii would be successful"
Unless you were in the boardroom when they decided the price, you can't say what their reasoning was. Expecting a company to sell any product at a loss is silly, and it seldom benefits the customer.
Look at printers, which are frequently sold at a loss. For the privilege of a cheap printer you pay a fortune for ink. To protect their business model companies have incentive to lock competitors out through technological and legal means. End result: Higher prices and less competition.
I'd rather pay the full price for something up front than suffer the hidden costs later. - Hace, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6Something to remember about the Wii is that even with the Wiimote, sensor bar and Wii Sports included in the $250 box, Nintendo stills apparently makes a profit with it. That doesn't leave a huge amount of money to throw around on fancy technology.
Personally I can't wait for the "gimmick" -phase of the Wii to pass. I doubted if it ever would on the DS and Nintendo proved me wrong, so here's hoping... - merr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3If it's an article on a blog, no problem. However, if someone links to their blog post that contains only an embedded YouTube video and nothing else, it's pointless and annoying. A link directly to YouTube won't destroy your blog with the digg effect and will make things a whole lot easier on those trying to watch the video.
Aside from that, merely having a front page link to your blog won't automatically make everyone want to read it. You have to have some substance there to pull readers in. - babayada, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5I always thought the console war thing was childish.
I guess you are supposed to identify yourself as a member of a social group by owning a certain game console and touting its values while demeaning all the others. It really is super-retarded when you look at it. More than that, it's pathetic.
You purchase a gaming console to enjoy it, not to become a member of some army of nerds. If you have the money, you can buy all three and enjoy each to your heart's content.
The same thing with PCs and Macs. Those who can afford it can buy one of each and enjoy each of them for their own, distinct values.
It's a matter of taste anyway. Who cares if others don't share your tastes? If you like anchovies on pizza, why expect others to like it just because you do? Why expect others to perceive the values of it that exist only in your subjective experience?
All of this prattle about which console is going to "pwn" is just ***** stupid. - nissu, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4"And that's why nobody gives a rat's arse if the PS3 GPU can run circles around the Wii. I don't *WANT* to play the 8th sequeal to a game franchise. I *WANT* to play something new."
Ok. So you'll skip new Mario, new Zelda and new Metroid. I think that the sequels to those three games are easily the most eagerly awaited games for Wii.
How many games on the Wii launch list are actually *new* and not sequels or reusing old game franchise? I'd say that almost every game in the list is either a sequel, a port of an existing game to Wii or uses existing franchise in some way.
Personally I don't mind sequels or reusing known franchise, as long as the games are good. Isn't that the only thing which matters in the end? - teamparadox, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Well the really odd thing is the Wii is only $50 less then the core 360. They could easily have been able to put in a new graphics solution that was more efficient and powerfull instead of using the flipper again and they could have done it for the same price. I think what happened was they were rushed into this by MS launching the 360 a year before anyone thought they would. Nintendo spent all of their R&D time on the new control system leaving the actual hardware for last but ended up running out of time because of the early launch.
- Paroparo, on 10/12/2007, -3/+5Now I'm totally a fan of Nintendo and agree the GC was a success because it still had great games and made a profit, but could someone please give a source to the claim that it made more money than the PS2? I'm just curious, since I hear this claim a lot, but nobody's ever backed it up.
- MedHead, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2It's not like these companies have PR teams or anything.
- kent1146, on 10/12/2007, -10/+12This isn't about gaming hardware at all. It's about the controller. They probably could have just released the Wii controller as an add-on to the Game Cube. But controllers and add-ons never sell.
In order for them to sell the controller and the new game play mechanics that go with it, they had to release it as a new console system. The Wii is just the packaging used to sell the controller.
And that's why nobody gives a rat's arse if the PS3 GPU can run circles around the Wii. I don't *WANT* to play the 8th sequeal to a game franchise. I *WANT* to play something new. - BenSerwa, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Miyamoto isn't a native English speaker so it's obvious something could get lost in translation, of course we have to interpret his meaning.
- FyberOptic, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I think we should all look back at the NES and SNES for a moment. The NES ran a custom 6502 processor, while the SNES ran 65816. Both chips were from the same company, and the latter was capable of being 100% compatible with the original 6502 in its default startup mode. Now not only did the 65816 in the SNES run faster, but it had an increased number of opcodes, which even in this default compatibility startup mode, allowed one to run more optimized their code than on a plain 6502. And even if you had clocked a 6502 to run at the same speed, the 65816 would have simply performed better. As such, the SNES, combined with other factors, was a huge technological leap over the NES.
The same thing pretty much applies here, to an extent. The new Wii processor is not only much much faster (which alone is enough to warrant a new console out of it), but it's going to have an improved instruction set, allowing for better performance than its predecessor. Not only that, but it might even be getting more instructions per clock cycle, I don't know the details between the two as of yet, which would give it much better performance as well.
So as many people have pointed out already, "architecture" is the key word here. It's a different processor, it just happens to be of the same architecture, much as my blazingly fast PC I'm typing this is on is of the same architecture as my old 90mhz Pentium. Or technically, even my old 4.77mhz 8088. This means NATIVE compatibility with the Gamecube, no silly emulation.
As for the 6502/65816 comparison earlier, it was only a shame that Nintendo didn't try to implement backwards compatibility back then! But unlike the Gamecube and Wii, the NES and SNES used different sound and video hardware, making them completely incompatible. - julienbh, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4In fact Miyamoto is just like god. Without the super powers... well scratch that.
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