70°

Wii U: Is ticking the HD box enough to compete?

The industry is in a strange place. Everyone is discussing the significance of mobile gaming and how it might be eating away at the portable gaming market that’s long been dominated by Nintendo and Sony. Let’s forget about that for a second and concentrate on the home consoles.

Nintendo has made it very clear that they intend to capture the ‘hardcore’ market that slipped through their fingers with the Wii. Despite the Wii being an excellent console it lacked the power to match the Xbox 360 and PS3, making it difficult for developers to port their games over to Wii without creating a whole different engine.

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Nitrowolf24618d ago

I think the WiiU will be able to compete well against the PS3 and Xbox 360 and then some. I do think it is ready for next gen PS and Xbox, but in terms of power it may be the weakest out of the 3 (new consoles.

Twizlex4618d ago

I don't think the controller is going to lead to a lot of direct competition with PS3/360. The Wii U is more like a home console for iphone lovers. It might have some neat stuff and it'll probably do alright, but I don't think it will "beat" Sony or Microsoft even if it sells 100 million units. If that were the case, then they already lost to Apple, Samsung, Google, Facebook, etc. etc.

UltimateIdiot9114618d ago

Against the PS3 and 360? Why? At that point, the PS4 and Xbox720 will be announce and out soon. The price of WiiU will be a lot more costly than a PS3 and Xbox360.

Those with WiiU are casual folks mainly, so I sincerely doubt many of them will go out and get the WiiU.

madjedi4618d ago

@ozstar Sorry individual mario and metriod/zelda, games aren't sitting at 50-100 million copies sold are they. If not then it's very likely the casuals aren't likely to eat up the wiiu like they did the wii.

ozstar4617d ago

@madjedi, New Super Mario Brothers Wii has sold 22 million.

Jdrm034618d ago

good thing power isn't what matters. What matter is the library of games. Sure wasn't power that sold the ps1 and ps2 lol

madjedi4618d ago

Looking at the wii's third party lineup vs the ps3/360 lineup you sure you want make that foolish a statement, next time specify your argument better.

If power or graphics didn't matter, we would still playing 8 bit games can people stop pretending that graphics and power doesn't matter.

Btw the gameplay nowadays wouldn't be possible without the power to run and process it.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 4617d ago
Valay4618d ago

I wish we had more information about Wii U's online setup. Reggie basically said we'd hear something at E3, though Nintendo hasn't said much.

vglulz4618d ago

Yeah, up to now they've been pretty vague about what to expect with their online stuff. I'm keeping an open mind until we get concrete details. I hope it is on-par with the PSN at least.

Nitrowolf24618d ago

Yeah i'm wondering what happened to that

ChickeyCantor4618d ago

Basically Developers are Free to pick their own system.
Nintendo will provide their own, but they do NOT have to use the system.

Ubisoft already explained with GR that they are using their own user system.

battyschlaps1224618d ago

The Wii U won't be able to compete graphically with the Xbox 720 and PS4.

Fact.

jacen1004618d ago (Edited 4618d ago )

720 and ps4 will never be able to compete graphically with my pc either. and i dont see them being graphically superior to the wiiU infact the wiiU is gonna be the first true 1080 console dont expect anything more from the ps4/720 maby bigger hard drive and more memory but as for blow your mind away graphical leap between them and the wiiU it wont happen because basicly it isent possible. gone are the days of major graphical leaps its not gonna be like it was years ago

RBlaze4618d ago (Edited 4618d ago )

I don't know man...

I think consoles are capable of holding their ground against PCs in their early days. Don't get me wrong, PCs catch up quick (for a higher price) but you'd be crazy (imo) to suggest that consoles are always inferior to PCs.

Consoles are more for me... For the sole reason that I like the ease of it... Knowing that what ever you get on your console (90% of the time) will run how you expect it to. But I respect what the PC can do... And hell, I'm yet to stumble across a console game as addictive as the Total War series...

EDIT: And I don't know about the Wii U... There was a time when Nintendo held their ground with powerful hardware... Then they moved into more innovative stuff... But (again, imo) they seem to have pushed it a little far with the 3ds, and I have a feeling the Wii U might not tick as many boxes as they'd hope... One thing I am certain of though is the power of the Nintendo First party games. They will remain a major strength of Nintendo for a long while yet x

qwertyz4618d ago (Edited 4618d ago )

you are wrong, MS has been working on 720s gpu since 2009 thats where AMDs new GCN gpu architecture was derived from.

http://www.anandtech.com/sh...

MS wanted a GPGPU for their nextbox and the traditional VLIW that amd gpus up till now have used is not efficient and not good for compute tasks so AMD had to develop a new architecture for the nextbox that'd be able to accelerate the cpu(work as a cpu co processor as well as GPU). how do I know this ? because I work at AMD although I;m not on the 720 development team neither do I know their base of operations.

nintendo themselves said that wii u will not be significantly more powerful than current hardware although if rumored specs are true it should be about 8-10x more powerful than current consoles with 1.5-2gb ram which is still NOT a generational leap. a current single gpu high end pc is between 30-35 times more powerful than consoles in real world performance now THAT is a generation leap.

there are already a number of pc games that make console games look last generation so what are you talking about ?

the next gen consoles will be more powerful than singe gpu high end pcs of today. console makes do not buy hardware like we do they contract companies to design the cpu and gpu then outsource manufacturing to the lowest bidder and pay loyalties to the chip designers on each console sold this is MUCH cheaper than buying parts ready made and combined with the cost savings associated with mass production the price goes down even MORE.

a gtx580 die costs about 180(maybe even less to manufacture) yet sells for over 500. why? because nvidia has to make PROFIT thats not how things work with consoles. I'm a pc fanboy myself but saying n=nextbox and ps4 won't be as powerful as high end pcs of today is ignorant .

using 28nm nvidia can pack 2gtx580s into the same die space as a single current gtx 580 and will cost the SAME amount to manufactor($180) and the same power consumption as current 580s. fabrication technology affects die size(which also affects manufacturing costs) and power consumption.

Aside from this MS and Sony launch their consoels at a loss which turns to profit as the hardware becomes cheaper over time(they both did this at the begining of the generation MS took a $160 hit on each console at launch wile sony took an even bigger one) they both did this so they could use fairy powerful hardware(by 2005 standards).

It also makes sense because they can use profits from software sales( and this gen) to pad their balance sheets as till their hardware becomes profitable

@DNov

the first 28nm gpus are coming before the end of this year(the amd southern islands gpus) then early next year nvidias 28nm kepler will be released so you are dead wrong. 28nm is ready its 20nm that may not be ready until late 2014. besides the launch ps3 was 380w(I think the slims are about 250w) so what are you talking about ? next generation launch machines will have a power consumption of about 450w MAXIMUM which will reduce with die shrinks.

current consoles where NEVER 100watts not at launch and not even now that the chip die sizes have been shrunk significantly.

and no I don't talk about next gen hardware all the time I usually troll console articles

DNov4618d ago

Hey qwertyz, do you do this all the time? There is no way you can cost and heat effectively place even one GTX580 into a console as high and half as thin as a PC. Unless you wait until GTX580 because part of the low end section of graphics cards there is no way thats happening. Not to mention you aren't going to see 28nm being mass produced until about 2015. Current consoles use about 100 watts all together. A 580 uses 3 times that and would easily melt a console. So unless you are willing to pay hundreds of dollars more to get a 28nm GTX580 in 2014-2015, you wont get one. Also, the average gen gap is 8-10 times the power. Gen 7 was a monster, but that won't happen again seeing there is nothing higher than 1080p to aim for, so this gen all we will get is native 1080p and 60fps.

mike1up4618d ago

Fact?

Ummm you do realize that none of the consoles that you mentioned are realeased yet right? That means we have absolutely no specs. So how is that a Fact?

matey4618d ago (Edited 4618d ago )

WiiU is using OpenGl 5 basically DX11/DX12 u cant beat that its also 1080p Native alot better than ps3 640p plus WiiU does the highest resolution textures u can get its got at least a 4 core cpu at 3.6ghz as EA said imagine our games on this amazing system in 1080p with fluid animations running on our Frostbite tech then imagine an open online where u can share game experiences on Facebook/Twitter/Youtube ect the WiiU in a nut shell is DX11/DX12 comparable 1080p social beast.

Its officially using OpenGl its confirmed to be more capable than DX11 so i was guessing it had to be OpenGl 5.0 maybe im wrong but its going to be powerful and think SM4.1/SM5.0 aswell BEAST that Zelda Tech shown me all i need to know i didnt need Iwata to confirm it isnt possible on ps3 i knew it wasnt straight away.

To Droid Control - When PS4/720 come out what exactly do u think they will be DX12/DX14 no such thing m8 Crytek are working on Timesplitters4 now 4 PS4 on DX11 as a benchmark 4 next gen sorry kid but like EA said with WiiU its at a stage where Graphics are at there best now with 1080p/OpenGl 5/DX11/DX12 u cant improve on WiiU its got tons of on board EDRAM 4 extreme gameplay remember the PS2 had faster RAM then PS3 ie why PS3 cant play PS2 games all im saying is WiiU is as good as it will get Next-Gen we have hit a brick wall at that level its down to creativity now end of there will be no OH we dont want to make WiiU games anymore its not powerful enough bullshit as all 3 will be around DX11/DX12 mark get a grip Mr Droid

SilleGamer4618d ago

It would have been enough back in 2009 - however it needs a raft of compelling exclusives or third party titles to remain relevant.

The next generation will introduce a wealth of new features, will the Wii U be enough to compete?

hilyou4618d ago

u know ho everyone was amazed by dreamcast's graphics but by the time time ps2, gamecube and xbox came out, they crushed dreamcast in terms of horsepower. i think this is going 2 be da same with wii u. also i can see alot of potential in wii u but sadly i think alot of devs wont use it! everyone had dreams of really really good wii games with the motion tech but sadly it was a gimmick! super smas bros brawl sucks on the wii mote, but its really good on a gamecube controller.

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80°

Nintendo's Massacre Of The 3DS And Wii U Is Finally Complete, Regrettably

Hanzala from eXputer: "The cruel hammer of Nintendo has fallen. Farewell, 3DS and Wii U, you surely brightened my life and many others; you won't be forgotten."

60°

8 of the most useless amiibo figures ever released

A new list goes over eight of the the most useless amiibo, ranging from the Shadow Mewtwo card to the Qbby figure.

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80°

Looking Ahead: The Lingering Questions About the Next Mario Kart

VGChartz's Mark Nielsen: "10 years. It’s been almost 10 years since the last mainline release in the Mario Kart series. Mario Kart 8 came out for the Wii U in 2014 and became the best-selling game for the system by a sizeable margin, and later pulled the same magic trick on the Nintendo Switch under the stage name Deluxe. All in all, it's sold nearly 70 million copies over the last decade and is still selling like hot cakes to this day, so it’s no wonder Nintendo has been in no rush to replace it. However, with rumors of a new system being just around the corner, and reports a few years back that a new Mario Kart is indeed under way, it seems the era of 8 might very well be drawing to a close. It’s an exciting prospect to be sure, but after two Nintendo systems with Mario Kart 8 at their heart, a lot of questions remain about how Nintendo will choose to follow it up."

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Yi-Long6d ago

I hope they just keep building on Mario Kart 8; Add a track-creation tool, and probably open it up to more Nintendo IPs with new tracks and characters, so Metroid, Punch Out, Starfox, Animal Crossing, etc etc.

gold_drake6d ago

there wont be a new one until the switch 2 comes out.

nintendo needs their bangers early on