Topic: I finally understand.

lolno. PS1 won't move those HD-quality sprites/textures and light effects. Ever. Heck, if the PS1 struggled with 320x240 Neo-Geo ports, what do you think it would move a HD-quality sprite based game?

Stop talking out of your rectum, man.

It was a rhetoric statement, you absolute freaking walnut.

How old is the PS3? How many games got in it's lifetime? Comparing a 8-year old PS3 library with a 1+ year old Wii U library is a bit unfair, don't you think?

No one ever said that all games need to push to 11. The problem is that alot of the same even as good as it is can become tiring, Personally I don't think a 2D Donkey Kong was needed a year after launch. Even though its a way different game than Mario Bros or Rayman, from a pure visual view it makes the systems line up look a tad bit homogenized even if it isn't the case. (Plus being a kid of the 90s/00s I'd rather see the 3D platform come back into vouge).

To be honest this just goes back to the core problem of having bad third party support. Even two of the three games you said in Child of light and Pier Solar can be found on every other platform, alongside a ton of other games.

I do find things like the super fast internet browsing (while still in the game) and the ability to turn the volume on the game pad to be truly awesome.

@AJ_Lethal

In the case of Pier Solar he isn't excatly wrong. Its an up port of a game a few years ago made for the Mega Drive/Gensis.

The new HD mode couldn't run on a PS1, but the original game could.

To your second point the PS4/Xbone have been out only a few months and they both already have pretty decent diversity in games, with the rest of the releases for this year really bolstering the PS4.

Calling this:

an up-port is an understatement

Yeah but just to get the point across. I really hope that game lets me play with HD environments and sprites but use the 16-bit custscenes.

The PS1 statement was a bit of a hyperbole, but I was making a point that those games aren't exactly pushing the Wii U's hardware. And look at you throwing "HD" around as if that's impressive or noteworthy at this point. HD happened 8 years ago on the other platforms. I don't make these statements to claim that other systems are superior, just that well Nintendo hasn't exactly been at the forefront of gaming for some time now. I hoped the Wii U would change that, but obviously...that's not happening.

You made the overall comparison, not I.

Also, just to be clear... I enjoy this kind of back and forth, aside from the name calling and insults you dudes toss around. Talking games and differing opinions is just good fun.

Completely true. If I can bury the tired over-reliance on shooters like 3 years after it should've stopped being the main popular hardcore gaming genre, even from a popular culture perspective (right now it feels like the equivalent of listening to hair metal in 1992), Nintendo desperately needs to hold off on some of the platforming for a bit. And I say that as a huge platforming fan.

@Shingi_70
Word.

Fire Emblem needs to hit the U soon. I want something I can really sink my teeth into for a while.

And the question is: is there any need to make a tech-demo out of each game? Because if you want that sort of thing you should get a goshdarn PC.

You could cram a kajillion of polygons and insanely high resolution textures and still end up having an eyesore because of a crappy art direction.

I really don't know what you're talking about. DKC: TF is stunning and looks better than any game I've ever seen on Sony's or Microsoft's machines. Maybe it's in the eye of the beholder but none of the uncanny valley, and usually glitchy, looking games made any impressions on me as did the colorful settings and detail of games like DKC: TF.

You're responding to my comments on the new third party games coming to the Wii U. Nintendo's first party titles look great. Super Mario 3D World was one of the best looking games I've seen well...ever. I haven't played DKC: TF as I'm a bit burnt out on 2D platformers for the time being.

I know art direction, Is mostly subjective, but that's just factually not true on a technical level.

DKTF is really good looking regardless.

But you're saying they look like they came out 15 years ago purely because they're 2D. I don't see why we should abandon a particular style of game just because it has been done before. You don't see people running around complaining about movies because they borrow from genres that existed decades earlier.

What games couldn't have existed in some form 10-15 years ago? There aren't that many genres that exist today that technically would have been impossible 10-15 years ago. The last decade hasn't been a radical shift in tech, it has been a refinement of existing tech. Some if not most of these games you're mocking are in 1080p with nice effects, solid controls and awesome animations. How is that not using the tech of today? Why does it have to be a brown, 3D, sandbox adventure game to be "meaningful"? What a load of BS.

And no, I wasn't stuck in the "everything should be 3D" world back in the late 90s. I was knee deep into 2D games on my Gameboy and the most advanced gaming machine I had was a SNES. In the years after that I got into strategy games and shooters on PC.

Lastly, you better get used to this. We're hitting a graphical plateau where every dev can basically get whatever they want. The guys who push the hardware to its limits aren't necessarily the ones who get the best looking game. Every generation this has become more and more of a thing to the point where now it's hard to pick out the small shadow detail differences. When devs can get the look they want at 1080p with 60fps constant, there ain't much left.

@skywake

Hmm, I think the movie metaphor may actually be a good way to look at this. I have no problem watching black and white films, films on VHS, and even on the rare occasion I can enjoy a silent film. But for the most part I find myself watching films that are in color and hopefully in HD. This preference isn't due to my hatred for all things old, nor is it because I'm obsessed with 1080p-everything! It's just progress. People consider Citizen Kane to be one of the greatest movies of all time, but that doesn't mean we should just stop and go..."You know what that movie was the best so let's just make and watch movies like that. Let's make them all black & white. Let's dress everyone up in clothes of that era, film the movie to look old and dated, and even score the film to sound like it's 1941 all over again." That sounds terribly boring.

Video games aren't that different, though the timeline is shorter and the progress is accelerated. The reason Nintendo is so iconic and games such as Zelda: A Link to the Past, Super Mario World, Star Fox, and Super Metroid are still adored today is because they were innovative for their time. They paved the way for new ways to engage with video games, and they did so with so much style and charm that we still consider them some of the best games of all time. But that doesn't mean we should just stop and say... "You know what, the SNES really was the best era for Nintendo ever, so let's just make and play SNES games. Let's make everything 2D, let's make the graphics purposefully look old, and let's make the soundtracks sound like 1990's quality midi." This also sounds terribly boring.

Super Metroid is possibly my favorite game of all time. It does everything well, and I can go back to it and it still feels fresh and exciting. Plus, every time I hear those intro noises it gives me that good ol' injection of nostalgia. But I've played a lot of amazing games since then that are just as good, and that's because they too pushed things forward and paved new ways to play. Here's a few more games that nudged me off into new directions: Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Resident Evil, Ico, Pikmin, Katamari Damacy, Shadow of the Colossus,Super Mario Galaxy, Dark Souls, Journey, and the Last of Us. All of those games presented new experiences, and they did so by utilizing the current technology at the time. The only title in that bunch that could be described as a "brown, 3D, sandbox adventure" is maybe Zelda: OoT... and uhh yeah

Criticizing the Wii U's lack of new games that utilize the system's hardware is not some sort of masturbatory way of saying I LUV DA BEST GRAPHICS. I'm just not satisfied with living in the past.

You claim: "When devs can get the look they want at 1080p with 60fps constant, there ain't much left."

So you're saying welp we've reached 1080p at 60 fps, so let's just throw in the towel and start moving backwards? That's just sad. The clarity and effects happening in Super Mario 3D world were an absolute delight to behold. More powerful hardware allows artists and devs to unlock their imagination and push us, the audience, into new territories. The retro obsession happening right now, even with Nintendo's first party titles, are just safe bets. They are comfort food. We've done this before and people love it, so let's do it again.

Just as I loathe Hollywood's current obsession with remaking movies of the past 20 years, I also don't wanna play games that are just rehashes of the past 20 years.

I think you're drawing hasty conclusions.

Skywake has a point. We're reaching a graphical fidelity wall because Moore's law and the law of dimmishing returns are a more noticeable reality right now. Graphical jumps from 7th to 8th gen consoles range are a far cry from the jumps from 5th to 6th ones. The search for mind-blowing graphics will be futile one day and we will only see small improvements through the course of the years.

Not to mention it gets harder and harder to make use of such technology. Eventually it won't be financially feasable to push the limits of those machines.

@AJ_Lethal
I'm not just talking about graphics,and I never once brought it up in my last post. I'm talking about the philosophy behind the games. Do you want to play games that try new things visually and mechanically or play games that are reminders of how good games were "back in the day?" And in this day and age the term "graphics" is a bit vague ala the 16-bit era. "How many bits does it have? How good are the graphics?" The visual identity of a game has a lot of components that make up what you refer to as "graphics." More powerful hardware allows for thing such as:

Higher resolution textures
More animation
Dynamic real-time lighting and shadows
Dynamic shaders
Complex AI solutions

@CanisWolfred
How is it getting harder to use the technology? It's getting easier everyday. Fifteen years ago you would have needed a huge team to make a AAA title, now with game engines such as Unity you can create an amazing game with like 2 dudes in a room.

You guys seemed to be obsessed with this concept of "graphics aren't everything" , as if that's the best defense for the reality that Nintendo opting to make the Wii U weaker than the other systems has cost them all third party support. Let me ask you a question: Are you happy with your Wii U? Is it everything you hoped it would be?

soon(in a decade or so) the Quantum computers will be up and running, when that happens even 10 PS4s will look like baby toys when it comes to power!
so why worry about the power now that the gap sin't so huge