Topic: Is Nintendo really using a form of Blu-ray for Wii U games?

Long live Valve!
_{Seriously. I don't wanna lose my Steam games too soon...}

You know, you've written a long rant in a tone that SOUNDS like you're trying to disagree with me but it really doesn't. I've said repeatedly in this thread that I think that we will move closer to a download only game market. I not only think the idea that somewhere between 2015 and 2020 the majority of games will be brought online is not crazy but I think it's probably right.

That wasn't the point I was originally making nor is it the point I have been repeating throughout this thread. The only thing I originally said was that cartridges are getting cheaper and that we are moving towards a point where they will be a better option than optical disks. When tendoboy1984 said that we're heading to "download only" all I said was that the day when gaming is a download only world is probably after the day when cartridges are a better option than optical disks. Apparently you agree because you just said "the next two generations of consoles will likely feature some form of physical media". So I don't think it's crazy to think that at some point before the "digital only" future a home console will launch with cartridges instead of optical disks. Neither do you apparently.

The strange thing about this topic is that everyone seems to agree (except for tendoboy1984 when a point is first brought up) but nobody seems to want to agree....... except for the used sales stuffs where I'm going to go against the grain and say that used sales are literally a legal form of piracy.

We all agree, just that we're all coming from different perspectives. It's rare that this kind of thing happens, and a sure fire sign that we're all right.

I agree with you on the used game point, too. I hate that part of the market with a passion, since it hurts the publishers and developers that I like, and I want to see keep making me games to play.

Glad we all agree now but just to be uber nerdy I graphed optical disk size and cartridge size next to a projection of how big a game the "average consumer" will be able to download in under an hour. These should all be straight lines because it's on a log scale.

If my graph is good and 10GB ends up being the peak of what games need for storage then downloadable should be fairly accessible to the average user by 2015. Cartridges will be there in 2012/2013 and optical disks where there in the late 90s. If developers push game sizes closer to something like 50GB then it's closer to 2020 for downloadable games but optical disks are there already and cartridges might get there by 2015/2016.

The date really depends on how big the games are.

With a rare few exceptions, the publishers and developers are more interested in making smaller games than blockbusters, to capitalise on the mobile market, and to allow fast turnover of games. Most major publishers are happy with one, mabye two blockbusters a year, and then filling things out with a steady stream of smaller budget productions. I don't see 50GB becoming a standard game size by any means, much like how 99% of movies made are most definately not $150 million+ productions.

I see 10GB being a very attractive number, though. From personal experience, downloading a 10GB game is not too painful on a relatively slow ADSL2+ connection, doesn't destroy my caps too much, since I do it while I sleep in the off-peak period, and gives me what amounts to a "full" game experience.

Certainly the uptake of fast broadband will outpace the game size inflation.

Physical media will still have a long term role in emerging markets, however, and for that reason alone, even if publishers ignore retailers completely in Australia, America, Japan, and Europe, they'll still be making physical copies of games for placed like the Middle East and Africa, mainland Asia and South America.

You are probably right about the publishers increasing their interest in smaller games but next year every home console will be doing 1080p. As well as that memory gets cheaper every year and the newer consoles will have more and more video RAM to store textures in. Higher resolution textures, higher resolution models and larger worlds mean bigger games.

There will be smaller games in 2015 that won't need more than 10GB. They'll probably include the New SMBs, the small sport compilations, the next Guitar Heros and even the Portals and whatnot. There will also be the large games, the Marios, Zeldas, Metroids, CoDs, Gears, Elder Scrolls, Batmans, Battlefields, Halos, Uncharteds etc, etc. Those games will be pushing 50GB (especially if we have a media with a faster read speed!) because people will want to see how far the tech can be pushed.

Yes, 99% of movies made are most definately not $150 million+ productions but people buy into Blu-Ray for Avatar not Donnie Darko. In the same way a lot of games won't go beyond the 10GB "limit" but the system sellers will and console makers will design their console with those games in mind.

Nope. More detail means less boxy looking objects when they are close to the camera. Except boxes, they'll look just as boxy.

The N64 could display graphics with more pixels than the DS, but the DS graphics for Mario 64 had more detail. The DS version looked far superior to the N64.

@ImDiggerDan Screen resolution, texture resolution and model resolution.
aka "why those Wii games running on emulators at 1080p frankly look pretty average"

I don't think it will happen because Nintendo would have to get a licensing agreement with Sony to have a part of Blu-Ray.So i doubt that would happen.

we already discussed why this is not a deciding factor, Sony is part of the group that governs Bluray, but they don't exclusively own the format, other companies are involved there as well, not just Sony, saying Nintndo would use this as a reason to not use bluray would be like saying they wouldn't use DVDs for the same reason