Topic: Food For Thought: How Could Multiple GamePads work?

I didn't really want to go too far with the idea, but at some point, my imagination went haywire on me, and now I have an idea to share.
Before continuing, some quick things to note: I based the entire idea off of a quick remark from @Grafeaux (thanks for the inspiration, dude!) on the idea of local multiplayer via LAN (here is his post). Everything I'll write here is just food for thought (as the title implies), nothing more. I lack the knowledge of the technical capabilities of a WiiU to determine whether this idea is plausible or just delusional, so try to suspend your disbelief for a bit, okay?

Now to get to the point: how could the WiiU theoretically handle more than one GamePad at once? Depending on how far the idea can be taken, I'd think there is a way.

By default, the WiiU doesn't seem to be able to detect multiple GamePads at once, because the Wi_Fi signal used to connect them isn't strong enough to handle two or more separate video/audio streams in addition to input feedback. The compromise would mean downgrading the visuals to 480p or even less (which would look awful), and Hyrule Warriors proved that people don't take well to a visual downgrade for multiplayer support.
Instead, we need to consider different means of connecting a GamePads. If Nintendo were willing to do so, they could produce GamePads to be sold separately (let's ignore the price point for now) - but not identical to the GamePad included with a WiiU. These separate GamePads would come with a USB connector that gets plugged into the bottom port of the GamePad and a USB port on the console (preferably one of the front ports). Additionally, separate GamePads would be unable to support the internal Wi-Fi, to avoid technical issues with the "main" Pad, but be able to connect to the WiiU via general wifi, as well.

Now, why both wired and wireless connection? Allow me to elaborate.
The WiiU has up to 6 ways of communicating with peripherals and external devices: 4 USB ports, one Internal Wi-Fi signal, and one general wifi signal. The Internal Wi-Fi signal should always be used by the main Pad, that's pretty clear. Meanwhile, two USB ports (preferably the ones on the backside) should be left alone to uphold both USB to LAN adapter and an external HDD support. That means, we would have two USB ports and the general wifi signal to connect additional GamePads to. And Super Smash Bros. 4 and Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate already proved that the WiiU can connect to a 3DS via wifi, which is all we need to know for now. In addition, browser functions like HD livestreams and YouTube also show that the WiiU's internal wifi is strong and fast enough to allow video/audio submission at the same quality level of the bluetooth signal. So why not use that for a second GamePad?
Now, imagine having FOUR GamePads, all connected to a single WiiU (one via Internal Wi-FI, two via USB, one via general wifi, with a LAN adapter for online)! The possibilities would open up like nothing! Multiplayer games without splitscreen, party games with equal control options, completely new concepts that make use of having four separate screens! But no game has that. The obvious consequence would be that Nintendo would have to patch support for multiple GamePads into previous releases to make the idea more appealing:

• NintendoLand: actual races for F-Zero, free weapon choice in Hyrule, better controls for Metroid Blast, throwing shuriken together in Takamaru's Castle, having unique skill/tools to make ghost hunting even more exciting!
• Mario Kart 8: obviously, no more forced splitscreen!
• Hyrule Warriors: 4-player co-op? Ehhh, Tecmo would need the better Warriors Engine for that, first.
• Super Smash Bros. U: possibly add a vastly improved Smash Run, have marathon missions, and back-to-back Multi-Man-Smashes!
• Bayonetta 2: local multiplayer, obviously!
• Game & Wario: even more chaotic competition, expanded minigames, and maybe one or two new ones!
• Pikmin 3: local co-op AND competition modes!
• Splatoon: local multiplayer 2on2, and maybe 2-player online on one console!
• And so much more for future titles!

Obviously, this would require a lot of work and preparation to succeed. But I actually think it would work very well, if properly integrated. And just to add to it, this would open up another barrier: recording from the GamePad. Intercepting the Internal Wi-Fi connection to capture an encrypted video seems a bit too far off since that kind of stuff doesn't exist for us, but a USB capture device is mostly a matter of tweaking some wires and having the right ports, nothing too spectacular. But the GamePad screen would finally become showable, meaning that livestreamers, LP'ers, and even guides/reviews/highlight reels could finally show us what they see on the GamePad.

Soo, yeah. That's all for now. What do you guys think? Do you like my idea? Or even the general notion of multiple GamePads on one console? Be frank, be honest, I can take it! Maybe one of YOUR favourite games could benefit from this idea!
But make no mistake - it's all just food for thought. So dig in!

EDIT: thanks to @Smash_kirby for pointing out my gross mistake (I thought the GamePad connects to WiiU via bluetooth)

Maybe Nintendo could do something awesome like allow two gamepads to be used during MK8 so both players could honk horns, or two gamepads for Splatoon so both players could look at maps.

This could really be a game changer

The tablet uses Wi-Fi direct, not Bluetooth, Bluetooth lacks the speed and the range that Wi-Fi direct has, the controllers for the Xbox one also use Wi-Fi direct. There is a sort of special port on the bottom of the pad that is used for as far as I can figure from watching the Treehouse, AV and direct connection with the system. I would buy a super tablet, able to play WIiU games from the tablet and store one WiiU game or two Wii games on the device. They can do two tablets through Wi-Fi direct but they are having a problem of pricing as they might run into the problem of people demanding the tablet to be done away with in the basic model but at this moment it won't make a difference. Your ideas are rather interesting though.

Kaze: First off I love your ID picture...your comments always stand out because of that awesome picture.

Second, I really like the idea. I am with you, I don't know all the technical aspects of what you are going for, but I really think Nintendo ought to return to the idea of multiple gamepads (or as I suggest more options to link up 3DS's with the Wii U alla SSB4). I recall several articles from either 2013 or 2014 regarding the idea of having two gamepads per Wii U. Some articles talked like this was going to happen and then all of a sudden it was turned off as a possibility. There could be multiple reasons for this, but I really think it would breath new life in the Wii U.

(My mind wanders off the farm to consider if the NX isn't something akin to what you are talking about...although one would think the Wii U would need beefing up, however if you had a new "gamepad" that offered the ability for more power alla a GPU in a computer....argh...I've gone to the county 5 states away from me).

Anyway, I like the willingness to consider multiple options to make this happen. The reason I point to the New 3DS as a plausible option is that it has gyro, it has a touchscreen, it has the little nub thingy, it has the power under the hood (maybe not 720p 60fps...I'm not certain if it can do that or not), it has the connectivity, and I think it is interesting that they are offering Splatoon faceplates for it as well (https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2015/05/get_inked_with_this_new_nintendo_3ds_splatoon-themed_cover_plate) While they look so awesome...I think it sad that you could have the faceplates but not be able to play the game on it!!!

I think your option with multiple gamepads (essentially LAN gamepads) and the New 3DS options are our best bet for improved local multiplayer especially for Splatoon, but also for the multitude of titles you posited. Instead of reinventing the structure...just add on to it...improves longevity and frankly us Nintendo gamers are suckers for solutions like this (ie. "Here is my money, Nintendo. Please just take it!"

Splatoon on!

@HollywoodHogan Damn right you are, brother!

@Smash_Kirby Yeah, the price for separate GamePads would be a major factor in such a concept. I've heard before that Nintendo doesn't want to offer separate GamePads until there's a game to support that, and only if the manufacturing costs are low enough to offer them for less than $80. That does make sense, since controllers must be feasible, even if the general price-performance balancing is good. I didn't cover that because it's the root of a lot of fruitless arguments about what would be a good price for an extra GamePad.

@Grafeaux The Gamepad has a resolution of 576p, I think. And while the N3DS couldn't possibly handle that resolution level, I'm actually rather positive that a downgraded version of Splatoon would work on it - even on 60fps. Also, based on the coverplates, I wouldn't put it past Nintendo to announce a 3DS version of Splatoon, but for much later so it doesn't interfere with the WiiU version too much. However, that might just be wishful thinking. ^_^

I believe what you are referring to is E3 2012, when Reggie officially announced the support of 2 Gamepads. A few months down the road, it was followed by a few articles explaining how Nintendo is waiting until the Wii U is popular enough for them to justify selling Gamepads separately. Obviously, that never happened.

@Kaze_Memaryu I wish your idea was in existence right now. It should definitely be feasible, especially if you could connect the Gamepad via USB. In fact, I'd imagine the Wii U selling much better if they had this and marketed the local multiplayer aspect. This idea was one of the reasons I took an interest in the Wii U.

Alas it was not to be, and the Gamepad is likely too hard a sell for a game console with not a lot of sales due to it costing a lot to make.

One thing I've always wanted is a new Four Swords game, although I think that could also work with connecting multiple 3DS to it too.
Also when I think it was Miyamoto who said that 2 gamepads could work in the future at 30fps or something, another thing I was kind of hoping for was 1 on 1 Project Giant Robot with 2 gamepads.
I don't really know a lot about how it all works, but would the Wii U be able to display multiple screens to separate gamepads if they were connected to it?

To be honest I'd rather Nintendo could make some more great gameplay ideas work with one gamepad before they tried making them work for two.

The wireless hurdle is the biggest one for sure but it's not the biggest one. Just laying this out there the GamePad is a 480p (0.35MP) screen and it's using wireless N 5Ghz. So basically it has something around 70Mbps to play with. And you can tell by looking at it that even at 480p they're using a fair amount of compression to get the thing to work and be responsive.

The only other product on the market that's also doing this and, from what I can tell, doing it as well is the Steam Link. It does it at 1080p (2MP). But to ram the point home about how much bandwidth is needed they not only ship it with wireless AC (~200-500Mbps) but they HIGHLY recommend you use wired (1Gbps). Sure they have something like 6x the resolution AND they're using less compression AFAIK. But still. They do need a lot of bandwidth to keep the latency low.

So when you're talking about extra GamePads? With wireless that bandwidth is shared. So with two GamePads you're effectively asking if you can push twice the resolution (0.7MP) with the same amount of bandwidth. With four? Well it's 4x (1.4MP). And we know from using the thing what sort of range the thing has at 480p. For it to work with 2x? They'd have to halve the bandwidth somehow or we'd just have to put up with more compression. And again, this is just on the bandwidth side of the equation.

You have to also consider the extra horsepower required on the Wii U's side of things. The same numbers as I mentioned before also apply really. Effectively four GamePads and one 720p display would be as hard to display as a single 1080p image. Think of it as having a five player split-screen. You know how the framerate and detail in Mario Kart tanks when you get to three players? Well it's the same thing. And plus lets be honest, for Mario Kart? Split screen works so the added cost and wireless issues (or cable tangle) isn't really worth it.

The only game I can think of where it'd kinda be helpful would be with Splatoon. But TBH I reckon if they really, really wanted multiplayer they could just work out a way to get the game working split-screen without the GamePad. You'd just have to deal with screen-cheaters which, TBH, you'd have to deal with if everyone had their own GamePad map anyways....

It would work exactly like this:

Horribly expensive.

@skywake Those are some very interesting pieces of info there! However, I really wasn't aware that the required bandwidth is THAT high - that makes the whole financial point rather trivial, since the sheer processing power needed to feed four GamePads with correct video stream would more than likely overstrain the WiiU completely.

@Kaze_Memaryu
I wouldn't call it "required" bandwidth, it's probably better to think of it as bandwidth being measurable in more than just the raw, average Mbps. The reason they recommend the wired connection for Steam Link isn't so much because it's faster even though that does help. It's more because it's a dedicated, reliable, low-latency link. A wireless connection, particularly one that's being shared, is none of those things. So a GamePad connected via USB? It would work pretty well... but I wonder what the need would be.

Either way, you have to remember that streaming a game isn't quite the same as streaming a video. With a video you have at least a good few seconds before the thing has to be displayed. With something that's pre-recorded your device can buffer ahead right upto the end of the video if it wants. The fact that higher levels of high-quality compression requires more CPU cycles to encode? Doesn't matter because you have all the time in the world. When it's live? Well you get most of that except you can't buffer ahead. If you look at the stats on a twitch video, usually you'll be sitting around 10-30sec behind "live". Which is usually just enough to cover the variation in speed of your connection.

.... but when you're streaming a game? It's not just "live", it's LIVE live. They try to keep everything down to under around 15ms, so at 60fps they're less than one frame behind. Even then if they can get it faster that's even better because it means less input latency. There's no room for any buffering at all. When video isn't as live your connection is only as good as the average. When it's this quick? Your connection is only as good as it is when it tanks. Made worse by the fact that you have to encode the video pretty much instantly. Problems which again aren't as big if you're on a stable wired connection. But still.

Actually, that function is already built-in into the firmware:

I just wanted to post this separately into a new thread (and I know this thread is a bit old), but it just seemed to fit in here.

If you assume the hardware side works fine, it's still fairly dubious how much they could do with it through software.
Rendering 3 different screens would pretty much require that the 2 gamepads had very little going on on them, or it was all much lower quality than is necessary.
We saw the dip in graphical quality that a first party Nintendo game took due to rendering just 2 screens (Star Fox)
So add another to that. And then add the fact that most devs are worse than Nintendo at optimising on their hardware. It doesn't leave you with anything that great.

I think Nintendo is past the point now of thinking on how to make 2 or more gamepads work on the Wii U. That ship has sailed.

Oh hey a stealthy zombie thread.