That Facebook post links to AndroidPit that linked to that Eurogamer speculation based article that says the Switch is using an underclock Tegra X1....It isn't an official confirmation at all.
People are saying that is a mis-translation. Kimishima was saying that the Nintendo Switch have the potential to sale as much as the Wii not that he expects the Switch to sale like the Wii.
@XCWarrior Who cares that Pokemon was the so call sole thing. The year is what the year is. Who cares "if it wasn't for XYZ". Guess what, in this reality that we are currently in, Nintendo had Pokemon. Nintendo made money. The end. You see Nintendo will have a new system on the market the next fiscal year. You see Nintendo is expanding into other ventures.
Super Mario Run didn't bomb. Considering the typical mobile game have a 2% conversion rate. Super Mario Run is double that conversion rate. Plus, it haven't even been released on Android yet.
Furthermore, that game probably didn't even cost $500,000 USD to make...
@XCWarrior I will never understand "if it wasn't for Pokemon" statements. Pokemon is an IP that Nintendo actually own a part of. It is there freaking right as a company to use there IP as they see fit to do.
@NEStalgia Yes, it is only the X240, X250, X260 and X270 the traditional X models. The X1 models (X1 tablet and the X1 Carbon) don't have the removable battery. The traditional X models do have removable batteries. I own a x250. It has two batteries. One is removable from the outside and the other battery is on the inside of the chassis. The battery that is inside the chassis is user replaceable. I removed the underside panel from the chassis to upgrade my hard drive to a SSD and upgrade the ram module.
@NEStalgia Agree with everything you wrote. Thinkpads, at least the T(non s model), X2XX (x240, x250 and x260 etc) series and P models have dual batteries. One battery can be replaced from the outside and the other battery can be replaced by unscrewing 8 or so screws from the underside to remove bottom panel from the chassis.
@kurtasbestos And most misses this essential question: what does the age of the hardware have to do with the quality of the 3DS's games? Can high quality game still be mad on the 3DS? I answer, I think, is yes.
@Handy_Man The Switch is extremely child unfriendly. A child would easily lose the $50 USD joy cons to the Switch in tablettop mode and/or in the dock mode if you don't have a stand alone controller.
@Falcon96 The issue, I suspect with Sun and Moon, is that it is a rushed down port of the Pokemon game that will be on the Switch and not something originally [edit:build from the ground up] for the 3DS.
@Damo i wouldn't say that yet about the Switch hardware. We still don't know what CPU is being used in it. For all we know it could have a72 or a73 in it which on par if not stronger than the CPU in the Xbox One and PS4...It won't run with the same graphical effects as the x86 twins due the GPU most being weaker...Even then, the GPU have some call mixed procession where CUDA can use something call half compute. Anyway, the Switch should be able to handle ports this time around...
My biggest beef is that Nintendo have basically starved both the 3DS and the Wii U of high profile titles over the past year and a half. Despite the 3DS's sales, it is library doesn't have much depth and non-existent western support...The Switch launch is piss poor. The only thing new Nintendo have is 1 2 Switch? No release date for the ARMS game that actually makes good use of the Joy-Cons. The only title outside of the March 3 date is Mario Kart 8 DX for full price? In fact, a lot of third parties don't even have release dates. Apart from the prices of the controllers, why am I'm buying the Switch? When are the games coming out that the Switch can play? For the Switch to consist of Wii U ports and games that use ton of assets from Wii U games (Splatoon 2 is some str8 up BS) the whole launch year looks lazy as hell from Nintendo.
So with the game industry a few of the giants are pushing development costs to astronomical levels and smaller studios have trouble competing. That's why you see so little middle ground, it's basically big AAA dev or tiny indie game with little to nothing inbetween. You think it's just a coincidence that EA is buying up struggling studios and closing them down?
This. So much. This is exactly what happen last generation with developers bankrupting themselves to release HD titles on the XBox 360 and PS3.
"Performance wise, danger is that in a couple if years time, we'll start to see Scorpio & PS4 Pro only titles (esp. for VR). Whereas porting a Ps4/x1 title to switch it seems is doable, I expect Scorpio/Pro to switch won't be. So Switch has maybe 18months to build an install base that justifies exclusives and/or can survive missing out on the latest AAA blockbusters hitting Scorpio & Pro."
Looking at the slow start of the PS4 Pro, I highly doubt PS4 Pro games will ever come true. That would require the 45 million plus to upgrade at very brisk pace. And that isn't happening anytime soon if at all.
@MitchVogel Wow. I expect better from a writer from NintendoLife. A special snowflake. The Wii was Nintendo only way out at the time vs Microsoft and Sony was during with the PS3 and Xbox 360. Sony and Microsoft lost billions of dollars. In fact, due to the rush to develop HD games we have lost countless developer and the middle market for developers have all but disappeared. You have Microsoft and Sony to thank for that. But Nintendo is a special snowflake. Nintendo played it smart. Furthermore, there are a lot indication that the Gamecube was easy to develop for as well. I give you that it is on the record that Nintendo did make the N64 hard to develop for but no will is going can say with a straight face that the Wii was difficult to develop for.
@KirbyTheVampire Here is the other thing that is striking. When Eurogamer back in Summer reveal the concept of the NX along with the fact that developers were using a basically a overclocked X1 as the dev. kit. If the CPU is a stock X1, the Switch wouldn't need a fan or anytype of active cooling with a lower clockrate and with two SMs. (see Gooogle's Pixel C which had the X1 while being passively cooled at a higher clock rate)
I had generally been assuming that 2 SMs was the most likely configuration (as, I believe, had most people), simply on the basis of allowing for the smallest possible SoC which could meet Nintendo's performance goals. I'm not quite so sure now, for a number of reasons.[/em]
Firstly, if Nintendo were to use these clocks with a 2 SM configuration (assuming 20nm), then why bother with active cooling? The Pixel C runs a passively cooled TX1, and although people will be quick to point out that Pixel C throttles its GPU clocks while running for a prolonged time due to heat output, there are a few things to be aware of with Pixel C. Firstly, there's a quad-core A57 CPU cluster at 1.9GHz running alongside it, which on 20nm will consume a whopping 7.39W when fully clocked. Switch's CPU might be expected to only consume around 1.5W, by comparison. Secondly, although I haven't been able to find any decent analysis of Pixel C's GPU throttling, the mentions of it I have found indicate that, although it does throttle, the drop in performance is relatively small, and as it's clocked about 100MHz above Switch to begin with it may only be throttling down to a 750MHz clock or so even under prolonged workloads. There is of course the fact that Pixel C has an aluminium body to allow for easier thermal dissipation, but it likely would have been cheaper (and mechanically much simpler) for Nintendo to adopt the same approach, rather than active cooling.
Alternatively, we can think of it a different way. If Switch has active cooling, then why clock so low? Again assuming 20nm, we know that a full 1GHz clock shouldn't be a problem for active cooling, even with a very small quiet fan, given the Shield TV (which, again, uses a much more power-hungry CPU than Switch). Furthermore, if they wanted a 2.5x ratio between the two clock speeds, that would give a 400MHz clock in portable mode. We know that the TX1, with 2 SMs on 20nm, consumes 1.51W (GPU only) when clocked at about 500MHz. Even assuming that that's a favourable demo for the TX1, at 20% lower clock speed I would be surprised if a 400MHz 2 SM GPU would consume any more than 1.5W. That's obviously well within the bounds for passive cooling, but even being very conservative with battery consumption it shouldn't be an issue. The savings from going from 400MHz to 300MHz would perhaps only increase battery life by about 5-10% tops, which makes it puzzling why they'd turn down the extra performance.
Finally, the recently published Switch patent application actually explicitly talks about running the fan at a lower RPM while in portable mode, and doesn't even mention the possibility of turning it off while running in portable mode. A 2 SM 20nm Maxwell GPU at ~300MHz shouldn't require a fan at all, and although it's possible that they've changed their mind since filing the patent in June, it begs the question of why they would even consider running the fan in portable mode if their target performance was anywhere near this.
This is a bit closer to the performance level we've been led to expect, and it does make a little bit of sense from the perspective of giving a little bit over TX1 performance at lower power consumption. (It also matches reports of overclocked TX1s in early dev kits, as you'd need to clock a bit over the standard 1GHz to reach docked performance here.) Active cooling while docked makes sense for a 3 SM GPU at 768MHz, although wouldn't be needed in portable mode. It still leaves the question of why not use 1GHz/400MHz clocks, as even with 3 SMs they should be able to get by with passive cooling at 400MHz, and battery consumption shouldn't be that much of an issue.
This would be on the upper limit of what's been expected, performance wise, and the clock speeds start to make more sense at this point, as portable power consumption for the GPU would be around the 2W mark, so further clock increases may start to effect battery life a bit too much (not that 400-500MHz would be impossible from that point of view, though). Active cooling would be necessary in docked mode, but still shouldn't be needed in portable mode (except perhaps if they go with a beefier CPU config than expected).
Case 4: More than 4 SMs
I'd consider this pretty unlikely, but just from the point of view of "what would you have to do to actually need active cooling in portable mode at these clocks", something like 6 SMs would probably do it (1.15 TF FP32/2.3 TF FP16 docked, 460 GF FP32/920 GF FP16 portable), but I wouldn't count on that. For one, it's well beyond the performance levels that reliable-so-far journalists have told us to expect, but it would also require a much larger die than would be typical for a portable device like this (still much smaller than PS4/XBO SoCs, but that's a very different situation).
I'm starting to suspect that the Devil's Third developer that said NoA is true. Basically, they order the bare minimum to NCL and if the demand is high the NoA excutive get bonuses.
"...This is the case in any U.S. company, especially in the sales division; they always underestimate the sales performance. This way, when they sell over the low estimated sales, they can claim a higher percentage over estimated sales and request a bigger bonus accordingly. There is a typical tendency for this to happen. That's a fact, and it's a flaw in U.S. sales strategy."
@AlexSora89 "Kind of a pyrrhic victory" are you kidding me. Xbox 360 most likely didn't turn a profit. And Sony never made back the money it lost on the PS3 despite having the PSP and PS2 still selling very well co-currently with the PS3.
@DanteSolablood Here is what you wrote: "fault of Nintendo cutting costs by going with an older CPU which couldn't make use of it's potential."
If you want to get technical, x86 is even older than the PowerPC arch that the Wii U uses. The CPU isn't due to Nintendo trying to be "cheap". The CPU issues is due to Nintendo targeting a low power small form factor along with having native backwards compatibility with the Wii. The CPU use in the Wii U isn't cheap due the R&D cost of it's development.
"Developers had to rebuild ports from the ground up spending more time & money, or just chop them down so much they thought their own reputation was on the line."
That is just bullpoop. There were a lot of engines that supported the Wii U that were available on the Xbox 360 and PS3. So, those games wouldn't have had even build from the ground up.
@DanteSolablood You are wrong about the CPU. The CPU wasn't cheap. It was customized low power draw that incorporated the Dolphin/Gecko tech with in it. Nintendo, actually spent quite of bit of money to create the CPU. I'm not going to go in on the edram which again isn't cheap. I wish people will stop spreading misinformation about the Wii U CPU. Yes, the CPU is "underpowered" compared to the x86 but Nintendo made the decision to emphasized a small form factor and low power consumption.
@rjejr Nintendo could do something like a 3DS/DS or GPD android device were the the screen is on top and the controller option is the bottom. Instead of the screen on the bottom part, it would just be space. Also, and hopefully, if Nintendo took this direction, the bottom doesn't have to be perfectly flat. The bottom could be just like the Joy-Cons the the bump on the backside of the device.
I'm starting to suspect that Nintendo, internally, at least after the first year of the Wii U of the market consider the Wii U dead and stretch out the bare minimum of content...
I have this game on the Wii U and died in like the first hour. The combat seem to be very unclear. I'm wondering if I should play this on the Wii U or just buy the Switch version.
@ThanosReXXX Goodness. Wherever you work whatever line of business you are in, God, help me if I have to ever interact with anyone can even write this:
"Their first interest is NOT to satisfy the customer, but to simply have faith in their own product or their ability to market it in such a way that people will still buy it regardless."
(I guess this is what is thought in MBA curriculum?)
How can you make money without customers? For someone that works in marketing I would have had assumed that you would want to at least protect your brand. Also, then what is the point of market testing and/or focus testing? What is the point of getting customer feedback?
Furthermore, I have worked in Food Service, like working a server for a catering company and kitchen prep worker for a mom and pop restaurant while (currently) in and out of college. Keeping our customers happy was the upmost priority for me. If a customer wasn’t happy due to poor food quality and/or poor food preparation and/or the catering event not being set up correctly and/or appropriately for the event that worried me. Why? If that customer need isn’t being met by the company that I was working for that customer would go to a competitors’ business (and for the restaurant a unsatisfied customer could walk down the street to a competitor). Thus, the result would possibly be less business for the company that I work for and less hours overall for me and my coworkers. So, for the lines work that I work in, customer satisfaction is very important. For the catering business it is extremely important to have a great relationship with customers due to the sheer cost of catering events.
Ubisoft brand is damaged in the eyes of Nintendo fans and Ubisoft needs to take a look at that. I will give you a hint. They released very bad games. Ubisoft released trash on the DS, Wii, 3DS and the Wii U. So, I will continue to bring up the horrible games that Ubisoft made on Nintendo platforms. Yes, I’m using Ubisoft Wii support to demonstrate that the quality of Ubisoft’s support is, on a historical level, extremely questionable on Nintendo’s platform. If ZombiU was a such a good game, then why haven't Xbox One and PS4 players purchased like it was purchased on the Wii U? Personally, I won't even look at a Ubisoft game on PC if it isn't the GofY version and it is on sale less than $14.99 based on their release history. I'm not going to even give their Rabbit/Mario crossover game a chance. In short, Ubisoft can go eat crow and sit on a spiked baseball bat for all I care. Ubisoft could disappear and nothing of value would be lost.
But since you brought it up again: the Wii was easy money for most third party developers, and making true triple A experiences coming from HD consoles would have simply made the investment too big, because of the optimizations they would have had to make due to the restrictions of the platform. So, for them, it was simply a consideration of pros vs cons, and going the easy route and making simple games was apparently the answer to that equation for most of them back then, otherwise we would certainly have seen more regular titles.
That doesn’t excuse the low-quality games that the Platform had to endure. The industry pumped that console with trash and took that money to subsidized HD development. They didn’t bother to attempt to even build any type of long term relationship with Nintendo fans. Then, third parties get mad when their games stop selling and paint this false narrative that Nintendo fans don’t buy games which goes on to be repeated ad nauseam.
And besides that, Nintendo was partially at fault themselves because of their convoluted online system, so even if games were ported completely, the online experience was still quite a hassle, so for more reason than one, you should mainly be pointing the finger at Nintendo, for not providing a platform that third party developers could do enough with and be interesting and strong enough to support the third parties' regular titles on, but like I already said before, a lot of Nintendo fans seem to think that in order to be a true fan, you must blindly support someone or some company and it is then frowned upon if you talk about their mistakes or say something negative.
I'm a BIG Nintendo fan myself and I love them for having given me so many great experiences, but they are VERY stubborn and set in their ways, because of their still very traditional heritage and also because they aren't as quick to move with the times as the other two companies are, which to some degree is understandable because the other two are much younger, but still: they must improve, and they must do it fast.
Nintendo isn’t as big as Sony or Microsoft. Nintendo only does gaming. Nintendo cannot depend on other branches for revenue and/or profit to put out consoles at an extreme loss. Sony and Microsoft have done this historically. Sony’s losses on the PS3 was catastrophic. It is very debatable that Microsoft even pulled a profit from even having a gaming division despite charging for online access. Yes, Nintendo incurred losses this generation; but, the totality of those losses much less than what both Sony and Microsoft had loss. Arguably, the jump to HD consoles in generation 7 happen too soon. A lot of studios failed during that period to the increase cost and development time of HD games. (And the funny thing is that a lot of games truly didn’t even run at HD!).
@Beau_Skunk Problem is that Nintendo didn't use the term casual. Casual is an invention by the gaming media. Nintendo used the term "Expanded Audience".
In all honesty, I hate casual and hardcore split customer. Effectively, the split is a false dichotomy. Yes, games can be causal and/or hardcore and/or mainstream; however, doesn't mean that casual can be used as a term to describe a gamer.
I will always disagree with the sentiment that it is "logical".
Yes, I guess, no one can disagree with the number which is like 4 AAA ports: AC:3, AC:Black Flag, Watch_Dogs, and Splinter Cell:Blacklist
EA had 4 AAA ports as well (Madden, FIFA, Mass
Effect 3, and Need for Speed: Most Wanted U)
Was it logical that third parties didn't put any effort into their Wii games as well? Ubisoft released the most games on the Wii as well that were very questionable in quality and some cases the games were flat out broken. The reason that I continue to bring up the Wii and other Nintendo devices is that Nintendo fan's issues with Ubisoft is due to Ubisoft repeatedly release low quality efforts besides even the Wii U. This isn't some just some badly rushed first year ports. Ubisoft continues to treat Nintendo fans as gaming's red head paramour child over the course of several generations across both handheld and home systems.
U say that we shouldn't blame developers for bad games? Is it logical that we should support and buy sup-par games so that we could possible get better games? As some that recently started to play games PC as well as on Nintendo platforms possibly deal with un-optimized PC ports from the likes of Namco and WB and even Ubisoft, that is absurd viewpoint.
So, no "...we can't just simply go and point the finger at these developers." in my view is 100% complete wrong. If a business isn't going to put efforts in to the products they are selling then why should I lay down my cash for them?
For a $60 game Ubisoft gets $27 back. Assuming Ubisoft moved 150,000 out of 700,000 at full price we are looking at 4.05 million dollar alone, in terms of revenue, for that on Ubisoft's balance sheet. Let say for simplicity that the retail price dropped to $20 after the 150,00 units were moved. Now, still assuming the 45% retail margin as indicated in the above link, let's say Ubisoft moved 500,000 units @ $20. That is another 4.5 million dollars on Ubisoft's balance sheet. Let say the reaming 50,000 was on sell on the eshop for $10. Ubisoft would get roughly 70% margin from the sale price. 50,000 units on the eshop would net .35 million dollars on Ubisoft balance sheet.
4.05+4.5+.35= 8.9 million on Ubisoft balance sheet.
I would find it shocking if that game had a budget of over 5 million dollars. A game doesn't haven't to move 1.5 million units to be successful and/or profitable.
A real life case example on sales (I wouldn't be surprise if you have already read them though):
@ThanosReXXX It isn't about "cost" or "investment". It is about customer service. If you are going to treat a customer like trash. Expect trash sales. A developer/publisher that isn't willing to have the best possible parity why bother releasing the game.
Don't even get me started on how Ubisoft flooded the Wii and DS with shovelware and never put forth any of that money into solid Wii games. In fact, Ubisoft used the Wii/DS profits to actually invest in Xbox 360 and PS3 development.
Money Quote: "Guillemot said the company's casual games business was "extremely profitable" and helped to finance the initially costly development of games for next-generation consoles — Sony's PlayStation3 and Microsoft's Xbox 360."
@ThanosReXXX Zombi U, a game that was in "development hell" for years, also, it was stated by the CEO that Zombi U was a very minimum investment, as we can see by the documented glitches and poor production for a $60 game. Damn, right the sales should not have even hit the 700,000 units. But oh wait, when did 700,000 sales become "meger"? Furthermore, in the same article, the CEO said that a port of a Wii U game cost roughly 1 million Euros. I highly doubt they lost that much money when supporting the Wii U like the CEO was trying to imply.
Source here: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-07-23-ubisoft-says-wii-u-ports-costing-under-USD1-3-million
Splinter Cell Blacklist, a game that was missing local multiplayer on the Wii U version?
Black Flag, a game that Ubisoft, which as stated in link that post in post #37, sent out to die.
Also, I see you didn't even bother to mention the low quality efforts that they released on the 3DS. Complained about the sales and canceled the rest of the titles. Currently, the 3DS sits at 40 million units in the West. The issues that a Nintendo fan may have with Ubisoft isn't just with the Wii U support. It is with the 3DS as well. Considering, Ubisoft
Sure, they may have had released titles, but let us not pretend that Ubisoft put forth their best efforts.
Also, the thing is we didn't hear anything about Activsion say crap and spouting off lies about the Wii U customer base.
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Re: ARM Confirms That The Nintendo Switch's Chipset Is Very Close To Tegra X1 Spec
That Facebook post links to AndroidPit that linked to that Eurogamer speculation based article that says the Switch is using an underclock Tegra X1....It isn't an official confirmation at all.
Re: Nintendo Switch Version Of For Honor Out Of The Question Right Now
@SLIGEACH_EIRE I highly doubt that is either the xbox one nor the ps4 version will look like....
Re: Tatsumi Kimishima Expects Nintendo Switch To Sell "About As Well" As The Wii
「Ｗｉｉ程度の販売になる可能性がある」との見方を示した。
google translate this as
There is a possibility that it will be on sale on the order of Wii.
Re: Tatsumi Kimishima Expects Nintendo Switch To Sell "About As Well" As The Wii
People are saying that is a mis-translation. Kimishima was saying that the Nintendo Switch have the potential to sale as much as the Wii not that he expects the Switch to sale like the Wii.
Re: Feature: The Rollercoaster Ride of Nintendo's Financial Reports
@XCWarrior
Who cares that Pokemon was the so call sole thing. The year is what the year is. Who cares "if it wasn't for XYZ". Guess what, in this reality that we are currently in, Nintendo had Pokemon. Nintendo made money. The end. You see Nintendo will have a new system on the market the next fiscal year. You see Nintendo is expanding into other ventures.
Super Mario Run didn't bomb. Considering the typical mobile game have a 2% conversion rate. Super Mario Run is double that conversion rate. Plus, it haven't even been released on Android yet.
Furthermore, that game probably didn't even cost $500,000 USD to make...
Re: 3DS Enjoys Bumper End To 2016 With Hardware And Software Sales Both Up
@sillygostly Sun and Moon is already downport from Switch based hardware...
Re: Feature: The Rollercoaster Ride of Nintendo's Financial Reports
@XCWarrior I will never understand "if it wasn't for Pokemon" statements. Pokemon is an IP that Nintendo actually own a part of. It is there freaking right as a company to use there IP as they see fit to do.
Re: Nintendo Will Replace Your Dead Switch Battery, At A Cost
@NEStalgia Yes, it is only the X240, X250, X260 and X270 the traditional X models. The X1 models (X1 tablet and the X1 Carbon) don't have the removable battery. The traditional X models do have removable batteries. I own a x250. It has two batteries. One is removable from the outside and the other battery is on the inside of the chassis. The battery that is inside the chassis is user replaceable. I removed the underside panel from the chassis to upgrade my hard drive to a SSD and upgrade the ram module.
Re: Nintendo Will Replace Your Dead Switch Battery, At A Cost
@NEStalgia Agree with everything you wrote. Thinkpads, at least the T(non s model), X2XX (x240, x250 and x260 etc) series and P models have dual batteries. One battery can be replaced from the outside and the other battery can be replaced by unscrewing 8 or so screws from the underside to remove bottom panel from the chassis.
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo 3DS, A System That Still Has a Role to Play
@kurtasbestos And most misses this essential question: what does the age of the hardware have to do with the quality of the 3DS's games? Can high quality game still be mad on the 3DS? I answer, I think, is yes.
Re: Video: New Nintendo Switch Advert Shows Off Its Number Two Feature
@Handy_Man The Switch is extremely child unfriendly. A child would easily lose the $50 USD joy cons to the Switch in tablettop mode and/or in the dock mode if you don't have a stand alone controller.
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo 3DS, A System That Still Has a Role to Play
@NEStalgia Have you looked at the price of USB 3.1 C to HDMI converters?
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo 3DS, A System That Still Has a Role to Play
@Falcon96 The issue, I suspect with Sun and Moon, is that it is a rushed down port of the Pokemon game that will be on the Switch and not something originally [edit:build from the ground up] for the 3DS.
Re: Soapbox: It's Nintendo's Job To Make Switch A Success, Not EA's, Ubisoft's Or Capcom's
@NintendoFan4Lyf Great point about DOOM; honestly, I think DOOM would be a better fit than Skyrim IMHO.
Re: Soapbox: It's Nintendo's Job To Make Switch A Success, Not EA's, Ubisoft's Or Capcom's
@Damo i wouldn't say that yet about the Switch hardware. We still don't know what CPU is being used in it. For all we know it could have a72 or a73 in it which on par if not stronger than the CPU in the Xbox One and PS4...It won't run with the same graphical effects as the x86 twins due the GPU most being weaker...Even then, the GPU have some call mixed procession where CUDA can use something call half compute. Anyway, the Switch should be able to handle ports this time around...
Re: Editorial: Pricing Blunders Have Distorted The Narrative Around Nintendo Switch
Furthermore, we don't know how Nintendo is even going to handle the Virtual Console. We know so little and Nintendo is charging out the wahooooo.
Re: Editorial: Pricing Blunders Have Distorted The Narrative Around Nintendo Switch
My biggest beef is that Nintendo have basically starved both the 3DS and the Wii U of high profile titles over the past year and a half. Despite the 3DS's sales, it is library doesn't have much depth and non-existent western support...The Switch launch is piss poor. The only thing new Nintendo have is 1 2 Switch? No release date for the ARMS game that actually makes good use of the Joy-Cons. The only title outside of the March 3 date is Mario Kart 8 DX for full price? In fact, a lot of third parties don't even have release dates. Apart from the prices of the controllers, why am I'm buying the Switch? When are the games coming out that the Switch can play? For the Switch to consist of Wii U ports and games that use ton of assets from Wii U games (Splatoon 2 is some str8 up BS) the whole launch year looks lazy as hell from Nintendo.
Re: The Wii U Generated Just 2.1 Percent Of UK Games Market Revenue In 2016
@XCWarrior Despite the decline of Video games in Japan, Japan market for video games is greater than some of larger European countries combined!
https://newzoo.com/insights/rankings/top-100-countries-by-game-revenues/
It takes the markets of Germany, UK, France and Spain combined to slightly beat out the Japanese gaming market.
Re: The Game Boy Was Nearly a Cheap, Short-Term Project
"...over the portable gaming market that still persists to this day somewhat."
Love the backhanded compliment.
Re: New Code Found in Unreal Engine 4 Further Reinforces Claims of Handheld / Docked Power Gap with Nintendo Switch
@Yorumi
So with the game industry a few of the giants are pushing development costs to astronomical levels and smaller studios have trouble competing. That's why you see so little middle ground, it's basically big AAA dev or tiny indie game with little to nothing inbetween. You think it's just a coincidence that EA is buying up struggling studios and closing them down?
This. So much. This is exactly what happen last generation with developers bankrupting themselves to release HD titles on the XBox 360 and PS3.
Re: New Code Found in Unreal Engine 4 Further Reinforces Claims of Handheld / Docked Power Gap with Nintendo Switch
@JamesCoote
"Performance wise, danger is that in a couple if years time, we'll start to see Scorpio & PS4 Pro only titles (esp. for VR). Whereas porting a Ps4/x1 title to switch it seems is doable, I expect Scorpio/Pro to switch won't be. So Switch has maybe 18months to build an install base that justifies exclusives and/or can survive missing out on the latest AAA blockbusters hitting Scorpio & Pro."
Looking at the slow start of the PS4 Pro, I highly doubt PS4 Pro games will ever come true. That would require the 45 million plus to upgrade at very brisk pace. And that isn't happening anytime soon if at all.
Re: Pachter Says Switch is the Easiest of the Big Three to Develop For
@MitchVogel Wow. I expect better from a writer from NintendoLife. A special snowflake. The Wii was Nintendo only way out at the time vs Microsoft and Sony was during with the PS3 and Xbox 360. Sony and Microsoft lost billions of dollars. In fact, due to the rush to develop HD games we have lost countless developer and the middle market for developers have all but disappeared. You have Microsoft and Sony to thank for that. But Nintendo is a special snowflake. Nintendo played it smart. Furthermore, there are a lot indication that the Gamecube was easy to develop for as well. I give you that it is on the record that Nintendo did make the N64 hard to develop for but no will is going can say with a straight face that the Wii was difficult to develop for.
Re: Eurogamer Report Suggests Nintendo Switch GPU Runs 60 Percent Slower When Undocked
@KirbyTheVampire Here is the other thing that is striking. When Eurogamer back in Summer reveal the concept of the NX along with the fact that developers were using a basically a overclocked X1 as the dev. kit. If the CPU is a stock X1, the Switch wouldn't need a fan or anytype of active cooling with a lower clockrate and with two SMs. (see Gooogle's Pixel C which had the X1 while being passively cooled at a higher clock rate)
Re: Eurogamer Report Suggests Nintendo Switch GPU Runs 60 Percent Slower When Undocked
I really am starting to hate Eurogamer. They take on fact (the clock speed) and write a hold article insinuating that the worst case is fact.
Re: Eurogamer Report Suggests Nintendo Switch GPU Runs 60 Percent Slower When Undocked
The text below is from this source w/ regards to the SM: Source
Case 1: 2 SMs - Docked: 384 GF FP32 / 768 GF FP16 - Portable: 153.6 GF FP32 / 307.2 GF FP16
I had generally been assuming that 2 SMs was the most likely configuration (as, I believe, had most people), simply on the basis of allowing for the smallest possible SoC which could meet Nintendo's performance goals. I'm not quite so sure now, for a number of reasons.[/em]
Firstly, if Nintendo were to use these clocks with a 2 SM configuration (assuming 20nm), then why bother with active cooling? The Pixel C runs a passively cooled TX1, and although people will be quick to point out that Pixel C throttles its GPU clocks while running for a prolonged time due to heat output, there are a few things to be aware of with Pixel C. Firstly, there's a quad-core A57 CPU cluster at 1.9GHz running alongside it, which on 20nm will consume a whopping 7.39W when fully clocked. Switch's CPU might be expected to only consume around 1.5W, by comparison. Secondly, although I haven't been able to find any decent analysis of Pixel C's GPU throttling, the mentions of it I have found indicate that, although it does throttle, the drop in performance is relatively small, and as it's clocked about 100MHz above Switch to begin with it may only be throttling down to a 750MHz clock or so even under prolonged workloads. There is of course the fact that Pixel C has an aluminium body to allow for easier thermal dissipation, but it likely would have been cheaper (and mechanically much simpler) for Nintendo to adopt the same approach, rather than active cooling.
Alternatively, we can think of it a different way. If Switch has active cooling, then why clock so low? Again assuming 20nm, we know that a full 1GHz clock shouldn't be a problem for active cooling, even with a very small quiet fan, given the Shield TV (which, again, uses a much more power-hungry CPU than Switch). Furthermore, if they wanted a 2.5x ratio between the two clock speeds, that would give a 400MHz clock in portable mode. We know that the TX1, with 2 SMs on 20nm, consumes 1.51W (GPU only) when clocked at about 500MHz. Even assuming that that's a favourable demo for the TX1, at 20% lower clock speed I would be surprised if a 400MHz 2 SM GPU would consume any more than 1.5W. That's obviously well within the bounds for passive cooling, but even being very conservative with battery consumption it shouldn't be an issue. The savings from going from 400MHz to 300MHz would perhaps only increase battery life by about 5-10% tops, which makes it puzzling why they'd turn down the extra performance.
Finally, the recently published Switch patent application actually explicitly talks about running the fan at a lower RPM while in portable mode, and doesn't even mention the possibility of turning it off while running in portable mode. A 2 SM 20nm Maxwell GPU at ~300MHz shouldn't require a fan at all, and although it's possible that they've changed their mind since filing the patent in June, it begs the question of why they would even consider running the fan in portable mode if their target performance was anywhere near this.
Case 2: 3 SMs - Docked: 576 GF FP32 / 1,152 GF FP16 - Portable: 230.4 GF FP32 / 460.8 GF FP16
This is a bit closer to the performance level we've been led to expect, and it does make a little bit of sense from the perspective of giving a little bit over TX1 performance at lower power consumption. (It also matches reports of overclocked TX1s in early dev kits, as you'd need to clock a bit over the standard 1GHz to reach docked performance here.) Active cooling while docked makes sense for a 3 SM GPU at 768MHz, although wouldn't be needed in portable mode. It still leaves the question of why not use 1GHz/400MHz clocks, as even with 3 SMs they should be able to get by with passive cooling at 400MHz, and battery consumption shouldn't be that much of an issue.
Case 3: 4 SMs - Docked: 768 GF FP32 / 1,536 GF FP16 - Portable: 307.2 GF FP32 / 614.4 GF FP16
This would be on the upper limit of what's been expected, performance wise, and the clock speeds start to make more sense at this point, as portable power consumption for the GPU would be around the 2W mark, so further clock increases may start to effect battery life a bit too much (not that 400-500MHz would be impossible from that point of view, though). Active cooling would be necessary in docked mode, but still shouldn't be needed in portable mode (except perhaps if they go with a beefier CPU config than expected).
Case 4: More than 4 SMs
I'd consider this pretty unlikely, but just from the point of view of "what would you have to do to actually need active cooling in portable mode at these clocks", something like 6 SMs would probably do it (1.15 TF FP32/2.3 TF FP16 docked, 460 GF FP32/920 GF FP16 portable), but I wouldn't count on that. For one, it's well beyond the performance levels that reliable-so-far journalists have told us to expect, but it would also require a much larger die than would be typical for a portable device like this (still much smaller than PS4/XBO SoCs, but that's a very different situation).
Re: Guide: Collecting Zygarde's Cores for the Complete Forme in Pokémon Sun and Moon
When I see Zygarde, I always think of Pokemon, Gundam edition.
Re: NES Classic Edition Sold 196,000 Units in US Launch as Pokémon Sun and Moon Set Records
I'm starting to suspect that the Devil's Third developer that said NoA is true. Basically, they order the bare minimum to NCL and if the demand is high the NoA excutive get bonuses.
"...This is the case in any U.S. company, especially in the sales division; they always underestimate the sales performance. This way, when they sell over the low estimated sales, they can claim a higher percentage over estimated sales and request a bigger bonus accordingly. There is a typical tendency for this to happen. That's a fact, and it's a flaw in U.S. sales strategy."
http://www.polygon.com/features/2016/11/16/13596478/the-ups-downs-and-future-of-tomonobu-itagakis-devils-third
Re: Yooka-Laylee's Wii U Cancellation is Only Due to Technical Challenges, Not the System's Woes
@John_Enigma More like Wii U RIP (Nov 2012 to June 2016)
Re: Feature: The Wii U's Journey - Four Years of Excellence, Failure and Indifference
@AlexSora89 "Kind of a pyrrhic victory" are you kidding me. Xbox 360 most likely didn't turn a profit. And Sony never made back the money it lost on the PS3 despite having the PSP and PS2 still selling very well co-currently with the PS3.
Re: Feature: The Wii U's Journey - Four Years of Excellence, Failure and Indifference
@DanteSolablood Here is what you wrote: "fault of Nintendo cutting costs by going with an older CPU which couldn't make use of it's potential."
If you want to get technical, x86 is even older than the PowerPC arch that the Wii U uses. The CPU isn't due to Nintendo trying to be "cheap". The CPU issues is due to Nintendo targeting a low power small form factor along with having native backwards compatibility with the Wii. The CPU use in the Wii U isn't cheap due the R&D cost of it's development.
"Developers had to rebuild ports from the ground up spending more time & money, or just chop them down so much they thought their own reputation was on the line."
That is just bullpoop. There were a lot of engines that supported the Wii U that were available on the Xbox 360 and PS3. So, those games wouldn't have had even build from the ground up.
Re: Feature: The Wii U's Journey - Four Years of Excellence, Failure and Indifference
@DanteSolablood You are wrong about the CPU. The CPU wasn't cheap. It was customized low power draw that incorporated the Dolphin/Gecko tech with in it. Nintendo, actually spent quite of bit of money to create the CPU. I'm not going to go in on the edram which again isn't cheap. I wish people will stop spreading misinformation about the Wii U CPU. Yes, the CPU is "underpowered" compared to the x86 but Nintendo made the decision to emphasized a small form factor and low power consumption.
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo Switch Pitch - A Jack of All Trades
@rjejr Nintendo could do something like a 3DS/DS or GPD android device were the the screen is on top and the controller option is the bottom. Instead of the screen on the bottom part, it would just be space. Also, and hopefully, if Nintendo took this direction, the bottom doesn't have to be perfectly flat. The bottom could be just like the Joy-Cons the the bump on the backside of the device.
Re: Rumour: GameCube Virtual Console Coming To Nintendo Switch
I'm starting to suspect that Nintendo, internally, at least after the first year of the Wii U of the market consider the Wii U dead and stretch out the bare minimum of content...
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo Switch Pitch - A Jack of All Trades
@hieveryone Yeah. My bad. As you see I stay my butt on Nintendo sites and general gaming sites.
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo Switch Pitch - A Jack of All Trades
@Manjushri The eurogamer nx article in late July stated that the NX dev kit were using overclocked X1 hardware which required active cooling....
Re: Talking Point: The Nintendo Switch Pitch - A Jack of All Trades
@JohnGrey Why are you on a site called "NintendoLife"? Cant you go post on the other gaming sites like IGN or PlaystationLife or XboneLife?
Re: Rumour: GameCube Virtual Console Coming To Nintendo Switch
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2012/10/rumour_gamecube_coming_to_wii_u_virtual_console
Nintendo stay killing the Wii U with fire. Kill the Wii U. Death to the Wii U.
Re: Rumour: GameCube Coming to Wii U Virtual Console
Instead of the Wii U, it comes to the Nintendo Switch...
Re: Feature: Xenoblade Chronicles X - One Year Later
I have this game on the Wii U and died in like the first hour. The combat seem to be very unclear. I'm wondering if I should play this on the Wii U or just buy the Switch version.
Re: Nintendo Switch Will "Expand The Possibilities Of Fun" Says Ubisoft's Alain Corre
@ThanosReXXX Goodness. Wherever you work whatever line of business you are in, God, help me if I have to ever interact with anyone can even write this:
"Their first interest is NOT to satisfy the customer, but to simply have faith in their own product or their ability to market it in such a way that people will still buy it regardless."
(I guess this is what is thought in MBA curriculum?)
How can you make money without customers? For someone that works in marketing I would have had assumed that you would want to at least protect your brand. Also, then what is the point of market testing and/or focus testing? What is the point of getting customer feedback?
Furthermore, I have worked in Food Service, like working a server for a catering company and kitchen prep worker for a mom and pop restaurant while (currently) in and out of college. Keeping our customers happy was the upmost priority for me. If a customer wasn’t happy due to poor food quality and/or poor food preparation and/or the catering event not being set up correctly and/or appropriately for the event that worried me. Why? If that customer need isn’t being met by the company that I was working for that customer would go to a competitors’ business (and for the restaurant a unsatisfied customer could walk down the street to a competitor). Thus, the result would possibly be less business for the company that I work for and less hours overall for me and my coworkers. So, for the lines work that I work in, customer satisfaction is very important. For the catering business it is extremely important to have a great relationship with customers due to the sheer cost of catering events.
Ubisoft brand is damaged in the eyes of Nintendo fans and Ubisoft needs to take a look at that. I will give you a hint. They released very bad games. Ubisoft released trash on the DS, Wii, 3DS and the Wii U. So, I will continue to bring up the horrible games that Ubisoft made on Nintendo platforms. Yes, I’m using Ubisoft Wii support to demonstrate that the quality of Ubisoft’s support is, on a historical level, extremely questionable on Nintendo’s platform. If ZombiU was a such a good game, then why haven't Xbox One and PS4 players purchased like it was purchased on the Wii U? Personally, I won't even look at a Ubisoft game on PC if it isn't the GofY version and it is on sale less than $14.99 based on their release history. I'm not going to even give their Rabbit/Mario crossover game a chance. In short, Ubisoft can go eat crow and sit on a spiked baseball bat for all I care. Ubisoft could disappear and nothing of value would be lost.
But since you brought it up again: the Wii was easy money for most third party developers, and making true triple A experiences coming from HD consoles would have simply made the investment too big, because of the optimizations they would have had to make due to the restrictions of the platform. So, for them, it was simply a consideration of pros vs cons, and going the easy route and making simple games was apparently the answer to that equation for most of them back then, otherwise we would certainly have seen more regular titles.
That doesn’t excuse the low-quality games that the Platform had to endure. The industry pumped that console with trash and took that money to subsidized HD development. They didn’t bother to attempt to even build any type of long term relationship with Nintendo fans. Then, third parties get mad when their games stop selling and paint this false narrative that Nintendo fans don’t buy games which goes on to be repeated ad nauseam.
And besides that, Nintendo was partially at fault themselves because of their convoluted online system, so even if games were ported completely, the online experience was still quite a hassle, so for more reason than one, you should mainly be pointing the finger at Nintendo, for not providing a platform that third party developers could do enough with and be interesting and strong enough to support the third parties' regular titles on, but like I already said before, a lot of Nintendo fans seem to think that in order to be a true fan, you must blindly support someone or some company and it is then frowned upon if you talk about their mistakes or say something negative.
I'm a BIG Nintendo fan myself and I love them for having given me so many great experiences, but they are VERY stubborn and set in their ways, because of their still very traditional heritage and also because they aren't as quick to move with the times as the other two companies are, which to some degree is understandable because the other two are much younger, but still: they must improve, and they must do it fast.
Nintendo isn’t as big as Sony or Microsoft. Nintendo only does gaming. Nintendo cannot depend on other branches for revenue and/or profit to put out consoles at an extreme loss. Sony and Microsoft have done this historically. Sony’s losses on the PS3 was catastrophic. It is very debatable that Microsoft even pulled a profit from even having a gaming division despite charging for online access. Yes, Nintendo incurred losses this generation; but, the totality of those losses much less than what both Sony and Microsoft had loss. Arguably, the jump to HD consoles in generation 7 happen too soon. A lot of studios failed during that period to the increase cost and development time of HD games. (And the funny thing is that a lot of games truly didn’t even run at HD!).
Re: Reggie Confirmed For On-Stage Appearance At The Game Awards 2016
@WilliamCalley I wish it was true. Reggie Sucks!
Re: Reggie Confirmed For On-Stage Appearance At The Game Awards 2016
Wow. Another crappy Nintendo of America executive. I hope he get booed. In fact, here a boo from me: Booooooooooooo Reggie Sucks. Booooooooooooooooo
Re: Ubisoft Director Says Nintendo Switch May Unite the Casual and Hardcore Gaming Audiences
@Beau_Skunk Problem is that Nintendo didn't use the term casual. Casual is an invention by the gaming media. Nintendo used the term "Expanded Audience".
Re: Ubisoft Director Says Nintendo Switch May Unite the Casual and Hardcore Gaming Audiences
@BiasedSonyFan Good post. I'm god honest sick of that trite narrative that Nintendo abandoned the "hardcore".
Re: Ubisoft Director Says Nintendo Switch May Unite the Casual and Hardcore Gaming Audiences
In all honesty, I hate casual and hardcore split customer. Effectively, the split is a false dichotomy. Yes, games can be causal and/or hardcore and/or mainstream; however, doesn't mean that casual can be used as a term to describe a gamer.
Re: Ubisoft Director Says Nintendo Switch May Unite the Casual and Hardcore Gaming Audiences
@Tempestryke To bad the online gaming community doesn't realize this...
Re: Nintendo Switch Will "Expand The Possibilities Of Fun" Says Ubisoft's Alain Corre
@ThanosReXXX
I will always disagree with the sentiment that it is "logical".
Yes, I guess, no one can disagree with the number which is like 4 AAA ports: AC:3, AC:Black Flag, Watch_Dogs, and Splinter Cell:Blacklist
EA had 4 AAA ports as well (Madden, FIFA, Mass
Effect 3, and Need for Speed: Most Wanted U)
Was it logical that third parties didn't put any effort into their Wii games as well? Ubisoft released the most games on the Wii as well that were very questionable in quality and some cases the games were flat out broken. The reason that I continue to bring up the Wii and other Nintendo devices is that Nintendo fan's issues with Ubisoft is due to Ubisoft repeatedly release low quality efforts besides even the Wii U. This isn't some just some badly rushed first year ports. Ubisoft continues to treat Nintendo fans as gaming's red head paramour child over the course of several generations across both handheld and home systems.
U say that we shouldn't blame developers for bad games? Is it logical that we should support and buy sup-par games so that we could possible get better games? As some that recently started to play games PC as well as on Nintendo platforms possibly deal with un-optimized PC ports from the likes of Namco and WB and even Ubisoft, that is absurd viewpoint.
So, no "...we can't just simply go and point the finger at these developers." in my view is 100% complete wrong. If a business isn't going to put efforts in to the products they are selling then why should I lay down my cash for them?
Re: Nintendo Switch Will "Expand The Possibilities Of Fun" Says Ubisoft's Alain Corre
@ThanosReXXX
Here is a simple case example for the case of ZombiU:
Looking at this link:
http://unrealitymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/game-pie.jpg
another link on this topic:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2010/02/anatomy-of-a-60-dollar-video-game.html
For a $60 game Ubisoft gets $27 back. Assuming Ubisoft moved 150,000 out of 700,000 at full price we are looking at 4.05 million dollar alone, in terms of revenue, for that on Ubisoft's balance sheet. Let say for simplicity that the retail price dropped to $20 after the 150,00 units were moved. Now, still assuming the 45% retail margin as indicated in the above link, let's say Ubisoft moved 500,000 units @ $20. That is another 4.5 million dollars on Ubisoft's balance sheet. Let say the reaming 50,000 was on sell on the eshop for $10. Ubisoft would get roughly 70% margin from the sale price. 50,000 units on the eshop would net .35 million dollars on Ubisoft balance sheet.
4.05+4.5+.35= 8.9 million on Ubisoft balance sheet.
I would find it shocking if that game had a budget of over 5 million dollars. A game doesn't haven't to move 1.5 million units to be successful and/or profitable.
A real life case example on sales (I wouldn't be surprise if you have already read them though):
http://yachtclubgames.com/2014/08/sales-one-month/
Sales after breaking the 1 million:
http://yachtclubgames.com/2016/04/feat-unlocked-one-million-copies-of-shovel-knight-sold/
Anyway, I guess maybe we are speaking past one another.
Re: Nintendo Switch Will "Expand The Possibilities Of Fun" Says Ubisoft's Alain Corre
@ThanosReXXX It isn't about "cost" or "investment". It is about customer service. If you are going to treat a customer like trash. Expect trash sales. A developer/publisher that isn't willing to have the best possible parity why bother releasing the game.
Don't even get me started on how Ubisoft flooded the Wii and DS with shovelware and never put forth any of that money into solid Wii games. In fact, Ubisoft used the Wii/DS profits to actually invest in Xbox 360 and PS3 development.
Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-games-ubisoft-idUSL2287657620070822
Money Quote: "Guillemot said the company's casual games business was "extremely profitable" and helped to finance the initially costly development of games for next-generation consoles — Sony's PlayStation3 and Microsoft's Xbox 360."
Re: Nintendo Switch Will "Expand The Possibilities Of Fun" Says Ubisoft's Alain Corre
@ThanosReXXX Zombi U, a game that was in "development hell" for years, also, it was stated by the CEO that Zombi U was a very minimum investment, as we can see by the documented glitches and poor production for a $60 game. Damn, right the sales should not have even hit the 700,000 units. But oh wait, when did 700,000 sales become "meger"? Furthermore, in the same article, the CEO said that a port of a Wii U game cost roughly 1 million Euros. I highly doubt they lost that much money when supporting the Wii U like the CEO was trying to imply.
Source here: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-07-23-ubisoft-says-wii-u-ports-costing-under-USD1-3-million
Splinter Cell Blacklist, a game that was missing local multiplayer on the Wii U version?
Black Flag, a game that Ubisoft, which as stated in link that post in post #37, sent out to die.
Also, I see you didn't even bother to mention the low quality efforts that they released on the 3DS. Complained about the sales and canceled the rest of the titles. Currently, the 3DS sits at 40 million units in the West. The issues that a Nintendo fan may have with Ubisoft isn't just with the Wii U support. It is with the 3DS as well. Considering, Ubisoft
Sure, they may have had released titles, but let us not pretend that Ubisoft put forth their best efforts.
Also, the thing is we didn't hear anything about Activsion say crap and spouting off lies about the Wii U customer base.