65 replies to this topic

[0003mg]

[Limelight788]

That actually looks really good to me. Can't wait to see how the games look.

[omega]

wow...major step from the original wii i cant wait.. the wii U is gonna be just amazing i cant wait for some more details though!

[Pro Pizza! >:D]

I hope Wii U will allow patching for games and DLCs!!!

[Someone]

Wasn't this the one that was confirmed to have been run on the Xbox 360?

[Shane74340]

Wasn't this the one that was confirmed to have been run on the Xbox 360?

Nope, the third party games were confirmed to be 360 footage.

[Someone]

Oh. I'm glad it's not, then, since that's a really good video! Just imagine how good the next Smash Bros. will be.

[Feld0]

I hope Wii U will allow patching for games and DLCs!!!

Considering the 3DS allows that, there is no logical reason the Wii U wouldn't.

When I saw this demo, at first, I was like, "Why is Nintendo showing a nature documentary in the middle of their conference."

Then my jaw dropped when I realized Reggie wasn't kidding when he said this was a realtime demo. And let's also consider that it's a first-gen demo, too - I can't even imagine what developers will do with this system a couple of years into its life.

[AMAC]

That looks great! I can't wait to see how games look on the Wii U. I'm sure we'll see games that look much better than this demo, which is an exciting thought. I can't wait to see Super Mario Galaxy, or any other Super Mario game, on this console.

[Jikayaki]

Something to look into the version of this demo used during the conference isn't the full version of the demo and the demo itself is far more impressive if you can find a good quality video. Something missing in this version for instance is the hawk or falcon part of the demo, which shows in real time the seasons changing and the falcon interacting with the environment( pulling a leaf from a tree, rain dripping of the falcon, and the falcon playing in the snow). This demo is actually very impressive once you stop to think about it even in comparison with some of the latest PC games like Witcher 2. You can't play this using current home consoles, and according to Reggie this demo was based off an earlier developer kit, thus doesn't represent the full capabilities of the console. I have higher hopes for Wii U graphically than I did originally. The CPU is likely based on info from IBM based on Power 7 architecture. This means in layman's terms there is a chance that the CPU at least is a full generational leap a head of Xbox 360, so it wouldn't make sense for the GPU to lag behind. It still won't be capable of graphics to the level of that recent EPIC demo, but neither will any next gen consoles.

Edited by Jikayaki, 08 June 2011 - 12:50 AM.

[Biohazard]

Hey, Jikayaki, what did you think of the Zelda tech demo?

[Jikayaki]

Hey, Jikayaki, what did you think of the Zelda tech demo?

It was impressive in its own right. The highlights of HD Experience Zelda Tech demo was the lighting, shadow, particle effects, and resolution of the animations. It looked impressive from the beginning so I really haven't given it much of a second look, but compared to the Japanese Garden Tech demo there wasn't as much going on. I'd safely say that like the Japanese Garden Tech demo the effects done in the Zelda demo was beyond anything you can do with current consoles short of the PC right now. I'm interested in seeing how Zelda Wii U ends up looking like as historically Zelda tech demos are always worse than the final product.

[Guest]

Look at the attached pictures of the Spaceworld Zelda tech demo and Zelda: Twilight Princess. There's quite a big difference. If the new Zelda tech demo is already beyond PS360 level, a Nintendo IP at the end of WiiU's life cycle is going to look awesome.

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[Mukkinese]

What I found hilarious about the Xbox footage, used to show the games in development for Wii U, was that right after it was shown and most still thought it was Wii U generated graphics. All the comments on various sites were full of twits saying how awful the quality of the graphics were and that they don't come close to Xbox or PS3.

Sheesh! Some people, why do they do that? I really don't understand, if they don't like the look of the thing, no one is forcing them to buy it.

[Caius Casshern Sins]

What I found hilarious about the Xbox footage, used to show the games in development for Wii U, was that right after it was shown and most still thought it was Wii U generated graphics. All the comments on various sites were full of twits saying how awful the quality of the graphics were and that they don't come close to Xbox or PS3.

Sheesh! Some people, why do they do that? I really don't understand, if they don't like the look of the thing, no one is forcing them to buy it.

People actually did that, they must feel really stupid right now. I would love to see their faces.

Edited by zxride64, 08 June 2011 - 04:40 PM.

[Aaron Barton]

My impression is that its graphics capabilities are not far beyond the current competition. That is probably plenty enough power anyway, but at the same time they don't want to reveal specs because people would judge the system on the fact that the specs are similar to five year old products, despite that you shouldn't.

We're rapidly approaching a threshold where graphics across the board are going to be impressive and they simply won't matter anymore. There will still be improvements, but they won't be defining systems like they were a decade ago, when everybody was debating what system had the best capabilities.

The industry in the modern era is about marketing, software, and services. Hardware matters more in form than raw tech specs.

What's most important about Wii U on the technical side is its architecture. Work on the system to an extent carries over from the current generation. Don't expect visuals of Wii games to get much better than you see in their first year. Developers already know how to achieve results with the hardware because they've worked on the Xbox 360 for years. Of course they aren't identical, but they're going to find all the ins/out/tricks a lot faster this time.

[Wertville]

^

Actually... The Wii U could be substantially better than the PS360 with 3 year old tech. Which would actually be cheaper than buying no longer produced 5 year old tech. Just the fact that games that have just started development only a few months ago look like PS360 games, on an outdated devkit tells me that the graphics have not even close to come to their maximum.

[Jikayaki]

My impression is that its graphics capabilities are not far beyond the current competition. That is probably plenty enough power anyway, but at the same time they don't want to reveal specs because people would judge the system on the fact that the specs are similar to five year old products, despite that you shouldn't.

We're rapidly approaching a threshold where graphics across the board are going to be impressive and they simply won't matter anymore. There will still be improvements, but they won't be defining systems like they were a decade ago, when everybody was debating what system had the best capabilities.

The industry in the modern era is about marketing, software, and services. Hardware matters more in form than raw tech specs.

What's most important about Wii U on the technical side is its architecture. Work on the system to an extent carries over from the current generation. Don't expect visuals of Wii games to get much better than you see in their first year. Developers already know how to achieve results with the hardware because they've worked on the Xbox 360 for years. Of course they aren't identical, but they're going to find all the ins/out/tricks a lot faster this time.

Your impression is quite off then. Both demos to some degree showcased effects simply impossible to replicate with current generation consoles. That's without mentioning that both demos where running at 1080p native resolution in real time while pulling off Global Illumination, high quality textures, and ext. Literally only a few PC games on their highest settings can do some of the things being done in both demos. The more impressive demo the Japanese Garden Demo is specifically stated as being based on an older version of the hardware and Zelda tech demos always are worse than the final product. Their choice regarding the demos perhaps wasn't the best. It would of helped get the capabilities of the console around to specific crowds of individuals if one demo had been a realistic urban setting (a FPS ext). We've more or less already meet the threshold where most individuals have a hard time telling several of the current improvements in graphics compared to the capabilities of the current consoles. That has a lot to do with the fact majority of it is very subtle and that no developer has really embraced tessellation. What improvements can be seen for next generation consoles also really need to be seen in person or the original video files as recordings lose quite a bit of detail.

[Biohazard]

Speaking of tessellation, I just heard that the Xbox 360 will employ a rendering technique called "mega meshes" that will supposedly take advantage of the tessellation unit that I never knew the console had.

Here's a tech demo.

[Mukkinese]

That is impressive.