Blu-Ray Enabled Wii... ZOMG i hope not!

[dannbrownn]

Right then first of all here is the link: http://news.filefront.com/rumor-of-the-day-blu-ray-enabled-nintendo-wii/

 

I am sure that you will know that pretty much anyone can just make something up like that so i am refusing to believe this is true!

 

But I do like the name 'Wii Watch' for the dvd channel!

 

Lets look at this sensibly though, would Nintendo reallt add blu-ray to the wii in any way shape or form? Possibly as an add on drive or something but who knows how big or expensive that might be, also surely a blu-ray drive would require the wii to have HDMI or at least a component output above 480p... which would mean a new model of the wii anyway... which would mean that they might as well build it into the new model... but then you get the size and price issue again!

 

Anyway would Nintendo really risk something like this when they have the fastest selling console of this generation already?

 

But when you look at it...

 

Nintendo did originally say the wii would have dvd playback... then removed it... then remember when a few japan release dates were announced/leaked a few months ago and there was the mysterious 'DVD enabled Wii' on the list, in that same group of dates etc was the 'Wii Health Pack' and little did we expect to see the wii balance board and Wii Fit that it turned into.

 

Then there is the quote from reggie at the end of the article in that link, who knows what he could be talking about!

 

Personally i think it could be a disaster to change the Wii's winning formula in a minor way... yet alone a major decision like this!

 

I don't believe the rumour, and i don't want to!

 

Whats your take on this?

[Darv]

It's so ridiculous it really takes the piss.

 

The Wii simply doesn't have the processing power / memory to play a Blu Ray disk. Not forgetting the fact that it needs to output high def and would need an HDMI socket.

[Cube]

Very unknown site, unknown source.

 

Sounds like rubbish, tbh. The only way it would happen is if there was a Panasonic Qwii.

[Jasper]

No matter what, this would be awesome.

 

But an informant that walks in the wrong door Willy Wonka-style? That's just plain silly. It would be cool if it was true, but I doubt Nintendo would take the chance by letting an informant walk freely through their headquarters and I doubt they would be so stupid to quickly eject the disc and put in a Blu-Ray movie box while the informant was watching. If they left it in they would at least have the Blu-Ray player excuse...

 

But it would be nice if Nintendo got a Wii Watch Channel out there. To run normal DVDs, you don't need extra hardware, not? Just a software application with the necessary codecs. That's what I think, though.

[AshMat]

Why would you hope they didn't release it as an add on? I men yeah it's obviously not gonna happen, but so what if it did? How does it affect you?

(Aimed at dann)

 

Also, in what way is filefront and "unkown" website? I mean it's not really known for news as it is for game downloads etc, but still it's not like it's unknown.

[Hellfire]

I just read the thread title, I don't need to read more to know it's BS.

[Konfucius]

Yes surely Nintendo would support Sony in their struggle to bring Blu-Ray to the masses.

 

I think all we (maybe) get is a standard DVD version.

[Charlie]

I was loling before I even got into the actual thread.

[Marshmellow]

Well the article is very vague, but I seriously doubt that Blu-Ray is coming to the Wii.

[dannbrownn]

Why would you hope they didn't release it as an add on? I men yeah it's obviously not gonna happen, but so what if it did? How does it affect you?

(Aimed at dann)

 

Also, in what way is filefront and "unkown" website? I mean it's not really known for news as it is for game downloads etc, but still it's not like it's unknown.

 

There are all sorts of reasons that i don't want to see blu-ray even as an add on, firstly it would be massive u-turn after all the 'market isn't ready for HD' stuff ninty said last year which would make them as credible as sony- not very!

But seriously, sony have already tried to say the wii is expensive, a blu-ray add on would give them more ammo, surely a blu-ray drive would be as big as the wii itself! which takes from it's 'fit into every living room' size and design, why would we want to encourage the use of disks instead of cheaper downloads?.. nintendo are a games company.

i will come back to this later as i am writing this on the wii and my wiimote batteries are not looking to healthy!

[DCK]

There are so many reasons why this isn't true I can't even begin listing them.

[Ten10]

Yep I know is a load of crap too. Nintendo is the last company to jump onto an unstable format. They didn't even fully like the idea of using dvd's.

[Fanelia]

yeah, they would have alle movies compressed on cartridges instead.

[Jasper]

There are all sorts of reasons that i don't want to see blu-ray even as an add on, firstly it would be massive u-turn after all the 'market isn't ready for HD' stuff ninty said last year which would make them as credible as sony- not very!

 

Nintendo said that two years ago and that day it was a viable decision. But now the tides have changed a little, so it would make sense. Nintendo will jump in once the market is ready for it and the price can be ready. It is not only for movies that you can use Blu-Rays (although I really doubt you would be able to play movies on it).

 

By the way, the article states he clearly could see it was a Blu-Ray movie, but how did he see that? Was there a blue box on the table in wich they inserted the disc (maybe it had those huge letters 'Hey, spyboy, this is a Blu-Ray (playing on a Wii' over it). It could have been a DVD, even if it is a film. And that would make sense combined with their announcements for a DVD enabled Wii. It would be nice if you could download that DVD channel (wich would pay the license cost immediatly).

[DCK]

It's important to note that Nintendo went into the design of the Revolution by ruling out HD. They designed the Revolution's hardware and then came to the conclusion that the hardware wasn't capable of outputting HD. As a standard marketing move, they pretended that HD didn't matter and they still hold that. Of course, Nintendo is not actually against HD.

 

Having said that, the Wii isn't able to output HD video signals. The Wii drive is not capable of playing Bluray discs nor will Nintendo release an expansion. Finally, Nintendo is not going to support a Sony format. HD-DVD is a cheaper and strategically better alternative.

 

I'd actually want Nintendo to support HD-DVD - with Wii support it would have a much stronger against the inferior Blu-ray system. But there's absolutely no way it could happen.

[mariosmentor]

A DVD add-on isn't a bad idea but a Blueray drive is just silly.

 

After seeing Sony's struggle to sell Ps3, one of it's major selling points being "It's got a Blueray drive!!>!>?!?!" hasn't really appealled to many.

 

So why would Nintendo invest in it now? They may be looking into it and experimenting for a future console but I don't believe that the Wii will be seing it. At least not a Blueray one.

 

Plus didn't Nintendo original state when the Wii was in early development it would be able to play DVDs?

[DCK]

It actually has a DVD drive. It could be modified to play DVDs by a firmware upgrade or a minor hardware add-on.

 

Most modchips enable DVD playback on the Wii, even.

[thirtynine.]

Im pretty sure the ps3 was and or is one of the cheapest blueray playeds around 600£ wii = epic phail/

[AshMat]

There are all sorts of reasons that i don't want to see blu-ray even as an add on, firstly it would be massive u-turn after all the 'market isn't ready for HD' stuff ninty said last year which would make them as credible as sony- not very!

But seriously, sony have already tried to say the wii is expensive, a blu-ray add on would give them more ammo, surely a blu-ray drive would be as big as the wii itself! which takes from it's 'fit into every living room' size and design, why would we want to encourage the use of disks instead of cheaper downloads?.. nintendo are a games company.

i will come back to this later as i am writing this on the wii and my wiimote batteries are not looking to healthy!

 

This affects you how?

If it were true, let them make it, honestly, how does it affect YOU?

[Speedfreak]

It's important to note that Nintendo went into the design of the Revolution by ruling out HD. They designed the Revolution's hardware and then came to the conclusion that the hardware wasn't capable of outputting HD. As a standard marketing move, they pretended that HD didn't matter and they still hold that. Of course, Nintendo is not actually against HD.

 

Yeah, Nintendo spent millions designing their chips and it was only after they were finished they realised "Oh shit, we can't do HD". Lol, who the fuck are you kidding?

[DCK]

Yeah, Nintendo spent millions designing their chips and it was only after they were finished they realised "Oh shit, we can't do HD". Lol, who the fuck are you kidding?

With a few more millions it could've pulled it off

[Jasper]

You're right, DCK, but with the wrong idea.

 

Nintendo started off designing the case in wich the hardware inside should fit. When the actual chip design started (wich was after E3 2005), Iwata had already been on stage stating 'this is the box of the revolution', 'this is how it will look'. Now the Nintendo engineers had to fit the chipset inside the tiny casing.

 

But I sincerely doubt that Nintendo did all this because of HD. I don't believe you DCK when you state that Nintendo suddenly realised that they couldn't pull of HD. They chose not to pull it off. If they didn't push forward their 'irrelevant graphics' concept, they would have designed a better and more powerfull console pulling off HD. But think of it differently: they said that graphics are not important, and it send a Huge Shock through the industry. And Bam! Nintendo received enormous attention for their console. No matter what was said about it, people were talking about it.

 

And it also makes it possible for Nintendo to make profits. So it's a double profit for Nintendo: people notice Nintendo's new project and Nintendo can make a cheaper console.

[Fresh]

Wii... Blu-Ray. Sure, whatever.

[DCK]

Of course they didn't realise it afterwards... They picked a hardware configuration that couldn't do HD, and they weren't bothered to upgrade it. Point is, Nintendo is not against HD.

[Jasper]

Of course they didn't realise it afterwards... They picked a hardware configuration that couldn't do HD, and they weren't bothered to upgrade it. Point is, Nintendo is not against HD.

 

Again, you are wrong. Nintendo has a vast core or hardware developers, of technicians, of engineers. They are always developing new hardware and looking for the most powerfull option. I'm pretty sure Nintendo had a model set up using a better PowerPC Processor (G5 or something), better graphics card and HD output. As a hardware company, they know that they'll nee HD in the future. I'm pretty sure that if you get into Nintendo HQ deep enough, you'll find some astounding (but bigger) Wii's.

 

Nintendo never said 'they weren't bothered' to upgrade it, that's what ou made of it. Nintendo said they weren't going High-Defenition because the market was not ready for it (and the facts were that the HD-tv numbers were low).

 

Nintendo is not against HD, but they certainly just 'didn't bother' with upgrading the hardware. The engineers improved the current hardware, yes, but you can be pretty sure that they have better hardware - even if it's just for seeing the result. Probably they picked the cheaper one afterwards, wich means more profit (and at the time they had a viable reason for not choosing it).