IGN: Revolution Horsepower

[James McGeachie]

You should see what Reggie said to developers in the closed doors conference then. the quote was something along the lines of "As you can see, Revolution will more than hold it's own in graphics technology".

 

The fact of the matter is quickly made with a GC dev kit or not, the Revolution is an upgraded Gamecube, simple as that. If you look at Samus' suit there, you can see there's a lot of smoother lines to it. It may not be by much, but it's definitely slight above the Prime 2 model. Retro have already said in an interview Prime 3 is using the same engine as the past games anyway, they just said that it went under a lot of changes going from Prime to Prime 2 and will undergo "even more" going to Prime 3.

 

Nintendo didn't show that video for no reason, what would've been the point? It really is a rough representation of how early games will look...actually, that should be BETTER than most early games look. Remember, not all GC games are incredible system pushers that make the most of the system like RE4. It'll be the same with Revolution games and chances are most of them wont even come close to looking as good as RE4.

[Nintendork]

I don't care.. because the architecture is not alien to developpers there will be no 16 month learning curve for developpers, it means we'll get stunning games from launch.

 

Remember hardly any of us have HDTVs, and if we did.. we'd probably be rich enough to afford and have and be playing an xbox 360 right now.

 

Cheap hardware means cheap games and more oppurtunity for developpers.

 

Shorter development cycles with less delays.. well at least for everything except Nintendo.

 

I'm happy with this, and Iwata has reiterated today that cheap disposable USB pen drives and external storage will be used to compliment the GameCube memory cards, on board 512mb.. the SD slots.

We're getting a lot of choice to back up our stuff.

 

Anyway... I'm happy with this, and this is a worst case scenario:

A stylish cheap small system with great games and an awesome controller with the power of the original xbox.

 

These specs if we believe the Australian developper who spoke up last week are for the second from last release of the dev kit.

 

Final hardware revisions need to be engineered, budgetted and tested of course.. Have faith, I'm certain we'll have a significantly more powerful system.

 

Also developpers speak of developper culture.. 360 developpers have so much powerful they get lazy almost, they use the brute force stance to making games.

They don't get the most out of the hardware.. well at least they aren't right now.

 

Revolution developpers will be able to work within the maximum confines of the system.

 

Pinch of salt people, pinch of salt.

[Guest Jordan]

I'm sorry, but i disreguard this as total bull shit.

You can't just throw around clock speeds and expect to get results. IGN Matt's journalism has gone down the shitter and the only view point he has is an invalid one.

 

I'll wait till his "Sources" get names, then i'll comment.

[Nintenchris]

Personaly i think we will all be plesently surprised when we actually see some Revolution screens... and i think Nintendos own games will be looking the most pollished as they must of had games in development for a very long time.... BRING ON E3!

[Guest Jordan]

Personaly i think we will all be plesently surprised when we actually see some Revolution screens... and i think Nintendos own games will be looking the most pollished .... BRING ON E3!

 

Those were shown at E3 2K5 and were probably running on GameCube hardware.

 

EDIT: You also have to remember one thing. The Revolution doesn't support HDTV it doesn't have the need to have 3 processor cores or a highly advanced Direct X 10 featured GPU or all that ram.

 

Simply put, your Revolution games will probably look as comparable to XBOX360 games running on a standard TV.

[Nintenchris]

Those were shown at E3 2K5 and were probably running on GameCube hardware.

 

EDIT: You also have to remember one thing. The Revolution doesn't support HDTV it doesn't have the need to have 3 processor cores or a highly advanced Direct X 10 featured GPU or all that ram.

 

Simply put, your Revolution games will probably look as comparable to XBOX360 games running on a standard TV.

 

Yeah i was talking about proper screens not the Metroid ones from last E3.

Anyway i agree with you, its just a fact that if you want HD graphics you need some serious hardware to back it up... and to be hounest im happy that Nintendo have decided no to spend the extra money on better hardware to support HD graphics.

 

This could be the killer move for Nintendo by having the cheapest hardware with AWSOME graphics and new controler they could sneak up and win the race.

[colormonkey]

BicTac is probaply telling is something important. With a few adjusments in the letters it could be "rendered in camera 3d per graphics". But that dosn't make any sense?

 

"eredrend ni ramoec d3 rep phasicrp"

[Innovance]

Is it just me or does that look like Metroid prime 1 (yes I know it's a tech demo) I was never impressed by that tech demo.

 

Its you, also dont forget that the lower resolution of the clip/images makes it harder to appreciate the improvements, it also looks better in motion, but that is definately above both primes

[Nintenchris]

Another thing... lets take the DS and PSP as an example

 

The DS is graphically inferior

The DS is cheaper and the games are cheaper too

The DS offers a new way to play games

The DS has new games to offer that wouldnt have been possible on any platform before it... like Nintendogs (I mean like touch and voice control)

 

The PSP has almost PS2 like graphics

The PSP is more expencive

The PSP offers the same games you have played to death on the PS2 (excluding a few that would have been possible to make for the PS2)

The PSP does more than just play games... UMD movies and the like that dont add to your gaming experience

 

So even tho the DS is graphically inferior it still outsells the PSP

 

Now if you think about it... this could work for the home console market in the same way it has in the handheld market.. it just depends on Nintendo getting it right.

[Patch]

"eredrend ni ramoec d3 rep phasicrp"

 

3D camera pre-rendered in graphics?

3D graphics pre-rendered in camera?

Pre-rendered 3D graphics in camera?

 

Argh, I can't resist anagrams, despite my feelings about the author.

[Guest Jordan]

The PSP has almost PS2 like graphics

 

The PSP doesn't even have PS2 graphics, or even near it. Compare Splinter Cell: Essentials for PSP and Splinter Cell 1 for PS2 and you'll see what i mean.

 

The PSP lacks in alot of areas it just has a really strong CPU that does alot of the work.

[Guest Stefkov]

to carry on that, the ps2 was the weakest of last generation yet it won.

i think before that the n64 won yet it was graphically inferior to the ps1.

i saw a site somewhere that had this info

[Nintenchris]

The PSP doesn't even have PS2 graphics, or even near it. Compare Splinter Cell: Essentials for PSP and Splinter Cell 1 for PS2 and you'll see what i mean.

 

The PSP lacks in alot of areas it just has a really strong CPU that does alot of the work.

 

Yeah yeah i know... but you get the idea though.. if the DS can outsell the PSP even though its graphically inferior due to the DS's touch screen and voice control and the like, surely Nintendo can pull it off with the Revolution.

[ndreamer]

i didn't take much to guess that the revolution was an extension of the gamecube hard ware, it had to be to run gamecube software and be 100% compatable. what those specs ign are passing out are missing is the types of extensions they have added to it over the last few years ati & ibm haven't been working away for so long to just up the clock rate and add a few more bits of ram. while i don't think the revolution will replace my pc in the graphics department it should be abble to hold it's own on my tv.

[JetSetWilly]

The specs do matter in that they affect the perception of the machine in the hardcore-gamer market. These are the people who Nintendo need to adpot the machine first, they are the people who will be aware of it's existence at launch. GameCube is [wrongly] bashed for its kiddy image. Revolution will be bashed for having a kiddy image and being a wimp.

 

Now if you look at DS vs PSP, well in Japan the DS didn't go supersonic until the games came that expanded the market. When DS and PSP were head-to-head with core-gamers the PSP weekly sales soon outstripped the DS. And, as Iwata has indirectly said in recent post-GDC interviews, the DS did not manufacture its own interest amongst non-gamers, it tapped into two things that are already very popular in Japanese society - dogs and the Prof. Kawashima brain training books.

 

Then take DS vs PSP in North America and Europe. Two territories which, I would argue, place a good deal more empahsis on image and perception. There the DS is not a clear winner. Amongst my peers they only know about DS cos I bang on about it, they're not interested - they want PSPs cos they have the image, power and content they're familiar with.

 

If Revolution will be as powerful as the original Xbox or thereabouts how can it hope to compete with PS3 and Xbox 360 on visuals at launch let alone 5 years hence? You're not telling me that their greater power is just for HD alone else it would follow that you could make a game that looks like Ghost Recon or Oblivion for the current Xbox and you quite plainly can't.

 

I'm all for innovation, but not at the expense of technology. In a world where first impressions based on visuals so often seal the deal Revolution will fighting with one arm behind its back.

[Patch]

Then take DS vs PSP in North America and Europe. Two territories which, I would argue, place a good deal more empahsis on image and perception. There the DS is not a clear winner. Amongst my peers they only know about DS cos I bang on about it, they're not interested - they want PSPs cos they have the image, power and content they're familiar with.

 

I can't obviously say for sure, but I would bet money that if the DS had been more powerful than the PSP, it would not have made one jot of difference. The fame of a product alone will instill in people the idea of 'Well, it's the most popular, so it must be the most powerful'. I know tons of people who think the PS2 is the most powerful machine of its generation.

 

The Gamecube was more powerful than the PS2, the N64 more powerful than the PS1. In fact, if anything, recent trends have shown that the most underpowered console is the most successful!

[JetSetWilly]

The Gamecube was more powerful than the PS2, the N64 more powerful than the PS1. In fact, if anything, recent trends have shown that the most underpowered console is the most successful!

 

But that's my point, it's all in the perception. People were pumped for PS2 so much so that a year later a more powerful GameCube and Xbox were but bothersome flies.

 

The trend is whichever the public thinks (or is led to believe by adept marketing) is the best is the winner. Weak specs like this breed a negative perception in the core market and they are the ones Nintendo desperately need to be buying the console first. It's all very well relying on Nintendo die-hards to buy it - but we are in the minority. If the core market turns its back on the Revolution the new market will never see it.

[Patch]

I totally agree with you about it being all about the perception. But I don't think that perception is built on the specs of a console.

 

Having said that, I don't know what it is built on. Why did the PS1, a console made by an outsider company, become so dominant so quickly? It was of course down to public perception. But what gave the public that perception? Marketing? Word-of-mouth? Negative perceptions of opposition companies? Or a combination of these? Whatever it was, I can't believe it was because of PS1 specs released prior to its launch.

 

The core market by your reasoning would have bought into the more powerful N64 and hence the mass market would have followed.

[Teppo Holmqvist]

And one thing that Matt Assholemina also forgot or just didn't simply care about. Gamecube was based on PowerPC processor, Xbox was based on Intel Celeron, budget version of classic Intel Pentium II processor. These processors are practically from different universes. Comparing megahertz against megahertz is basically pretty useless in that enviroment, because your normal PowerPC processor kicks shit out from standard x86 processor that runs with with same clockspeed.

[JetSetWilly]

And one thing that Matt Assholemina also forgot or just didn't simply care about. Gamecube was based on PowerPC processor, Xbox was based on Intel Celeron, budget version of classic Intel Pentium II processor. These processors are practically from different universes. Comparing megahertz against megahertz is basically pretty useless in that enviroment, because your normal PowerPC processor kicks shit out from standard x86 processor that runs with with same clockspeed.

 

From Matt's article, five paragraphs in:

 

"However, it's important to remember that there is no way to accurately gauge the performance difference between GCN's PowerPC-based architecture and the the Intel-based CPU of Xbox. Further, even if we could, these numbers are only one part of the equation."

[Nintenchris]

Whoa its turned into a war at the Nintendo.com forums and its outta control!

What makes it worse is that not one of them has seen the revo in action... and there arguing over news that didnt even come from Nintendo!

[JetSetWilly]

The core market by your reasoning would have bought into the more powerful N64 and hence the mass market would have followed.

 

That isn't my reasoning though. I haven't said "perception is based on power". I've said that perception dictates who wins. These low specs foster a negative perception alongside the other baggage that the Nintendo brand carries with it.

 

I think that with this generation the gulf in power is going to be so great that it will contribute far more to peoples attitudes than previously.

[Jamba]

Bah, this is all meaningless tosh really. In the instance of the GCN the balanced hardware and fantastic architecture meant that it whooped both the PS2 and Xbox in efficiency and I am totally confident on Nintendo having better architecture again this time around.

 

The simple fact that Matt kept on comparing the specs to the Xbox just tells you how badly the original Xbox was designed. I look forward to getting a system that I have as much fondness for as my GCN and my DC.

[CaVaYeRo]

"eredrend ni ramoec d3 rep phasicrp"

 

3D camera pre-rendered in graphics?

3D graphics pre-rendered in camera?

Pre-rendered 3D graphics in camera?

 

Argh, I can't resist anagrams, despite my feelings about the author.

 

 

that's it. Bitac has several times talked about some tricks for showing pre-rendered graphics which looks like if they were real time 3D. That would explain some things...

[Guest Jordan]

JetSetWilly has a point, everyone percieved the PS2 to be the most powerful (people who didn't actually know that is) and alot of people still think that simply due to the Sony Hype Machine™