IGN Revo's latest podcast

[Fierce_LiNk]

We're going to see good third party games, we're going to see bad third party games. We're going to see good use of the FHC, we're going to see terrible use of the FHC. That's how it's always going to be.

[ndreamer]

dc had diffrent arcatecture to most consoles it only renders what it see's wheres a ps2 rendereds everything regardless if it's there or not, the dc is probley more powerful at handling bigger worlds as long as you don't see it all on screen at once.

i was expecting some gc/ps2/xbox ports to the revolution and i think thats okay as long as they where good games to being with and they don't sell them for marked up prices.

[James McGeachie]

Where does it say it's only 2 times better? I think it would be better than 2 for sure.

 

On a ton of updates from IGN where they talked to developers about the hardware. As they said in their podcast I posted too, this IS Revolution development kits now, no longer just Gamecubes with Rev controllers. The specs put it at less than 2 times as powerful than the Gamecube numbers wise, but since obviously the hardware will be more efficient it'll be able to do a bit more than the numbers suggest, so they think they'll be able to get around 2 times the power of Gamecube out of it, in total. There's no chance in hell of 3 times.

 

http://uk.revolution.ign.com/articles/699/699118p1.html

 

Those were the most recent specs and they're not just speculation, IGN have been talking to developers with the hardware, Matt does not "talk out his ass" as some people like to think. The funny thing is though, unlike what most people would like to think, it seems like the Revolution's specs have actually been decreasing a bit over time recently, as beforehand IGN had thought there'd be more RAM but it seems now there's a bit less.

 

The fact of the matter though is that numbers wise, you have these 3 main jumps from Gamecube to Revolution:

 

485Mhz > 729Mhz for processor speed

40MB > 88MB for RAM

162MHz > 243MHz. for GPU clockspeed

 

Numbers don't mean everything, that's for sure, but no matter how efficient this hardware is it can't get 3 times the power of Gamecube. These numbers are definitely not going to change much either. Also, before anyone says anything, Red Steel is definitely possible on these specs

[KKOB]

got every faith in nintendo especially after the sucess of the DS-even third partys are starting to use the stylus wisely so it'll be the same with the revo especially as nintendo is focused on making developing for the revo quicker, easier and cheaper than other systems.

[Teppo Holmqvist]

485Mhz > 729Mhz for processor speed

40MB > 88MB for RAM

162MHz > 243MHz. for GPU clockspeed

 

Gamecube didn't have 40 MB's of memory. It had only 24. Plus comparing GPU mhz's is really silly, because by that same logic Radeon 9000 would be nearly same card as Radeon 9800, because mhz's are nearly same (250 mhz < 325 mhz).

[James McGeachie]

Gamecube didn't have 40 MB's of memory. It had only 24. Plus comparing GPU mhz's is really silly, because by that same logic Radeon 9000 would be nearly same card as Radeon 9800, because mhz's are nearly same (250 mhz < 325 mhz).

 

It had 40MB memory TOTAL, I don't know what it splits up into because I'm just going by the IGN specs. Also, I know fine comparing the numbers is silly for the most part but I said that in my post that they're not fully important, however they do help show that the difference is nowhere near 3 times.

 

EDIT Taken from Nintendo's official GC specs

 

Main Memory : 24 MB MoSys 1T-SRAM, Approximately 10ns Sustainable Latency

A-Memory : 16MB (81MHz DRAM)

 

Total = 40. The A-Memory counts in the comparison because it seems the Revolution doesn't have that additionally to what we've seen.

[The fish]

Multiplatform ports=good. People who want NFS and FIFA games see the Rev's low price point compared to the other 2 consoles, and the hardly noticable difference in graphics as most Europeans don't have HD-TV, and they think "Hey, I might as well go for the cheaper one." Then they see what else they can get on their shiny new console.

Upgraded Gamecube games, bar something like TP=bad

[ShadowV7]

I have every confidence in Nintendo and the graphic's will be good with Cube-Mapping (I think it's called)

[DCK]

In real world performance, the Revolution may be able to deliver double the performance of the Cube, but graphics-wise it doesn't mean much of a difference. I think the Revolution can profit really well from the extra memory it has, but I doubt the graphics will be that much better - most Red Steel screens show little improvement over what we're seeing today.

 

And all those hardware-accelerated features don't do wonders, they help but they don't make it all that much better. They only do specific jobs and really don't add that much to the general performance.

[Teppo Holmqvist]

...most Red Steel screens show little improvement over what we're seeing today.

 

Sure, but they are from first game for system. I personally don't like that people always deem console after its first games, because first tier games are always little rushed and "ugly". If you compare Fantavision or SSX against latest PS2 games you notice how big leap there has been during the years. Of course Revolution won't feature that dramatic leap, but I'm pretty sure that graphics will get little bit more complex after a while.

 

And it is always about optimization. Seriously, you can even play* movies on old IBM 286 with 4.77 mhz processor and 64 KB memory if you optimize enough.

 

* And this is true story. You can find video around the net.

[DCK]

That doesn't count as much for the Revolution. The Revolution is very similar to the Cube - the hardware is very familiar, and the developers already know how to push the Cube to the limits. Of course Red Steel is not the Revolution's maximum (I doubt it's close), but if it shows off average graphics (which I think it does), the improvement isn't that great.

 

If they add shaders on the other hand... Bah, never mind.

[ultrajamie]

show my a console that didn't launch with one or two good games and a ton of 3rd party shovelware. xbox 360 hardly managed even that.

 

the fact were are seeing things of the calibre of red steel is heartening...

 

Nintendo recently stated that they intend to avoid the drought of big name games after launch they had with both the cube and the N64. which means that we will get system selling franchise games throughout the launch YEAR. if it takes 3rd parties a while to catch up, then so be it.

[ShadowV7]

Well if the Rev and Xbox 360 is comparable on normal TV's then that's good enough for me.I think we're underestimating Nintendo a little bit here.