Next Gen Console News

[AOI_Tifa_Lockhart]

So looks like Nintendo have started the ball rolling for the next console race, whilst Microsoft and Sony try and mimic the Wii's intuitive controller functions it seems Nintendo's looking set to release their next gen console.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-13186597

Maybe this'll get Microsoft and Sony on the bandwagon. however I think it's unlikely to be released in 2013 nevermind for 2012. It's usually at least a year of speculation, get the public's mouths watering with rumours and what not. However Nintendo have never been too graphics orientated with recent console releases, heck the Wii is simply overclocked cube hardware, which is impressive considering their high console sales. But if they can be even more intuitive with this next release I reckon they will have very good sales, it all depends on just what they plan on changing as they've proved that gfx aren't everything and their sales show this. Maybe them leading the pack with the new console release cements this idea that they'll be again going for family orientated fun gaming as opposed to hardware pushing graphics and cinematic gameplay etc.

This, tied in with Cryteks recent outcry regarding console RAM and such like, makes me wonder when we'll hear from Sony or Microsoft regarding their next consoles and possible specs. I'm sure it'll be months and months of speculation before either even bother announcing to the press their console name ideas or possible release dates, nevermind specs. They'll milk the current consoles dry before looking at the next gen consoles.

Tifa

[Delete]

It's true graphics don't make a game, but it sure does make it look pretty. I've played a few wii games and the first words that come to mind is eww. But in all seriousness, the wii did what it was supposed to....entertain, as will the wii 2.

As for the newer Microsoft and Sony systems, like you said...I believe it will be awhile before we hear news on them. The 360 and PS3 are both doing pretty awesome, and I'm thinking gaming consoles may be reaching there limits tbh.

[AOI_Tifa_Lockhart]

Ya pretty Wii games are few and far between. Most are re-hashes or the ageing Mario franchise, and Sega titles, which still seems like an alien concept having Sonic on a Nintendo console ¬¬ A few stand out games for me on the Wii were Madworld and Monster Hunter Tri. Yet games I played most were multi player fun orientated ones, like Wii Resort and Wii Sports as they're always a laugh. So long as they concentrate more on fun, which they seem to be doing then it should be good. But I think they rely on too many remakes of Mario, Pokemon and all the other excessively drawn out series that should have been put down a long time ago in my opinion. But I say good for nintendo, get the ball rolling, Sony and Microsoft will jump at the chance to outdo nintendo when they release the specs of their new console. No doubt Sony and Microsoft will be like Nvidia and AMD, wait until the other releases their specs so that they can marginally exceed their competitors spec wise.

I just want ironed out reverse compatability from all consoles, it was my main gripe with both consoles. Also achievments/trophies should unlock in game currency to buy new games. Of course that would never happen as everything these days is money driven..oh well. PS3 was on the right track with early releases but they've cut down the console a lot since then. Also I think Xbox should remove their custom HDD. Sony went with the standard laptop HDD which allowed for Solid State upgradings if people are feeling frivelous. Outside of that though...I can't see them ever making a fully customizable/upgradable console. people buy consoles for its ease of use, out of the box you gto a console that can perform the same as everyone elses. But could upgrading end up being a huge sales disaster for them? Or would it be a huge boost to sales allowing a more PC community style gaming base where you can achieve better GFX and performance with upgrades etc. Who knows :-?

Tifa

[Akaimizu]

Too much control to the user when it comes to consoles kill their main advantage. They obviously *are* consoles due to matching hardware standards for which all software can be written specifically for...without any worry that it'll run different on (certain people's) machines.

Basically, as long as I'm on a console, if a software is written for it, I know that it runs just as good on mine as it does on some person's machine across the world and that it is configured to run well. That's because we can pretty much be set on that anything written for said machine will run decently. Because it forces the devs that if they write something for the machine, it'll be written in such a way that it's perfectly playable. If not, then the game won't really sell. No worries. No looking up minimal hardware specs. Just get the disk and go.

Now I would say the PCs will always be where they are, and somewhat separated from consoles for quite a few genres. While First person shooters have become a console-savvy gametype, there's still a lot which the console makers don't want too much of. A good example would be online MMOs. There's a couple of good reasons why there are so few between any of the consoles. One being the upgradability of the clients and how fast they can put them out and keep them in sync. The other being a money thing.

MMOs are the biggest PC advantage and yet it's also the biggest PC game sales killer. And both Microsoft and Sony know this well. All too well in Microsoft's case. In general, the more you allow MMOs on your system, the more it kills the notion of people buying a good number of titles on your system. On the PC, a lot of people have literally traded aspects of buying retail PC software and instead given their money to Monthly payments and micro-transactions. And thus a huge huge drop in Number-of-games sales over number of machines. A big factor which actually is where the income for console makers comes from. They want people buying games, not buying only a few games and investing their cash just in them. It doesn't hurt so much on the PC because game sales aren't the source of income to deal with the console costs. On the consoles, that business model is entirely different.

[Outrider]

I'm pretty excited about the new controller concept the rumormongers are going on about. It essentially combines tablet functionality with a standard dual-stick controller. I haven't heard confirmation on whether this controller would include motion control or if you'd have to use a regular Wii controller for something like that.

Now to try and figure out how I can convince work to send me to E3.

[AOI_Tifa_Lockhart]

It'll be interesting to see, however you need intuitive controlls but also ergonomic comfort. Whilst the Wii prooved a point that games can be more about fun and interactivity than cinematic graphics, these types of controls aren't suited to long gaming sessions. Nowadays games tend to be immersive through graphics, and I think motion based controls, whilst fun, end up being more of a gimmick to people who play games a lot. You simply cannot be expected to be that damn energetic in a game for long periods of time ^^

Tifa

[Outrider]

It'll be interesting to see, however you need intuitive controlls but also ergonomic comfort. Whilst the Wii prooved a point that games can be more about fun and interactivity than cinematic graphics, these types of controls aren't suited to long gaming sessions. Nowadays games tend to be immersive through graphics, and I think motion based controls, whilst fun, end up being more of a gimmick to people who play games a lot. You simply cannot be expected to be that damn energetic in a game for long periods of time ^^

Tifa

What makes you think you need to be energetic to play a Wii game?

Granted, most of the mini-game compilations require you to waggle all over the place, but this bizarre idea that every game that uses motion somehow requires more energy than any old dual-stick game is ignorant at best.

As somebody who has logged a couple hundred hours on core Wii games that use motion controls, I can assure you that you should not be getting tired or expending significantly more energy than any other traditional games.

[Split]

It'll be interesting to see, however you need intuitive controlls but also ergonomic comfort. Whilst the Wii prooved a point that games can be more about fun and interactivity than cinematic graphics, these types of controls aren't suited to long gaming sessions. Nowadays games tend to be immersive through graphics, and I think motion based controls, whilst fun, end up being more of a gimmick to people who play games a lot. You simply cannot be expected to be that damn energetic in a game for long periods of time ^^

Tifahttp://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2011/04/25/nintendo-confirms-wii-successor-will-be-playable-at-e3.aspx

I share the same worry, but take heart: somewhere in here is a specific quote from a dev (since many developers already have this new console and are making games for it) saying that it's "not a gimmick like the Wii." I've also heard that it's both HD capable and more powerful than the PS3. Now all it needs is 3rd party support...

[Sexy_Raine]

Honestly, I'm not that excited for a new console in 2012. It feel its too early, and 3DS was just released. I got a feeling MS and Sony aren't going show now consoles for awhile. Nintendo of America better announce some Wii games, besides Legend of Zelda and Kirby Wii sequel. Sony supported the heck out of the PS2 during PS3's first two years so Nintendo better do the same, as most current Wii owners aren't going to buy the new system near release

[Nitro Vordex]

A screen, huh? So it's going to be a Dreamcast controller with an HD VMU?

[McLaughlin]

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2011/04/25/nintendo-confirms-wii-successor-will-be-playable-at-e3.aspx

I share the same worry, but take heart: somewhere in here is a specific quote from a dev (since many developers already have this new console and are making games for it) saying that it's "not a gimmick like the Wii." I've also heard that it's both HD capable and more powerful than the PS3. Now all it needs is 3rd party support...

At this point I'd settle for first party support.

[Outrider]

A screen, huh? So it's going to be a Dreamcast controller with an HD VMU?

Pretty much.

Which is awesome.

Then again, I also really enjoyed that you could play Virtua Tennis using only the VMU screen, so I'm probably not the best judge of these kinds of things.

[AOI_Tifa_Lockhart]

Hmm yeah it's not difficult to be more powerful than a PS3, it's using old technology, and considering how quick PC hardware is released and outdated it might as well be a century old by now. I meana 3.2 Ghz single core, and 256 MB of GFX memory?! Well...it just goes to show what decent games optomization can achieve I suppose. Still i'll be interested to see the spec, if they stick with ATI as they have done in the past they may get a 6 series card put in there and some form of phenom, possibly an x3 or x4? It'd have a lot of potential i'm sure. But I can't see the next gen of consoles sticking to the 256MB mark in terms of GFX memory, even a £30 GFX card for PC will have 512 these days I mean c'mon guys. Even 5 years ago they should've gone with 512MB...oh well

I'd suggest they'll have to ramp up to 1GB for GFX at least and enough RAM and processing power to make sure they avoid a bottleneck in performance. Let's hope they don't go too over the top though...well PS3 and Xbox hardware is anything but OTT but their cooling solutions were feeble, stop rushing releases, take your time and strain test those consoles to a beast so people aren't left with poor quality components and over-heating consoles ><

Tifa

[Syndrome]

As was said before, pretty graphics and HD resolution do not make a game, but in this day and age it is very hard to look at jagged edges and dancing ants around your characters/HUD. I have my Wii running in 480p, as do most of you, and though it looks better, it still doesn't look great. I am excited to see Nintendo stepping up and pushing forward in this department. I just hope they bring back the old Nintendo quality control so that most of the third party games that come out aren't bottom of the barrel games that a mobile phone can run with ease. Online definitely needs to be a priority too. Everyone that plays a PS3 or 360, who has an internet connection of course, plays online. Whether it is the almighty FPS or an rpg that has some online tacked onto it like White Knight Chronicles. How hard is it to grasp the concept of a screen name and friend list? Another aspect that I think they failed on was the Wii Channels. They could have done SO MUCH with it but five years later they have hardly released anything, States side anyway. I would love for them to build on that because I think that they and third party developers could do a lot with it.

[Outrider]

Some interesting speculation from 1up.com:

http://www.1up.com/news/nintendo-stream-console

Apparently developers are being told the new Nintendo console will push online into some pretty ambitious territory (or at least in that direction). Knowing Nintendo, these plans won't pan out, but it's always fun to speculate.

[Split]

Some interesting speculation from 1up.com:

http://www.1up.com/news/nintendo-stream-console

Apparently developers are being told the new Nintendo console will push online into some pretty ambitious territory (or at least in that direction). Knowing Nintendo, these plans won't pan out, but it's always fun to speculate.Really? First the Wii, now the Stream? Man Nintendo sure are torturing the whole peeing metaphor.

/immaturity

[Outrider]

Really? First the Wii, now the Stream? Man Nintendo sure are torturing the whole peeing metaphor.

/immaturity

I'm a little embarrassed to admit that the joke popped into my head pretty much instantly as well.

[BIG OLAF]

I think it's a bad sign that every time I read the thread title, my mind automatically replaces the word "News" with "Wars".

[Akaimizu]

I was thinking they might simply go with an indirect meaning like

"Number 1"

It's the "Nintendo Number 1".

Then everybody would be anticipating the sequel. Making Youtube mixes with Dr. Evil from Austin Powers, etc. But hey. It'll be free viral advertising.

[eclipsXe]

They should call it the original Wii name, The Nintendo Revolution, if the Wii makes there next console with a PSN like network and even the basic 360 type hardware, it'll be a great system. Alot of game developers wanted to put alot of games on the Wii but it's current hardware couldn't handle it. I mean picture the wii with updates, dlc, a real online friends list, (please no more friend codes) then picture it with the fun games like Brawl and Mario Kart but even better because now they can put more into it because the Wii could finally handle all of it and the Wii not being left out when a multi console game hits. The Wii would be the perfect system.

[BIG OLAF]

They should call it the original Wii name, The Nintendo Revolution, if the Wii makes there next console with a PSN like network and even the basic 360 type hardware, it'll be a great system. Alot of game developers wanted to put alot of games on the Wii but it's current hardware couldn't handle it. I mean picture the wii with updates, dlc, a real online friends list, (please no more friend codes) then picture it with the fun games like Brawl and Mario Kart but even better because now they can put more into it because the Wii could finally handle all of it and the Wii not being left out when a multi console game hits. The Wii would be the perfect system.

Except it would probably have absolutely no good 3rd-party games.

[eclipsXe]

Except it would probably have absolutely no good 3rd-party games.

They would have a whole lot more if the Wii could handle 3rd party games like the other consoles can