Wii-U thoughts so far

[ZeroAX]

That last part in intriguing. I mean it was obvious that the "Wii generation" had abandoned console gaming for ios games, yet nintendo gave their console such a silly name to try and tap into the popularity of its previous console. I too think that it will be easier for Nintendo to get hardcore gamers to buy the Wii U than former Wii only gamers. It'd be sad to see Nintendo do so badly again

[BurningDoom]

The whole point of this is that someone said that Wii U ports will be crappy.

I'm not buying that it's gonna have crappy ports. Sounds like unsubstantiated Nintendo hating to me.

How about I turn this around, then. Do you guys have anything to show me to support that it's gonna have crappy ports?

Ok, you keep shifting around your major claim (before it was about the enthusiasm about graphics in media coverage and now it is about the actual quality of the ports) but I am trying to keep up.

A couple of things here.

1) I expect graphics in Wii U ports of existing gen games should/could be close to if not (in some cases) better than their PS3/360 counterparts. I don't doubt that the hardware is likely "there" to do so. HOWEVER, the Wii had potential to produce "best ports" of PS2/Xbox games but often didn't due to the inclusion of waggle controls (e.g. Metal Slug Anthology, Okami) or B-teams working on porting engines and producing uglier graphics on the Wii. That said, graphically there are bright spots like Silent Hill Shattered Memories or RE4, both of which look better on Wii.

2) Again, following the similarity positioned Wii, I expect the Wii U to get watered down ports of PS4/Xbox 720 games. There's a long history of that this generation. It almost certainly won't have the specs to keep up, and for the majority of its life it will likely be the ugliest current console on the market.

3) Several early reports on ports of PS3/360 games are not looking good. Some games are reaching parity, others are looking worse. Developers are saying that the Wii U is "maybe even better" than the 360/PS3. I've yet to see many ANY reports talking about how much BETTER a Wii U port of a current gen game looks. See:

http://kotaku.com/5943073/batman-arkham ... the-wii-u-

http://www.vg247.com/2012/08/17/wii-u-g ... says-sumo/

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012- ... 0-versions

4) The quality of graphics in ports have zero bearing on whether I would want to purchase a Wii U.

Then we're in agreement, it's not gonna have crappy ports of existing games. And that was my point to begin with. I wasn't even replying to you to begin with, I was replying to Zing. The better graphics comment was in there to support that. Then you jumped in and wanted me to prove it.

Here's the whole post:

You realize that Nintendo is promising better graphics than any other console on the market, right? So watered-down isn't quite the right word here. I think you're looking for "enhanced" port. Like many PS1 ports to the Dreamcast.

While you just quoted the highlighted section and focused on it. My main point never got jumbled at all, it was you that focused on one section of my post rather than my main point.

And to compare to 720 and PS4 ports at this point is kind of silly. We don't have the slightest idea what they're gonna be like or when they're even coming.

[MrPopo]

this is how I see it as well. A few pages back Dave posed a question about if there were Wii games that looked like they couldn't run (visually) on PS2/GCN/Xb and I found that intriguing.

There is one game I can think of off the top of my head. Muramasa would not run on the PS2 and be the same game. Muramasa has extremely fluid action. It's predecessor, Odin Sphere, gets very choppy when you start to have a lot on the screen, which Muramasa does not suffer from.

[ZenErik]

this is how I see it as well. A few pages back Dave posed a question about if there were Wii games that looked like they couldn't run (visually) on PS2/GCN/Xb and I found that intriguing.

There is one game I can think of off the top of my head. Muramasa would not run on the PS2 and be the same game. Muramasa has extremely fluid action. It's predecessor, Odin Sphere, gets very choppy when you start to have a lot on the screen, which Muramasa does not suffer from.

But would it have run on the GCN or Xbox well? The PS2 was seemingly the least capable of the three, but I still love it.

Speaking of Muramasa. I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE VITA PORT. YES!

[MrPopo]

this is how I see it as well. A few pages back Dave posed a question about if there were Wii games that looked like they couldn't run (visually) on PS2/GCN/Xb and I found that intriguing.

There is one game I can think of off the top of my head. Muramasa would not run on the PS2 and be the same game. Muramasa has extremely fluid action. It's predecessor, Odin Sphere, gets very choppy when you start to have a lot on the screen, which Muramasa does not suffer from.

But would it have run on the GCN or Xbox well? The PS2 was seemingly the least capable of the three, but I still love it.

Speaking of Muramasa. I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE VITA PORT. YES!

No idea. It seems like the kind of thing that you'd need to dig deep into the technical specifications of the game (simultaneous moving sprites, image size, etc) and you could maybe extrapolate from there based upon the specs of the ox box and the GC. But you'd probably be better off just ripping the graphics out of the Wii disc and try to make a playable demo of a screen on each console.

[ZeroAX]

I don't think the gamecube would have been able to run Super Mario Galaxy.

[Reprise]

I just pre-ordered the ZombieU deluxe package. Looking forward to 30 November

I don't really know what to make of the Wii-U yet, but I'm just hoping on some awesome first party titles as per Nintendo's usual. Maybe they'll be a few surprises too, like when the first Metroid Prime blew me away on the Gamecube.

[dsheinem]

Then we're in agreement, it's not gonna have crappy ports of existing games.

No we aren't. I said that port parity or improvement is yet an unknown. If anything, according to the coverage thus far, there's much to indicate that seeing inferior ports of PS3/360 games farmed out to third parties or B-list crews are a distinct possibility. It certainly happened on the Wii's ports of PS2/Xbox games with some frequency.

While you just quoted the highlighted section and focused on it. My main point never got jumbled at all, it was you that focused on one section of my post rather than my main point.

You made several points, including at least one about what press coverage of the Wii U signaled about graphics: that they were superior and would produce the nicest looking ports. That remains unsubstantiated.

And to compare to 720 and PS4 ports at this point is kind of silly. We don't have the slightest idea what they're gonna be like or when they're even coming.

We know they are in development and that all rumored specs have been leaps beyond the Wii U's official steps. All of this is silly, frankly, so I don't see the 720/PS4 port discussion as any more inane than what you're floating.


I think that Nintendo's long history of poorly selling third party games will continue to hurt it. To that point, the Wii probably did more to scare away development of "hardcore" projects for a Nintendo console than the Wii U will do to entice them. It's all about the bottom dollar, and there's not a lot of historical incentive for EA, Activision, Ubisoft, etc. to develop huge and expensive projects for the Wii U. Much cheaper and better to try and port existing stuff with some "enhancement" (maybe graphics, maybe control, etc.) or downgrade/port PS4/720 games. In any case, top studio talent likely won't be spending an inordinate amount of time on the Nintendo version, as has long been the case now...

[ZeroAX]

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012- ... se-and-out



.....wow?

This seems big to me, at least in terms of indie content. And who knows, perhaps the indies will be willing to use the gamepad in a much more interesting way than the big studios.

[MrPopo]

Here's hoping we could get a port of MechWarrior Tactics to the Wii U, with a large single player campaign (maybe the campaign for Wolcott and Luthien in the Clan Invasion) and utilizing two gamepads for the asymmetric turns and show the results on the big screen.