its interesting to note that the developer admits that wii u supports compute shaders, but then he says that wii u is shader model 4.0 and that uses 55nm fabrication
well,the 55nm is obviously as big mistake since we know for sure nintendo is using 40nm
about the shader model 4.0,i wonder how can he claimthat when already said wiiu supports compute shaders?
compute shaders is something you only find in shader model 5.0,surely a directx10 hardware can use somehow try to do new features found in directx11 hardware butthat could result in low performance and a slodown in the hardware that want conceived for those purposes according to many hardware reporters and we know for sure that nintendo is about performance and optimized hardware so clearly they wouldnt give support to features that would slow down the hardware
we also know thanks to unity doc that the unity engine requires a hardware capable of shader model 5.0 to support compute shaders with the unity engine and that wii u supportsallthe features found in the new unity engine 4.0 so there is no denial it
http://docs.unity3d.com/Documentation/Manual/ComputeShaders.html
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Compute Shaders
Compute Shaders are programs that run on the graphics card, outside of the normal rendering pipeline. They can be used for massively parallel GPGPU algorithms, or to accelerate parts of game rendering. In order to efficiently use them, often an in-depth knowledge of GPU architectures and parallel algorithms is needed; as well as knowledge of DirectCompute, OpenCL or CUDA.
Compute shaders in Unity are built on top of DirectX 11 DirectCompute technology; and currently require Windows Vista or later and a GPU capable of Shader Model 5.0.
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we also know that wii u can also use multi threaded rendering thanks to project cars builds, so now we have two features found since directx11 was presented
i think people tend to confuse technology with power
wii u might not be that much ahead in power compared to the older consoles like ps4 and xbox one seem to be, but that doesnt make it an old hardware
wii u gpu could be considered like a low range gpu of shader model 5 and the ps4 and xbox one gpus could be considered like medium range gpu classes
As for the claims of having hard time with the coding, well, thats always expected from a new hardware and even more if you use an early SDK and development kit, and we also have quotes from other developers that coding for wii u aint that difficult, od course if you just port over a gae coming from an old directx9 hardware you cant expect a good perfomance cause you are forcing the new hardware do things the way the older one was cocieved for, you also waste new features like geometry shaders that could enhance the performance in certain areas and even force the hardware into using multipasses, just like xbox 360 does, where the work could be done in a single pass, so obviously this also both wastes power and slowsdown the gpu capabilities
all these problems can be solved if you do a ground up game or at the very least rework the source code of the game to optimize it to do things the way wii u was designed for, this last option obviously requires some work effort, time and money investment
o well, at least we also got others who do not agree with digitals foundary anonimus developer
http://www.cinemablend.com/games/Wii-U-Digital-Foundry-Story-Part-Nintendoom-Wheel-Says-Dev-61599.html
or
http://wiiudaily.com/2014/01/indie-developer-on-wii-u-development/
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Indie developer chimes in on the “Wii U anonymous developer story”
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and well, its only this developer who disagrees
we also have kamiya, shinen multimedia develpers, etc
http://mynintendonews.com/2014/01/13/kamiya-says-developing-for-wii-u-was-pretty-much-the-same-as-xbox-360-or-playstation-3/
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Platinum Games designer Hideki Kamiya has told his fans on Twitterthat developing for the Wii U was pretty much the same as developing for the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3. Kamiya was asked the question by a fan due to a recent feature by Digital Foundry which suggested that Wii U was more of a complex machine to develop for than the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3.
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