| HappySqurriel said: Maybe I’m slow, but I don’t understand why anyone would think that Nintendo would release a "Wii HD" unless it was just a Wii system with a built in scaler. Why would Nintendo choose to (A) dramatically increase their software development costs, (B) hurt their hardware profitability, injure their image with fans (by having a short lived product), and (C) sacrifice further sales of what will become their most popular home console ever when they're not being pressured by anyone? This would be a lot like a hockey team that was up 3 to 1 after their first period sending all of their best players home so they can show off the talent of their rookies ... Its a losing strategy that only a moron would use. |
I bolded the assumptions that, frankly, are just plain wrong.
(A) Making a HD and SD version of a game on what is effectively the same platform is trivial. There is no dramatic increase in dev costs. The SD/HD difference is often the only point of contention that reviewers have with Wii cross-platform titles, over their HD counterparts. More importantly, if game developers saw the Wii as a contemporary to the HD consoles, rather than the PS2, cross-platform games might actually start with the Wii HD as a basis for game design.
(B) Selling 100% BC Wii HDs to the HD crowd, and still making Wii SDs for the SD crowd would not hurt Nintendo in the slightest. Quite the opposite, in fact -- it would expand the audience, and cause many Wii SDs to be repurchased as Wii HDs. Remember, upgrading isn't a requirement, if Nintendo says every game must also support the SD console.
(C) See (B).
The "Wii HD" really would just be a "scaled" Wii, after all. A faster GPU and more texture memory would really be the only prereq -- it doesn't need to have more base memory or a faster CPU at all. A HDD, better textures, and 720p output would appeal to a very large crowd, though, I believe. Ask yourself if you would purchase a Wii, say in two years time, that cost the same, or slightly more than the current Wii, but had a built-in HDD, upscaling hardware, more texture memory, and a faster GPU, along with 720p output support -- say it upscales any Wii game, and any future Wii games can make use of the additional texture memory if they so desire (there's certainly room on the DVD).
