Fils-Aime on Wii 2: “We’re not there yet”

[Mr Khan]

Twistedpixel said:

The next generation hardware probably won't be exciting at all. Since content drives them, they'll want a system which can allow them to produce content as cheaply and as quickly as possible and prototype games years in advance. So what will a Wii 2 look like?

1. It'll have an X86 out of order execution CPU.

• Because its much faster to prototype/compile and they can start game production on off the shelf hardware.
• Because they want to maximise the number of developers small and big which can make use of it, especially emerging countries developers who may produce very innovative content.
• It has some of the very best power management of any CPU out there.
• The Wii concept is similar to a mouse.

2. It'll have a combined CPU/GPU with embedded ram.

• Bandwidth is expensive, it costs more energy moving data in modern chips than it does doing the calcuations, also saves board complexity/size.
• The GPU is the most important component for making clean looking HD content and they'll want performance here if they want to implement 3D.
• AMD will be able to offer this within a year.

3. The media is irrelevant. If it works, cheaply, they will use it.

Yawn. But there you have it.

 

I thought we learned the lesson about off-the-shelf parts from the original Xbox. Though that was more a case of them not moving to own their actual parts.