| kain_kusanagi said: The N64 was more powerful than the Sega Saturn and PSX. But CDs alowed the PSX and Saturn to store more and larger textures. |
And the point of "storing more and larger textures" if they were unable to handle them properly? BTW the same could be said about texture resolution, infamous limited texture cache of N64 doesn't all of a sudden make PS1 textures look better.
| kain_kusanagi said: My bet is the Wii-U will be the least powerful 8th generation console. |
Oh my, you're a prophet!
The system that's going to debut first likely will be the least powerful (NES, Wii U). Actually there's only one exclusion from that rule as long as Nintendo involved (Wii), otherwise Nintendo usually debuts with stronger hardware (SNES, N64, GC). Handhelds are totally different story, since there're battery restrictions which was Nintendo's priority until now, but even there the rule usually stays valid.
So people who imply that weaker hardware is integral part of Nintendo's strategy just ignore the past. Nintendo's attitude to profit on hardware from day one force them to design hardware with limited net cost in mind, while most competitors have a luxury to increase net cost at will but keep price tag for consumers compareble to Nintendo one. Nintendo might debut with weaker hardware but there's always a generation leap in perfromance, the only exclusion from the rule is Wii (and maybe GBC, if you consider it nextgen, not a GB revision).
