Ubisoft says Wii U is “Not really.” next-gen

[radha]

I'm not saying "Graphics can't get better", I'm saying "Graphics can't get much better given the hardware currently available and the limitations on game publishers due to development costs"

 

The raster-scan line algorith is a very old and well understood "hack" to produce 3D graphics without the processing power requirments of a global illumination scheme. We have spent decades building upon this flawed approach and we're getting to the point where we have done (just about) as much with it as we possibly can.  We can stack the material and lighting effects we have produced on top of eachother, but we're really hitting the limit of how good these can look using a raster-scan line approach.

Beyond this, development costs have already increased to the level that few developers can afford the "mistake" of making a game that is not a massive success. If development teams have to more than double, and development timelines increase by 50% to 100% again, how many games would really end up being profitable; and how many developers would survive?

 

The problem with the development cost is the way the industry works, not exactly the way games are made. Note that the use of middleware has exploded in this generation and in the next generations it will mature, creating a better middle ware market where not all games are made with UE. The movie industry for example, handles bigger budgets but the way their industry works allows them to.

Video games are also an inmature media and as it matures, the industry will become more efficient. Something similar happen to web develoment in the begining and now thanks to web framworks web development is not as has expensive, complex and error filled as it used to be (of course gaming will take more time since is much more complex).

The main problem with the graphics for wii u wont be the hardware capabilities. When the ps3 come out GT interviewed a group of developers and one from naugthy dog said something very interesting, they were talking about how the PS3 would win over the 360 because it will have better graphics, but the guy at naughty dog sayd - WHY? , why would developers spend more money making the ps3 version superior, if sony if not compensating them for that and it is already more expensive to make a ps3 game look as good as the 360 version? - something similar could happen to the wii u, even if it is more powerfull why would third parties invest more to make the nintendo version better looking when nintendo will not compensate then, note that at the time the naughty dog developer sayd that MS had a 10 million advantage over the ps3, well ps360 will have a 50+ plus advange over the wii u so there is no way developers will get the compensation from the biggers sale on the wii u, so all points to the fact that even is the wii u is indeed more powerfull , only nintendo IPs will take advantage of that, just like sony does now, everything else will be ports that look just as good as long as is not too expensive.