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forethought14 on 13 July 2013
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Zero999 said:
forethought14 said:

I think Nintendo needs to think of the support they could have had if Wii U had more horsepower. Sure they can't compete with "technical advancements", but that doesn't mean they have to gimp their hardware's potential. That's like running a race and realizing that there's someone leading and running very fast, so then you think to yourself "oh, he runs so quickly. I'm not even gonna bother trying to run at that speed". I just know that Nintendo can do it, they can design a pretty beefy console even with a gimmick. (there was so much more they could have done with 100$ for the MCM than what they've done). The Gamecube was 199$ at launch, and it competed favorably in graphics with its competitors, now slap that philosophy of at least decent-end graphics onto a console, and then add the gamepad, and you've got roughly the same price Wii U is sitting at right now. 

 

What they really need, is a philosophy change. Sure they can't compete with graphics, but at least try to in order to secure as much support as possible. 

Bolded: I'm 100% sure people have to understand that wii u has all the horsepower it needs.

See, that's not the point though. The difference is moderately large, but it's not big enough to say that it will be "impossible" to port games. I'm certain that Wii U has enough horsepower to surpass PS3/360 and run PS4/X1 games one way or another, but considering how developers are treating it, they won't want to port games for the console if it will give them nothing in return. Next-generation is going to be more expensive to develop for than the current gen, and downporting it to Wii U will likely be quite costly. Again, it won't be impossible, but the fact that they think they'll need to invest quite a bit to make it happen is something they're looking down on, and that's the problem with Wii U's overall power. Recall that many developers are claiming it to be "underpowered". More powerful than PS360 for sure, (developers who say otherwise need to get their acts together, looking at you, all of EA) but not as powerful as they want.

Wii U not selling well right now can also play a factor to those developer decisions. If Wii U were selling immensly, then I'm sure a few developers would consider next-gen ports to the system. I guess I should have mentioned that sales are also affecting their decisions, combined with the specs, and the fact that the architecture is very different.