Nintendo NX vs Handheld Steam Machine (AKA Smach Zero - SteamBoy)

[Game_God]

Stefan51278 said:

forethought14 said:
NX Go! won't have the 4G (I doubt Nintendo will bother), nor will it have the same resolution (probably not that high, more like 540p). I'd say it'll be less powerful due to the fact that a $299.99+ Handheld will sell horribly for Nintendo. $199.99 max. I'd say it's possible that the NX Go! will have 32GB flash memory internal, not a whole lot, will be surprised if it had more. Considering the jumps in RAM from Nintendo Handheld to Handheld, if from DSi we went from 16MB to 128MB in 3DS, a same jump from New 3DS's 256MB would lead to 2GB of RAM for the NX Go. A Quad Core CPU is likely considering the New 3DS is a Quad Core, though anything modern in architecture will be a SIGNIFICANT leap in power from those ancient ARM11 cores. For GPU, I don't know. May not match Wii U in that department, don't know what architecture they'll be using for that. AMD GCN architecture is likely, the RX 2XX would be a good fit. RX 3XX seems too recent, but you'll never know. Since it'll be priced lower than this SteamBoy, it won't match it's RAW power.

The recent AMD RX 3XX series is just a rebrand of older graphic cards with some of them having more Ram, including cards from the AMD RX 2XX series.

I think the key in the hybrid-console-handheld-business is scaling your games for the different machines. PC Games are very good with scaling their requirements for a wide range of possible hardware-configurations, there are even auto-configuration-tools like Geforce Experience from nVidia. Steam-Machines are going to do the same and this Smach Zero will play most games on low settings.

You can see similar things for example on iOS where some games can run on hardware that is four years old, but the same games are shining on the last iPad. This good perfomance on a so transforming platform (doubling graphics-perfomance every year) is simpler to implement when there is a litte number of hardware configurations that a programmer can detect and test in a reasonable period of time time like one new iPhone/iPad every fall.

This could reduce costs of developement for games that are released for this one platform on multiple machines, but this fact doesn't imply that the home console has to sacrifice most of the perfomance because of the handheld. Create a good handheld with a low-power SoC from AMD, put 2 GB of Ram in the device and a 720p screen. Runs all new games from Nintendo, but with lower graphics-quality for 199.99$ launch-price.

The home console can have a chip with higher perfomance, a higher resolution (1080p) and higher graphics-quality with 4 or 8 GB of faster Ram for 299.99$. The difference between games on those two devices would be closer than what we have seen with Smash Bros. on 3DS and WiiU.

Factory-Costs would drop soon with the use of standard-parts and it would be possible to maintain attractive hardware-prices with making some money on every sold machine. When 2018 or 2019 arrives and 4K is the new gold-standard for TV's like FullHD is today, new games could implement a third graphics-tier, a new home console with 4K launches and a new handheld with 1080p-support. No game-drought, because the whole library of games would be compatible, older games without 4K-tier-graphics just would be upscaled.

This is the only way hybrid should work.

I agree with everything you wrote, I hope Nintendo does this kind of hybrid, where you can use your NX Go/Boy as a controller for the home NX, like a Wii U Gamepad.