TheWPCTraveler said:
I am of the opinion that the next handheld, dual-screened and with 3D, or not, should be more powerful than Wii U. That said, I'm thinking you'll get rid of those, no? The problem I see with your set-up is the mobile console. The GamePad runs 6 hours max with the default battery at 540p, and doesn't really have to do the heavy lifting. That, and the different power settings when plugged in or not. In theory, that is a great idea, but devs will most likely end up targeting the 600 GFLOP part. This is Japan we're talking about.
I have a different approach in mind, however. 2016: Handheld, 2017: Console. In my opinion, a slider would do well, especially if the top screen is capacitive, and the device can be utilized as a phone. There should be multiple variants, too. Base price should be $179 (4.3" screen), and all devices should have equal footing when it comes to power and screen resolution. Add $50 for a bigger screen (5.3") and better battery life. Add another $60 to bump up the storage from 8 to 32GB, add phone hardware and 1GB RAM (for multitasking), have a better (set of) camera(s), and switch from a clamshell to a slider layout. All devices are more powerful than Wii U, with two screens and the face-tracking 3D tech. (top: 1920*540px, bottom: 720*540px). Why the power? To milk one more year out of the Wii U and theoretically encourage at least some development there. Why the lay-out and 3D? To take advantage of backwards compatibility to 3(DS) and also take away devs interested in fanservice. Yum. That's for the handheld. The reason it launches a year earlier is to give the console breathing room, would you really spend, say, $600 a year in hardware alone? Well, that and it can be utilized as a controller for the platform. The standard console needs to come in at $290 max (250GB), for the base price, with the Pro controller or some improved Wiimote+nunchuck. Add $70 and you can have either 1TB storage, or an improved GamePad (720p display). Add $110 instead, and you can have both. Or, add $200 for the ultimate bundle: 1TB console + deluxe XL hardware unit. All I ask from it is for it to be able to handle streaming 720p to a TV and to four controllers at once, that was a big flaw of the Wii U to me.
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Something kinda has to give to have an affordable handheld that's still powerful, but if you weigh yourself down with dual-screen and 3D screen ... you get into trouble. One thing I have thought about though is what if the screen could twist or even detach and be repositioned vertically just for backwards compatibility. Basically this idea:
I kinda view the NX Pocket as being something really just to get kids into the NX ecosystem. Once you get them there, then hopefully they're more apt to choose the NX console over a Sony/MS console, becuase they already have games for the NX to play so going to NX home or mobile console is a no-brainer for them.
But you can kinda skimp on some features for the NX Pocket.
I actually did some research for the battery tech for the mobile console. I'm assuming an $18 battery (manufacturing cost). That's a huge battery it would be 1.5x the iPad Air battery, which has 32 wH but times 1.5x that goes to 48 wH. At 70 GFLOPS/watt we get 600 GFLOPS at 7.5 watts, add in 2 watts for the display (high brightness) and 0.5 watts for the WiFi signal. That's 10 watts, that means with a 48 wH battery, you're looking at 4.8 hours of gameplay ... about the same as a 3DS. Not bad, right?
Just don't expect this thing to be nearly as thin as an iPad Air or anything like that and Nintendo would have to sell it at cost to start with, but that's ok. It could be the size of the Wii U tablet, or it could be more along the size of a Surface Pro tablet or something or perhaps a different type of form factor (like that PC Engine LT).
The home console can then be something pretty built almost strictly for the US market/older gamers. You have the kids and "I just want to play Mario and Animal Crossing and not pay a lot of money" market covered with the pocket NX. You have a fresh/different take on the console concept geared towards Japan and a really high end portable console which seperates Nintendo from all the tablet/smartphone makers and even the PS4/XB1 too (they're not portable, they can't stream to a TV, you can't take them anywhere) covered.
So the console then doesn't really have to be all things to all people (which is part of what's gotten Nintendo into trouble, they try to make everyone happy, but they have to then compromise on a million things and no one ends up happy). Even still though at 2 TFLOPS, at 70 GFLOPS/watt that's still only 28 watts! That's less than the Wii U. I think Nintendo would be very happy with that. They really need to jump on that 14nm AMD FinFet process like crazy. It's perfect for them.
