Ck1x said:
I'm very much aware that there are major differences between PC development versus console development, which is why I suggested that it would be a great idea if Nintendo contracted this to someone that's very experienced at it. You come across like it's the furthest thing from being possible even though we know next to nothing about the NX. The whole notion that PC development of yesteryear is the same as today needs to go away quickly. This is why fanboys believe that systems like the PS4 and XbOne perform so much higher than a much more powerful PC, which is just crazy talk! The advancement in graphics API have allowed even PC developers to code as close to the metal and improve performance at the same time. The lowest denominator is what's truly holding gaming back and that includes the current consoles because they aren't as future proof as many would believe. The latest patent from Nintendo shows that they've been researching ways to increase supplemental processing power through multiple factors. So this could lend more credence to an adaptive software to hardware approach as well. People shouldn't just rule stuff out because a company isn't or wasn't known for doing something in the past. Apple wasn't known for making phones before the iPhone or music devices before the ipod. Things change and businesses go where they can grow their market and revenue, it's as simple as that. |
I think pretending that PC game development has evolved to be more efficent and that the majority of PC game developers and leveraging advanced APIs to be as close as "to the metal" as consoles is a bit laughable. Just take your average AAA PC game and look at how astoundingly inefficient PC games are, and how the modding community takes over and churns out enhancements that the developers easily could have implemented given the time and money. You can't possibly argue that PCs are as close to getting the max performance out of the hardware as consoles are. The mere fact that you can code hardware specific enhancements for consoles means that consoles should always get more out of the hardware than PC games will.
Now is that to say that consoles can out perform much higher spec'd PCs? Absolutely not. Anyone who says so is drinking some console kool-aid. High performance PC games should always look better than their console counterparts. Always. The fact that a game like Uncharted 4 can stun some PC fans, by achieving graphical fidelity PC fans did not think were possible for such hardware specs speak for two main things: 1) console developers design everything from getting the most out of the hardware they're given and 2) how PC developers simply don't put nearly as much emphasis on efficiency. However, consoles are as futureproof as Sony or Microsoft want them to be. The fact that they have tens of millions of users and the potential to sell millions of games mean Sony or MS can dictate what those lowest common denominators are. Does that mean that as consoles age they start to hold PCs back? Absolutely. But as Sony demonstrated, no one is buying a $600 console, regardless of how "future proof" it might be. There will always be a compromise between performance and affordability that PCs do not have to make.
So that brings us back to Nintendo, and your stance that a "PC style engine" approach is reasonable. I don't come across as it being the furthest thing from possible (it certainly is) I see it as an incredibly dumb move. Nintendo prides itself on making affordable, efficent hardware. They don't focus on power, they focus on games, which means they don't necessarily need to have X1 level of graphics so long as they're above the standards of the Wii U in their eyes. If they took your approach, they would need to compensate for the performance loss by increasing its power. They are giving up performance (even though as you said, API improvements have lowered the performance decrease, the fact remains that there is still a signifcant performance decrease at play here) all the while pushing for smaller efficient chipsets that produce less heat and use less energy. That seems a bit contradictory. Don't believe its an issue? Compare the specs of an iPhone 6 to a Vita. The iPhone 6 blows it out of the water, yet in terms of game performance. Many of the iPhone's top games in terms of graphical fidelity are only marginally better than Vita counterparts. Why is this? Well as you said, they're not as "to the metal" as Sony is with the Vita, and along side that, iPhone developers have to develop for the lowest common denominator. I believe in Apple's case they say your game must perform respectfully on hardware 2 generations old. So that's what developers design for. They certainly aren't optimizing the performance of their game for every iPhone sku in those three generations.
And again, iPad games are not iPhone games. Even within that ecosystem, you have to do a non-trivial additional amount of workto make an iPad game work for the iPhone. There would undoubtedly be additional work a developer would have to endure if Nintendo were to take such an approach.
So let's imagine Nintendo takes your approach and the NX home performs better than the Wii U, and obviously worse than the PS4 and Xbox One. What if the NX portable is only a small step over the 3DS in terms of perfomance? How is the average consumer going to react to a console that performs worse than it's competition that is over 3 years older? Probably not well, even if they can buy one game for their NX home and play it on their NX portable. It doesn't make a lick of difference if no one is going to bother spending $500 on hardware to take advantage of such a feature. This, coupled with the the fact that added devopment work that could be mandatory, development costs for the platform would undoubtedly be higher than it would be to develop a PS4 game or Xbox One game. To me, this console isn't looking to appealing to anyone that isn't Nintendo and Nintendo's diehard fans, who to be honest, are more than likely going to buy any hardware Nintendo puts out regardless of its features or software ecosystem.
