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Resident_Hazard on 08 June 2008
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Mifely said:
Viper1 said:
Mifely said:

The Wii will have some decent 3rd party engines after a while, but they'll never be truly spectacular in the graphics sense. They won't suck as bad as most of the shovelware does though. Nintendo has consistantly set the high bar for their games with their 1st party titles. There really aren't engines that ever outdo them on their platforms, ever. Some come close now and then (RE4 on the GC, for example), but Nintendo will always be king. You can't ever expect more out of the Wii than Nintendo provides. Their games are fun to look at, but not astonishing in the graphics department. I would argue that "fun to look at" is what really matters to the typical Wii user, and Nintendo knows that.


You've been pretty spot on until here. Many 3rd parties outclassed Nintendo graphically on the SNES and N64. Squaresoft, RAREWare, Factor 5 and others. On GC, Factor 5 continued that trend right out fo the gate. Rare also held up their talents again for a game. In fact, Nintendo at one point during hte N64 days admitted that Rare had better tools than they did.

While these are certainly exceptions and not the rules, they are THE bar for which other 3rd parties should strive for.


I would disagree that Starfox: Adventures (Rare's only GC game that I recall) was better, graphically, than Super Mario Sunshine, Zelda: The Wind Waker, Zelda: Twilight Princess, Metroid Prime 1/2 (2nd party) etc. On par, or pretty close, but not really better. I think I'd have to say the same about Rogue Squadron/Rebel Strike -- good stuff, but not really better than Nintendo's 1st/2nd party titles.

On the N64 and SNES... sure I suppose, but the relative differences weren't really spectacular. Nintendo is always a contender for #1 on their own consoles (just like Sony and MS are on theirs... go figure), so if you take a look at Super Mario Galaxy, Metroid Prime 3, etc., you have a pretty accurate picture of what the Wii can do, and will ever be capable of. Those games are good... but they aren't on par with the X360/PS3... they are, however, pretty close to the what the Xbox was capable of (like it or not). Sure, a little better -- I'm not argueing that.

What I'm getting at, is that if graphics is what you're looking for, the Wii will just never compare, due to a huge number of reasons, technical (hardware comparison with 360/PS3), financial (publishers don't want to sink money into a game which may not appeal to a large portion of the Wii's audience... pool/poker/tennis/kiddie title is a better bet for them), and otherwise. The focused demographics of the X360 and the PS3 make them much more viable platforms for risking a large project on... at least you have some guarantee of appeal to many of the console owners. With the Wii, you have to appeal to everyone from Grandma, to Uncle Bob to little Johnny, and have no guarantees whatsoever of a target audience.

Solitaire/Billiards/GemTetrisWhatever/Sudoku/Sims/BassFishingSuperPro have always reigned supreme on the PC -- financially those kinds of games are without peer. If you're a "real" gamer looking for good stuff out of your Wii... well... welcome to "mass appeal". Nintendo will always be your hero, in that regard.


No one is disputing that the graphics on the Wii will never compare to the Xbox360 or PS3--everyone knows that. The thing is that the Wii isn't a puny technical midget. It is far more capable of churning out high-quality, surprising and impressive graphical feats on it's own. It's comparable to the original Xbox in power, though the theory is that the Wii was assembled to operate much more effeciently, and therefore, capable of pulling off graphical feats clearly superior to the original Xbox. The Wii is perfectly suited to making larger, high-budget hardcore titles. The only reason anyone thinks otherwise is because third party companies are all-too-often complete and utter morons. If they put the time, money and dedication into a hardcore Wii title--and promoted it with some intelligence--it would be successful. And the more third party companies that wake the fuck up and realize it, the better each successive title will perform. You're missing the point (like too many 3rd party devs) that the Wii is intended to be "casual only" and "mass appeal only." Nintendo has always targeted a wider than hardcore audience while still maintaining a dedication to hardcore gaming. The Wii is no different. It only takes the necessary next step to make gaming seem easier to non-gamers, and fresh and new again to the hardcore. No one who owns a Wii really has any right to complain about dismal 3rd party fare on the system if they aren't buying the decent 3rd party games. I've seen people bitch and complain that "hardcore games" and "third party games" on the Wii suck or that there are too few. Yet, on their OWN Wii, all they have is Mario Galaxy, Smash Bros, and Wii Sports. They're part of the problem. They should shut the hell up and actually invest in hardcore Wii titles like Geometry Wars, Blast Works, Resident Evil 4, RE:Umbrella Chronicles, Fire Emblem, Okami, No More Heroes, Manhunt 2, etc, etc. The pictures posted of The Conduit in here should be taken with a grain of salt since they are from a game that is very much still unfinished. Now, if what was said from Factor5 ever so long ago--that the GC could do anything the Xbox could--then I expect to see the Wii routinely blowing away GameCube/PSP/Xbox-era graphics. There's no reason at all for companies to do anything that looks like a first-gen PS2 game.