"Since the N64, the vast majority of games really worth owning a Nintendo console for have been Nintendo franchises. Until that changes, Nintendo will never be my personal favorite again no matter how many consoles they sell."

I agree with everything you said here...I still buy Nintendo consoles because I have to play some of their 1st party titles, but "the Nintendo" from the SNES days was something else.

Soriku said: Nintendo's next console will be their best yet. Why do I think this?... First of all, it's going to be HD. It'll probably be stronger than the PS3, or between the 360 and PS3. The PS4 and the new Xbox will be stronger still, but at least the new Nintendo system is in HD. The devs will likely not have to worry about how "weak" the new system is. Third parties shouldn't worry. Second of all, the third party support. Since the Wii will (most likely) end up being the #1 console this gen (sales-wise) then I see a PS1-PS2 effect. The Wii will get massive third party support this gen, especially from Japan, and that will continue. Since the Wii is most likely ending up in #1, every (or at least MOST, that aren't stubborn) third parties will put all their major franchises on the Wii. Maybe not all for the stubborn ones, but many main series will be on Nintendo's next system. It'll be the NES-SNES effect or PS1-PS2 effect all over again. Third parties shouldn't worry much about software sales either. It could be another PS2. Third, it will be like the DS. I'm not so sure the Wii will end up like the DS in terms of third party support, but it might be close. Either way, what I mean is it will appear to BOTH the "casual" and "hardcore". The "casuals," getting into gaming will likely buy the new editions of Brain Training or "[Insert name of Nintendo's new system here] Sports," etc. While for the hardcores they will buy Nintendo's games that appeal to them and the countless third party games. It'll be like the DS. Fourth, it'll have a better online system. It still might use FCs, but a likely enhanced version and online games will have more capabilities. The new system will likley have a harddrive (or a LOT of flash memory. I mean tons of GBs of flash memory.) and will also support MMOs fine. Overall, online will be MUCH more fun. Likely even demos with a harddrive or something. Definitely a big improvement. Fifth, it will be much more innovative. Nintendo has innovated every gen, and they will DEFINITELY innovate again. They will likely have a much more advanced Wii remote-type thing that will be easier to control and much more accurate. Maybe even people will not call it "gimmicky" due to its accuracy. Sixth, soem sort of DVD playback or some other sort of media movie entertainment. This goes hand-in-hand with having bigger disc space than the typical 9 GB. How much will the new system hold? Double that? Triple? etc. Seventh, (this relates to only devs, though), the new system will be easier and cheaper to develop for than games this gen. HD games will still be expensive, but the new system will be easier to develop for seeing as how devs are already having experience with HD games. Opinion-wise, this may not be the best system. Maybe people will just love the Wii so much. Maybe people will still prefer the SNES era. Who knows? But Nintendo's next system will be HUGE and likely be my favorite Nintendo system. Thoughts?

I'm sorry but I just couldn't read the whole post after you said "first of all, HD" , I did scan the rest of the post though. So HD is the big deal for a Wii gamer now? Boy, I have no comment.

Magnific0 said: Soriku said: Nintendo's next console will be their best yet. Why do I think this?... First of all, it's going to be HD. It'll probably be stronger than the PS3, or between the 360 and PS3. The PS4 and the new Xbox will be stronger still, but at least the new Nintendo system is in HD. The devs will likely not have to worry about how "weak" the new system is. Third parties shouldn't worry. Second of all, the third party support. Since the Wii will (most likely) end up being the #1 console this gen (sales-wise) then I see a PS1-PS2 effect. The Wii will get massive third party support this gen, especially from Japan, and that will continue. Since the Wii is most likely ending up in #1, every (or at least MOST, that aren't stubborn) third parties will put all their major franchises on the Wii. Maybe not all for the stubborn ones, but many main series will be on Nintendo's next system. It'll be the NES-SNES effect or PS1-PS2 effect all over again. Third parties shouldn't worry much about software sales either. It could be another PS2. Third, it will be like the DS. I'm not so sure the Wii will end up like the DS in terms of third party support, but it might be close. Either way, what I mean is it will appear to BOTH the "casual" and "hardcore". The "casuals," getting into gaming will likely buy the new editions of Brain Training or "[Insert name of Nintendo's new system here] Sports," etc. While for the hardcores they will buy Nintendo's games that appeal to them and the countless third party games. It'll be like the DS. Fourth, it'll have a better online system. It still might use FCs, but a likely enhanced version and online games will have more capabilities. The new system will likley have a harddrive (or a LOT of flash memory. I mean tons of GBs of flash memory.) and will also support MMOs fine. Overall, online will be MUCH more fun. Likely even demos with a harddrive or something. Definitely a big improvement. Fifth, it will be much more innovative. Nintendo has innovated every gen, and they will DEFINITELY innovate again. They will likely have a much more advanced Wii remote-type thing that will be easier to control and much more accurate. Maybe even people will not call it "gimmicky" due to its accuracy. Sixth, soem sort of DVD playback or some other sort of media movie entertainment. This goes hand-in-hand with having bigger disc space than the typical 9 GB. How much will the new system hold? Double that? Triple? etc. Seventh, (this relates to only devs, though), the new system will be easier and cheaper to develop for than games this gen. HD games will still be expensive, but the new system will be easier to develop for seeing as how devs are already having experience with HD games. Opinion-wise, this may not be the best system. Maybe people will just love the Wii so much. Maybe people will still prefer the SNES era. Who knows? But Nintendo's next system will be HUGE and likely be my favorite Nintendo system. Thoughts? I'm sorry but I just couldn't read the whole post after you said "first of all, HD" , I did scan the rest of the post though. So HD is the big deal for a Wii gamer now? Boy, I have no comment.

 

What an asinine reaction. HD will be, essentially, the norm by the time the next Nintendo system launches 4-7 years from now. He's not saying, OMG SUDDENLY I CARE ABOUT HD WHEN I, AS A NINTENDO GAMER, TOTALLY DISMISSED IT BEFORE. His prediction is that the next system will be HD-enabled, and since everything is moving into HD, it's logical that the next Nintendo console will also move in that direction.   Honestly, that post had much more ridiculous points.  What a thing to focus on...

Ok. Now I read your post , to be just while replying this :

You just said the next Nintendo will be just like what we have NOW with PS3 and 360 but still appeal to the casuals (so is cheap, it has the Nintendo franchises, and the type of shovelware that sells) and with all that it will still sell current Wii-like numbers?

What you may not realize is that this generation is very likely to last longer than 5 years. I bring that point up because it's only logical to assume in 6-7 years from NOW, we'll see a new tech jump that could very well make this generation look as "ugly" as you see last-gen when compared to it. If the next Wii is only as a little more powerful than PS360, it will not be able to handle next-gen games.

Online gameplay, you say. Do you think Nintendo will be able to compete in that arena with the more experienced and established MS and Sony? This generation is far from over and we are still expecting more breakthroughs from the HD consoles in the online service branch. Wii could still see some progress, but it's already lagging behind and hindered by tech (specially no hard drive). Next Wii will definitely improve on online, but the others will overshadow it in such a way on this department it will make it look old-gen (again).

Cheaper to develop for? Develop what? Watered-down ports? 'Nuff said.

Resident_Hazard said: What an asinine reaction. HD will be, essentially, the norm by the time the next Nintendo system launches 4-7 years from now. He's not saying, OMG SUDDENLY I CARE ABOUT HD WHEN I, AS A NINTENDO GAMER, TOTALLY DISMISSED IT BEFORE. His prediction is that the next system will be HD-enabled, and since everything is moving into HD, it's logical that the next Nintendo console will also move in that direction. Honestly, that post had much more ridiculous points. What a thing to focus on...

I think his point was more along the lines of that HD is not an essential game element.  A game will not cease to be fun or exciting or anything if it's not in HD (if it does the game has bigger problems). 

It's like getting pickles on your hamburger.  Some people must absolutely have their pickles but most people could take them or leave them knowing the hamburger itself will probably still be good without them.  There are even a few (crazy) people who don't like pickles at all.

Likewise, HD is inessential at this point.  It's nice to have, but games won't suddenly stop being fun without it. 

A few thoughts on why the Wii's processing power is so much lower than that of the PS3 and XBox 360:

1) Nintendo was not sure that the Wii was going to be a success, and (certainly) did not predict the Wii being as popular as it is; they were probably very worried that they would produce the next 'Virtaul Boy' and didn't want to spend that much money on R&D and didn't want to take any hardware losses on the units they did sell.

2) Nintendo understood that third parties would doubt how successful the Wii would be, and they didn't think any publishers would accept the risk of the Wii along with the risk of HD-games at the same time. Without the low development costs of the Wii it is unlikely that any of the third party games that have been released for the Wii would have ever been produced.

3) HDTV is still a luxury item which a minority of people around the world own. Nintendo has no reason to motivate people to buy HDTVs and it seems foolish for them to lose money up front (and to spend much more money on software development) on something that is not going to benefit the majority of gamers in this generation.

All of these factors will not be in place in the next generation so the next system will be more in line with what the competition would release at a similar point in time. This doesn't mean that Nintendo will attempt to produce a bleeding edge system afterall the Wii demonstrates that isn't necessary, and the diminishing returns on graphics' technology would make that a pointless pursuit. To expand upon why it is pointless is that the PS3 and XBox 360 can produce graphics that are rapidly approaching the quality of pre-rendered movies (in particular if you consider what would be possible if they focused only on 480p); in the next generation any improvement beyond (roughly) 4 times the power of the PS3 or XBox 360 will likely only be used to generate subtile effects which few people notice.

Teh next wii system will be in 1000080P and will beat Soony by introducing 12D gaming!

Glad to know you got some insider information on Nintendo's next console design...

HappySqurriel said: A few thoughts on why the Wii's processing power is so much lower than that of the PS3 and XBox 360: 1) Nintendo was not sure that the Wii was going to be a success, and (certainly) did not predict the Wii being as popular as it is; they were probably very worried that they would produce the next 'Virtaul Boy' and didn't want to spend that much money on R&D and didn't want to take any hardware losses on the units they did sell. 2) Nintendo understood that third parties would doubt how successful the Wii would be, and they didn't think any publishers would accept the risk of the Wii along with the risk of HD-games at the same time. Without the low development costs of the Wii it is unlikely that any of the third party games that have been released for the Wii would have ever been produced. 3) HDTV is still a luxury item which a minority of people around the world own. Nintendo has no reason to motivate people to buy HDTVs and it seems foolish for them to lose money up front (and to spend much more money on software development) on something that is not going to benefit the majority of gamers in this generation. All of these factors will not be in place in the next generation so the next system will be more in line with what the competition would release at a similar point in time. This doesn't mean that Nintendo will attempt to produce a bleeding edge system afterall the Wii demonstrates that isn't necessary, and the diminishing returns on graphics' technology would make that a pointless pursuit. To expand upon why it is pointless is that the PS3 and XBox 360 can produce graphics that are rapidly approaching the quality of pre-rendered movies (in particular if you consider what would be possible if they focused only on 480p); in the next generation any improvement beyond (roughly) 4 times the power of the PS3 or XBox 360 will likely only be used to generate subtile effects which few people notice.

 I agree. @BoldedWe see this in games such as crysis. I wonder how they will expand on graphics though. So we may see more innovation the generation after next because of the lack of needing more power in the console.  I got a question though. Is there anyway they could improve graphics substantially like (VR). If not then all upgrades to the power of systems may only be for physics/AI purposes. 

I will say this about Wii though, Nintendo has fucked up in the past. If sony makes a new system in a few years which passes the ps3 at a cheaper price better stuff, Nintendo will be forced to compete. You know what Nintendo has a bad case of flopping a lot, since Super Nintendo, Virtual Boy flopped, N64 flopped, Gamecube flopped, Wii is their baby and if they don't make the next system to meet what people want in the future they will flop again. Sony will probably take over, unless microsoft ends up making a new system with its horrific death rate. If Microsoft fails again their out of the race. They are not going to waste time going through all that shit again with the warranty and crap so they lose more money.

Sony has the upper hand in the future. I will say Nintendo does also they both know how to build systems. Microsoft just knows how to build software.

BTW: This whole thread is pure speculation. We will see what happens. No one can predict the future.