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Forums - Nintendo - High Voltage - we're proving that the Wii isn't underpowered

shams on 19 June 2009
thetonestarr said:
shams said:

I can let you all in on a BIG secret...

The *real* reason that games tend to suck graphically on the Wii is...
...
...
...the hardware is actually quite complex & tricky to program, especially with respect to getting the most out the hardware...


Anyone goes around saying the Wii is simple to develop for and underpowered is speaking a load of bull$hit.

...and the reason I know this? Well, I'm slowly diving further into the depths of the Wii architecture/hardware every day now. And its a lot closer to the PS3 in architecture than it is to the 360...

Its *very* different

Actually, that's very simple to explain.

Who manufactures the Wii's CPU? IBM, under the Power architecture.

Who designed/manufactures the Cell processor? IBM, and it's also based on the Power architecture.

 

Both have very similar design behind their processors (although the PS3's is theoretically far more advanced), so the overall way they work will be rather similar.

Not really to do with chip design - more about overall system architecture.

The 360 *is* a PC - shaders, DirectX (API driven), linear memory (etc).

The Wii is not - dedicated memory for different tasks, memory banks... (and a whole bunch of other things I'm not going to talk about). In some ways, its a souped up DS/GBA - without an embedded screen.

In some ways, the PS3 is a lot *easier* to program than the Wii - because you can just use the main CPU/GPU, ignore the SPUs (initially) - and get a heap of power/RAM out of it.

Its been really eye-opening porting our PC engine (and Flowerworks, which is out on the PC now btw...) to the Wii. The game has already been significantly optimised - we were just so wasteful on the PC, everywhere.



Gesta Non Verba

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Ail on 19 June 2009
HappySqurriel said:
Ail said:
Yes because those screenshots totally hold a candle to Uncharted 2, God of War 3 or KZ2 screenshots...

If someone says a Honda Civic is not underpowered would you bring up the quarter mile times of a Mustang?

Saying something is not underpowered is (essentially) saying that it has adequate power, not that it is very powerful.

Most of the comments about the Wii being underpowered are made by comparison to others console, not looking at the Wii alone...



PS3-Xbox360 gap : 1.5 millions and going up in PS3 favor !

PS3-Wii gap : 20 millions and going down !

Kasz216 on 19 June 2009
mjc2021 said:
Boggern said:
Isn´t it the controls that set The Counduit apart from other Fps games like Halo and
Killzone. It can´t compete with their graphics (it looks really good for a Wii game) but
with it´s customizable controls it will do something that can´t be done on X360 and PS3.

Too bad Killzone and Conduit don't have split screen online play. That's really one of the best things about Halo. Halo 2 on the Xbox even offered that.

Yep.  Don't know why that isn't mandatory in FPS.  It really should be.



dahuman on 19 June 2009
Ail said:
HappySqurriel said:
Ail said:
Yes because those screenshots totally hold a candle to Uncharted 2, God of War 3 or KZ2 screenshots...

If someone says a Honda Civic is not underpowered would you bring up the quarter mile times of a Mustang?

Saying something is not underpowered is (essentially) saying that it has adequate power, not that it is very powerful.

Most of the comments about the Wii being underpowered are made by comparison to others console, not looking at the Wii alone...

then it's more like the Wii is not as powerful, not that it's under powered then =P one thing though, happy did bring up an interesting point with cars, because Wii takes almost no power to run yet it's able to produce that level of graphics whereas the 360 and PS3 take 10 times more power but not showing 10 times the performance when it comes to gaming.



Guovssohas on 19 June 2009

About the Wii's power, it's NOT underpowered for SD games, it's an SD console for God's sake, Standard Definition. IF the Wii was designed as a HD console, then it would be way more powerful.

Is that so hard to understand?



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NightDragon83 on 19 June 2009
Ail said:
Yes because those screenshots totally hold a candle to Uncharted 2, God of War 3 or KZ2 screenshots...

Too bad screen shots =/= sales, otherwise KZ2 and Uncharted would have sold a heckuva lot better than they did... Uncharted also comes bundled with the PS3, and it still hasn't topped a million units in the Americas a year and a half later!  And KZ2, arguably the PS3's biggest exclusive title since MGS4,  has been out for nearly 4 months and has just barely passed 800k so far... that's pretty sad for PS3's biggest market.



On 2/24/13, MB1025 said:
You know I was always wondering why no one ever used the dollar sign for $ony, but then I realized they have no money so it would be pointless.

hsrob on 19 June 2009
Kenology said:
hsrob said:
puffy said:
What The Conduit is competing with is FPS's on Wii.. Call of Duty: World at War is the only one out there that can do anything to The Conduit's sales and that would be basically nothing.

They set out to make a solid FPS experience for Wii and I think they've proven that the Wii can do more than what other games in the genre have done. They have never said: Our game is better than KZ2 and Halo 3, just the definitive Wii FPS. That's exactly what it'll be. I really don't see where the hate towards them is coming from, there seems to be a lot of word-twisting going on..

This.  No fan in their right mind has said that The Conduit will be able to compete with the best of the best shooters out there.  The problem is that there are barely any good shooters on the Wii, so even a solid shooter will be a worthy addition to the library for anyone who is fan of FPS. 

To be perfectly honest i think HVS are taking the route of all publicity is good publicity route with The Conduit because, to be honest, if they didn't create a bit of controversy or promote a reaction in people who would be paying any attention to them or this game?

I don't understand how an FPS on the Wii is automatically not able to compete with an FPS on one or both of the HD Twins.  If we're using graphics as a metric, then sure, I agree.  But gameplay is fair game.

I probably overstated it in the first post. I'm not saying it automatically can't compete, i just think it's unlikely given the pedigree and experience of the developer with FPS.  I'll happily be proven wrong.



SaviorX on 19 June 2009
shams said:
thetonestarr said:
shams said:

I can let you all in on a BIG secret...

The *real* reason that games tend to suck graphically on the Wii is...
...
...
...the hardware is actually quite complex & tricky to program, especially with respect to getting the most out the hardware...


Anyone goes around saying the Wii is simple to develop for and underpowered is speaking a load of bull$hit.

...and the reason I know this? Well, I'm slowly diving further into the depths of the Wii architecture/hardware every day now. And its a lot closer to the PS3 in architecture than it is to the 360...

Its *very* different

Actually, that's very simple to explain.

Who manufactures the Wii's CPU? IBM, under the Power architecture.

Who designed/manufactures the Cell processor? IBM, and it's also based on the Power architecture.

 

Both have very similar design behind their processors (although the PS3's is theoretically far more advanced), so the overall way they work will be rather similar.

Not really to do with chip design - more about overall system architecture.

The 360 *is* a PC - shaders, DirectX (API driven), linear memory (etc).

The Wii is not - dedicated memory for different tasks, memory banks... (and a whole bunch of other things I'm not going to talk about). In some ways, its a souped up DS/GBA - without an embedded screen.

In some ways, the PS3 is a lot *easier* to program than the Wii - because you can just use the main CPU/GPU, ignore the SPUs (initially) - and get a heap of power/RAM out of it.

Its been really eye-opening porting our PC engine (and Flowerworks, which is out on the PC now btw...) to the Wii. The game has already been significantly optimised - we were just so wasteful on the PC, everywhere.

Then why are there so many more Wii games rather than  PS3 games? There are like 900.....



Leatherhat on July 6th, 2012 3pm. Vita sales:"3 mil for COD 2 mil for AC. Maybe more. "  thehusbo on July 6th, 2012 5pm. Vita sales:"5 mil for COD 2.2 mil for AC."

Chairman-Mao on 19 June 2009

By those pictures it looks as good as a regular 360 or PS3 game (which is a good thing). It's obviously not as hot as Gears of War or Uncharted but excellent for the Wii!



dahuman on 19 June 2009
SaviorX said:
shams said:
thetonestarr said:
shams said:

I can let you all in on a BIG secret...

The *real* reason that games tend to suck graphically on the Wii is...
...
...
...the hardware is actually quite complex & tricky to program, especially with respect to getting the most out the hardware...


Anyone goes around saying the Wii is simple to develop for and underpowered is speaking a load of bull$hit.

...and the reason I know this? Well, I'm slowly diving further into the depths of the Wii architecture/hardware every day now. And its a lot closer to the PS3 in architecture than it is to the 360...

Its *very* different

Actually, that's very simple to explain.

Who manufactures the Wii's CPU? IBM, under the Power architecture.

Who designed/manufactures the Cell processor? IBM, and it's also based on the Power architecture.

 

Both have very similar design behind their processors (although the PS3's is theoretically far more advanced), so the overall way they work will be rather similar.

Not really to do with chip design - more about overall system architecture.

The 360 *is* a PC - shaders, DirectX (API driven), linear memory (etc).

The Wii is not - dedicated memory for different tasks, memory banks... (and a whole bunch of other things I'm not going to talk about). In some ways, its a souped up DS/GBA - without an embedded screen.

In some ways, the PS3 is a lot *easier* to program than the Wii - because you can just use the main CPU/GPU, ignore the SPUs (initially) - and get a heap of power/RAM out of it.

Its been really eye-opening porting our PC engine (and Flowerworks, which is out on the PC now btw...) to the Wii. The game has already been significantly optimised - we were just so wasteful on the PC, everywhere.

Then why are there so many more Wii games rather than  PS3 games? There are like 900.....

that's because he failed to mention the reality of the situation which is that game cube tech has been around since 2001 and all devs had to do was update their engines for Wii or further optimize it for the most part, it doesn't matter if the PS3 has a lesser learning curve vs the Wii, the Wii tech is not new therefore easier to dev vs a tech that came out about 5 years later.