Official Nintendo Fanboy Smugness & Gloating Thread

[gravy]

Back peddling

Look I said that 5:1 never looked very likely, loads of people grapsed that and said so as soon as it was proclaimed.

To be fair I don't think it was even fully belieived by the person who originally predicted that statistic, I read it as a bit of op ed to get people to read wotr.

You've now shifted your position from "looked likely" to "looked likely in my opinion" qualified by "best facts I had available to me at the time"

If that's what you wanted to get across in the first place, fair enough.

However it just doesn't read like that, your post reads like a justification of the original 5:1 claims by implication that it was the received wisdom when the claim was originall made. It wasn't, it was a minority view.

That's what I took issue with.

[Bubba]

Wii Remote + Cell + 360 GPU would be rather interesting indeed...

Perhaps, but put on the market in Christmas 2006 it would have cost so much to make it would have been even less commercially successful than the PS3. Especially if, like Nintendo, you don't believe in subsidising your early hardware units.

Yeah, I never said it would be practical However, I honestly think the Wii needs a stronger C/GPU than it currently has, especially CPU. An overclocked gamecube CPU just isn't going to cut it for doing "funky stuff" in anything like real time. Perhaps not the complexity of Cell or the cost of the 360 GPU, but for the £190 I was expecting something a little more technologically advanced - a dual cored CPU for example and a more modern GPU design.

This is of course personal opinion combined with what I like to tinker with from the programming point of view. As such I don't see the Wii ever being my platform of choice for games. But by the sales figures it looks like I'm a dying breed of gamer so I suppose I just have to hope that from the ashes of this generation Sony and Microsoft can pull something together for next time, otherwise I'll be back to PC gaming (if that even exists by that point!).

It's weird - this generation more than any other I'd really love a superconsole with bits combined from all the others. Take the PS3 and 360's optical formats (HD-DVD, Blu-Ray) and combine them, Cell, 360 GPU, 360 Pad (for traditional games) and Wiimote / Nunchuck, Live online and dashboard, PS3 Home-esque optional portal, Virtual Console for some classic gaming (with Live Arcade style demos of course), and the list goes on.

Oh, I'll have a moon on a stick too please

Cheers

Bubba

[Darkflame]

But you will get your superconsole next generation, as no one is going to go backwards in technology, they only advance in different areas at different rates.

While being able to handel better physics will undenignably work well with a wiimote style controller, I really think its going to take a generation for developers too really get to grips with it anyway, whatever else nintendo had in that box.

I know Endorphine has been re-written for games now, which is kinda-sorter-maybe close to the sort of thing needed for Wii games.
But really, there isnt much there at the moment regarding programing and development techniques needed for good wii games.

I think patients is the word here, the landscape has changed.
In the long run I think more or less the whole industry will be switching away from premade animations.


In the meantime, Im hoping someone works out the potential fun the wiimote will have as a baseball bat when combined with lots of ragdolls

[Roobarb]

Yeah, I never said it would be practical However, I honestly think the Wii needs a stronger C/GPU than it currently has, especially CPU.

I would have liked to have seen a stronger step up from the 'cube as well. I don't buy this low-power so it can be always-on bullshit. Waste of good electricity if you ask me. Id much rather it was designed properly so it downloaded in the background only when it was in use, or at a scheduled time. I really resent the fact you can't use the forecast and news channels if you configure the console for Wii Connect 24 to be off in Standby. It's always a compromise though: higher power is not only more expensive wrt the chip, but also for cooling, especially in a small case. And i really think the wee form factor is one of the best things about the Wii.

for the £190 I was expecting something a little more technologically advanced

The £190 price must giving Nintendo UK a nice little earner, but the Japanese price is pretty fair for what you get over a Gamecube. The casework plastics are much higher quality for example, and all the extra bits like wifi, flash memory, sensor bar, slot drive, and wiimote+nunchuck add up. The free channels and browser are a nice addition as well. For the UK price i'd have been happy if they'd chucked in a classic controller and a couple of N64 VC games, or pushed the price to £199 and included another wiimote.

by the sales figures it looks like I'm a dying breed of gamer

Not sure if you're part of a dying breed, but the thing is that there's only so many people who are prepared to spend that much spare time playing hugely involved 40+ hour games, and many of the ones that do have the time can't afford an expensive console and fancy TV to show them off. Meanwhile the PS2 still had/has plenty of good games coming out for it, and the portable consoles have really come into their own this generation as 'not just for the primary school kids'.

PS3 Home-esque optional portal

Really? What do you like about it over Live? Looks like Sony's Microsoft Bob to me.

Oh, I'll have a moon on a stick too please

I find it tastes nicer on crackers

[Darkflame]

I don't buy this low-power so it can be always-on bullshit. Waste of good electricity if you ask me. Id much rather it was designed properly so it downloaded in the background only when it was in use, or at a scheduled time. I really resent the fact you can't use the forecast and news channels if you configure the console for Wii Connect 24 to be off in Standby.

You see, Id say the problem is the reverse;
The Wii dosnt seem to do any background downloading at all.

I wouldnt mind living it on if I had instant access to all its online features when I woke up.

As it is at the moment, I can turn it off all night at the wall, or leave it on.
Makes no difference as far as news and weather access speed goes. :-/

Its like the technical abilitys/design of the wii are quite behind what its firmware is coded to do.

by the sales figures it looks like I'm a dying breed of gamer

*yawn*
This old one.

The gaming market is expanding to include more gamers so you only look like your dieing in comparison k?

In 5, 10, 15 years time there will be just as much meaty, big &or complex games.

Only they will be motion controlled

and the portable consoles have really come into their own this generation as 'not just for the primary school kids'.

Well, outside japan.
The original game boy was marketed a bit at business men when it first game out, and it also had "serious" software.
Its not all new this stuff.

[teamonkey]

grumpy

You know what he meant.

The DS is doing better now than in the dreams of the most rabid of fanboys before launch. Nintendo themselves seem surprised (and grateful, bless their cotton socks) at the success. Despite being more expensive and less of a mass-market product than the DS, the PSP has mainly been damaged by a series of PR disasters, poor titles and generally poor handling: no-one guessed at how badly it would be managed.

The 5:1 prediction was silly, yes, but before launch it was still possible that Sony might just snatch the handheld title away from Nintendo. They went for the iPod angle and completely missed; if they'd hit the mark then things would have been different, though not by 5:1. If anyone had predicted 5:1 in favour of the DS before launch, they would have been thought of as mental - yet it's turning out to be true.

[Jamesac]

Back peddling

You know what the difference between backpeddling and clarification is?

No seriously, do you? I'm guessing not. Hint- one's somewhat insulting.

James

[SiN]

@Jamesac:
You're spot on, by the way. The "5:1 thing" is really quite irrelevant. The real point is that alot of people thought that the PSP was going to blow the DS away. I remember seeing the first PSP trailer like it was yesterday ... it was for Death Jr. I watched that and said, "shit, Nintendo are fucked!" I thought the DS was interesting, but frankly I thought the general reaction would be that the PSP out-classed it. And I'm pretty sure many people were thinking the same thing.

So no, this isn't just "Nintendo won because they own the market". Nintendo won because Sony screwed up, and because Nintendo did fantastic things with the system that nobody even thought was possible.

The 5:1 thing doesn't matter. What matters is that Nintendo came up on top, and came on top in such away that nobody thought was possible.


SiN

[disciple]

So no, this isn't just "Nintendo won because they own the market". Nintendo won because Sony screwed up, and because Nintendo did fantastic things with the system that nobody even thought was possible.

The 5:1 thing doesn't matter. What matters is that Nintendo came up on top, and came on top in such away that nobody thought was possible.

I'm really not sure on what you lot are arguing about but the above isn't true.

Lots of people here saw the potential of the DS a the time, stating that we believed Nintendo had the winner in the DS as long as *they* didn't screw it up. Repeatedly saying that the design had the potential to bring whole new genres to the handheld scene, this hinging on the software being developed, but that if *any company* could take such a design and maximize its impact, making proper use of the hardware then Nintendo were the ones to do it.

[Darkflame]

I think they were the minority, more people making predictions were siding with raw power then controll potential.
A similar situation is happening now too an extent, the Wii being dismissed as being just about gimmicky mini games and not for the "Hardcore" gamer at all.

[SiN]

Read this article: http://www.idlethumbs.net/display.php?id=233

It's a neat article that compares what the press were saying about the "Revolution" when it was announced versus what they said about the DS when it was announced. Here are the highlight quotes:

What the press said about DS: “Has Nintendo taken crazy pills? The DS sounds like a gimmicky system designed especially for particular games Nintendo already has in mind, with no consideration for third-party developers and publishers.” (Crispin Boyer, EGM)

“Are Nintendo really trying to narrow down their market and continue to force their interpretation instead of recognising what gamers actually want? Do the rumours of Nintendo affectionately shoving two fingers to third-party publishers actually hold some merit?” (Chris Leyton, TotalVideoGames)

What the press said about DS: “If this thing catches on, in 10 or 12 years optometrists worldwide are going to be absolutely baffled by the wave of cross-eyed kids they'll have to treat. Either that, or kids' eyes will just twitch uncontrollably: twitch up, twitch down, twitch left, twitch right, and on and on.” (David Smith, 1UP)

“What a stupid idea. Yes, I have two eyes, but they can generally only focus on one thing at a time. Looks like the second coming of the Virtual Boy to me.” (Joe Rybicki, OPM)

Clearly, alot of people weren't very optimistic about the DS.


SiN

[The Caffeine Kid]

Lots of people these day's have two (or more) monitors, but they still only have one pair of eyes.

[disciple]

What the press said about DS: “If this thing catches on, in 10 or 12 years optometrists worldwide are going to be absolutely baffled by the wave of cross-eyed kids they'll have to treat. Either that, or kids' eyes will just twitch uncontrollably: twitch up, twitch down, twitch left, twitch right, and on and on.” (David Smith, 1UP)

“What a stupid idea. Yes, I have two eyes, but they can generally only focus on one thing at a time. Looks like the second coming of the Virtual Boy to me.” (Joe Rybicki, OPM)

What stupid comments!

Clearly, alot of people weren't very optimistic about the DS.

Right, you've been speaking in context of the press and such, my comment was just related to the folks on this forum.

[Darkflame]

To be fair, the two screens buisness didnt make sense to me either before the touchscreen was also announced.

I think a lot of the worse press quotes probably came before the full system was known.


But still, yes, Id put my faith in the video game press to make stupid comments quite frequently on just about anything.

[HGFB]

Why don't you go back to the original forum threads we had on the subject and you'll all be able to see exactly what everyone thought.