Slashdot Mirror
More Hints at Nintendo's Revolution
The Nintendo press conference touched on aspects of the Nintendo Revolution, but offered no details on what "the" revolution is. No word on the controllers or when the console will be released. One new tantilizing aspect of the console was announced, though: "The console also will have downloadable access to
20 years of fan-favorite titles originally released for
Nintendo® 64, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System® (SNES) and
even the Nintendo Entertainment System® (NES)." No word on pricing, of course, but exciting nonetheless.
Bye bye, emu sites.
Nintendo can't even keep their web site up now, and they're going to offere downloadable content?
One man's Funny is another man's Offtopic.
I wonder what the limits of this download service will be?
:)
It would be awesome if you could download some of these games if you had purchased them previously (NES and SNES games), but I doubt they'd offer that service. It would be too much of a pain to implement.
Also, I wonder if they'll ever let you download Gamecube and Revolution games? I figure the answer to that is "no" because the games are so big. Bandwidth would be a problem, as downloading a full game would take -forever. Also, the size constraints on the onboard flash RAM (512 MB) would be problematic for this. However, if they make available old N64 games, that space might fill up pretty quick anyway.... However, there's always the possibility of a hard drive peripheral
hackshop.com - My tech hobby project hub
Online Smash Bros and a launch library consisting of all GC games as well as large swaths of the N64, SNES, and NES?
I could see this working well for Nintendo. It continues with their trend of fighting the console wars on their own terms. Not bad.
Philip Sandifer's academic website
http://media.cube.ign.com/articles/615/615030/img
Pictures of the Zelda trailer
http://cube.ign.com/articles/615/615045p1.html
Does this mean that Nintendo will let us mess with it? I would love to be able to program it. Not only would that increase sales, it would foster talent and good will towards Nintendo. Considering how large the GB/GBA development community is, I would think that would be a good thing. Also, the devices that people use to develop for the GBA Nintendo is always fighting because they can be used for piracy. But if you could develop from the get-go (or maybe with a $50 or $100 kit) people wouldn't need to reverse engineer things to run their own code.
Will Nintendo do it? I kinda doubt it, but I would really love it if they did.
Either way, if it makes it easier to make good games without needing huge teams of programmers to endlessly tinker to get decent performace, it could still be a very good thing.
On a side note though, the Zelda screens don't look as good as many of the PS3/X360 screens. Let's hope there is better to come (based on how much better the GC got though, it should still be great).
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Have to agree here, what the hell was Sony thinking with that design? I've even looked back at the pictures in the alst 24 hours thinking that maybe I'm just seeing it the wrong way, it looks like a ATM for christ's sake! Not having seen a 360 first hand I'd have to say its design is much nicer but is it a lot smaller than the original xbox, damn that thing was beastly. :)
But the Revolution. Wow, thats nice. good scope for colours. probably real easy for custom spray jobs seeing as there are no buttons and trays to worry about. Minimalist and functional.
Just my opinion on the three new systems, does anyone like the PS3 design over the 360/Rev and if so what is it you like?
How nice is this thing?!?, I'm so totally not a big N fanboy, but quickly turning into one. You can have your PS3 and Xbox multi-processor multi-hundred dollar systems that are mainly media systems, I want a game console and so far Nintendo is hitting the mark.
Downloadable content is phenomenal!!! I can play old favorites quickly and easily with no emulation woes, I just hope the payment system is similar to iTunes. A buck to have Excitebike, Zelda, FF would be amazing... I'd probably go up to $5-10 for newer stuff but not much over that.
I just want to see the controller, it is said to be the true revolution here and I'm sure it will be. This is what was needed in gaming, a return to the core focus. Sony and MS are missing out IMO, the Revolution is my only hope for gaming's future without juvenile "mature" titles like GTA and the like.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
So, does this mean that Nintendo will somehow provide a way for indie developers to get around that barrier?
Nintendo Financial Services?
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
Have they mentioned the idea of letting 3rd-party companies offer current games for download?
True, most current games would be too large, but it would be quite awesome if you could buy simple, independently developed (but N-approved) games via the same method that the back catalog games will be downloaded...
It would be really interesting if smaller companies could have a direct distribution route for "smaller" (but still innovative gameplay-wise) games.
What with Microsoft finally coming through on the Xbox backwards compatibility, and now this, it's pretty obvious that all three of the console makers finally get it.
The size of a game library can be just as important as the number of quality games. Consumers like choice. Just like with music, so it is with videogames. This is something that Nintendo failed to address with the Nintendo64 and the Gamecube. It's almost painful to see how well they get it when it comes to the portable market (GameBoy and family), but not their home consoles.
I, for one, am hoping they do the right thing, and make the library available for free. While they'll miss out on some revenues of old games, they'll have a guaranteed sell for the Revolution (and Nintendo typically sells it's hardware at break-even or profit), and a footstep into future sales. Combine this with sales of Gamecube games that will also work in the Revolution, and Nintendo could see itself launched into the forefront of the three console makers.
Interestingly enough, it's mostly thanks to companies like Netflix and Amazon that these companies are beginning to understand. They've made such a profitable market out of niche sales, that big business is being forced to recognize the power that is the little guy, instead of just pandering to hit sales. In the business world, they're calling this "The Long Tail", and it's turning out to be huge money. (So much so, that business executives everywhere are sitting up and taking notice.) There are articles in The Economist and Wired. The traditional thinking has been that 80% of revenues typically comes from 20% of the titles, and it's been true for a long time. However, in the internet world, where you're not limited by shelf space, and you can aggregate diverse markets, the other 80% of titles (niche titles) can bring in as much money as the most popular 20%.
Nintendo has always excelled at putting out hits (Zelda, Mario, Metroid, Pokemon, etc.), which is why I think they've typically ignored this facet of business, but I think that even they may be starting to take notice. Here's hoping so :-)
If they do this right, they can EASILY make lots of money off the emulation crowd. Most of us have no problems downloading & tweaking emulators, but the "mass market" doesn't have the patience/skills for that. If they target the pricing correctly(i.e. NOT the $20 they were charging for the GBA versions of these games) I don't see why people won't play this JUST for the nostalgia.
Some thoughts:
- If I download games to my SD card, can I somehow back them up to my PC?
- Would *I* pay more than $1-$2 dollars for an old NES game? How about SNES? N64?
- They seemed to mention Super Mario Sunshine as a downloadable game! I wonder if this is correct, because it must not have used all of the 1.5GB on the GameCube disc then.
- Nintendo really IS going out of there way to be different this time. If the specs turn out to be THAT much lower than the competition it will pretty much rule out lots of direct ports.
The XBox 360 gets unveiled; it hits the slashdot front page. The Sony PS3 gets unveiled; it hits the slashdot front page. The Nintendo Revolution gets unveiled; it goes to the games.slashdot section page.
Hmm.
Anyhow, Nintendo pretty much let down anyone who was hoping for real information today. I can shrug this off though. What matters to me though is what they do to developers.
Nintendo made quiet public statements a month or so ago that there would be more shown of the Revolution behind closed doors than there were in their E3 conference; today, they brought a Revolution prototype on stage (and apparently a functional one, since they said it wasn't as small as the final version would be) and said that they'd be showing it off in meetings later that week. I assume this means they're going to be revealing the information to developers this week that they didn't to consumers today.
And, well, they'd better. Work on PS3 games is clearly already starting or seriously underway. Nintendo can continue to cocktease consumers for another six months without it being a serious problem for them, but if they don't sell third party developers on this quickly they're going to outright miss the chance to get third parties signed on at all.
The thing that really concerns me is, Nintendo seems to be convinced they have solutions for low-budget high-concept dev houses; well, that won't really help much if nobody but the five or six massive developers Nintendo talks to behind closed doors this week are considered NDA-trustworthy enough to get dev kits, and by the time the low-budget high-concept game designers actually find out what the Revolution is they're already locked into making PS3 games.
Well, at least the new DS lineup is absolutely fantastic.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
That thing looks an awful lot like a disk drive for a desktop PC (and about the same size, too). What are the odds Nintendo allows you to use it in a computer? That would be very interesting indeed.
The Braying and Neighing of Barnyard Animals Follows.
Imagine, if you will, the ability for all those old multiplayer Nintendo games to be playable online. If Nintendo could make it so that any of those old multiplayer Nintendo games could be played against another person online instead of having him or her right next to you..... that would be the ultimate killer scenario. Is it possible? I don't know. A guy should be allowed to speculate, though.
Everyone would own one. Forget about market share. It will be 50% XBox 360 and 50% PS3... with 100% having a Revolution.
Heck, it may be anyway..... *drool*.
A community-oriented lyrics site
If by port you mean designing an emulator so then all the games work and that they've already made a NES and N64 emulator for gamecube so they could probably use it on Revolution. Then yes that sure is a lot of work porting. I mean designing a SNES emulator for Revolution in less than what? 11 months? sure will be a challenge. Infact I imagine they'll delay the next Zelda because all the Nintendo programmers will be busy designing SUCH a complicated emulator or they'll steal ZSNES's code.
The general consensus among my friends is that while making the old library of games available for the new platform is a hugely good thing, they are concerned about the apparant hardware spec.
After Sony and Microsoft making a huge deal of the processing power of their hardware, the rumors that Revolution will only be 2 - 3 times more powerful then the Gamecube (as opposed to 15 or so times more powerful for PS3 vs PS2)is somewhat troubling.
If any company can make games on weaker hardware that are better then offerings of competitors on faster hardware, it is Nintendo. But for 3rd party developers that lack Nintendo's pedigree, there may be some balking at putting new games on what appears to be an inferior platform.
The best chance for Revolution to succeed over PS3 or XBox 360 is for development on Revolution to be absurdly easy and cost effective. They may still lose out on having companies like EA target their platform, but can mitigate that by attracting publishers who are starting up and cannot afford to develop for the other platforms.
If Nintendo can attract enough developers to their platform, and have a heavy stream of new games coming out for their platform, they will do amazingly well.
Lots of new games + Abusrd amunts of old cheap games + low price of the console will allow Nintendo to succeed.
Of course, this is all speculation on my part. Until we know exactly what the hardware specs for Revolution are, being worried about the console being underpowerered are premature.
END COMMUNICATION
This could be the big feature even though it most likely won't see much coverage in mainstream media. Another quote from Nintendo they state game development is approaching 8 figures, and that developers are beginning to grow tired of this. Especially with the slashdot crowd you'd think this would be a big deal but not much is being said, the ability to affordably create your own titles with solid Nintendo toolsets is HUGE! This is the type of thing that breeds innovation and fresh new games. Devil Dice for PS1, Katamari Damacy for PS2 (kinda, it was a personal vision type of game), and numerous other great indy/small release titles. This just may be what steals the show if it is accessible.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
Sure it could. 512MB would store 8 of the largest possible N64 games (at 64MB) uncompressed. As I recall it, only Resident Evil 2 and Conker's BFD were ever that large. Thus, you're guaranteed space for over 8 games. The two Zeldas clocked in at 32MB, and Ogre Battle 64 was 40MB. With compression, I'd guess that the average size of a game would be somewhere around 20MB (not that Nintendo made lots of 20MB carts, that's just where I'd expect the balance to fall, considering the number of 16MB and 32MB carts). SNES games range from 1 to 4MB; you could literally fit hundred(s) of them in that space. NES games? Quite possibly a thousand of those.
--- Bwah?
Hmm. Let me download Snake, Rattle n' Roll and The Guardian Legend for $.99 (or whatever's fair... that means LESS than $19.99) and you've got yourself a loyal customer again.
Nintendo... the next iTunes Music Store-like experience?
-Rob
Marriage doesn't have to suck!
I think we're all dreaming that the price of classics will be less than $20/each. They didn't exactly give away the remakes they released for the GBA, granted they needed a cart so that increases the cost.
But $5/game sounds way too cheap in an office room I think.
-- taking over the world, we are.
http://rorexrobots.com/nin/Nintendo-E3.asf.torrent
nice fast 10mbit seed with nobody currently on it...get it while it's hot!
sig? uhh, umm, ok
Just look at the features of the PS3, 3 x Gigabit ports, WiFi, BlueTooth, CF, not to mention the RAM and GPU. There's no way it will be affordable.
Expect Nintendo to try and portray themselves as above the Sony vs. Microsoft battle. It looks like Nintendo think they are right now like Apple right before OS X and the iPod made them a major player again. Hopefully this will translate into them bringing major and useful innovations to the market.