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ATI Talks Revolution Graphics
Via 1up, an interview at the site Revolution Report talking with ATI about the power of the Revolution's graphics. From the article: "What I can say is that ATI is focused, as is Nintendo, in making [Revolution] a great, gaming entertainment platform. I know that a lot of journalists are very focused on specs. It's the big thing; as a geek, I look for that too. The key thing to keep in mind is that Nintendo, with ATI's help, is trying to create a game console where you don't have to look at [specs]."
As long as it illuminates pixels on a TV I'll be happy :-)
btw, first post ;-)
DxBlog - It's where you want to be
What do you mean by not have to look at specs? Will the graphics hardware be included with the game? ;-)
But seriously folks, what exactly does that mean.
If you like what I've said here, and want to read more, go to http://www.krillrblog.com
He doesn't say a damn thing. Do not bother.
Actually, it's like when you buy a cell phone, a toaster, or a lawn mower. Most of us don't care about the phone's processor speed or memory, just how well it handles calls and for how long. Most of us don't care about the wattage of the toaster, just that it makes toast. Most of us don't care about the horsepower of a lawnmower, just that it cuts grass.
Or to go back to cars--we don't care about horsepower, we care about performance.
You know, I can't tell whether you're sarcastic or not.
Generally when you put a game into a console, it works without needing to worry about power, specs, and other nonsense. That's the beauty of them.
Don't worry, a lot of first timers get confused.
I'm not scared of anonymous cowards.
It's usually understood that when you buy a Nintendo console, you buy first party games. I agree on lack of third party support, but it's obvious you're not making an effort.
I wonder, do you attempt to drive a car without wheels, and then blame the car manufacturer?
I'm not scared of anonymous cowards.
I can't give you a single performance number on my car. Or any other car, for that matter. I know it has no trouble driving at 60-70, when I test drove it (road testing since got it to 100 briefly, over that I don't feel safe even trying). I knew it had enough acceleration that I felt I could hit the gas to avoid something. I have no idea what the top speed actually is, I have no idea what the acceleration actually is. I have no idea how many horses and what torque the engine puts out. It puts out enough, thats all I care about.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
What he meant to say was, "Nothing to see here folks, move along."
Why do an interview if they aren't going to give any new information? Great, we understand ATI and Nintendo don't care what the specs are... but we do! GIVE US ZE INFORMATIONS!
Something similar happened a couple years back (IIRC) when AMD was losing the MHz battle and stated that MHz isn't everything. Well, sure, it isn't. But your whole argument this entire time has been that it is. So, when you shift your argument only when your losing... probably means the argument isn't all that good.
God Bless America. Why? Did it sneeze?
Personally, I want to know the wattage of my toaster, and all my other appliances, so I can decide what gets plugged in where. I admit this is a pretty unusual desire, though.
You are 100% wrong about the horsepower rating of a lawnmower. People do want to know this, which is why every single lawnmower at sears has a horsepower rating on it. They don't want to know the displacement, because that's largely irrelevant - so not ALL specs are critical, but some certainly are.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I'll have to agree with the rebuttal above. It's all about gameplay. For rpgs, I could care less about the graphics. What makes an rpg is the storyline (imho). Plot twists at key intervals keeps the gamer continuing on.
Every geek has some sort of website, programming or computer project. Here's mine: www.youtasteit.com . What's yours?
No the thing that matters most is fun. If you're buying a car for horsepower you probably want a car that is fast and fun to drive. Well guess what? Horse power isn't the only thing that makes a car. What about suspension? How heavy/thick/nice the steering wheel is? How great the tranny shifts? There is a LOT MORE to a car than just horsepower.
Let's use the Honda S2K as an example. It doesn't have a huge engine or a shit ton of horsepower but it's probably one of the most fun cars to drive.. Sounds a lot like Nintendo to me.
Now lets look at a drag car. It is fast. Real fast. It goes really fast in a strait line. It's fun, but uhhh.. Yeah.. All it does is go in a strait line.
I don't fucking care of the Revolution has the power of the SNES if they can make games that are FUN who fucking cares? I mean nice graphics are great. I love cod2, but if power and graphics are all that matters how come the DS is such a better buy than the PSP?
It's the game that counts not the car.. or system.. or whatever. I'd rather have a sweet car with a hot chick in the passanger seat than a bad ass car with an ugly dude in the passanger seat.
...you probably don't consider driving a rewarding experience. You aren't alone, I imagine the majority of people consider their vehicle a utility which simply gets them from A to B. On the other hand, I don't think the many people consider a game console to be a utility which simply consumes spare time in a safe and cost effective manner.
I enjoy a nice drive in the country, putting the top down and feeling the breeze. I don't see how fast I'm going or how quickly I accelerate to change the fun of the ride. How well my car performs doesn't matter- its the surroundings that do. So long as my car doesn't die on me or spew noxious fumes into the car, I'm all good. It just needs to work as expected without problems. After that, things like the music on the radio and the color of the trees matter more to enjoyment than the performance of the car.
Same with a console. It doesn't matter if it can push 5 polys or 5 million. Its how fun the games are to play. I was happy with graphics back on the SNES. Its gameplay that I want now. Specs don't matter, the games themselves do.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
When did Nintendo say that? The specs were even in the name of the system! And, despite the low-res textures, the 64--to me--ended up aging considerably better than the PSX, graphics-wise. If they were telling everybody to pay attention to the games exclusively, they would have named it the Nintendo-New-Mario-Game.
If you say "With the Revolution," it's obvious you haven't been existing in the same reality the rest of us have been in.
I'm not scared of anonymous cowards.
Nintendo has never, ever said that games were about power. They've always said they are about gameplay, pure, simple, and only. There's never been any reason for them to say anything else, they never have, and they never will.
The funny thing about this is that Nintendo says "we need to focus on gameplay," people tell them to piss off and say it's an effort to avoid the power argument, and then, later on, when everyone else comes back and says "well it's not about the power, it's about the gameplay," everyone applauds that as a geniune show of clarity and insight.
Whatever.
I'm not scared of anonymous cowards.
With the lack of exclusive games on consoles these days all we have left to argue about is console specs. It's sad that todays generation of kids will not experience what it means to be a true fanboy. For the record, Sonic could kick Mario's ass anytime, anywhere ;)
Nintendo made the games based on the SGI, but the N64 was NOT as powerful as the SGI. It couldn't pump out that much resolution and having carts instead of CDs limited the amount of detail you had for textures. If you emulate an N64 game or even have played either Zelda that were ported to the GCN you will notice how good they look, and I'm telling you now that it wasn't due to "overhauling and upgrading the graphics" its the higher resolution output.
Cars are more like PCs than consoles. A car is built for the road it will run on. A PC is built for the software it will use. With consoles it is the other way around, they have software built specifically for them. It doesn't matter what their hardware is like, because(ideally) the games will be designed around the system.
the 64--to me--ended up aging considerably better than the PSX, graphics-wise.
Definately. And no || loading.... || screens either!
Religion for nerds. Stuff that really matters
Personally I haven't played anything with Nintendo on it since the N64 and the batarang controller, but I still love and play alot of SNES and NES games.
Well, sucks to be you then. Missed out on a lot of good games.
You posted this:
"Personally I haven't played anything with Nintendo on it since the N64 and the batarang controller, but I still love and play alot of SNES and NES games."
Commenting on a post about this:
"ATI Talks Revolution Graphics"
I do believe the kettle is black. What's your point?
Like all the others who have posted, I don't seem to remember any over the top claims of the N64's potential.
In a unique situation for consoles (about a year before the Nintendo64 shipped) you could actually go to an arcade and see the what the N64 could do first hand.
"Killer Instincts" and "Cruisin' USA" were popular arcade games that both ran on the Ultra64 hardware... which was nearly identical to the final shipped Nintendo64 hardware.
Simply put, any hype that was out there at the time could be completely validated by a trip to your local arcade.
Sony, OTOH, has always made outrageous claims of sheer power and have always failed to deliver.
The PS2 was supposed to be able to render "Toy Story" quality graphics in realtime...
(which we all know to be utter bullshit now...)
Yet at the time these claims were enough to make nearly everyone I knew pass up on a Dreamcast and instead opt to wait for the PS2.
Sony's *outright lies* were effective enough that they killed the Dreamcast and
nearly drove Sega out of business altogether.
The PSP was supposed to be a PS2 power to-go, yet I have yet to see a game that even comes close
to looking as good as an average Dreamcast game.
(The PSP *IS* a damn fine portable genesis/snes/gba/tg16/nes/sms/neogeo though...
and Sony has done everything they can to prevent that from being the case with the 'firm-wars' ^_^ )
Anyway, back on topic...
The Revolution will likely be underhyped (compared to PS3 anyway) and over-deliver.
If 'Resident Evil 4' was done with (1x) Gamecube power and the Revolution will be roughly
(3x) Gamecube power, then I am not worried *at all*...and the new input methods make it that much more appealing.
Just because I didn't play the N64 didn't mean I wasn't exposed to it. I had some friends that begged me to bring my PSX over with Warhawk, THPS and all the other hits every time they'd call. They had an N64 with Zelda, Mario, Rogue Squadron, etc.
Maybe I'm retarded but I could never get used to the wacky controller either, and some games forced you to use the bad analog stick. I use the Kiky-X usb to playstation controller adapter anytime I fire up mame or zsnes.
The Killer Instinct and Crusin USA boards weren't even remotely like each other let alone like the Nintendo 64.
...and that's just the CPUs! The rest of the hardware is just as different. The KI board used a HDD!
Killer Instinct:
50MHz SDT79 R4600-100MS
Crusin USA:
50MHz TMS32031
N64:
93.75MHz R4300i
I'm not saying that Sony and Microsoft haven't lied, I'm just saying that you shouldn't beileve everything that a game manufacturer tells you.
first off, this was like the first analog stick ever used for a console
secondly, you kinda suck
-Nintendo fanboy
Processor Speed != Performance.
The N64 was ultimately very different from what KI and Cruisin' USA perspective, but also keep in mind other details... with Cruisin' USA, for example, that extra 40 Mhz could have been used for additional processing such as split screen play--since the original arcade machine was networked for multiplayer, the N64 had to do that alone. And as you point out, there were differences. Which goes back to my first remark...
Processor Speed != Performance.
Deja Vu
n. 1. The sensation that you've read this very article before.
What? You're full of crap. Does a person have to know exactly how many Gs they experience in order to have fun on a roller coaster? Absolutely not. In the same way, obsessing over horsepower, torque, or other numbers does not make your driving experience any more or less fun; wanking off about how many shaded pixels per second your game console can put on your HDTV does not make the games it plays more or less fun either.
Yes, we are geeks here, and enjoy knowing those kinds of things. But to believe that the way that you do things makes your experience more valid than someone else's is plain short-sighted elitism, and is plain wrong.
u smel
What a bunch of horseshit. I don't know and don't care what the performance of my car's engine is, but I find driving very rewarding, I'm just not a fanatic.
To drag this back on topic, when I was five I didn't know or care what the specs for my Amstrad were, just that I could play Jet Set Willy. Later, I didn't know or care what specs my Amiga 500+ was, just that sensible soccer was a good game.
Geeks care about specs, users care about the experience. If videogames are going to be mainstream, console makers have to realise this. If you can give a good price, experience, and specs then fine. Otherwise the majority of people would rather lose the third for the first two.
"Maybe I'm retarded but I could never get used to the wacky controller either" That "wacky controller" was the basis for the DualShock you are using now. The PS1 (the PSX is a media hub that also plays playstation games) has NO analogue controllers as standard until the end of it's life. Now that's wacky. Personally, I found the N64 pad to be one of the best, especially for FPS, at the time. The analogue stick/trigger button combo has yet to be bettered IMO. The fact is if you do or dont buy games based on who made the console, then yes you are a retard, as you've missed some of the most innovative and enjoyable games ever made. And that applies to whether you stuck to MS, Sony or Nintendo.
You need to know at minimum three things about a car to know what its power performance (as opposed to handling performance) is going to be like;
Yes, but do you need to know what the power performance is going to be like? It matters to you, but some people just want a car with an engine and 4 wheels.
This is actually a fairly expected answer. They are working on a product for Nintendo, who is notorious for having quality games for their consoles but not necessarily the flashiest, prettiest games. So we should have seen a comment along these lines. Now, it is also sort of intersting to look at it from another angle. Here you have a chance to create a product that by looking at the numbers you would suspect is slower and underperforming, while in reality it is actually better then its competitors.
I think it is also good that Nintendo is not (nor would I expect them ever to) trying to sell their console on statistics alone. The hardware configuration and statitistics of the 360 and PS3 were constantly being touted by M$ and $ony for how great the systems are. It is also possible they are losing focus by trying to extend the grasp of gaming systems and turning them into full out "media centers."
Nintendo is not worrying about all the bells and whistles, but is instead designing a gaming console to be used for gaming. By keeping your attention focused on that single task, you do not need to throw tons of processing power and ridiculous hardware into the machine so it can perform its specialized task.
It would be intersting if during this experience ATI managed to come up with a nice, more efficient graphics processing design that could still be powerful and useful in a PC computing environment. The power drains that some graphics cards seem to pull nowadays is getting crazy and it is always fun to laugh at the cards so big they take an extra slot just to cool them.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."
We already know that it is not going to do High Def. Sure sure, you don't have a High Def set right now so why do you need it? Becomes in a few years DIGITAL tv WILL replace ANALOG tv and you will have to ditch your current setup anyway so why not go high def at the same time? Tech moves faster then you think. Just try to remember back when was the last time you saw a movie in TV screen format vs widescreen? Do you have a widescreen tv?
HD looks fantastic. There are some people who claim it is only a marginal imrpovement over DVD but they are idiots or have only seen extremely poor examples. I just watched a HD version of Spirits Within and while the movie itself hasn't improved it is a far better visual experience then the regular DVD version. It truly looks stunning.
Or put another way, do you still play your PC games at less then 640*480? By the end of this year there will be 3 consoles standing next to each other in the shops and the revolution better offer some incredible games because graphically it is going to be the looser.
Will Nintendo deliver? Who knows, they succeeded with the DS in deliviring fun games on inferior hardware BUT not with the gamecube.
Nintendo will certainly have one giant disadvantage. It probably will not be peoples main console. The big cross platform games will look better on anyone else console AND will not require you to buy a controller addon just to play them in a low res format.
Being different can work, iPod is very different from other DAP players, or it can fail, Apple PC vs IBM Clones.
As for people not looking at specs. Right. Nice try. Specs matter. Specs determine a lot of gameplay. The simplest thing of level size and level load is determined by the specs.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
While I understand that the hardware is functionally different, my main concern with ATI is their written drivers.
I have 2 'gaming' computers in my home LAN - one with a pretty good ATI card, the other with a slightly older Nvidia card. IMO ATI and Nvidia have been relatively neck and neck technologically for years now. ATI advances half generation with this new product, Nvidia leapfrogs that 6 months later, ATI leapfrogs Nvidia 6 months further on, etc.
Where there is a HUGE difference is the drivers. Nvidia drivers seem to be to simple to install, very stable, and really outstanding. ATIs on the other hand are buggy, kludgy, and inconsistent until MANY generations after first release. I frankly use the Omegadrivers in preference to whatever comes directly from ATI. In performance, I read the specs and my Nvidia card should be slightly worse than the ATI, but the ATI doesn't appreciably outperform the Nvidia.
So you put ATI hardware into a box that CAN'T be upgraded, can't easily be patched by the user? From my experience with ATI drivers, that would make me nervous.
-Styopa
If the analog stick sucked, then your friends should've gotten new controllers. The stick design is a plastic stick rubbing against metal gears. They wear out over time. The controllers should last for about a couple years on average before the responsiveness gets noticably bad.
I've never tried it, but supposedly you can improve the responsiveness by opening up the controller and cleaning out the plastic dust from the gears. Of course there is a limit to the effectiveness of that approach, but it should prolong the life of the controllers.
Right, and anything that can be quantified is a specification.
On the other hand, my '89 Nissan 240SX with hopped-up suspension (well, more like hopped down) will outhandle an S2000 (at least a stock one) and has considerably less horsepower. QUITE a bit less. People who just want to go out and have fun should be satisfied with my car by your logic. However, I distinctly remember that the buzz on the web before the S2000 came out largely centered around the powerplant and its output. This pretty much puts the lie to your example.
True. But, that's what some people want. They find out it's what they want based on specifications (and reviews/confirmation/debunking of same in the media.)
If that's how you feel, why not just play SNES? Answer: Because you want the new shit with the better graphics an the new control schemes and a bunch of other shit. Personally, I spend more time playing SNES games (in emulation, granted; this way I get S-Video) than I do playing modern games. No lie.
If she's hot, she's got specs worth checking out :D
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Not necessarily, but it's an indicator of fuel efficiency. If you didn't have mileage stats, you would look at the engine displacement and power output (along with the gearing, and the Cd) and you might be able to make an educated guess.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Uhm... Nintendo isn't losing. They made a conscious decision to have slower hardware. They weren't forced to have slower hardware. They decided on it.
It's a tradeoff: If you want the fastest hardware, get a PS3. If you want adequate hardware at a lower price with a funny controller, get the Revolution.
Neither of them wins, it's a design decision.
Thanks fopr nothin pal.
What I want to know is when the next Zelda game will be out.... It was supposed to have been out last May.
People want to know the horsepower of their lawnmower so they can own the mower with the highest horsepower on the block.
If you asked an average person evaluating mowers what the difference was between a 5 and 7 hp rig, they would have no idea except that the 7 was "better".
I guess bigger number must equal best performance, regardless of the application....right?
The majority of the time - not in every case, but in most - someone drafts someone who knows something about lawnmowers if they go to buy a lawnmower. In a traditional relationship, the man (who is expected to know something about horsepower) is elected to go pick one out and bring it home. So yes, I think most lawnmower buyers know the value of additional horsepower (mostly that it's harder to stall the thing.)
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
An extremely significant percentage of auto buyers do want to know MANY statistics, including horsepower, torque, mileage city and freeway, and interior space.
Yes, which is why I only included the example as an aside.
Cars are pretty much commodoties -- a car from GM will peform all of the tasks that a car from Toyota will. Not so for video game consoles.
You are 100% wrong about the horsepower rating of a lawnmower. People do want to know this, which is why every single lawnmower at sears has a horsepower rating on it
The presence or absencse of a number doesn't mean that people care about it -- it means that the manufacturer and the merchant care about it.
The manufacturer and merchant care about putting the horsepower rating on the mower because doing so sells more lawnmowers, proving that the customer cares, too. In the absence of a maverick CEO who believes in "doing the right thing" and the heavenly alignment in which the shareholders allow them to do so, corporations respond only to monetary influence, and respond they will.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I wasn't aware of those differences....clearly someone hit wikipedia or something!! :)
I do however remember seeing that Ultra64 logo during the demos
for both of those games. EGM and others at the time were writing that the Nintendo64
(or Nintendo Ultra64 in Japan) was the same hardware as the "Ultra64" arcade boards.
openly stated that they wont be making a major graphical increase in their games, that instead they "are relying on developers to create new and innovative games". Now, I realize that graphics aren't everything, and that storyline and the amount of fun provided by the gameplay are some of the biggest factors in a game being successfull, but, hell so are graphics. The Gamecube was in my opinion a kiddie machine for kids whos parents were either to stupid to buy a PS2 or Xbox (ya, I hate the Xbox also, but for the love of god, anything is better than GC), or the parents are too damn worried about what their kids play and so when they get older and invite friends over, the friends go "aw, man, he's stuck with a GC, lets get the hell outta here", he has no friends - when hes like 15 playing on a kiddie platform. Not to mention that the graphics on GC were only about a 150% increase from the N64, versus PS2 and Xbox, which were MUCH better. If the graphics on GC sucked, and Ninendo doesn't plan on any major graphical improvement, the Revolution wont look any better than the PS2 and or Xbox.
End of post on how much Nintendo has grown to suck since their days of 8 and 16 bit glory...