The Glade 4.0

We all recognize the hardware innovations that Nintendo has brought to gaming over the years, but they aren't on the forefront anymore. Of anything. That's the problem.

They're one of two companies in gaming that I can think of that are actively pushing 3-d and virtual reality at the consumer level...

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Modern virtual reality from Nintendo? I can't imagine what you're talking about.

Nintendo pushes handheld 3D, Sony pushes it in the living room. No one on this board seems to care about it except me so I don't see that as much of a selling point. I expect it to be an option on most next-gen titles, it's already on a ton of AAA titles for 360/PS3.

They revolutionized consoles in 1996 with the introduction of the analog stick (and a great game to go with it).

They introduced motion controls to home consoles. Whether this is a good thing or not remains to be seen. Yes, Microsoft and Sony copied them...with highly-specialized and poorly supported peripherals. The quality of the lasting impression made by motion controls is writ large by their importance in all three companies' next-gen console plans (that is to say, irrelevance to nonexistence).

They've flirted with 3D since the Virtual Boy. Pretty much no one seems to actually care. The Nintendo 3DS is the top-selling handheld (if you don't count mobile devices), but rarely is the 3D used for anything.

They failed to jump on the optical media forefront, the Gamecube was the beginning of their downhill tumblr (with its teeny low-capacity discs and the start of their indifference toward third-party developers). The Wii (and because it was included, Wii Sports sold like gangbusters...but only a novelty item, not a platform.

The Wii U is a far better system, one that returns to actually being a gaming system (and sorry, Mr. EA, New Super Mario Bros U looks more impressive than anything I've seen on the Xbox 360). It's too bad that Nintendo's cranio-rectal obstruction Gosnelled it.

You misremember. The Nintendo 64 was the start of Nintendo's downfall, when they decided to stick with cartridges and not optical media they had been developing in partnership with Sony for the Super Famicom. If they had continued down the CD path, the Playstation would have never seen the light of day and Nintendo might be in a completely different place right now.

Wut?

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Holy shitsnacks!

Weird autocorrect, I guess. I'm sitting in an airport. Apparently I type "Tumblr" a lot more than "tumble" (which makes sense, because I don't really use bookmarks).

You must have either missed, or misinterpreted what I meant when I said "at the consumer level."

Trying to sell gamers an entire new flat panel for several thousands of dollars isn't at the mass market consumer level.

The 3DS and the Oculus Rift, on the other hand, are targetting 3d gaming in three digits with better features (glasses-free on the 3DS and coupled with integrated, high-performance head tracking on the Rift).


Fixed, and GOOMH.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I'm not holding up Nintendo as the morally and intellectually superior console. They could do more for third party developers, including giving them more console power
with which they can work. Sony and Microsoft have their flaws too.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Funny you should say that, because I think you're out of touch with what "consumer level" means if you're putting the unavailable Oculus Rift in it, and if you're trying to claim that 3D in the living room costs "several thousands of dollars." You can get a state of the art TV with 3D support for under a thousand dollars, I did back in February 2012. In fact there are some on sale right now under $800.

I'll grant you that I haven't been TV shopping lately because I don't do much console gaming. I was extrapolating the monitor prices I was seeing when I went monitor shopping around the new year up to typical TV sizes.

As for the unavailability of the Rift...

I said "actively pushing" as in "promoting." Rift has been generating huge buzz and interest in the press and media targetted at consumers, and it's been actively courting and assisting developers in integrate its new features into their games. The developer kits are either shipping or being assembled...

On the other hand, I suppose making 3-D TVs available at a price markup with no other real feature upgrades so I can play games at a low framerate with shuttered glasses is generating the same excitement and pushing the boundaries.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

The Rift is an interesting piece of tech, but I don't see it becoming part of the console space. 3D, on the other hand... Almost every new TV has the capability, and people buy new TV's a lot. No one buys a TV these days specifically for its 3D capability, nor are the sets really marked up in price for having it. I have an LG set with passive 3D, so there's no shutter glasses and no loss of framerate.

It's a shame 3D has fallen out of the spotlight, its inclusion in some AAA titles over the past couple of years has really bumped up my immersion.

That's my point. It's not fallen out of the spotlight except within Sony's (edit: and, to be fair, X-Box) demesne. On the PC, it's on a world tour publicity blitz, and on Nintendo handhelds, everybody knows it's a feature that works well, whether they use it or not.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I have no idea whether I'm typical, but this is most definitely not the case for me and those around me.

I'm on the same TV I bought in...2007, my parents still have the plasma they bought in 2004, and my various co-workers that I know of bought theirs in roughly 2008 and 2004 or 2005.

In comparison, I've bought 3 monitor setups (I'm rolling the 3-screen experiment into one purchase to prevent it from inflating the numbers), and used 3 different primary computers (not 3 incremental upgrades, mind you -- I'm short just a case and a power supply from having all three still functional independently) in that time frame.

TV tech advances aren't compelling enough compared to the cost of upgrading to "buy new TV's a lot."

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Here I am on the other end of the spectrum, I've purchased two new living room sets since 2010, and I'd like to upgrade my bedroom TV at some point. Strictly because the advances in technology are compelling enough to make me not like using my old TV. Once you use a TV that can stream anything wirelessly from your network, turn anything you want into 3D, and come built in with any apps you need like Netflix, Hulu, Pandora... it's hard to go back. I laugh in the face of HTPC's.

If I still gamed on a PC, I might be more like you. As it is I'm fine with my 15" laptop and have no plans of anything beefier.

See, when I purchased my 46" LCD, I told myself that what I had was good enough and wouldn't be replaced until one of three things happened -- I could get OLED-level black qualities at a living room screen size, wide-angle glasses-free 3-d became available with sufficient content streams to make it worth investing in (TV, movies, filmed and processed in 3-d through the whole pipeline), or broadcast (which I include cable or satellite, if they're using native sources) TV or video formats bump up the resolution to 4k. Oh, in the <$2000 price range.

As yet, I've no need to upgrade.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Unless you plan on sitting 20 feet away, 4k video in the average living room is useless and glasses-free 3D at living room sizes is not even a thing outside of unpriced trade show prototypes. Black levels I can understand. Why does the 3D need to be glasses-free? Why not passive? You can buy clip-ons if you already wear glasses.

Because I (and others) don't want to wear glasses to play a game.

If I (and others) did, Virtual Boy would have sold a bajillion units.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

A useless response when I was specifically addressing Kaffis and when he's already shown some level of support for the Oculus Rift. Obviously he's okay with wearing things.

I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were having a 1-on-1 email conversation in which others were unable or disallowed to contribute.

I thought it was a message board.



No need to be a dick.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

I was addressing his specific, personal points as to why he doesn't purchase a new TV. If he's willing to wear an Oculus Rift for head tracking, he should be willing to wear a set of light weight lenses for a 3D effect.

I'm wearing an Oculus Rift for head tracking *and* 3-d. Wearing glasses for just 3-d is less appealing, because it's less feature-rich.

Also, what console gaming I do is more likely to be same-room multiplayer or involve spectators as a social outlet. My PC isn't a social gaming platform, most of my play there is either single player or online multiplayer. Living room gaming is where my brother and I invite over a mutual friend to heckle as he plays Call of Duty and loses to 11 year olds...

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

Backpedal! EA now says it does have Wii U games in development, just fewer in number than their PS4 and X1 (what the hell is the proper abbreviation? XBOne? Xb1? Gah.).

I am going with Nextbox until further notice.

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XBOne I think is what I'll be using.

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Holy shitsnacks!