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Wii U Architecture

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Re: Wii U Architecture

#51

Post by morelisp »

mardifoufs wrote: post #34
psychphysic wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also promoted the pad beyond the console. Many weren't sure if it was a new pad for the original Wii.

I didn't know that until this post lol. And it was released when I was 12 and actually into gaming. Now I find it weird that the "controller" is so weak that it can't do anything but stream from the console, it kind of make the portability useless.

Critically, it could stream something different than what the console was rendering to the TV. At the time it seemed Nintendo was hoping for the kind of design explosion the DS had early in its life, and a few titles trying such things were really good, but for many reasons it didn't stick the way the DS did.

Re: Wii U Architecture

#52

Post by astura »

anotherman554 wrote: post #47
astura wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Breath of the Wild was originally intended to be a Wii U exclusive, with a 2015 release date[1], but it didn't end up that way. The developers had some Wii U Gamepad features in early prototypes but found that looking between the gamepad and TV was distracting and axed them. [1] https://www.polygon.com/2015/3/27/8303247/the-legend-of-zeld...

I feel pretty confident the Sheika slate was designed around the Wii U tablet and they only cut that aspect of the game to make the Nintendo Switch version look just as good as the Wii U version. If a Nintendo employee claimed it was to avoid distraction I'm pretty confident they are lying.

I read that here, my memory was a little off - https://web.archive.org/web/20170302073322/http://www.ign.co...

>"In doing our testing without the touch features we noticed looking back and forth between the Gamepad and the screen actually took a little something away from this type of Zelda game," he said.

>"There was no hesitation or reluctance in removing those features because we felt the way it is now is the best way to play the game," he added.

I can understand the cynicism, but, to me anyway, I agree that it's not ideal gameplay. The game pad was a big miss for me for anything other than being able to play a game when my husband was using the TV. I ended up kinda hating the gamepad.

So I believe both can be true.

Re: Wii U Architecture

#53

Post by Sakos »

mardifoufs wrote: post #34
psychphysic wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also promoted the pad beyond the console. Many weren't sure if it was a new pad for the original Wii.

I didn't know that until this post lol. And it was released when I was 12 and actually into gaming. Now I find it weird that the "controller" is so weak that it can't do anything but stream from the console, it kind of make the portability useless.

Asynchronous game design is something that holds a lot of promise. Traditionally, that was something reserved for online multiplayer in PC games. But suddenly it was possible to design local coop around one player interacting with the game in a different way than the others. The idea is still really cool, but I think most devs are unwilling to experiment with such a niche product.

Re: Wii U Architecture

#54

Post by wodenokoto »

psychphysic wrote: post #26
chungy wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel that it had plenty of power to make fantastic looking games and great experiences. It did, and it shows in that many of the top-selling games on Switch are ports of Wii U games.

Breath of the Wild ran poorly on both platforms on release. Which surprised me, and undermined the power of the Switch. That said the Switch remains underpowered compared to contemporary game consoles.

It did? I never noticed performance issues with breath of the wild

Re: Wii U Architecture

#55

Post by herbst »

ace2358 wrote: post #3

The Wii U was unfortunately not a very successful console, but I feel that it had plenty of power to make fantastic looking games and great experiences. It came out in a weird time for technology and Nintendo always uses slightly older hardware. As a homebrew device it is amazing. There are still exploits being found with a new, safe, simple method out now thanks to some crazy dedicated modders. There’s a whole homeb…

I bought a Wii U (my only console) just a few months ago. It's still amazing, you can download all available games for free directly from Nintendo.

The controller is meh, however most games also let you play with a pro controller. The screen on the Wii U brick is barely used.

And if you have a party or so just let them bring their Wii controllers, all the multiplayer games support them.

If you are not a classic gamer but are looking for some gaming fun it might still is the perfect console for you

Re: Wii U Architecture

#56

Post by astura »

mardifoufs wrote: post #34
psychphysic wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also promoted the pad beyond the console. Many weren't sure if it was a new pad for the original Wii.

I didn't know that until this post lol. And it was released when I was 12 and actually into gaming. Now I find it weird that the "controller" is so weak that it can't do anything but stream from the console, it kind of make the portability useless.

The idea was to have two different screens displaying different information and there would be interactions between the two. Like the Nintendo DS's two screens. I played a tech demo(?) at the store where you'd aim a bow and arrow with the Gamepad at a target that was on the TV.

The idea didn't really end up panning out for most games.

Re: Wii U Architecture

#57

Post by criddell »

buildfocus wrote: post #23
m_st wrote: post #19

My reason to buy a Wii U back then was that whenever I found the time to play a video game, I had to go through a session of Windows Update, Steam update and game update that I lost interest by the time it was ready. Compare that to the Wii U back then: Turn on and play. Nintendo even achieved to keep this mindset with the Switch: It will update in the background so usually you just turn it on and play.

I got a steam deck - it makes a very decent attempt at transforming the former experience into the latter, but keeping access to all your existing PC games.

How well does it succeed? One reason I've only played games on consoles is that if I see a game that has PS5 on the box, I know it will run on my console. Do Steam games make a similar promise for the Steam Deck?

Re: Wii U Architecture

#58

Post by mikepurvis »

anotherman554 wrote: post #49
mikepurvis wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which games really used the secondary screen in an interesting way? The main ones I can think of are: Splatoon— second player without split screen. New SMB U— gamepad player can spawn blocks to help you reach secrets. Wind Waker— map and inventory. But an awful lot of titles just mirrored the TV or had a button to enable off-TV play.

In Tokyo Mirage Session you get text messages from the characters on the second screen so it's like you are glancing at your cell phone as you play. This worked very poorly when they ported it to Switch and you had to go into a menu when a party member texts you.

I felt like later in the Wii U's life, they were pushing it more as being for off-TV play, and that meant that that kind of stuff would have to be implemented anyway— Wind Waker HD certainly had the dual approach, where the default was to play on the TV with inventory on the gamepad, but if you played in off-TV mode, then the inventory was a pause menu popup. That extra development work to support both was probably invisible to most users who only ever played on-TV.

That combined with the increasing inevitability that everything was going to be ported to a later, single-screen system anyway, and it's not hard to see why titles like Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze and Zelda BOTW didn't use the secondary screen at all.

Re: Wii U Architecture

#59

Post by whywhywhywhy »

The concept of this machine was such a mess. You can truly tell something was rotten in the org chart when a bizarre console/tablet compromise is what they actually shipped with a straight face.

Re: Wii U Architecture

#60

Post by jrootabega »

astura wrote: post #52
anotherman554 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel pretty confident the Sheika slate was designed around the Wii U tablet and they only cut that aspect of the game to make the Nintendo Switch version look just as good as the Wii U version. If a Nintendo employee claimed it was to avoid distraction I'm pretty confident they are lying.

I read that here, my memory was a little off - https://web.archive.org/web/20170302073322/http://www.ign.co... >"In doing our testing without the touch features we noticed looking back and forth between the Gamepad and the screen actually took a little something away from this type of Zelda game," he said. >"There was no hesitation or reluctance in removing those features because we felt the way it is now is the best…

I don't want to dispute your experience, just add that in my experience, the game pad was perfect* for Batman: Arkham City. You would look down at it in the same situations where Batman would look down at his gadgets. So even though the game pad wouldn't work well for every game or every person, I think it had undeniable inherent benefits in some situations.

* They bungled the audio aspect, though. If you played with headphones, you couldn't route game pad audio through them.

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