So the guy says the NX is a modular console like a transformer. You can even choose your own control layouts.

There is these nintendo patent that maybe sugest something modular:

"He also says that it will be some kind of integration between mobile phone and the NX, that the mobile games from Nintendo for ANdroid/iOS will unlock itens and stuff in the NX games.


But he suggested that you could use a mobile phone + NX together, since the NX won't have a network sim card slot because that would make the NX more expensive. So they could work together "

What if I stick my cock in it?

Modular crap would spell the end for Nintendo.  They pride themselves on innovative user interfaces, not some DIY kit of a UI.  Furthermore it'd be extremely costly and inefficient to maintain as no one will be able to predict which 'modules' will sell and which won't, leaving them with warehouses full of unwanted hardware.  And thirdly, it'd be a developers nightmare.  It's one thing making Angry birds scale between different specs, doing so with Zelda is a whole different story.  In the end it'll mean that the cheaper models will get a poor mans version, while the top line will only benefit from better alpha effects.

I'm not buying these rumours.  I'll believe docking the handheld.  I'll believe detachable controllers, but only just.  This console à la carte thing is bullshit and I'm calling it now.  I will however return to something I said before the WiiU launched: they should make it so that you can have an in-home ecosystem of Nintendo tablets that are cheap and run through, and can work together with, a base console.  If anyone can undermine Apple's Ipad, it's Nintendo with a cheap, family friendly tablet thing where once you own the home console, another tablet will only set you back €100-€150.  And if those tablet things can double up as portables it would only get better.

SupremeAC said:

Furthermore it'd be extremely costly and inefficient to maintain as no one will be able to predict which 'modules' will sell and which won't, leaving them with warehouses full of unwanted hardware.  

I'm not quite sure what you are imagining here. The rumour is that a new chip can simply be inserted into the main unit in cartridge form. That's no more complex than the N64 expansion pack. You make a bunch, see how demand goes and make more, or less. The controls seem to be snap on pieces of plastic, hardly bank breakers. The base station probably works like other eGPUs work (External GPUs) like the Thunderbolt laptops. If there are SCDs, I would imagine it would work like the patent, there is only one SCD of a set power and you daisy chain them together.

SupremeAC said:

It's one thing making Angry birds scale between different specs, doing so with Zelda is a whole different story.  In the end it'll mean that the cheaper models will get a poor mans version, while the top line will only benefit from better alpha effects

So Scorpio and Neo are a bust because it's that hard to make a scalable version of all these AAA games?

gamingeek said:

I'm not quite sure what you are imagining here. The rumour is that a new chip can simply be inserted into the main unit in cartridge form. That's no more complex than the N64 expansion pack. You make a bunch, see how demand goes and make more, or less. The controls seem to be snap on pieces of plastic, hardly bank breakers. The base station probably works like other eGPUs work (External GPUs) like the Thunderbolt laptops. If there are SCDs, I would imagine it would work like the patent, there is only one SCD of a set power and you daisy chain them together.

So this Tegra chip is a SoC right?  so it has a CPU and whatnot of its own?  And devs will be forbidden from tapping in to that power for anything else than aesthetic improvements and framerate and stuff?  Bullshit, just as it's bullshit that Scorpio and Neo won't be either held back by the Xbone or PS4, or even worse, make the latter redundant.  Look at Hyrule warriors on the 3DS, it's said to be neigh unplayable on the original model.  If it's eGPU's (terrible name), that could work, as there would be litterally no extra CPU power on hand.  Even so, games will need to be optimised for multiple setups, which will impact the quality of a large portion of gamers, just as is the case with PC's.  If there's anything more than 2 setups, I don't think games will be optimally configured for all sku's.

As for snap-on bits of controllers: those 'idea's' have been circulating as early as from before the Wii was launched.  They were bad idea's then and are bad ideas now.  You could lose them, need to buy new ones custom built for every other game, publishers would need half the back of the box just to explain what controllers and/or modules are required.

gamingeek said:

So Scorpio and Neo are a bust because it's that hard to make a scalable version of all these AAA games?

No.  PS4 and Xbone are bust.

gamingeek said:

You dismiss all that and then come up with this idea?

So instead of having an ipad you will pay ipad money for a Wii U like base station. Then sell invidual tablets for the whole family for 150 euros each?

The hell is that? How would this base station be able to cope with more than 1 user at a time and who would be buying 4 cheap tablets with this thing? And who is makng Nintendo tablet apps? And wanting a tablet to run on a custom Nintendo OS?

People buy Ipads for their kids to play games on.  Those kids can then empty their parents visa through overpriced in-app purchases in crappy games.  Ipad's are expensive.  If Nintendo can manufacture a home console with its own family friendly OS, quality games, tablet like controller for about €300-350, it'd be a perfect substitute.  If you then could buy extra tablendo's on the cheap and they could all be used outsde the house, or together at home for multiplayer, it'd be a clear win.

Anyhow, I think it's clear by now that you and I do not see face to face when it comes to what would be an actual good idea for a home console.  But I enjoy debating it over and over in endless loops nontheless.  

Also, consider this:

the 3DS is rated at 4.1W power draw.

Tegra chips alone are rated at 10W.

My Surface Pro2's SoC is rated at 15W, and if I would game on it on battery, it'd drain it empty in less than an hour.

The Nvidea Shield reportedly lasts between an hour and a half to 3 hours, playing Hearthstone.

If Nintendo wants this to be a full on portable, there are 3 options:

• the GPU and CPU will dial back considerably while not plugged in (gameplay rammifications)
• the whole thing will only last for an hour or 2-3 on a charge
• they'll sell backpack sized external battery packs for it.

SupremeAC said:

Also, consider this:

the 3DS is rated at 4.1W power draw.


Tegra chips alone are rated at 10W.


My Surface Pro2's SoC is rated at 15W, and if I would game on it on battery, it'd drain it empty in less than an hour.


The Nvidea Shield reportedly lasts between an hour and a half to 3 hours, playing Hearthstone.

If Nintendo wants this to be a full on portable, there are 3 options:

• the GPU and CPU will dial back considerably while not plugged in (gameplay rammifications)
• the whole thing will only last for an hour or 2-3 on a charge
• they'll sell backpack sized external battery packs for it.

ORiginal 3DS had a total garbage battery. So I won't be holding my breath here.

SupremeAC said:

So this Tegra chip is a SoC right?  so it has a CPU and whatnot of its own?  And devs will be forbidden from tapping in to that power for anything else than aesthetic improvements and framerate and stuff?  

Who said that?

SupremeAC said:

Even so, games will need to be optimised for multiple setups, which will impact the quality of a large portion of gamers, just as is the case with PC's.

Yes it happens with PCs, it's going happen with Neo and Scorpio, it happens with PS4/XB1 and Wii U, it happens with phones, it happens with tablets. It's a fact of life. It's not an impossibility.

SupremeAC said:

You could lose them, need to buy new ones custom built for every other game, publishers would need half the back of the box just to explain what controllers and/or modules are required.

Fuck everything.

I think you're imagining a very different situation from what's in my head. From the patent it looks like you can just swap out the position of the main stick, d-pad and buttons. I haven't imagined developers releasing custom buttons for every game. Perhaps you have more forward thinking on this, I can't imagine that happening myself.  

SupremeAC said:

People buy Ipads for their kids to play games on.  Those kids can then empty their parents visa through overpriced in-app purchases in crappy games.  Ipad's are expensive.  If Nintendo can manufacture a home console with its own family friendly OS, quality games, tablet like controller for about €300-350, it'd be a perfect substitute. If you then could buy extra tablendo's on the cheap and they could all be used outsde the house, or together at home for multiplayer, it'd be a clear win.

Anyhow, I think it's clear by now that you and I do not see face to face when it comes to what would be an actual good idea for a home console.  But I enjoy debating it over and over in endless loops nontheless.  

Wii U?

What's happening here?

SupremeAC said:

Also, consider this:

the 3DS is rated at 4.1W power draw.


Tegra chips alone are rated at 10W.


My Surface Pro2's SoC is rated at 15W, and if I would game on it on battery, it'd drain it empty in less than an hour.


The Nvidea Shield reportedly lasts between an hour and a half to 3 hours, playing Hearthstone.

If Nintendo wants this to be a full on portable, there are 3 options:

• the GPU and CPU will dial back considerably while not plugged in (gameplay rammifications)
• the whole thing will only last for an hour or 2-3 on a charge
• they'll sell backpack sized external battery packs for it.

3DS is positively archaic now, both battery and the innards of these devices have moved on considerably. Every new model of Tegra brings about a generational leap in mobile power terms. NX is not going to have an X1. It's going to either have a customised X1, without having the Android overhead and operating system around it and it will have low lever access to the metal.

The other option is the next Tegra chip  -Parker- which uses a more advanced manurfacting method, it has smaller transistors, should theoretically be more powerful (X1 was twice as powerful as K1 for instance) and it will be more power efficient and cooler. That's why it makes sense that NX would use the so-called X2 chip. It lines up with the "cutting edge chips" WSJ quote, the timing lines up almost perfectly with when Nvidia were set to release it next year too (was this the real reason NX was delayed to 2017?). It could have a smaller power draw - it's said to be more power efficient. The X1 is half the power of the XB1 in GFLOPS yet the XB1 is a 100w device while the X1 is 10w.

I also get the impression that this new device is going to be Vita sized and can probably have a larger battery. If it's anything like modern devices it probably comes with a USB power cable/detachable collapsible power adaptor and can probably be recharged via mobile phone USB chargers.

I don't expect it to have a massive battery life, but I think opinions have changed over the years. I don't think people expect batteries to last that long when you are doing intensive tasks with portable technology. My phone drains after 3 hrs of browsing the internet from a full charge. Yes I do agree that it will be downclocked in portable mode, but then the portable screen it has to render on is a lot smaller than a big HDTV display so it wont have to work as hard. The pixel count alone would be (a lot) lower. Plug it on, the chips clock higher and performance increases.

Also don't forget that even if it were to use the X1 that is still 3.5x more powerful than Wii U, so even dialled back and downclocked for portable mode you would still get great looking games that perform well. Even Wii U can do Nintendo games at 720p and 60FPS. In Gflop terms Wii U is below 360 but the more modern features mean it can still put out great looking games and with a lower power draw too.

Maybe it will be a problem for massive AAA games to be ported over, but how many of those games are people imagining on this thing? The X1 CPU set is a lot more powerful than the Jaguars in PS4 and XB1 and the X2 CPUs are better.

Dvader said:

Did I say I didn't want carts? It will lead to compression of many games though.

Wii U discs are 25gb - Nintendo advise that NX carts are 32gb. Also they wont be rendering textures at 4k levels or anything and the RAM the system has wont be 8gb or anything so you wouldn't get compression in data, textures would be already be lower, because the RAM is lower anyway. So the data you need would be less anyway. If you want to say that the textures wont be as good as a home console, that wont be because of the cart size, it will be because of the RAM. On a portable at least.

Dvader said:

ORiginal 3DS had a total garbage battery. So I won't be holding my breath here.

It does? I've never had a problem with it, from a full charge.

Also did anyone else buy the high capacity Wii U battery, or was it just me?

Really looking forward to watching Designated Survivor on tv this Fall.