What is the Revolution? YOUR Thoughts.

Or maybe, if the machine shut down while you were still in-game you would die!!!

GR781 said:

The idea of cheap development , and easy development, already exists in the context of gaming, its in no way revolutionary. Its just very good to have.

After a while, the word has become a slogan, and its being bandied about far too easily at the moment.

I completely agree with that. You just clan't claim that lowering costs is a "revolution", and I doubt very much that that's Nintendo's 'revolution' (it better not be!). The idea of cheapening game development costs has always been around, it has just become more and more important, as the generations go by.

The PSone and the Dreamcast are two (now defunct) consoles that spring to mind when ease of development (AKA; lowering cost of development) is said. The Dreamcast is supposedly one of the easiest consoles to work for, and it came out in 1998!

The PSone opted for simple hardware architecture, which was one of the major factors of it's success. There wouldn't have been the tidal wave of PSone third-party support if it had the same complicated dual-CPU make-up as it's rival, the Sega Saturn. Sega then learned from their mistake, and in turn made the Dreamcast easy to develop for (the damage was already done, though). But the rest is for another topic.

The point is, lowering costs has been happening for years. Indeed, Nintendo already got in on the game this gen with the 'Cube. It's neck and neck between the GameCube and the Dreamcast for ease of development, this gen.

As for the 'revolution', and my thoughts;

Well, the 'revolution' has to lie in the control department, as it's the only aspect of the machine's hardware that we've yet to see. Nintendo, I believe, have also stated that to be the case. I've really no idea what it is. I'm not too eager to speculate either. Getting all worked up about gyroscopes is pretty pathetic when the Revo pad may not feature gyroscopes at all. We just don't know, but we've not long to wait.

As a side note, and my own personal hopes and aspirations for this 'revolution'- I'm really glad that it will be something simple, as Nintendo have stated. I'm just not ready to be wearing clunky VR goggles, throwing my eyesight away, and inducing a lifelong migrane problem just for something that wouldn't work well at all, anyway.

It's been specualted that the 'revolution' is actually so simple, that all the guesses that people have made over the past year or so have been well out. It's apparently something that's been around for years, it's just never been applied to gaming before. Thus making it a gaming revolution, and not a general one.

I'm quite happy in the knowledge that it will be a simple addition to control. Some may think the above to be more of a gimmick, but I've faith in Nintendo. As long as it's as amazing (and revolutionary) as the analogue stick on the N64 (which was actually stolen from the Atari Jaguar) was, then I'll be happy. Anything less will be a huge dissapointment.

Now here's the thing. Some around here like to tout how Nintendo revolutionize the industry every other cycle. While I'm not adverse to this notion, Nintendo themselves don't really support it. That 'other cycle' has come around again, but this is the first time the Nintendo have actually stuck their necks out and called their new console the 'Nintendo Revolution', which is really saying something, whether they meant it to or not.

So, having now said that, the Nintendo's latest innovation in control better be way more ground breaking than analogue control, or the D-Pad, to truly live up to it's name. Part of me worries that Nintendo are setting the community up for a big dissapointment. You can't call your console the 'Revolution' and not deliver something truly mind-blowing.

That's the difference (and Nintendo's potential downfall this time). The NES, N64, and Dreamcast (which I personally believe to be a 'revolutionary' console), all with their un-assuming names, sprung their little innovations onto the un-suspecting gamer. In short, with those consoles, there could be no dissapointment with their innovations really, because there was no promise of a 'revolution'...

In short, with those consoles, there could be no dissapointment with their innovations really, because there was no promise of a 'revolution'...

Indeed, the expectation and hype which Ninty are building could be their downfall. Then again they are an experienced company, surely they wouldn't be building this kind of hype and expectation unless they were supremely confident.

Well said Oni. Dreamcast was deffinatly a Revolution, it made wonder why the hell i didn't buy it earlier.

I think Nintendo can deliver.

To be fair, Saturn only had such a complex system because they panicked after seeing the power of the then PSX; and bolted another chip on quickly.

I'm still of the opinion that the "Revolution" is in many forms, we get the controller, developers get the Hardware and controller.

It'll be like the DS, to us it's Dual Screen, to developers it's the Developers System - I mean it's not like we can point the finger at the DS and say *that* is the innovation. Obviously the touch screen is the main focus, but the way in which developers are afforded new development techniques and the interaction of two screens and the microphone / wireless play quite a part too.

Exactly.

Its the overall package rather than any specific one feature that will be the revolution.

I've seen these kind of threads all over the 'net talking about the "Revolutionary" controller. Most ideas are just a collection of gimmicks, or apparently gimmicky suggestions, without any real thought as to how it'd operate in games (beyond some kind of novelty Wario Ware experience - fun but not exactly a revolution for playing more involved games). Three possibilities strike me as having important ramifications for gaming proper:

1. Force Feeback on the analogue stick. Imagine feeling the - simulated and scaled down - force of a clash of swords in Soul Calibur 2, or having to truly force your way through a swamp or a horde of enemies. Better still, imagine a game where one of the basic means of interacting with the environment is to feel the shape of objects. Only the most basic aspects of touch have been covered by the DS. Unfortunately, this isn't likely - as stated above - given the wireless nature of the controller and the necessary battery capacity. However, maybe Nintendo have been doing some serious research on battery life (or at least borrowing from those that have).

2. Gyroscope. As we're all aware now, the gyroscope could offer us control by changing angles in 3D. Note that a gyroscope only offers control based on a change in slant, tilt and roll (i.e. tilting the controller forward, to the side and around). It wouldn't offer control based on a change in position. The way I see it, a gyroscope would be useful in first-person shooter type games, where the analogue stick could control movement of the person, whilst the gyroscope controls the character's angle of gaze (or where they're aiming). This would feel very natural and free up one hand to shoot in the direction specified by the gyroscope, whilst walking with the analogue stick.

3. A real innovation, for me, would be the use of position sensing technology. The sensing of changes in the position of the controller in 3D space could open up a wealth of possibilities for controlling the position of a character's hand (or hands if the split part controller is at all close to the truth) independently from their walking or gaze.

Taken together, the gyroscope, positional sensor and traditional analogue stick could allow you to intuitively have independent control of where a character is walking, looking and acting (e.g. grasping or hitting), just like your legs, eyes and hands act as separate parts of a coupled system. Now that would be a revolution!

Aside from my musings, I seriously like the idea of an out-the-box virtual online community ala Animal Crossing: kind of like all those dodgy kids' shows idea of being on the internet.

Interesting ideas there (and quite a lengthy and detailed post considering you're apparently a new member- congrats ).

There's no doubt that Nintendo need something up their sleeve. Despite all their other innovations, they have never before said that any other console would be 'Revolutionary'. They better have something big planned!

Dr_R wrote: 3. A real innovation, for me, would be the use of position sensing technology. The sensing of changes in the position of the controller in 3D space could open up a wealth of possibilities for controlling the position of a character's hand (or hands if the split part controller is at all close to the truth) independently from their walking or gaze.

AHA - now THIS is the kind of thing I meant in my gyroscope part, but I couldn't think of the name for it/didn't take into account that the gyroscopes only sense tilt, etc. Cheers very much for putting a name to it for me. You seem to pretty much want exactly what I want - cheers for the interface comment as well!

Oh...and welcome to Cubed3!

Thanks for the warm welcome. I'll try to keep posts informative and entertaining (which might mean I don't make too many).

I think gyroscopic control and position sensing are quite possible, technologically speaking (I work in computer vision/perception and we use this kind of technology quite a lot). But for me the idea of a position sensor would overcome a nagging doubt I've had about Revolution.

I've commented on the news pages that a potential Revo controller could, if successful, simply be mimicked in a new peripheral by Sony/Microsoft. But a position sensor needs a stationary point for calibration. This could be the console itself, thus negating the possibility of another company simply bringing out a new peripheral.

My only doubt is as to how robust the system would be (i.e. would it be accurate and reliable enough to not send you flying off the end of a platform rather than making that inch perfect jump). The scientific equipment for position sensing is quite sensitive to other signals (like the radiation from computer monitors). However, science has to deal with many problems that Nintendo wouldn't (e.g. the sensors have to fit on a fingertip rather than in a large controller) and there's no reason to think that Nintendo would even use the same measurement techniques.

All in all, it'd be a mouth-watering prospect. Even if it's not the Revo controller, I hope someone out there is taking note of the ideas bouncing around the 'net.

I'll try to keep posts informative and entertaining (which might mean I don't make too many).

You're right about Nintendo's ideas being nicked though. It happens all too often I'm afraid. Even if it were in the console itself it still leaves the possibility of an add-on, although I suppose it all depends on what the Revolution is I guess.

Excellent idea about the actual console being the means of caliberation - that'd mean nobody could steal the ideas without a major rethinking of their entire platform. Something tells me you're going to be a veeeery good member indeed...