Anyone else a bit disappointed with the Wii U in terms of graphics?

They do tend to favor Xbox, but their slant against PS3 games is nowhere near the level it is against Nintendo.

For example, in GameInformer articles there's usually a section right below the headline that details what consoles the game is available for, and for the entirety of the time I had the magazine they never listed Wii unless the game was Wii exclusive. Someone wrote in to ask them about it one time and they claimed they don't list the Wii versions because they have to be made from the ground up and thus don't count as the same game, but then they would list PSP versions of the game alongside 360 and PS3 even though PSP versions of games are always vastly different from console counterparts. It's a little thing but at the same time they're basically hiding the fact that you can get a game on the Wii from consumers.

That's just horrible. I can understand your anger now...just, so unfair. I won't curse, but that's really terrible. :-(

Yeah, it's kind of a bummer. GameInformer overall though is still pretty cool and usually the first to feature info on games, I kinda wish I still got it, but Gamestop accidentally switched us to the email-only version of the magazine and we keep trying to switch it back with no results. Oh well.

Frankly, the guys over at DigitalFoundry are pros. If they say the Wii U version is the worst, it is. Arguing with them about tech stuff is like arguing with Einstein over general relativity.

It's not like what they're saying doesn't make sense either. The rumors are the Wii U has a weak CPU (not the Power 7 previously rumored, but rather a modified tri-core version of the Wii CPU with out-of-order execution) coupled with an inexpensive but still solid GPU. It makes sense then that the Wii U version would look as good as the 360 version while suffering from CPU related bottlenecks.

Jacob4000 said:
Frankly, the guys over at DigitalFoundry are pros. If they say the Wii U version is the worst, it is. Arguing with them about tech stuff is like arguing with Einstein over general relativity.

It's not like what they're saying doesn't make sense either. The rumors are the Wii U has a weak CPU (not the Power 7 previously rumored, but rather a modified tri-core version of the Wii CPU with out-of-order execution) coupled with an inexpensive but still solid GPU. It makes sense then that the Wii U version would look as good as the 360 version while suffering from CPU related bottlenecks.

I've read a few more of their articles since then and am more convinced that it's one of those things I'll have to see for myself rather than have them explain to me. They do really seem like they know what they're talking about, but a few of the things they wrote in that article don't seem to make much sense just by reading them. It's probably a case of when I pick up the game and that happens to me for the first time it'll be a lot clearer what they were getting at.

justonesp00lturn said:
If Nintendo is going anywhere I'd almost prefer they move to PC gaming. Being able to mod the shit out of Zelda and Super Smash would be really cool. Don't think Nintendo will ever allow that though, they're so traditional :C

Well if they left the hardware business, there's nothing saying that they'd only be able to offer games for one other platform. They'd go multi-platform, like SEGA. PC included.

Jacob4000 said:
Frankly, the guys over at DigitalFoundry are pros. If they say the Wii U version is the worst, it is. Arguing with them about tech stuff is like arguing with Einstein over general relativity.

It's not like what they're saying doesn't make sense either. The rumors are the Wii U has a weak CPU (not the Power 7 previously rumored, but rather a modified tri-core version of the Wii CPU with out-of-order execution) coupled with an inexpensive but still solid GPU. It makes sense then that the Wii U version would look as good as the 360 version while suffering from CPU related bottlenecks.

Starred. Digital Foundry are pros, and what they say in these comparisons simply is the truth. They are not biased. If you want questionable comparisons, go to TheLensofTruth.com. Digital Foundry have been accused of being biased in favour of the 360 in years gone by, but really that was just butt-hurt PS3 fanboys crying into their milk over missing pixels, worse framerates etc.

But then came the DF articles where the PS3 was declared the winner, and nay-sayers had to shut their mouths. The Wii U version of the game can chug down to the high 20s in terms of frames per second, whereas the lowly PS3 version never gets below 40. They're not bulshitting. Those scenes where in one, 360: 52fps, PS3: 46fps, Wii U: 32fps, or the other one - 360: 46fps, PS3: 42fps, and Wii U: 26fps.. the 360 and PS3 are relatively close to each other, with the 'U version lagging a greater distance behind.

Of course it's not always running at 26fps on Wii U, but it's that great level of variance that's the problem. The campaign on PS3, I can tell you (having finished it on Veteran on that platform) is a pretty smooth game throughout. There's some scenes where you get a feeling that it's not as smooth, but it's still OK. You never get huge drops to 26fps. I mean, Crysis 2 runs in that particular ballpark on PS3. Crysis 2. Compared to that game, computer hardware looks at Call of Duty on laughs.

As Jacob says, the Wii U just has the old Wii CPU tripled-up with one or two new instruction features, and some last-gen AMD Radeon. The GPU is decent, but the whole thing is let down by the weak CPU, which is where the console will always suffer, in the same way that the PS3 always suffered because while it had (at the time) a well above-average CPU, the GPU was weak compared to the 360's.

The difference of course being that the PS3 and 360 were new, competing platforms. Here we have a brand new system which is beaten by 6-7 year old hardware. Even if only in certain areas. Really, if the Wii U was only going to offer last-gen visuals, it could as least perform better than both of the oldies.

I'm honestly not surprised about any of this, it's the reason why I'm not an early adopter of the Wii U. I'll stick to my PC version where the frame rate isn't capped thank you!

Still, having a CPU bottleneck already could turn into a serious problem later down the line. 

Martin_ said:

Well if they left the hardware business, there's nothing saying that they'd only be able to offer games for one other platform. They'd go multi-platform, like SEGA. PC included.

I guess that's true. I doubt Nintendo will go the Bethesda or Valve route and offer modding tools, but if it's on PC there's bound to be a way to mod it. Hell, even the Wii versions are moddable, it's just more trouble than it's worth.

Martin_ said:

The Wii U version of the game can chug down to the high 20s in terms of frames per second, whereas the lowly PS3 version never gets below 40.

Did you watch the video? The PS3 version drops below 40 (and sometimes 30) as much as the Wii U does (and the Wii U dropped to "the high 20s" maybe twice in the whole video), and the article clearly states both of these. I'm not saying they're lying about the framerate. What I found confusing was where they said the PS3 version is better because it stays lower for longer, but I guess it makes the Wii U version worse because it then becomes more unpredictable, whereas with the PS3 version you have time to adjust to and correct the lag.

This isn't really my ballgame, but a hacker claims to have discovered the WiiU's specs on some level.

http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2012/11/hacker_claims_to_have_deciphered_wii_u_cpu_and_gpu_speeds

As people have already been saying, WiiU has a notsogreat CPU, but has tons of RAM and a huge GPGPU, which will hopefully be dandy enough to last once devs figure out how to run with it.
Also though I'm not a pro on the porting business, I just wanted to bring up that tons of early PS3 ports were frankly awful, but PS3 is my favourite HD system thus far and I don't think the bad ports say anything about what it's capable of. I think the only awful WiiU ports we've seen are Samurai Warriors (not sure if there's anything else).
Considering how new the console is and the fact it works a bit differently with the whole GPGPU substituting for CPU, the ports we've seen so far are not bad at all, comparatively. It'll probably only get better, at least when it comes to PS360 ports, how the WiiU deals with ports of other 8th Gen consoles may not be all too great in comparison.

Also on the Mass Effect thing, it doesn't seem bad at all? Considering:

• early ports for new hardware are usually a bit poor
  
• Bioware clearly doesn't care much for the WiiU treatment (i.e. no DLC, no trilogy, they made a solid port and that's all they're obligated to do unfortunately)
  

@SuperLink - Marcan was one of the guys who created the Twilight Hack, he generally knows quite a lot about Nintendo hardware, and just hardware in general. There's no doubt people will question the credibility of this source, because it's positive, but I'm pretty sure he's got accurate results.

Wii U has 1.24GHz CPU, 550MHz GPU.

Marcan's comments corroborate earlier stories about the provenance of the CPU, which suggested that the cores are indeed very similar to the Broadway architecture found in the Wii, which in itself harks back to IBM's PowerPC 750 core which first debuted way back in 1997. The core was still fairly modern when it debuted in 2000's GameCube, and was up-clocked to 729MHz for the 2006 Nintendo Wii. For the transition to Wii U, clock speed has almost doubled, core count has tripled and according to Marcan, there is more on-board cache. Other sources have previously suggested further enhancements to the technology, such as out of order execution - a feature that isn't present in the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 CPUs.

Dude also notes that direct comparisons to 360 CPU shouldn't be "clock for clock".

So yes, the Wii U CPU is nothing to write home about, but don't compare it clock per clock with a 360 and claim it's much worse. It isn't

PAL Wii U Does Not Upscale Wii Games

http://www.vg247.com/2012/12/05/wii-u-pal-backwards-compatibility-doesnt-upscale-to-hd/

Linkyshinks said:
PAL Wii U Does Not Upscale Wii Games

http://www.vg247.com/2012/12/05/wii-u-pal-backwards-compatibility-doesnt-upscale-to-hd/

just lovely guess its karma for Pandora's Tower and Another Code R

I have read the EuroGamer comparisons, more for interests sake than anything else.

I pretty much don't really care on such comparisons, I'm more curious about the Wii U tech for the sake of knowing.  As such, the 'ports' I've played so far don't really deserve the comments I feel.

I think AC3 did OK on the comparisons, not bad since this runs at full 720p.  Having played it myself, it occasionally suffers from major framerate drops, but this seems to be the same across all consoles.  Graphically it has 'issues' but still looks stunning!

Batman - on Wii U this runs with FXAA - 360/PS3 don't according to EuroGamer, yet they still suggest the Wii U is inferior due to dropped frame rates.  I wonder if Batman would keep up or better the competition if FXAA wasn't enabled?  Having played this for a few hours today (ta MIL!), I think this one is superb - no dodgy frame rates I've noticed and it looks lovely.

Putting a Wii game back on is difficult - they are so blocky, the Wii U is just a cracking bit of kit.  It may only have a 3-core 1.2Ghz CPU, but considering the rubbish ports from the 360/PS3 launches, for early days I wish the press would stop looking for reasons to put the console down, rather than concentrate on what it is - a Nintendo home console, which was never supposed to 'compete'!