The future of high-definition gaming

"Red Herring explores the implications of high-definition gaming (720p, 1080i, 1080p) for not only consumers, but for Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo."

HUH? According to Nintendo's Wii GUI, 480p iiiis HD... Its from Nintendo so it must be right since they can do no wrong... right?

;- P

Man I dont know how it will affect the industry as a whole, but I know Ill never go back to playing on anything smaller than a 50 inch HDTV.

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y11/mike777/7846media2.jpg
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y11/mike777/tv2-1.jpg

The fact that two of the big three are supporting people like me who want their games to look as good as possible is just the icing on the cake.

Will it hurt the Wii? I dont know, im actually going to wait to see if I can borrow someones Wii console and test it out on my setup before I buy one. RE4 for gamecube looked HORRIBLE on my tv, absoloutly terrible. Im not going to plunk down the money for a Wii if the image quality looks the same.

Uhh... Sega Saturn was released in 95 and had online gaming.

I don't remember if the modem was avail at lunch... but it sure was soon after launch.

:-)

480p is "EDTV" but it really isn't much improvement from SDTV.

To me the Wii's lack of HD was a big nick against it. I will probably get it eventually but for the price it isn't worth it to me. When the price goes down and they release it in black then I can deal with it not being HD since it should still have a couple fun games.

4. Uhh... Sega Saturn was released in 95 and had online gaming.

I don't remember if the modem was avail at lunch... but it sure was soon after launch.

:-)

***********************************

the atari 2600 has a modem

Whos fault is that Michael, RE4? Or your TV.

Perhaps you should have done some research first and found a TV that can handle both SD and HD signals well.

Thats why Im getting the HLS5087W from Samsung, that DLP can eat your tv, in terms of performance.

In my house we have a 21 ft projector screen. Halo 2 run in 480p looks like complete crap on that screen.

On our 52in tv H2 run in 480p looks better than the projector but it still looks like crap.

So knowing that why should I buy a Wii when I know the games are going to look like they are out of focus.

Because they have a new controller yeah, I think not.

EDTV is an enormous difference over SDTV....the difference between 480i and 480p is greater than the difference between 480p and 720p/1080i. Before "HD" was in, there were still 40+ inch TVs...and they had to have clear, sharp pictures. That is why EDTV (progressive) was created.


http://thoughtsfortheages.blogspot.com/2005/12/revolution-is-not-traditional-sd-it-is.html
http://www.projectorcentral.com/hdtv_edtv.htm

dont you mean the dreamcast shane?

While I have played most of my games on a 65 inch screen, I think that the recent push into HD for video gaming just underscores everything I don't like about current games. I've never owned a game (for very long anyway) where its best aspect were graphics. Most of the games I own in my back collection are because of the story, game play, or its 'fun value'. GoW and RFoM just seem like an age old debate of my penis is bigger then your penis I'm really not seeing what the hype is about. Ok, they are good looking but yeah what else to they have? Sony Attacking my entertainment unit for massive damage with Blue Ray sucks (along with the overall system design). 360's games are well lacking in quality and quantity. Will not having HD hurt the Wii. yeah for people that really don't care about gaming (beyond M ratings and graphics) yes. Its always fun to play on a larger screen that goes without saying and with prices of larger screens going down is it no wonder more people are buying them. Last time I looked I couldn't find any over 40 that wasn't over 480i, but does the average TV viewer care about resolution?

Sorry so long but what really I want is for someone to tell me what HD has brought to gaming?

:p

I think that for the short term, it will not hurt Nintendo. But as more and more people buy HDTV set's, and the prices of both the 360 and the PS3 drop, then it will hurt them real bad. Question is, will Nintendo have sold millions of the Wii by then? Only time will tell. I just find it funny to see comments from fanboys about how no one including Joe six pack has a HDTV.Yet people spend 15 bucks a month to play WOW and own Ipods. Microsoft and Sony know this, and the sales of HDTV's prove this also. How many people do you know that bought an HDTV since the 360 came out?

HDTVs are more common than alot of people think. But alot of people are disappointed that there is such a lack of general HD content such as tv and your normal dvd.

People buy HD and think everything will be in HD but we all know that isn't the case.

No HD is a problem for Wii, or at least it will be in a few years. SD looks like crap on HD displays. That's all there is to say about that. When many more people have HDTVs somewhere past half Wii's lifespan, it will start running into some problems. However, Nintendo's NEXT console will have HD graphics, so they can save themselves with that (I just hope it will be 1080p).

Working on this story REALLY made me want to get an HDTV. The lead came from a visit to the San Francisco headquarters of Dolby's research labs. Sitting in front of a huge HD display flanked by speakers pumping out 7.1 surround sound during Burnout and Dead Rising was awesome.

Contrary to popular belief, there are other necessities people buy OTHER than an HDTV.

Hell, I work full time and study part time (also paying rent and utilities). I don't have the money to buy a $600 PS3 or a $400 Xbox 360 and an HDTV to get the FULL experience (from what I've heard).

Obviously I'm getting a Wii and that's it. My 4yr old TV still works perfectly and does the job.

"...$4 Billion on lcd's and plasmas..."

That's like 100 TVs.

Not to be bashing Nintendo all the time (ive got a wii on preorder, fyi)... but, they have underestimated the market in the past (esp in the console arena). Eg. when Miyamoto insisted on sticking with expensive cartridges for N64 because games were **better** if there were no load times and devs. would simply work around the smaller capacity issue... but, of course there were unintended (unexpected) consequences of that decision.

So, the lack of HD wouldnt be something to write off as 'big wup'... it may come back to bite them.

LOL @ John

You assume much for someone you dont know anything about.

1.) I did my research, at the time I bought my tv 720p sets were the most commonplace, knowing that PS3 and the 360 would deliver on HD content I really wasnt worried too much about how current gen games looked since I was more or less future proofing my home theater solution. So your assumption about me not doing my research is wrong.

2.) Its actually not REs fault, dont cry. Nor is it mines, its actually Nintendos, the gamecube HAD a digital AV port, but the port was removed in later versions of the gamecube due to this logic by nintendo:

"On newer models of the Nintendo GameCube, we opted to remove the digital A/V out port from the system because we found that less than one percent of all Nintendo GameCube players used this feature."

Nintendo still thinks HD is inconsequential, but here you are getting huffy about the model of HDTV I bought and want to boast about some tv you might get. Im glad you will be getting a samsung DLP, and im glad the specs are better than a 3 year old television (thats how technology usually works genius, newer models have better specs, duh.) but at the time of my purchase Samsungs were notorious for lag issues while playing anything from PC games to playstation.

I wasnt about to drop almost 3k on a tv that was going to basically be shit for gaming.

So again, your assumption about someone you know nothing about (me) is dead wrong.

Congrats on your tv you DONT HAVE yet tho, lol. Myself, I think I will probably be going with the HP MD6580n. My 720 will go into the bedroom or something.

*insert obligitory "the tv Ill be buying soon can eat the tv you will be buying soon in terms of performance faggotry response here*

You really didnt post anything revelant to the topic though did you? The topic being: "will Nintendo's exclusion of HD support for Wii hurt the console's chances despite its targeting a different audience?"

to :p

how bout immersion...???...

playing on an HD screen just draws u closer into the experience.

"According to iSuppli, shipments of HD displays should overtake analog cathode ray tubes (CRTs) by 2008."

This does not surprise me. Has anyone walked into a store lately to purchase a CRT? It's almost impossible. They're far cheaper, but harder to find these days. And although I'm sure customers are demanding the flatter screens, I'm sure the retail stores also want the higher profit items vs selling lower profit CRTs.

In the end, it's still a matter of a 10-15 cycle for most consumers purchasing TVs. It's not like most people purchase a new TV every year. So even if you can only purchase a flat screen or HD TV by 2008, the reality is, most people won't buy one for years.

I seem to be the only person who doesn't care about HD and the PS3 controller not having rumble.


If a game is good enough, I don't pay attention to the graphics; and as for rumble, I've been using a Wavebird for so long, I don't care for it anymore.

I don't understand why everyone says SD looks like crap on an HDTV. I have a 36" 1080i/720p tv and sd looks just fine. 480p looks amazing. Perhaps it is because I seem to be one of the very few people with a big HD CRT. When I got it a few years ago, plasmas really hadn't caught up with CRTs at that point but I still wanted an HDTV. The main problem I see is no HDMI, just DVI.

You people make me sick. Complaining about lack of HDTV support to grace your precious $2000 setup and stupid stuff like that, while there are people out there who don't even have enough money to eat. Do you hear them complaining?

First, look at the world around you before starting to complain about stuff that's not important. You people are the reason this world is as screwed up as it is. Of course, all you care about is sitting on your fat asses playing video games.

@Embassy (thanks for the comment back)

Ok, lets talk about immersion then. What was the last game that gave you that feeling? Was it because of the games HD aspects or something in the gameplay? I think bigger better designed worlds and better interaction with NPCs and environment make games more immerse, not higher resolutions. I think I'll take a world with a little less clarity if it means I could have better AI and more enemies. I also think sound is important to an immerse world and that is about the only thing I wish was a little better about the Wii (so far). I know when playing games like the original Resident Evil (PS) it was the sound that really kept me on edge (because we all know it wasn't the acting or the blocky people).

So once again is resolution really that important? And could the Wii not up scale like the 360 is doing if it really became an issue?

HD is a real big advance. Detail means more control, better interfaces and new worlds are possible.

For one, it means that the consoles have caught up to PCs in terms of resolution. I'm sure someone will say that you can get better graphics on PCs still. But that's not the point. We can finally play RTSs on the TVs without any problems. Eventually, this will open into all kinds of new applications, detailed maps, 3 part screens (like DS without touching) and realism in shooters with sniping. TVs have been stuck at the same resolution forever. Increasing the resolution is like going from Windows 3.1 to Mac OSX. It doesn't seem like it would be important, but there are so many new details, the sum is greater than it's parts.

I've never cared much for graphics, either. I happily played FFVI (super nintendo era) on my ps2. But there are actually new games and new experiences possible with HD.

As for the Wii, I don't think lack of HD will hurt it much. A lot of people don't have HD, or don't have it for their gaming. A lot of children will get the hand-me-down TV to play in their rooms, and the HD set in the living room won't have a Wii connected often. Lacking HD does help in one big way: cheaper development = more games.

Hell yeah Duskan! You tell em! Now lets go over to EngadgetHD and bitch at those lazy fat asses for bitching about anything at all, they should be ashamed for being able to afford nice toys while some poor kids somewhere are dying of a crack addiction!

What those poor kids crack addictions have to do with people posting on a videogame/technology blog, I dont know, but im with you man, those assholes make me sick too.

YEAH! GO BOY! YOU TELL EM! NOW QUICK, LETS TAKE OUR PAXIL AND PROZAC BEFORE WE BLOW A VEIN IN OUR FORHEAD BECAUSE THE DUMB BITCH AT THE RESTAURANT DIDNT GIVE US SOY MEAT LIKE WE ASKED!

*angrily drives low emission hybrid minvan out of thread*

Everyone says Nintendo should have produced a console with power comparable to the competition. Well, they tried that strategy last generation with the GameCube, and look where it got them.

If Nintendo added HD to the Wii, it would not only increase the cost of the console, it would increase the cost of the games too. And that would change the perception and risk factor for game developers. In standard definition, the Wii is more attractive to game developers than it would have been in high-definition.

(And, for the record, I enjoy SD games on my 46" HDTV. I even play PS1 games on it! Sure there are big blocky pixels, but the games are still as fun as ever.)

While SHIPMENTS of high def displays will overtake standard def in 2008, it's more important to ask when the INSTALLED BASE of high def will overtake standard def. Most people will not buy a new television unless they have to. With hundreds of millions of standard def tvs out there, that will be a long while off (i.e. by the time the next generation of home consoles launches and the point will be moot).

"You people make me sick. Complaining about lack of HDTV support to grace your precious $2000 setup and stupid stuff like that, while there are people out there who don't even have enough money to eat. Do you hear them complaining?

First, look at the world around you before starting to complain about stuff that's not important. You people are the reason this world is as screwed up as it is. Of course, all you care about is sitting on your fat asses playing video games."


I actually LOL to that..... thanks for the good times Duskan!........what an ass bag

Haha, I knew you would try to return a counter attack on myself Mike, its alright.

I would personally take a 50" Pioneer Elite plasma over a 50" DLP or LCoS any day.

However, I'm getting a TV primarily for gaming so I thought I'd go with the Sammy, as it can accept 1080p via VGA and Component, good for my 360.

I also have a question Id like to ask you... Have you experience any problem with burn-in or felt yourself worrying about it? And did you set your TV to 50% brightness and leave an HD source on for 200 hours before you got into using the TV heavily.

Im still perhaps considering a plasma, but my viewing distance is a little to close for a 720p set, Im sure I'll benifit greatly from a 1080p set.

If only I could afford a 50" 1080p Plasma, Pioneer makes amazing sets. Too bad its nearly 14 grand CDN for the 1080p set.

Anyways, yea I do know enough about TVs, check out my guide I made: http://forums.nintendo.com/nintendo/board/message?board.id=revolution&message.id=2188002

I'll be re-writing it to cover everything from past, present, future HD tvs, resolutions, and video cables and signals.

That was a quick guide I did up in an hour, though its useful to the new buyer.

HDTV Plasma/LCD price range: $3,000
$4,000,000,000/$3,000 = 1.3 Mil HDTV Sold

My monitor was 19" for my computer, costed 249 dollars and is high-def, heck I can play my 360 on it wonderfully via VGA if I wanted.

Your reasoning is flawed Zoot.

Not all Tvs are 3000, I wouldnt even agree with that being the average.

I'm just not sure yet how the Wii is going to look on my setup. I recently purchased a Sony 46" 1080i/720p TV, and my PS2 looks like total shit on it. However, I still have it hooked up with analog RCA video jacks. I'm assuming the Wii will have look better as long as I pony up for the component cables, correct?

"...will have look better..."

Um, I meant: "I'm assuming the Wii will look better..."

Stupid typos.

"online play (which didn't officially come to consoles until 2002)"

... I think I just saw my Dreamcast cry...

People seem to think that Hi-Def gaming wont be popular for years cause of the price of a high-def TV....

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,20556847-2,00.html

This is the new Laser Tv's, and it has been said quite a few times that not only do they produce 10 times more colours than a plasma, but are half as costly to make and use half the power. They reckon they will be available at a 50" size at less than US$800 as of this time next year. So ya'll have 12 months to save up for the next-gen of high-def tv's, and $800 aint much. I'm a Wii fan, i will get a Wii, and i will play it on the Laser TV when they come out. 480p is amazing, don't diss it till u see it.

Dreamcast? What nobody ever heard of Xband for Genesis and Supernintendo? I was sending emails and playing killer instinct YEARS before dreamcast.

http://www.novalux.com/

This is the American site for the above mentioned Laser TV's, they are gonna be very affordable and readily available in 12 months. High-def gaming never looked so good (funny how i am an advocate of these new HD tv's but i am the Wii's biggest fan?? Odd)

I've never watched a show on an HDTV before. I don't know one person who has them. Maybe each and every person whose house I've been to is a pauper, but since I haven't seen one yet outside of a store or a sports-themed restaurant... I'd say we're a long way from market penetration. In which case, I don't think it will hurt the Wii much in this generation. Next generation, sure, let them throw it in, but I'm personally glad Nintendo chose not to include it this time around, because one of the main reasons I'm not planning on buying a PS3 for a long time is not because it costs 600 bucks but more because such a large fraction of that price is probably going towards technology I can't take advantage of.

As Jedimonkey27 implied, HDTV and CRT are not mutually exclusive. A HD CRT is the best quality direct view display you can buy, period. Hell, the quality of a Plasma is generally expressed as being the most "CRT-like".And they're more flexible in that they don't have a native resolution like Plasma and LCD. And a lot of the folks buying those Plasmas and LCDs aren't buying them because they're HD. They're buying them because they're flat and purdy. When they get home they probably just plug in the composite video and go about their day. The fact that this report correlates an increase in HD displays and a decrease in CRT (again, two factors that are not interrelated in any way) kind of implies that they really don't know what the hell they are talking about.

To the question at hand, I think Nintendo made a great choice. They're going for the budget consumer, not the hardcore enthusiast. Their target market is BY DEFINITION the group that will be way at the end of the bell curve for upgrading their TV. Hell, I am an enthusiast, but I can't validate spending nearly $2000 on a HD TV that would be equal in size to the SD TV I already have. So the HD options on the other two don't really hold much sway.

Besides, it's the games stupid.

*Sigh...I probably need to clarify that the above is a saying and that I'm not actually calling anyone here stupid.*

I can't believe there are people on here trying to make themselves sound big by the size of their TVs, lol!

btw, if gamecube games don't look good on your HDTV in progressive, then you either chose to scale back on your purchase, or you just didn't know any better. Naturally GC games won't look high def as something like 360, but for 480p, it looks pretty sweet on the right TV.

People seem to forget that the look of a resolution also depends on your screen size.

Of course if you have a 27in tv 480p will good. At 52in 16:9 480p is shit. Tvs are just like monitors the bigger the tv the higher resolution.

480p really isn't that great.

It will be four or five years before I'll be able to afford an HDTV. By then a new nintendo console will be out or almost out, and it will probably support HD. This is actually very similar to how I wasn't in a place where I could play online games with a reasonable ping until very recently, and amazingly enough that's when Nintendo decides to embrace online gaming.

Sometimes being cutting edge is a waste of time and money.

Wait, wait Michael... you are saying you were playing RE4 with what? Composite? Or S-video? (I imagine you don't have the Digital Out, as you complained about Nintendo taking it away). If you were playing RE4 on a 50" screen with composite cables, then I can understand your grief. S-video cleans up the image considerably, also. I have a Gamecube system from launch with component cables and at 480p on my 37", everything looks really good and clean at maybe 10 feet away? While a 50" screen is going to require you sitting back further maybe, you should still get a really good image once your run 480p.

To answer the question you raised, no, RE4 with composite cables is not indicative of what Zelda:TP looks like on Wii in 480p (to offer a comparison).

my manservant will certainly be playing videogames for me on my HDTV in my veyron. if you can afford it, i seriously suggest you get one.

also, yeah, the gamecube looks miraculous on an lcd monitor. f-zero totally blew me away, celda shone, tales of symphonia, still fab, etc etc. but heck, the dreamcast looks good on an lcd monitor. for the most part.

Stop it John you're hurting Michaels feelings LOL. Seriously Michael you need to calm the fuck down and stop acting like a bitch, you criticize his assumptions whilst making pathetic ones of your own. tsk! tsk!

Wow. A lot of things here.

OK, online gaming has been on consoles officialy well before 2002. Even if you don't want to includde the BS Sattelaview (SNES) or X-Band (Genesis) which were just delivery devices you should still consider the Saturn Netlink in 1996 or at least give props to the Dreamcast and PS (2000).

As for HDTV, I will agree that 480p is only EDTV despite many sources claiming otherwise. It really doesn't matter if over 80 percent of the market still has SDTV sets. The Wii is compatible with HDTV sets and will look better on them, albeit not nearly as good as the X360 or PS3. Playing the Wii on HDTV won't suck. The original Playstation games look terribly blocky on SDTV and that didn't stop us from playing them.

As an odd bonus. you also don't have to worry about a situation like unreadable Dead Rising text on the Wii. This type of thing is actually putting some people off of getting an X360 until they upgrade to HDTV.

In regards to Nintendo possibly repeating their cartridge only N64 mishap by not including HDTV support, this isn't the same situation.

Nintendo kept with cartridges because they wanted to have no load times and because they could keep tighter third party control with lockout chips onboard. This decision ended up hurting them in the end primarily because of the cost associated with producing the cartridges. Games had to be priced higher to make up for the difference.

Nintendo is pushing the Wii to many audiences other than just hardcore gamers and videophiles. If they can convince the average soccer Mom and AARP member that the Wii will not only work fine with their current TV but will look even better when they upgrade to HDTV then I think they've got it made.

Dreamcast was the first console that can do 480p over VGA cable, and Dreamcast had more 480p games than the PlayStation 2 does. (http://www.hdtvarcade.com/hdtvforum/index.php?autocom=custom&page=hdlists)

No one ever played Mario because the mushroom had a high polygon count and was in HD.
I think HD is something that might be important to the American market, after all your existing picture standard is horrific! So HD is a big step up for you, but in Europe not so much. And we've all just forked out for plasma/lcd tvs anyway. And while our broadcasters are future proofing their programmes, options to pick up HD are far and few.

My feeling is there's no reason why we shouldn't have HD. PCs have been doing 1280x1024 for years, so why is it such a big deal to get a new console to do it?

1080p with HDMI is pushing it, though. To me, things look better at lower resolution with awesome AA and filtering. I think 720p over composite with 4x anti-aliasing should be the norm this generation.

As for Wii, the real disappointment isn't its lack of resolution, it's the fact that many games aren't using AA. For modern hardware at its price point, that's simply pathetic, to say nothing about the importance of AA at SDTV resolutions. But, casual gamers don't know any better, so Nintendo will get away with it, as usual.

As with DVD playback, it's not an issue of need. It's the fact that the current bar of technology allows it at an affordable price, so people should expect it.