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[Clockwork]

Nintendo's main branches? No, Again, they still don't know how to use programmable shaders (which is probably why the WiiU's GPU has so much fixed silicon in it).

Where is this coming from? I hate it when people echo rumors like this because at some point this will be read and spread to other people/sites and become accepted as a fact.

 

[ticl]

first of all not 1 person has seen what the ps4 can do. i have the ps3 and 360. also have the wii u. the wii u is by far a generation ahead of both. even my son who is a big ps3 fan says every game that i have on the wii u that he has on the ps3 runs better and looks better on the wii u. sony said everything that was shown at the unveiling of the ps3 was real footage and later came out was cg. But the wii u cant match the ram of the ps4. will that matter in games, who knows. i play games to have fun. and definately nintendo has the best games out.

 

[ArchedThunder]

first of all not 1 person has seen what the ps4 can do. i have the ps3 and 360. also have the wii u. the wii u is by far a generation ahead of both. even my son who is a big ps3 fan says every game that i have on the wii u that he has on the ps3 runs better and looks better on the wii u. sony said everything that was shown at the unveiling of the ps3 was real footage and later came out was cg. But the wii u cant match the ram of the ps4. will that matter in games, who knows. i play games to have fun. and definately nintendo has the best games out.

Holy anecdotes, Batman!
My brain hurts.

first i ever heard of a chip to run facebook.lol also seems like most people here dont own a wii u and really have no idea who it plays games

I'm not even sure what's going on anymore.

 

[z0m3le]

Developers aren't forced to use 60.000 triangles on a single character. If you can use more polygons it's just better.

Thanks to LOD, you don't need a high level of polygons to create huge scenes with 300+ characters in them, most can be 6k or less polygons, the ones up close can be 60k or maybe more/less (gow3 has a 40k polygon for kratos and everyone praises that model)

But these machines push 100s of millions of polygons, so the budget would really improve much with much better hardware, and then like I said tessellation would improve that number 100 fold thanks to its effects when in use.

Speaking of Tessellation, we did find out that Wii U uses Gen 2 right? that makes sense because of the R700, might mean that multiplatform ports won't use it, but it is fixed function so it performs really well. Gen 3 is more flexible which lowers performance but increases usefulness, froglins or whatever the R700 tessellation / 10.1 DX demo is called from AMD really shows off basically all the features of that architecture, including what you see in the bird demo with global illumination like lighting and how it works. Really interesting for those that haven't seen it in a long time or are unsure what Wii U should be capable of.

 

[Bony Manifesto]

Nintendo's main branches? No, Again, they still don't know how to use programmable shaders (which is probably why the WiiU's GPU has so much fixed silicon in it). But hey, you never know when someone might pull a Rareware (Retro maybe). Remember, Conker's bad fur day shouldn't have been possible on the N64.

Rare were a one-in-a-million developer though. Seriously, from their Spectrum days right up until Nuts & Bolts, they knew how to get the absolute most out of a system. I don't think we're ever going to see the likes of them again. Retro might be similarly enigmatic, but from the titles they've released, I'd say their proficiency is more in the artistic and design side of things than technical prowess.

 

[Jaded Alyx]

first of all not 1 person has seen what the ps4 can do. i have the ps3 and 360. also have the wii u. the wii u is by far a generation ahead of both. even my son who is a big ps3 fan says every game that i have on the wii u that he has on the ps3 runs better and looks better on the wii u. sony said everything that was shown at the unveiling of the ps3 was real footage and later came out was cg. But the wii u cant match the ram of the ps4. will that matter in games, who knows. i play games to have fun. and definately nintendo has the best games out.

Be very careful with posts like these, especially your last sentence.

 

[USC-fan]

Where is this coming from? I hate it when people echo rumors like this because at some point this will be read and spread to other people/sites and be one accepted as a fact.

Wishful thinking.

A lot if talk about ps4 games. All those builds shown were runnibg on dev kits with 1.5GB of gddr5 vram. This comes from a dev over at b3d. Most had only 3-4 weeks on this hardware.

As we saw with the wiiu. Games just keep looking better.

 

[ticl]

A lot of those functions are done by dedicated hardware. Of course you need ram to run the app, but all things related to the video/content being shared is done via dedicated chips.



Lol? There is nothing the PS4 can't do better than the Wii U, aside from "second screen" streaming.

first i ever heard of a chip to run facebook.lol also seems like most people here dont own a wii u and really have no idea who it plays games

 

[OG_Original Gamer]

Anyone know the name of the engineer Nintendo acquired from ArtX, before they were bought by ATI?

 

[tkscz]

Where is this coming from? I hate it when people echo rumors like this because at some point this will be read and spread to other people/sites and be one accepted as a fact.

The WiiU Latte (WiiU's GPU) thread. It was said by many of the techies on here that a lot of the unknown sections of Latte were fixed silicon. After Nintendo Admitted they don't know how to use programable shaders (Yes, Iwata did say that), it wasn't difficult to guess that most (not all) of the fixed silicon were fixed function shaders. It's one of the reasons why no one in the Latte thread gave any credit to Digital Foundry's article on Latte. They tossed out the unknown parts as nothing, regardless of the fact that the unknown parts make up more than the known parts.

Rare were a one-in-a-million developer though. Seriously, from their Spectrum days right up until Nuts & Bolts, they knew how to get the absolute most out of a system. I don't think we're ever going to see the likes of them again. Retro might be similarly enigmatic, but from the titles they've released, I'd say their proficiency is more in the artistic and design side of things than technical prowess.

This makes me sad

 

[Clockwork]

The WiiU Latte (WiiU's GPU) thread. It was said by many of the techies on here that a lot of the unknown sections of Latte were fixed silicon. After Nintendo Admitted they don't know how to use programable shaders (Yes, Iwata did say that), it wasn't difficult to guess that most (not all) of the fixed silicon were fixed function shaders.

I guess if that was your interpretation. All I saw was rumor and speculation.

Btw, this was Iwata's shader comment:

"The other point is that many of our third-party software developers have been dedicated to technologies like shaders. As Wii U is designed to bring out their real strengths, there have recently been more cases where we develop something with their help," said Miyamoto. "It has been more convenient for us to work together with them because they have been able to more smoothly utilize their know-how for development for Wii U."

Nothing mentioning fixed hardware, but that they have gotten some help/technical know how from other devs on shader usage.

Miyamoto said this:

"We already went through this initial learning phase and are now tackling how to take full advantage of high-definition graphics. In this sense, retraining our developers used to be a great hurdle."

So it sounds like it's not even an issue as of right now. Still no mention of fixed hardware.

 

[ozfunghi]

Add RAM via USB?

Wii U has USB 2.0, too slow.

I was just making sure I understood his image. I don't in any way agree with it or think it makes any sense.

He's made this asinine statement before. He was corrected then, yet still finds the need to bring it up again. RAM over USB2... right.

 

[blu]

The WiiU Latte (WiiU's GPU) thread. It was said by many of the techies on here that a lot of the unknown sections of Latte were fixed silicon.

They are fixed silicon in the sense that they are not discernable shader units. In the same sense that the tessellator is a fixed function unit, or the thread scheduler is a fixed function unit - those are units not directly (or not fully) programmable by the devs, but they are still units that are responsible for entire domains and/or aspects of the GPU work. We don't know what those unknown blocks do in Latte; we do suspect some of the functions but we cannot pinpoint those in the sense of 'block = function', so at the end we cannot enumerate functions accounted for and what remains beyond that. One thing is clear - the ratio of non-shader/non-tmu vs shader/tmu silicon on the die is higher than in other more familiar designs.

From that, though, to the statement that 'Latte has this or that fixed function which is otherwise carried in the normal shader units on the rest of the GPUs' there is quite a leap.

I've stated before and I'm still of the opinion that Latte likely has its customized ISA (instruction set architecture). That, though, is something which devs don't normally deal with directly - only indirectly via compilers and similar abstraction layers. IOW, a customized ISA would mean that devs just observe that this or that code runs at certain performance gains or penalties. Particularly if the ISA is not well documented in the devkit then developers (read 3rd parties) might never know what the exact changes are.

Our best bet in this regard would be if fail0verflow did their job so the rest of the world could get an attempt at reverse-engineering the GPU HAL, and from there - to properly studying the Latte.

 

[tkscz]

I guess if that was your interpretation. All I saw was rumor and speculation.

Btw, this was Iwata's shader comment:



Nothing mentioning fixed hardware, but that they have gotten some help/technical know how from other devs on shader usage.

Miyamoto said this:



So it sounds like it's not even an issue as of right now. Still no mention of fixed hardware.

Where did I say Nintendo said that? I said WE GUESSED it was just fixed, I didn't say we knew for sure. I said Nintendo admitted they themselves don't know how to use programmable shaders. Which they don't, they got outside help for that. Also that isn't Iwata, both quotes are from Miyamoto.

They are fixed silicon in the sense that they are not discernable shader units. In the same sense that the tessellator is a fixed function unit, or the thread scheduler is a fixed function unit - those are units not directly (or not fully) programmable by the devs, but they are still units that are responsible for entire domains and/or aspects of the GPU work. We don't know what those unknown blocks do in Latte; we do suspect some of the functions but we cannot pinpoint those in the sense of 'block = function', so at the end we cannot enumerate functions accounted for and what remains beyond that. One thing is clear - the ratio of non-shader/non-tmu vs shader/tmu silicon on the die is higher than in other more familiar designs.

From that, though, to the statement that 'Latte has this or that fixed function which is otherwise carried in the normal shader units on the rest of the GPUs' there is quite a leap.

I've stated before and I'm still of the opinion that Latte likely has its customized ISA (instruction set architecture). That, though, is something which devs don't normally deal with directly - only indirectly via compilers and similar abstraction layers. IOW, a customized ISA would mean that devs just observe that this or that code runs at certain performance gains or penalties. Particularly if the ISA is not well documented in the devkit then developers (read 3rd parties) might never know what the exact changes are.

Our best bet in this regard would be if fail0verflow did their job so the rest of the world could get an attempt at reverse-engineering the GPU HAL, and from there - to properly studying the Latte.

I'd like to hear more of your ISA theory.

 

[chertipros]

Anyone know the name of the engineer Nintendo acquired from ArtX, before they were bought by ATI?

I don't remember his name, but I remember he retired and became an artist.

 

[Spongebob]

He's not saying the WiiU would do it better, he's saying it's easier to implement into games and won't tax as much off the WiiU's GPU because it's fixed. In terms of development, especially for those who've never used programable or compute shaders (which is really just Nintendo), it would be somewhat of an advantage.

I predict the WiiU will have an edge over the PS4, and possibly Durango, with DoF effects and lighting. Whereas the other two will have an edge with textures and particles.

.

 

[PetrCobra]

He's made this asinine statement before. He was corrected then, yet still finds the need to bring it up again. RAM over USB2... right.

Why even specifically say USB2. It's one thing that that's all the Wii U's even got, another thing is that it would be just as ridiculous over USB3. It just wouldn't help at all.

No, wait, let me rephrase that - any purpose a RAM over USB upgrade could possibly serve is now more than satisfied with the possibility to connect any USB storage, because making that external storage faster would in no way resolve the slow speed of that interface.

 

[ozfunghi]

Why even specifically say USB2. It's one thing that that's all the Wii U's even got, another thing is that it would be just as ridiculous over USB3. It just wouldn't help at all.

No, wait, let me rephrase that - any purpose a RAM over USB upgrade could possibly serve is now more than satisfied with the possibility to connect any USB storage, because making that external storage faster would in no way resolve the slow speed of that interface.

Are you somehow deducing from my post that i was saying it would be possible over USB3? lol.

 

[A More Normal Bird]

For example with lighting, the Zelda demo & Need For Speed both show off instant changing the night and day setting.

That's really nothing special, as any game with dynamic TOD could do it. In fact, if the switch is only between two states (day/night) rather than a full cycle then it could just be switching between fixed lighting conditions - not that I'm saying that that's the case here. At any rate, I'd say the ability to map this function to the gamepad touchscreen rather than wasting a controller input for it is a bigger factor in this.

And at this point, I'm seeing better DoF/bokeh, and more of it, from WiiU games and demos than what was shown from the PS4 games and its demos.

W101 and Pikmin both use a similar Gaussian blur tilt shift effect, but it's a leap of logic to say that fixed functions played any role in this when it's an effect that's uniquely suited to the art-style and perspective of both games. Maybe the source code for the effect was included in Nintendo's early SDKs? As for Bokeh, are there any Wii-U games using it? It was in the bird demo AFAIK, but I can't recall seeing it in any retail products.

 

[VAPitts]

this has been asked a million times i know. but i just want a clear cut answer. besides the 1080p titles that we know were confirmed that the Wii U can run natively, does that mean that only 1080p can be done on titles of that caliber? like the fact that MH3U is upscaled, u know what i mean? this is just for clarification cuz i saw a post that i found in the search saying how more than likely the next wave or true next gen titles the Wii U won't be able to handle at 1080p.

 

[A More Normal Bird]

Yes, it's more than likely that only simpler titles (visually) will run at 1080p native. It's possible to make any game render at that resolution, but some rather large tradeoffs would have to be made in terms of visuals and framerate.

 

[VAPitts]

Yes, it's more than likely that only simpler titles (visually) will run at 1080p native. It's possible to make any game render at that resolution, but some rather large tradeoffs would have to be made in terms of visuals and framerate.

on of those tradeoffs being memory i take it?

 

[ozfunghi]

W101 and Pikmin both use a similar Gaussian blur tilt shift effect, but it's a leap of logic to say that fixed functions played any role in this when it's an effect that's uniquely suited to the art-style and perspective of both games. Maybe the source code for the effect was included in Nintendo's early SDKs? As for Bokeh, are there any Wii-U games using it? It was in the bird demo AFAIK, but I can't recall seeing it in any retail products.

I'm not familiar with methods used in videogames to mimic bokeh or tilt-shift... and while the technifications of a tilt-shift lens are definitely different from a regular lens, the effect popularly used (often mimiced through post processing) is generally just to generate a "bokeh" impression on an image with a scale that would otherwise not allow this. Making it look miniature. But since in videogames, were are talking about virtual mimicry anyway, i don't know what the differantiation would encompass or why you would make one to begin with. You seem to think one is superior over the other, technically speaking.

Also, what you think is gausian blur in W101, doesn't look like regular gausian blur to me.

 

[A More Normal Bird]

on of those tradeoffs being memory i take it?

Sorry, I meant that a Wii-U game running at 1080p would have to sacrifice/simplify other elements of its visual presentation and/or framerate.

I'm not familiar with methods used in videogames to mimic bokeh or tilt-shift... and while the technifications of a tilt-shift lens are definitely different from a regular lens, the effect popularly used (often mimiced through post processing) is generally just to generate a "bokeh" impression on an image with a scale that would otherwise not allow this. Making it look miniature. But since in videogames, were are talking about virtual mimicry anyway, i don't know what the differantiation would encompass or why you would make one to begin with. You seem to think one is superior over the other, technically speaking.

Also, what you think is gausian blur in W101, doesn't look like regular gausian blur to me.

Given on the blur in W101. As for highlighting the distinction between Bokeh/blur DoF (whether using diffusion, Gaussian etc), many posters on the net seem to treat Bokeh as a synonym for DoF. The poster in question said he saw more Bokeh on Wii-U titles than those shown for PS4, whereas I can't think of a single Wii-U title that uses the effect. Emulated Bokeh is more computationally expensive than a blur in my (limited) experience with DoF shaders; this seems to be backed up by both industry examples and the maths behind it all.

 

[ozfunghi]

Sorry, I meant that a Wii-U game running at 1080p would have to sacrifice/simplify other elements of its visual presentation and/or framerate.



Given on the blur in W101. As for highlighting the distinction between Bokeh/blur DoF (whether using diffusion, Gaussian etc), many posters on the net seem to treat Bokeh as a synonym for DoF. The poster in question said he saw more Bokeh on Wii-U titles than those shown for PS4, whereas I can't think of a single Wii-U title that uses the effect. Emulated Bokeh is more computationally expensive than a blur in my (limited) experience with DoF shaders; this seems to be backed up by both industry examples and the maths behind it all.

Screenshot at the bottom of the page, with the big red hand... on the right upper corner (building behind the corner), this is no gausian/diffuse blur imo. (Or there's more going on, but i can clearly see vertical deformations).

http://www.nintendojo.com/games/previews/preview-the-wonderful-101

 

[A More Normal Bird]

What do you think it could be? GTA4 had a similar image doubling sort of blur on distant details, which came with no noticeable performance hit (at least on PC). However the effect was static. I should clarify that when I'm talking about games, I classify a proper bokeh effect as one that would react differently with varying light intensity. That W101 image is rather uniformly lit, but I'd say if the game was creating light disks in its DoF we'd have seen it by now.

 

[AzaK]

this has been asked a million times i know. but i just want a clear cut answer. besides the 1080p titles that we know were confirmed that the Wii U can run natively, does that mean that only 1080p can be done on titles of that caliber? like the fact that MH3U is upscaled, u know what i mean? this is just for clarification cuz i saw a post that i found in the search saying how more than likely the next wave or true next gen titles the Wii U won't be able to handle at 1080p.

Wii U can do it but at some point any machine has its limits. 1080 requires about 2.5x the fillrate. Fillrate that can't be used for additional effects etc. If you have a machine of such power that you're not anywhere near maxing out its abilities at 720 then you might be able to go 1080 and the visuals be the same.

I'm obviously guessing here but we might be able to get 1080 but likely only for the simplest of games like 2d ones.

 

[Shin Johnpv]

Given on the blur in W101. As for highlighting the distinction between Bokeh/blur DoF (whether using diffusion, Gaussian etc), many posters on the net seem to treat Bokeh as a synonym for DoF. The poster in question said he saw more Bokeh on Wii-U titles than those shown for PS4, whereas I can't think of a single Wii-U title that uses the effect. Emulated Bokeh is more computationally expensive than a blur in my (limited) experience with DoF shaders; this seems to be backed up by both industry examples and the maths behind it all.

I could totally be wrong here, as I haven't spent much time with the game, and my memory could be off, BUT I could have sworn folks where saying/had screen grabs of bokeh in Zombi U. Again I could totally be remembering wrong though, maybe some one else can clarify.

 

[ozfunghi]

What do you think it could be? GTA4 had a similar image doubling sort of blur on distant details, which came with no noticeable performance hit (at least on PC). However the effect was static. I should clarify that when I'm talking about games, I classify a proper bokeh effect as one that would react differently with varying light intensity. That W101 image is rather uniformly lit, but I'd say if the game was creating light disks in its DoF we'd have seen it by now.

I know what bokeh is, or at least, what people mean when referring to it (originally it was just a Japanese term meaning "unsharp" iirc). I'm saying that what is being used in W101 is not simply a gausian blur like you said in your other post tot create a DOF. I'm not claiming it is a genuine bokeh effect, but i haven't seen any screenshots that rule it out either. Easiest way to judge would be a night scene with lights in the distance, i think.

I'm obviously guessing here but we might be able to get 1080 but likely only for the simplest of games like 2d ones.

While MH3 isn't exactly cutting edge by WiiU standards, it's not in the same categorie as "simplest of games like 2D ones" either.

 

[VAPitts]

Wii U can do it but at some point any machine has its limits. 1080 requires about 2.5x the fillrate. Fillrate that can't be used for additional effects etc. If you have a machine of such power that you're not anywhere near maxing out its abilities at 720 then you might be able to go 1080 and the visuals be the same.

I'm obviously guessing here but we might be able to get 1080 but likely only for the simplest of games like 2d ones.

right so kinda tit for tat, one for the other. like the textures and lighting that NFS: Most Wanted has probably wouldn't exist if they went 1080p huh?

 

[Smurfman256]

Wishful thinking.

A lot if talk about ps4 games. All those builds shown were runnibg on dev kits with 1.5GB of gddr5 vram. This comes from a dev over at b3d. Most had only 3-4 weeks on this hardware.

As we saw with the wiiu. Games just keep looking better.

...Where is this post, pray-tell? I would very much like to see this post and the writer's source.

 

[FieryBalrog]

What... OH you two interpreted the post wrong. He's saying it in terms of development

no, he's not

, and if you've been paying attention to Nintendo, he's probably right. DoF is an affect that's done these days with programmable shaders, something Nintendo admits they can't use, and yet the WiiU supports them (and compute shaders). So more likely than not, a lot of big shader functions (like lighting, DoF, maybe even tessellation) are all fix functions, something Nintendo can deal with no problem. Now, it's obvious the other 2 consoles will be able to do those things, in fact MDX said that, but they more than likely won't be fix function.

so, devs who are remotely up to speed on modern game development don't care

 

[phosphor112]

...Where is this post, pray-tell? I would very much like to see this post and the writer's source.

Some dev on B3D confirmed that most studios had only 1.5GB of VRAM available up until very recently. Some people are saying Guerrilla Games might be one of them, but I'm not sure about that.

 

[AzaK]

I know what bokeh is, or at least, what people mean when referring to it (originally it was just a Japanese term meaning "unsharp" iirc). I'm saying that what is being used in W101 is not simply a gausian blur like you said in your other post tot create a DOF. I'm not claiming it is a genuine bokeh effect, but i haven't seen any screenshots that rule it out either. Easiest way to judge would be a night scene with lights in the distance, i think.



While MH3 isn't exactly cutting edge by WiiU standards, it's not in the same categorie as "simplest of games like 2D ones" either.

I was just commenting on the question about will Wii U games be 1080.

Is MH Wii U up scaled or native? It is a pretty rudimentary engine based off the demo with little but baseline engine features that I could see.

 

[lunchwithyuzo]

I was just commenting on the question about will Wii U games be 1080.

Is MH Wii U up scaled or native? It is a pretty rudimentary engine based off the demo with little but baseline engine features that I could see.

It renders 1080p native, with an average of 45fps.

 

[AzaK]

It renders 1080p native, with an average of 45fps.

Thanks. My point still stands I think, and whilst MH isn't a 2D game, from what I've seen (only the demo) it is very, very graphically undemanding.

 

[lostinblue]

Thanks. My point still stands I think, and whilst MH isn't a 2D game, from what I've seen (only the demo) it is very, very graphically undemanding.

It's also not done from the ground for the Wii U.

1080p is possible, Toki Tori 2 and Nano Assault Neo stated they could have come out pulling 1080p, but they opted for either better framerate and/or more effects.

To see how good something 1080p can look though, you have to see something from the ground up built for it with proper budget and talent; thing is most developers in that situation will decide that there's more difference to be seen by making the game prettier and more intensive than simply pushing more pixels.

They could do, say, Mario Galaxy HD in 1080p with better textures and effects; but 3D Mario's next outing most likely won't be 1080p. All this to say that a lot of out perception of how intensive something really is also has to do with the effectiveness of the design; Mario Galaxy is gorgeous after all.

 

[tkscz]

no, he's not

And yet he quoted me saying that is what he said. I'm going to believe him over you.

so, devs who are remotely up to speed on modern game development don't care

Well yeah. The Wii's TEV got ignored for a reason. No one wanted to deal with that when everything else was moving toward a more uniform programming code. Regardless it is what it is.

 

[Donnie]

so, devs who are remotely up to speed on modern game development don't care

Developers who are looking for the best performance for their games would certainly care. Since obviously if you can offload certain popular effects to dedicated fixed function hardware you then have more programmable processing available for other parts of your game. No idea if the chip actually does have such fixed function units though..

 

[AzaK]

To see how good something 1080p can look though, you have to see something from the ground up built for it with proper budget and talent; thing is most developers in that situation will decide that there's more difference to be seen by making the game prettier and more intensive than simply pushing more pixels.

Agreed and in most cases I'd prefer them to use the cycles to make what's there, better looking. Even if it just means smoother, or AA or what.

In fact, in all cases because I only have a 720 TV

 

[A More Normal Bird]

I know what bokeh is, or at least, what people mean when referring to it (originally it was just a Japanese term meaning "unsharp" iirc). I'm saying that what is being used in W101 is not simply a gausian blur like you said in your other post tot create a DOF. I'm not claiming it is a genuine bokeh effect, but i haven't seen any screenshots that rule it out either. Easiest way to judge would be a night scene with lights in the distance, i think.

Sorry, I acknowledged that I was hasty in labelling it a gaussian blur in my first reply but perhaps didn't make it clear enough. I was asking what you think it could be because you seem to have a bit of knowledge in the area, but we both seem to be drawing a blank. My guess is a static (in relation to occlusion/luminosity, not focus [though I haven't seen enough of the game to know whether the focus is dynamic or not]) sort of image doubling pseudo-bokeh.

@Shin Johnpv: I searched for Zombi-U shots with Bokeh DoF but couldn't find any. It does use a polygonal lens flare texture, maybe some people confused the two.

I rewatched the bird demo and couldn't really discern if the DoF was bokeh/light sensitive, even in 720 the detail isn't there in a youtube vid. My conclusion is that even in the unlikely scenario that the GPU possesses a fixed function for focus code, it's not giving developers free (or even cheap) bokeh, which as I stated above is more computationally expensive than blur shaders.

@Azak: Saying you'd prefer increased AA over increased resolution is a little odd. In a scenario where developers are choosing between the two, I'd imagine performance would be the only arbiter. Don't forget that while both have the same effect of removing aliasing, increasing rendering resolution also has the benefit of resolving more detail on screen.

 

[ozfunghi]

Sorry, I acknowledged that I was hasty in labelling it a gaussian blur in my first reply but perhaps didn't make it clear enough. I was asking what you think it could be because you seem to have a bit of knowledge in the area, but we both seem to be drawing a blank. My guess is a static (in relation to occlusion/luminosity, not focus [though I haven't seen enough of the game to know whether the focus is dynamic or not]) sort of image doubling pseudo-bokeh.

@Shin Johnpv: I searched for Zombi-U shots with Bokeh DoF but couldn't find any. It does use a polygonal lens flare texture, maybe some people confused the two.

I rewatched the bird demo and couldn't really discern if the DoF was bokeh/light sensitive, even in 720 the detail isn't there in a youtube vid. My conclusion is that even in the unlikely scenario that the GPU possesses a fixed function for focus code, it's not giving developers free (or even cheap) bokeh, which as I stated above is more computationally expensive than blur shaders.

@Azak: Saying you'd prefer increased AA over increased resolution is a little odd. In a scenario where developers are choosing between the two, I'd imagine performance would be the only arbiter. Don't forget that while both have the same effect of removing aliasing, increasing rendering resolution also has the benefit of resolving more detail on screen.

Pikmin 3, Bird demo, Zelda demo seem to have some form of basic blurring in DOF. At least from what i found from images on google, lol. Haven't checked out ZombiU in detail yet. W101 could be doing some form of bokeh, but like you said, it could also be "faked". Problem is that even in real life, bokeh varies greatly depending on which lens is being used at what apparture etc... which makes it hard to judge. For the record, i wouldn't have any issues with the latter. Since it's software we're talking about, it's faked either way, so if it gives more or less the same result with less resources spent, i'm all for it. But i think we can conclude for now, that there is no "free bokeh" hardware in the wiiu, or else it would be present in any game playing around with DOF.

edit: This might be useful for some people.

 

[stanley1993]

i think nintendo magic will happen but we will have to wait fr e3 to see it. jus thinking abt it, nintendo is really working on a lot of games themselve or with partners(for the big titles) how much can nintendo handle even with a bigger team.

 

[AzaK]

@Azak: Saying you'd prefer increased AA over increased resolution is a little odd. In a scenario where developers are choosing between the two, I'd imagine performance would be the only arbiter. Don't forget that while both have the same effect of removing aliasing, increasing rendering resolution also has the benefit of resolving more detail on screen.

What I meant is that give me AA at 720 over 1080 because then that fillrate can be used elsewhere.

 

[A More Normal Bird]

That's fair enough. It's pretty much what most devs do now, although towards the end of this generation some have started to just go for 720p without any IQ improvements. Personally, ceteris paribus, I'd choose 1080p with a decent post AA over 720 + 4xAA or more, especially if the asset quality is there.

 

[UltimaKilo]

first of all not 1 person has seen what the ps4 can do. i have the ps3 and 360. also have the wii u. the wii u is by far a generation ahead of both. even my son who is a big ps3 fan says every game that i have on the wii u that he has on the ps3 runs better and looks better on the wii u. sony said everything that was shown at the unveiling of the ps3 was real footage and later came out was cg. But the wii u cant match the ram of the ps4. will that matter in games, who knows. i play games to have fun. and definately nintendo has the best games out.

If you can't even write, why did you procreate and have a child? Moreover, you're making up facts.

 

[Nostremitus]

If you can't even write, why did you procreate and have a child? Moreover, you're making up facts.

This has to be a joke... He's posting the same thing in multiple threads with slight variations...

 

[blu]

If you can't even write, why did you procreate and have a child? Moreover, you're making up facts.

Is too much to expect adults not to revert to personal insults on a games message board? You could have limited your post to the non-bolded part and it would have made a far better point.

 

[Earendil]

If you can't even write, why did you procreate and have a child? Moreover, you're making up facts.

Leave that kind of talk on IGN/GameFAQs/N4G please.

 

[FLAguy954]

Hearing more rumors about the GHz bump on the PS4 CPU and how the Nextbox may be using vanilla Jaguar cores, I am strangely more optimistic about the Wii U CPU, despite the architectural differences. (meaning all of the next gen CPU's are very efficient, the Wii U CPU even more so imo)