This week in NX Rumours (Week 16) NX Library to Explode

We try to avoid posting rumours as much as possible on Vooks, it’s part of our news policy and has been for years. You all seem to love it. Now we’re reaching a critical stage with the Nintendo NX where rumours, speculation and leaks are at a fever pitch. So instead of ignoring it, we’re going to collect them and analyse them.

The Nintendo NX rumour mill has again this week been churning, hopefully next week in Nintendo’s financial results or in the following briefing we’ll get some news about the NX – but for now – back to the rumours.

This weeks rumour once again comes from Emily Rogers, in a lengthy post on her on blog she went over a number of topics but we’ll just go through the more important ones.

The NX will build a larger library than the Wii U has down in its lifetime thus far

Emily believes that Nintendo now has the capacity to build as many games as they have for the Wii U in 3 years but in one year for the NX? How is Nintendo going to accomplish this and why?

She believes that the goal with the NX (whatever it turns out to be) is to increase the output of software from its first party teams but also its other studios. To do this Nintendo has completely changed how it creates game and how their teams work together. Not only that but multiple Wii U games which were in development have been moved on to NX, in previous weeks we’ve also head from Emily plans for Nintendo to ‘remaster’ games for the NX such as Super Smash Bros and Splatoon.

The NX, she believes will not suffer the same 3 month (or more) droughts that the Wii U and Nintendo’s output for the console will be at its highest ever.

At the same time Rogers has thrown liquid nitrogen over a roaring fire in regards to lasts weeks rumour from NeoGAF member 10k. He believed that;

The NX is going to have a screen controller (whether it’s optional or standard I don’t know) and can be used anywhere to play your home console games. The controller itself will not have any processing capabilities, it’ll essentially be a dummy vita. It’ll likely have basic OS functions to access the NX console from anywhere, like a tiny cpu.

Emily’s response was quick;

I showed this to my Nintendo sources, and they laughed. “The gimmick is made up. His sources lied to him,” they said. The gimmick that 10k’s sources were describing sounded like Wii U 2.

Even if the NX controller gets a built-in screen, why would the NX’s main gimmick — the hardware’s biggest selling point — be an enhanced, improved version of Nintendo’s worst selling console ever?

The Verdict

Honestly, this one probably isn’t a rumour – maybe the volume of output won’t be as much as Emily is saying but Nintendo have been tremendous strides in changing the way they make games. Not only that this was years ago they started putting these plans in action;

See question 5 from this investor briefing Q&A from 2014;

Q: You have explained your concern about users being divided by hardware. Currently, you have both a handheld device business and a home console business. I would like to know whether the organizational changes that took place last year are going to lead to, for example, the integration of handheld devices and home consoles into one system over the medium term, or a focus on cost saving and the improvement of resource efficiency in the medium run.

A:  Last year Nintendo reorganized its R&D divisions and integrated the handheld device and home console development teams into one division under Mr. Takeda. Previously, our handheld video game devices and home video game consoles had to be developed separately as the technological requirements of each system, whether it was battery-powered or connected to a power supply, differed greatly, leading to completely different architectures and, hence, divergent methods of software development. However, because of vast technological advances, it became possible to achieve a fair degree of architectural integration. We discussed this point, and we ultimately concluded that it was the right time to integrate the two teams.

For example, currently it requires a huge amount of effort to port Wii software to Nintendo 3DS because not only their resolutions but also the methods of software development are entirely different. The same thing happens when we try to port Nintendo 3DS software to Wii U. If the transition of software from platform to platform can be made simpler, this will help solve the problem of game shortages in the launch periods of new platforms. Also, as technological advances took place at such a dramatic rate, and we were forced to choose the best technologies for video games under cost restrictions, each time we developed a new platform, we always ended up developing a system that was completely different from its predecessor. The only exception was when we went from Nintendo GameCube to Wii. Though the controller changed completely, the actual computer and graphics chips were developed very smoothly as they were very similar to those of Nintendo GameCube, but all the other systems required ground-up effort. However, I think that we no longer need this kind of effort under the current circumstances. In this perspective, while we are only going to be able to start this with the next system, it will become important for us to accurately take advantage of what we have done with the Wii U architecture. It of course does not mean that we are going to use exactly the same architecture as Wii U, but we are going to create a system that can absorb the Wii U architecture adequately. When this happens, home consoles and handheld devices will no longer be completely different, and they will become like brothers in a family of systems.

Still, I am not sure if the form factor (the size and configuration of the hardware) will be integrated. In contrast, the number of form factors might increase. Currently, we can only provide two form factors because if we had three or four different architectures, we would face serious shortages of software on every platform. To cite a specific case, Apple is able to release smart devices with various form factors one after another because there is one way of programming adopted by all platforms. Apple has a common platform called iOS. Another example is Android. Though there are various models, Android does not face software shortages because there is one common way of programming on the Android platform that works with various models. The point is, Nintendo platforms should be like those two examples. Whether we will ultimately need just one device will be determined by what consumers demand in the future, and that is not something we know at the moment. However, we are hoping to change and correct the situation in which we develop games for different platforms individually and sometimes disappoint consumers with game shortages as we attempt to move from one platform to another, and we believe that we will be able to deliver tangible results in the future.

Too long didn’t read, well you should read it but if you haven’t got the time Satoru Iwata basically reconfirms everything that Emily has said – without talking about specific number of titles.

Nintendo has moved the way they make games to a single platform, this isn’t console or handheld but instead standard way to make games across multiple hardware and devices. Now the NX might be a home console, it might be a portable, it (won’t) might be a hybrid – but whatever it is Nintendo has spent the last two years changing the way it makes games to specifically avoiding a way to ‘sometimes disappoint consumers with game shortages as we attempt to move from one platform to another’.

The NX is going to smash it out of the gate – what with and how those games will look is the fun part.

Even two years ago Satoru Iwata saw the writing on the wall for the Wii U. His legacy was making Nintendo didn’t stuff it up again.