Over the last year or so, there has been a lot of hype, mystery, and controversy surrounding Nintendo’s new console. Systems like Xbox have taken the lead in gaming by offering capabilities like online multiplayer. When Nintendo showed off its new system at E3 Expo, it showed gamers that they truly intend to revolutionize the gaming community once again. But until Nintendo gives us the details “officially”, we can only speculate and wait.
hype and mystery
No one really knows too much about Nintendo Revolution [http://www.nintendorevolution.ca] . What will it look like? What kind of power will he “really” have? What games are in development? Nintendo, for the most part, keeps a check on things. We don’t even really know when the official release date will be. It has been reported that March 2006 will be the “unofficial” date.
Living in an online world, it seems like everyone has “the scoop” on the new console. Blog and forum members rave about everything from holographic images to new image processing methods where a developer could create hyper-realistic views at a fraction of today’s processing cost. The bottom line is that with limited facts, speculation is rampant, creating a lot of misinformation and hype.
What do we know… or think we know?
Nintendo Revolution Technical Specifications
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• Slim casing about the thickness of three DVD cases stacked flat on top of each other
• Can come in five different colors, including sleek glossy black and Apple white
• Compatible with previous versions. Plays GameCube optical discs and proprietary 12cm discs, the latter of which can be dual-layered for a storage capacity of over 8GB.
• Slot-loading drive with stylish blue light
• A proprietary component/digital output located on the back of the system
• Two USB 2.0 ports located on the back of the system
• Without Ethernet connector; Revolution connects to the Internet using 802.11b and 802.11g wireless Wi-Fi
• The GameCube docking station has inputs for four GCN controllers and two memory packs.
• Two front slots for 512MB flash memory, probably SD card compatible
• Use wireless controllers
• Custom IBM CPU, codenamed Broadway; speed and architecture undetermined at this time
• Custom ATI-GPU, codenamed Hollywood; speed and architecture undetermined at this time
• 1T-SRAM solution developed by MoSys; unknown amount of memory at this time
• Nintendo Download Service: Go online and download classic NES, S-NES and N64 games.
conclusion
As it stands now, Nintendo’s new console will most likely be available in early to mid-2006, along with the launch of the new PS3 and Xbox 360. What can we expect? I think it would be naive to think that Nintendo is going to release a system that will be inferior to the competition. They have been around too long to make another big mistake. Nintendo’s new gaming system will enter the market as a better than or equal to the competition, improving the next generation gaming system. Nintendo Revolution hopes to live up to its name when it hits stores in 2006.