June 1st, 2012

The hope remains for Unreal Engine 4 on Wii U

22 Comments

BlackNMild2k1 of NeoGaf, one of the original sources of information in regards to Unreal Engine 4 on the Wii U has stood by their claims, re-iterating that Nintendo has tweaked their hardware to support the engine. It is still unclear if we’ll see anything at E3 2012, but at least the hope isn’t dead yet. *crosses fingers*

  • Luciano Fran

    I just hope the wii u is strong enough to compete with the next gen consoles

    • Luciano Fran

      Yes first

  • http://www.wix.com/destroyah/broknrhytm2 D2K

    The hope never died in the first place because the facts never said nor suggested it wouldn’t be.

    Since we already know the Epic has a Wii U dev kit, and since we know the Epic will have a presentation to show off the Unreal Engine 4, and since we know the Epic has raved about the power of the Wii U, common sense would suggest that even if Epic isn’t working on a Wii U game per-SE’, support for the Wii U will be announced at E3 as well as for the 720 and PS4 IF those platforms are announced at E3 as well (I expect the announcement at least of the 720.)

  • Deuce

    The Wii U is either really strong to handle UE4, or UE4 isn’t really that much of an improvement over UE3.

    You guys of course have considered the possibility that UE4 isn’t that abysmally strong. Cuz we’re mature and we can seriously think of these possibilities with a clear head and not foolishly lock onto one possibility.

    • http://www.wix.com/destroyah/broknrhytm2 D2K

      See I don’t know. I would agree but that whole business of Epic not happy with Sony and Microsoft in regards to the current spec for their next gen console (apparently they must know) kinda throw a monkey wretch into things, Does that means that the UE4 at this point is not much of an improvement like you said, does that mean the Wii U could actually be more powerful than the 720 and PS4 at this (which is HIGHLY unlikely,) or does that mean that the Wii U can run UE4 at the ground level and Epic expect the 720 and PS4 to be able to push it further and they based on what they have it won’t push it any further than the Wii U can?

      A lot of questions to be answered next week.

    • zeta

      I think the latter is most likely it, as usual developers expected a big push in specs with the next gen Sony and Microsoft consoles and aren’t getting as much as they like, but they also have to realise that with gaming on PCs becoming more convenient (steam and cheaper PCs overall) that if those companies just push out expensive (talking about around the $475-550 range) tech it might not be to their benefit.

    • http://www.wix.com/destroyah/broknrhytm2 D2K

      It really isn’t worth it. They lost money on hardware sales, and then they lost on money on technical issues (RROD, Hackgate). Sony is losing money across the board in all their divisions so investing hundreds of millions of dollars into the creation a of monster console and then to lose nearly as much in hardware sales because of what they would have to prices it as is not financially feasible for them, or logical. Microsoft as a company is still doing fine, but with Sony in as much financial trouble as they are they really have so reason to make the 720 a beast machine. Especially with the 360 and Kinect doing as well as it is right now.

      Quite honestly, unless the Wii U has the success out of the gate that the Wii did, Microsoft could probably hold off on the 720 for another couple or years at least. It looks like Sony is going to play the waiting game to see what happens with the Wii U before they make a decision on what to do with the PS4. If Microsoft is smart they will do the same.

      If the Wii U takes off it won’t hurt them that much because with Nintendo launching first they were going to have to play catch-up anyway. But if they were to rush out with max power consoles and the Wii U failed, that would leave people stuck to choose between two consoles they could not afford and much like in the early 1980s people would just say “screw it” and walk away from console gaming altogether. Especially with the popularity of smart phone and pad gaming. That would be a disaster not only for Microsoft and Sony, but gaming period.

      I’m sure each of these companies have their own financial advisory committees and what not to let them know what action they should take and when. Nintendo figured it out a long time ago, but I think Sony and Microsoft are finally coming around to the fact that the days of spending willy-nilly on console development to basically have locker room bragging-rights on who console is the most powerful is over. It’s about survival right now. Who can come up with a product that costs the least to develop, the least to manufacture, and the least to the customer, yet still be innovative enough to catch fire so that a sufficient profit can be made.

    • Ezz151

      D2K makes an excellent point about companies being in survival mode and drawing customers through innovative and distinguished products. While core gamers care about which console has the best tech, the vast majority will be much more attracted to a unique product. Graphical improvements exist but have pretty much plateaued as far as wow factor vs production cost is concerned.

      As for UE4, its major advantage over UE3.5 (which is still incredibly impressive, by the way) is it’s focus ease of development and in editor changes; which include item specific lighting coding and cause and effect chains for player interaction, all of this which can be done on the fly without hours of bake time for changes or manually repositioning every in level element for every slight change. This all rocks, but considering that UE4 is slated for distribution in 2014 and the fact that its demo currently runs on a single Kepler gpu, which is far too advanced and expensive for utilization in wii u. I still think UE 3.5 will be incredibly impressive on wii u, and the console should remain relevant in 5 years as long as UE4 doesn’t take over in third party development.

  • Co-Wink-Key-Dink inc.

    WHY CAN’T THEY JUST SAY THREE THINGS

    A.No
    B.Where thinking about it
    C.YYYEEEEEEEESSSSSSS

  • http://wiiublog.com Jared

    I think it can Run UE4 cause, Epic whent out of there way to correct Geoff, said it was a crazy powerful and praz the wii u like no tomarrow even helped nintendo to tweek the wii u’s engine. Personaly I think the wii u is next gen. and going to kill this gen and hang with the next. Epic is trying to HELP the Sony and Mic. to stay up to what the Wii u can do. C’MON SON!!!!

  • RicardoSForever

    Let’s face it. Nintendo ain’t stupid. So if Epic, other 3rd parties and fans want UE4 on Wii U, it’s gonna happen. Unless we get trolled.

  • uPadWatcher

    I’m sure Nintendo and Epic Games will have a shocking announcement during the conference. I hope the selected games for the Wii U will have games powered by Unreal Engine 4. After the Big N tweaking the hardware and adding new features including a better CPU. And if they don’t deliver Unreal 4, there’s always plenty of room for Unreal Engine 3.9 .

  • StarTropics

    I want to see the graphics Nintendo themselves bring to the system. Games by Nintendo 1st and 2nd parties are usually the best looking on a Nintendo system and as far as I know Nintendo has never needed to use middleware from someone else

    • D2K

      No they haven’t. Nintendo knows how to get the best graphics out of any engine. SMG 1 and 2, Sonic Colors, DKCR, and SSBB for the Wii look 360 and PS3 quality in 1080p resolution.

    • Tails the Foxhound

      FYI, the Prime series runs on modified Unreal 2 (MP1, 2) and 3 (MP3, Trillogy) Engines. I only just found out about this myself.

    • bill

      Nintendo didn’t make Sonic Colors, it’s 3rd party.

    • D2K

      Oops. I meant to say New. Super Mario Bros. Don’t know why I said that. It was on my mind because Sonic Colors also looks awesome on 1080p res.

  • jobro

    Well if Ninteno worked on their hardware to make it run UE 4,They should bring it to the console :D
    (Nintendo also worked on 2 controllers usable at 1 time and it looks like they succeeded,so^^)

  • A1424andy

    GOD please We need the unreal engine 4 on the wii u.

  • http://www.techpowerup.com Stewox

    tweaked is innaccurate

    they BUFFED the hardware specs, that’s exactly what Epic wants.

    There is no tweaks or anything on the software side to be done for a specific engine, buff in hardware will make all engines run better obviously and better games possible for everyone.

    • D2K

      That brings up another interesting question. Being that Epic was upset about Sony and Microsoft trying to strong arm them into buffing up the hardware specs of the 720 and PS4, does this mean that the Wii U can run Unreal Engine 4 at the ground level, or does this mean that the Wii U can run Unreal Engine 4 at he level Epic wants it to be ran at?

  • Adrien

    well let’s see :) *crosses fingers too*