So it does, nice work!

It allows maps to be added to low poly models to give them tons more detail. It' s relly cool and much better than bump mapping.

Nintendo patented some kind of displacemnt mapping last year and it' s expected to be used in Revolution (obviously). It' d make Revolution games running on hardware 2x that of Gamecube appear to be as powerful as 360 or PS3 or at least initially.

I would say that if a studio had the skills, Revolution could output visuals like Oblivion using displacemnt mapping instead of having millions of polys and doing everything actual.

It' s not the " secret" though. I don' t expect Iwata to turn up at E3 and announce that nintendo' s secret weapon is displacement mapping.

Yeah I remember that - about doom 3 however it' s not entirely what Rev will be- since those DMaps were used only to create models in DOOM3 , and both PC' s and Xbox didn' t have hardware support for it.

I think that implementing some kind of hardware support for DMAPS would boost visual quality way above Oblivion.

Amazing.

I wonder if their DMapping is even better :)

And yeah it' s much better than bumpmapping , but it' s not really that much better than Normal Mapping (in visuals) , but should at the same time require less performance from hardware (than Normal Mapping) right?

I wonder if their DMapping is even better :)

I hope so, and Iwata did say...

Iwata: " When you turn on Revolution and see the graphics, you will say ' wow!' "

but should at the same time require less performance from hardware (than Normal Mapping) right?

Exactly. Unreal Engine 3.0 uses normal mapping, but displacement mapping can achieve much of the same quality without putting huge strains on the hardware. If Nintendo have found a way to make displacement mapping ultra efficient and ATi have implimented it into the graphics chip then Revolution could truly be awesome.

... yea, sure it does. And how do you know? must be some secert if its published right under noses.

What i think this ' secert' is nothing more than the graphical and dedicated physics ram or whatnot in the rev. I do think the rev will surprize people when they see the graphics in e3, alltough most games will just be some mini games useing the controller to give the press an impression on whats it like.

I like nintendos approach of making a console cheap and most imporantly quiet. I hat noise.

I shoud probably have said " what i think Revolutions secret is..."

But, like Gangsta said, share your vision...

A dedicated physics accelerator? Nope, it would add too much to the cost of production and they wouldn' t be able to sell the console for less than $299.

The secret?!

What do you know about patents filed by Nintendo?! You' ll need the entire collection of Revolution patents, i can send them to you if you wish, but part of the answer lies within them.

What can you gather from the quotes on the previous page?! What can you gather from the image i posted of the console?!

Ok, let me put it this way. PS3 and 360 have something in common that Revolution doesn' t share. You need to spot something about the console itself, it' s right under your nose which is the very best place for them to hide it.

Also, ...there' s a very good reason why the CPU and GPU are called Hollywood and Broadway and at E3 the connections will be announced.

Ok, so what DO you know?! It' s going to be portable and that the stand also powers it, likely being chargable so you don' t actually have to plug the thing in when you use it. The rest doesn' t really matter, but what if i said, you will be able to use Revolution in any room in your house. Any room. What would you say then?!

I don' t get it Majik, are you saying you can play the Rev in any room of the house? And if so, what' s so good about it? Is that the big Rev secret? Are you sure?

Majik has' nt a clue, just like the rest of us.... lets wait n see.

And if so, what' s so good about it?

You' re thinking about it the wrong way. The design of the Revolution itself is a clue.

Ok, so it' s official, ...the Revolution' s stand is not a power supply!

It seems that we were right to be skeptical about an article in Nintendo Official Magazine which claimed that the Revolution' s stand acted as an aesthetically pleasing power brick. Nintendo has officially dismissed the story with a leisurely wave of the hand, pointing out that " It was a small production error in the magazine," and that they have yet to announce anything about the machine' s power supply. It' s nice to know that blatantly incorrect facts in an official magazine can be deemed as a " small production error."

http://www.revolutionfanboy.com/2006/02/23/revolution-stand-not-a-power-supply/

I don' t get it Majik, are you saying you can play the Rev in any room of the house? And if so, what' s so good about it? Is that the big Rev secret? Are you sure?

well i think what majik meant is that you don' t need a tv set , you don' t have a tv everywhere in your house, and you' re not going to move your tv set from room to room... majik are u thinking about hmmmm damn how do you call this technology , censor movement with the helmet thing ??

remember that video mock up of revolution , that was soo well done that lot of people wanted to believe it ?? well hopes turned down later saying it' s fake , but what about if its not, what about if it' s all a game of nintendo ??

geez that video was sooo well done, could a fan possibly done that?? i' m sure it need a lot of people or a lot of time .... anyway yeah i' m dreamin ok probably ...

well i think what majik meant is that you don' t need a tv set

See, how come only Abasoufiane picked up on that?

censor movement with the helmet thing

Not exactly although that was my initial thought last year. And yeah, the Nintendo ON...



...it caused quite a stir. But that' s not what i think.

But what got me thinking about the visor last year was Nintendo buying an undisclosed number of eMagin VR visors...



...but when i thought about it, it wasn' t possible to do it cheap enough. So that' s not what i think either.

Now, just open yor minds for a second and think of Revolutions stand. It' s slanted and it' s been designed that way. The front of the console points up at an angle. If it were pionting away from you towards a wall then the angle would be right for displaying an image. Projecting an image.

There are rumours about it being stereoscopically projected 3D, but i highly doubt it (THAT would kill PS3). But i was curious as to why Nintendo had decided against supporting HD with Revoltion because with 360 and PS3 having higher quality visuals, surely Nintendo would want to make use of anything that could improve the quality of their own visuals?!

Well, what if Revolution could output visuals at 2048 x 1280 or whatever?!

This...



...is the size of a matchbox. It outputs a streaming viseo feed at up to 2048 x 1280. It' s going to be compatible with mobile devices like video iPod but there isn' t a full colour version on sale yet, ...it' s not due until later this year.

See...

http://www.hdbeat.com/2006/02/13/light-blue-optics-pvpro-mini-projector/

...for more details. This isn' t the onlt hi-res mini projector due this year though, there are several, and they' re all going to be fairly cheap, they dont have lenses or moving parts, just lasers.

My point is that amongst the Revolution patents filed to date, the front flap where Nintendo claim there will be SD-card ports is never shown open and it would HAVE to be shown open in the patents for the console. Why would they keep it back if it was only SD-cards?

See this is the Gamecube access flap shown open...



...and out of 30+ patent images, the front flap isn' t shown open in a single one. Is it so hard to believe that there' s a mini-projector in there that can display a 30" image in hi-res?! It would definately account for the slant on the console including the base, the lack of HDTV support, and would fit will all the quotes on the previous pages.



Ok, so your sat infornt of your TV with the controller. Revolution pinponts the location of the controller using sensors that you put on top of your TV, but what happens if your a kid and you only have a 14" TV?! Surely any move you make will be huge bacuse of the confined display and minimal distance between the sensors?! You' d need a bigger screen right?!

Before you mention the price of this technology, it' s been confirmed to be mass market friendly at under $100

Read these about the price of the technology and why Revolution could use it.

http://nintendo-revolution.blogspot.com/2005/06/price-of-future.aspx

http://nintendo-revolution.blogspot.com/2005/07/price-of-future-part-ii.aspx

I did have a lot more to say but i can' t be bothered right now and i know nobody will believe this anyway so i' ll just leave you with a couple of the quotes.

Iwata: " We invented the current way a console is played - in front of a television and holding a controller - but maybe that image will change

Fils-Aime: " The concept of a home system today is defined as hardware that you tether to a box, and you are tethered to it via a controller; we think that' s an old paradigm."

Wada (Square-Enix): " Not just a portable, not just a console - it' s exactly what we wanted in that it' s the birth of a completely new platform."

Miyamoto: " It' s convenient to make games that are played on TVs. But I always wanted to have a custom-sized screen that wasn' t the typical four-cornered cathode-ray-tube TV. I' ve always thought that games would eventually break free of the confines of a TV screen to fill an entire room. But I would rather not say anything more about that."

Wada (Square-Enix): " Not just a portable, not just a console - it' s exactly what we wanted in that it' s the birth of a completely new platform."

To Square Enix (specifically the Squaresoft side of it) I say, " don' t sing it, BRING IT" ...
The Dreamcast was a " very attractive" system to them but yet they didn' t do a thing for it, then they tossed the GameCube a half-assed bone with Crystal Chronicles, more than likely because they had NO choice in the matter as pimp daddy Yamauchi wasn' t giving them a license to develop GameBoy Advance games unless they agreed to show the GameCube a little love. So I' m always VERY skeptical whenever they praise non-Sony consoles, while some folks take their praise and run with it as being a sign that they' re secretly working on games for those consoles..

While Developers are afraid of extremly high cost for developing games for ps3/xbox360,NR might be the safezone for them...

Oh I see. Why didn' t you just say that from the start! It would be cool if you' re right.
I' m surprised that the technology you mention is so cheap.
You' re idea would explain why they don' t want to support HD as you said.
But I' m a little skeptic though. By the way, how do you know that it is a flap? Maybe it' s just designed to look like a flap when it' s actually nothing.

Miyamoto: " It' s convenient to make games that are played on TVs. But I always wanted to have a custom-sized screen that wasn' t the typical four-cornered cathode-ray-tube TV. I' ve always thought that games would eventually break free of the confines of a TV screen to fill an entire room. But I would rather not say anything more about that."

Shigeru also said that revolution won' t change that - meaning it will depend on your TV.

Stereoscopic graphics - also one of those things people kept talking about.

It definitely uses TV to output graphics.

I think that some of those things Majik said are very likely to happen but not exactly this way.

What I' m saying is that Nintendo might implement some innovation based on visuals , but not VR.

I just can' t wait for their secret to be announced :)

Wow, i' m suprised you guys even think it' s a possibility

NR might be the safezone for them...

That' s a definate Quez, It' ll certainly have more support than Gamecube did.

Why didn' t you just say that from the start

I didn' y expect it to be a popular idea. I thought i' d have to bring you round to it bit by bit, but evidently you guys are more open minded than i thought

By the way, how do you know that it is a flap

It' s definately a flap. Nintendo said it' s where the SD-card ports will be but they' ve not been mentioned since and the patents show nothing to do with them.

It definitely uses TV to output graphics.

No doubt. That' s a given, but the portability aspect of it is really important to Nintendo. If you can take it anywhere any use it without being confined to a TV...

I don' t think it' s virtual reality, like a visor, i think it' s projection. It makes sense when you look at the details but we' ll know soon enough anyway.

Whatever it is, it' s going to be huge and Revolution will sell through the roof!

if it' s a projector, and a good quality one at that, I' ll dfinitely be in line 5 hours before best buy opens on the release date of the rev. Projectors themselves are not very revolutionary for me, cuz they' ve been around for a while now, even HD ones. But having a projector in a console, WOW! Im super excited about this. If it' s not the big secret, i' ll be really disappointed and the actual secret will have to be something big so it can make me even more happy.

majik, yes we are open minded. I didn' t receive any flaming for writing about that racing controller with the little wheel instead of a left analog stick. Plus, up until E3 most of the things we say are specualtion anyway.

But Nintendo said that they designed the Gamecube as they did because they thought that portability was something people wanted (the handle for example). But then they regreted that design because it turned out people never wanted a portable home console.
It would seem strange for them to try the same thing all over again.

if this is true then the idea of it wouldn' t be so much as portability, but the fact that you don' t need a tv to play games, and then portability comes with it.

So it does. But if it does have a projector, wouldn' t you need something to project the image on? It' s kind of risky to expect people to have a single coloured wall without anything blocking it.