Late Night Consoling

Nintendo has officially announced a date for the full reveal of Revolution. Unsurprisingly, it will happen around E3, specifically during the company's pre-E3 press conference next May. There, Nintendo will unveil the final hardware and its games. Nintendo has hinted recently that there may be more surprises regarding the console itself, though with the company having shown the unique controller and described its GameCube backwards compatibility and Virtual Console functionality (by which owners can download and play games from the company's back library of NES, SNES, and N64 titles) one has to wonder if there can really be many more major features to announce. Specific details regarding the console's online service, which has so far only been announced to be free of charge, would be appreciated. Most importantly, however, will be details of the actual games, presumably playable at E3. With the exception of followups to several expected franchises and a few hazy announcements such as a Kojima game, a Grasshopper game, and some kind of new Nintendo franchise, the public has so far not been privy to any Revolution game details. A price point and final release date will probably be announced as well. It is not clear whether the company will go on a Revolution media blackout until the May event, but in the past executives have indicated that details of the console would start to trickle out at the beginning of 2006.

Following various rumors and reports that Europe would be receiving a total of 300,000 Xbox 360 consoles for its December 2 launch, Microsoft's Chris Lewis has confirmed that the number is approximately correct. He noted that the estimate is "not far removed from reality," and rather obviously surmised that the system might in fact sell out in Europe on launch day as it did in North America. In the months leading up to the system's initial launch, Microsoft indicated that the company did not plan for a huge launch shipment, but rather a moderate initial supply followed by regular restockings. The strategy is really the only feasible solution to a worldwide launch of new tech such as the 360, but given that the console has been next to impossible to find since it launched it seems that Microsoft might be struggling to meet that goal. Of course, it's still quite early in the machine's life. The company claims that it will ship 2.5M-3M units worldwide within its first three months, and there's time to make good on that promise.

There have been several little bits of information, rumor, and discussion in the last few days regarding Nintendo's upcoming next-gen console, Revolution, over the last few days, so here they are in one convenient news post.

One bit of Revolution that's been floating around the internet is a patent filed by Nintendo and pointed out by Revolution Report. The patent describes game emulation through software rather than hardware for a system that sounds very much like the Revolution's Virtual Console. This is not too surprising given that the machine will have to emulate four consoles total for its backwards compatibility. What's of more interest are the parts of the patent describing how games might allow the player to select from multiple characters in addition to the character(s) originally present in the game. This is in line with comments by Nintendo president Satoru Iwata indicating that games might be updated visually or in other ways while keeping the actual gameplay unchanged. The patent also describes how games might be filtered by series in addition to by platform, allowing players to easily access their favorite franchises. The patent dates back to 2001, though it is referenced by other more recent Nintendo patents.

RevoGaming claims to have been told by two developer sources that IBM has completed the Revolution's Broadway processor and is currently showing plans and a prototype to developers. Unsurprisingly, the developers claimed anonymity, though one stated that the processor is dual-core. Neither would discuss the Hollywood GPU, which is being designed by ATI.

1UP has spoken with several developers about how they feel about the Revolution in terms of actual game design and development possibilities. 1UP asks a series of identical questions to each dev, touching on drawbacks of the machine, game length, third-party support, HDTV, and more. The respondants are The Behemoth's Tom Fulp, Gearbox's Randy Pitchford, Vicarious Visions' Karthik Bala, Chair's Geremy Mustard, Radical's Eric Holmes, and Foundation 9's Chris Charla. Overall, the reponse was positive, with a frequent sentiment that designing for the system will be unusual but ultimately rewarding.

Red Entertainment producer Hiroi Ouji, who worked on franchises such as Tengai Makyo and Sakura Taisen, has stated that he prefers working with the Xbox 360 than with the upcoming PS3. He believes that the PS3 will require high development costs that will shut out all but the biggest studios, whereas the Xbox 360 has a developer environment that is easier to work with and can be used with a less exorbitant budget. Ouji is currently working on an Xbox 360 version of Tengai Makyo Ziria (Far East of Eden: Ziria), a classic Japanese RPG originally for the Turbo Grafx, known in Japan as PC Engine.

In news that can't bode well for Microsoft's Japanese launch of the Xbox 360, Team NINJA's Dead or Alive 4 (X360) has slipped from its system launch release on December 10. It's only heading back one week, however, so Western gamers shouldn't be too concerned about the title being significantly delayed more than it has been. IGN claims that as of last week the game was 95% complete, with studio head Tomonobu Itagaki indicating that the last 5% of a game's development are crucial. The Japanese launch lineup for the machine now consists of only six titles: Ridge Racer 6, Every Party, FIFA 06, Need for Speed Most Wanted, Tetris, and Perfect Dark Zero. The last two titles don't seem to be big system sellers either, given that Tetris has been available on countless consoles and PDZ is a first person shooter, a genre that is traditionally ignored in the Japanese gaming market. IGN points out that the original Xbox actually launched in Japan with more titles than its successor.

If you've already made your mind up about what next-gen systems you want, feel free to affirm your opinions with IGN's Top 10 Reasons to Buy an Xbox 360, Wait for Revolution, and/or Wait for PS3. It's hard to see these lists actually convincing anyone of a different purchase route than the one they've already chosen, but hey, isn't that what the internet is all about?

1UP chats with Team NINJA's Tomonobu Itagaki about Dead or Alive 4 (X360).