More details on upcoming Zelda game for Wii

Says you. It's a matter of preference. Why does pushing more shaders/polys/texture resolution = better? It doesn't. I'd much rather look at Mario Galaxy's visuals, despite being on significantly weaker hardware, than 90% of games on high end systems.

Hell, I'd rather look at Galaxy than Crysis maxed out, and this is coming from someone who's played through both it and Warhead with both maxed out.

I wish Nintendo had gone with stronger hardware for the potential to make games look even better than they do now, but I'm a strong believer that technical edge does not outweigh great art. If a game's visuals become obsolete via hardware, and lose all charm, then to me it's a sign the visuals were just a tech demo in the first place.

I can still look at something like OoT and appreciate the layout, model, and texture work for a game of it's age. Same for Half-Life. I'd love Zelda Wii to look like Uncharted 2, but I'm confident they'll make a game so pretty I wont care.

See, I totally disagree with you here. I'm not a fan of the art direction of NSMB Wii but in terms of rendering I think it looks great. Poly counts are high, textures are crisp enough, and there are plenty of shader effects to help bring certain situations to life.

You say it looks like it could almost run on the DS. I say you're dead wrong and have no idea what you're talking about. Who's right?

Audio/visuals play a huge part in conveying the purpose and execution of a game, but they are not the primary part of the experience. It's not even debatable. Interactivity and gameplay design is the primary component of games, as it's the one element that seperates it directly from all other entertainment mediums.

No gameplay = not a game. Cutscenes? They're not gaming, even if it's in a game. It's cinema.

How many developers take advantage of the hardware available for gameplay advancements? Like, what, 2%? The idea that developers groan and moan about developing on the Wii is very silly. Not everyone in the industry holds the same point of view as yourself, and most that do develop for other platforms.

Says you. You can find every game on the Wii a terrible mess for all I care. That's your opinion. Stop trying to pass it off as the word of God for what the system and Nintendo is/are about. You're disappointed, you want 'next-gen' (sic) Zelda, not everybody else feels the same way. The end.

Not really, I just dont need to go to the extreme of blasting everything about it despite the disappointments. It's a tie with the GCN for me as the msot disappointing system from Nintendo, though I still love it.

There's a lot I wish Nintendo did/would do, and a lot I dont forgive them for, but I'd be kidding myself if I tried to say I wasn't having a blast with plenty of games. Keep in mind I'm not the kind of guy who lavishes some franchises on other systems. EG: Modern Warfare and Halo are fun but will never be definitive system purchases for me.

I'm also a big PC gamer so I get a lot of my high-end fix here.

Yes but you made them out to be terrible, and I'm saying it's a matter of opinion. You can hate them, you're entitled to, but I think they look fine and on a technical level use the system quite well. You see washed out, I see sharp and defined.

But I do wish it had a more interesting and adventurous art direction.

That's one game, and a good example I might add. Dead Rising is one of the few games that have actually said "Hey, look at all this hardware, lets really do something unique for a our gameplay!"

You can, and you're entitled to your opinion, as long as you're aware it's not shared by everyone else. Where you might find serious fault with the company others dont feel the same way.

My overall attitude with the whole graphics thing is that graphics are extremely important, as is sound, to conveying the overall imagery and atmosphere of a game.

But to me graphics and sound dont need to be 'high end' to make their point, and whether or not they really dramatically improve the experience depends on the type of game they're built in.

A game like Modern Warfare or whatever needs better graphics because the gameplay is, mostly, built on old designs. They're examples of games trying to be Hollywood. They're about flash, bang, explosions, and wowing the player with amazing visual moments. I dont say that in a negative way, that's just the type of game they are.

But as time goes by these games usually age terribly because they dont have much else going for them. The charm is all in the visual ride. FarCry + Crysis are great examples. Way back when everyone went mad over FarCry due to how AMAZING the jungle rendering was, and it still is if you consider the age of the engine. However, years later along comes CryEngine 2 and Crysis, and suddenly the jungle of FarCry is tons less impressive. Crysis does everything FarCry did and then some. For jungles, this will continue over and over with each new version of the CryEngine; more impressive rendering for the current time period ultimately made obsolete by advancing technology.

But games that have a very unique, distinctive, and charming visual style will live on, while still managing to convey the emotion they did since the day they were released. Wind Waker will always be gorgeous because it looks like nothing else, despite being left for dead on a technical level by 99% of modern day games.

For the Wii, I do wish Nintendo had gone for stronger hardware because like everyone else I like pretty things. Souped up Metroid/Mario/Zelda would rock. But you know what? I play through Prime 1 to 3 and I see Retro's art direction as superior to nearly the entire industry, and I'm still wowed. I play through Galaxy and dont for a second, not a second, think how it would look on stronger hardware. TP has aged, but the art still keeps it strong.

Ultimately it's all about context. If a game is trying to do far too much for it's technical level then yeah, we end up with problems, especially when compared to the same game on a stronger platform. But when a game is confident in it's visual style for what it's trying to accomplish, I think the end results are hugely satisfying regardless of how strong or weak the system might be.

And of course people are entitled to feel differently, and they're entitled to feel that games should always have visuals in league with the strongest hardware of the time. But I always find it odd that people are fine when comparing games on the Xbox360 and PS3 to the Wii as a negative, but never bag out Xbox360 and PS3 games for their often weaker visuals compared to PC counterparts.

Lets not forget that while Uncharted 2 is a gorgeous game, Crysis is pushing far more as an engine. If we are to say Uncharted 2 still looks phenominal because it has such a strong art direction and beautiful rendering style, then are we not also entitled to say Mario Galaxy also looks phenominal?

Where do we draw the line between a system that is too weak and a system that isn't?

I'm not arguing against that view, if anything I supported it by saying I too wish the Wii had more power because I want to see my favourite franchises in greater detail, as yes it would make them 'better'.

What I'm saying is that, for me, it's not the make-or-break that seems to dominate some people's opinions on the Wii, where they feel Wii games are so heinously ugly and the system power so terribly weak it's impossible to look at a game and find the visuals impressive.

My Wind Waker and Galaxy examples were in support of art direction relative to the hardware it's on and the context of the game's environment ultimately dictating the overall visual style of a game. Zelda Wii would look better on higher end hardware, but I don't really care in the long run as I'm sure it will look fantastic, just like I can sit and view Wind Waker and Mario Galaxy and not for a second think "Wow, this really needs to look better".

That's why I bought up the comparitive argument of Crysis or other games on other systems. I mean really, how many people are quite content with the visuals of something Modern Warfare 2? News flash, it's really very basic on a technical level. IW just have fantastic people doing the art assets and level design. We don't complain that it should be pushing more bells and whistles, even though it theoretically could, because it looks so good as is. Galaxy and Wind Waker are the same for me; they'd look even better on greater hardware, but look so good as is I dont feel it's any kind of problem.

I've given up wishing for things in games that are literally impossible (eg: Zelda with Xbox360/PS3/PC graphics), regardless of how much I would love it, and instead focus on the blatant mistakes developers make regardless of the hardware their games are on.

And I dont see why people are bitching about Nintendo focusing on profit. They still produce games with tons of genuine love and top tier game design, and every other **** developer and publisher is just the same.