Nintendo successfully patents external console upgrade box

Nintendo has just been officially granted a patent for its new "Supplemental Computing Device," an external box that boosts console processing speed and network latency.

[ApocalypseShadow]

"Now you're playing with powah"...... Additional Powah...
https://m.youtube.com/watch...

[UltraNova]

Ok if NX will be upgradable then 3rd party devs might finaly jump on the Nintendo bandwagon again, so will I if the prices are right of course.

@next

Yep you are probably right but still it would be an interesting turn of events.

[NextGenCeo]

It is not Upgradable console. TV dock same time has fast chips for latency and pumping low handheld resolation to higher for the Full HD or evet 4k TV. That`s means not Upgradable console or device for us.
And I trust Eurogamer web site. They did not say `NX is a Upgradable console`.

[herbs]

NextGenCeo your logic is broken. This could easily be a replacement dock for the NX or it could connect to the existing one and just because Eurogamer didn't mention it doesn't mean anything at all because they don't have all the facts yet.

[herbs]

The really amazing thing about this patent is the ability for these units to daisy chain over a network. What this potentially means is that once there are enough of these in the wild computational power will become limitless making specs basically irrelevant.

[kneon]

@herbs

Not going to happen. Are you willing to let other people use up your bandwith just so their game will a run little better?

[freshslicepizza]

you have to hand it to nintendo for keeping people guessing even until now what the nx truly is. the downside of course is how many dev kits are actually out there to third party?

if they are going to go after a hybrid type system i don't want to have to pay for hardware i wont use. meaning if there is a tablet or some form of portability that then connects to the tv or some external box that adds performance then how does that serve customers like me who just want a regular console?

nintendo, if you are listening, i don't want to pay extra for gimmicks

[Dunban67]

some of you guys did not read the article- it would not effect the NX in "that" way

[UltimateMaster]

An interesting concept.
I am guessing that the additional CPU is the handheld NX.
(It better be the smaller CPU and not the main one)

[CrimsonWing69]

Not neccesarily. You assume that every NX owner will do an upgrade. If anything this will fracture the market to the point that it will be even riskier for third-parties to develop for the NX. How much will adopt the upgrade and how many of those adopters will buy the third-party published game as opposed to we have all these NX consoles out in consumers' hands how many will then buy said third-party developed game.

[pcz]

Judging by the picture, the NX is about 5ft tall

[melonfarm3r]

Haha!

[NextGenCeo]

lol lol hahah :D

[conanlifts]

No, japanese people are a bit shorter than westerners.

[Fullmetalevolust]

It's a supah computah! lol

[deafdani]

Symbolic "Funny" bubble for you, man.

[nitus10]

Hasn't this already been done? http://www.pcworld.com/arti...

[darx]

This a casual gamer site who only know console gaming.

[blawren4]

That works out of the box right, no tweaking of any kind?...exactly. No thanks.

[TheCommentator]

At least someone here mentioned it, because the idea isn't new at all.

[its_JEFF]

maybe the one @nitus10 linked doesn't quite work out of the box, but the Razer Core sure does. They released it this year, I believe. This thing must be doing something slightly different, but who know.

[deerain]

What worries me is the fact they were granted the patent when things like this already existed, so now no one else can do this ?

Didn't the mega drive have a disk player add-on, I am sure there was more.

[strayanalog]

64DD 2.0

[Maybay]

That's the Nintendo way (always thinking outside the metaphorical box).

[Cweed]

What in the Samhell is this. Im interested in more details.

[shuvam09]

Seems like Nintendo's version of Microsoft's "Power of the Cloud"...
Given that Tegra is confirmed, it might be based on Nvidia Grid technology...

[Perjoss]

Except an external piece of upgrade hardware is a real thing and not just marketing speak.

[blawren4]

Nothing is confirmed until its confirmed...which is has not.

[Cueil]

cloud compute isn't marketing speak

[nitus10]

@Cueil

Sorry but "cloud computing" is marketing speak. When I learnt about the so-called "cloud" back in the early 1980's we called it "Remote IT Servers" or to put is more simply "Another person's computer". Even today the basics have remained the same.

[northpaws]

I would guess the console itself is a mobile device for you to take it outside with you, then when you are at home, you plug in the external device for additional power to play on TV.

[blawren4]

That's how I see it too.

[jznrpg]

This is an interesting idea , I like it in theory

[drunkenspy007]

It seems like we won't see this anytime soon, which I wouldn't mind if I didn't want to play the new zelda so bad. hopefully they'll release the game on the wii u before then.

[blawren4]

This one is actually plausible. This is what I was hoping for, handheld docks in console for power boost and HD TV output. I have a feeling that major third parties will simply make games that support a fully docked system, If true, I believe the key to be Nintendo NOT requiring both for third parties. Nintendo made games will be on both, and handheld games can easily be on both. I hope Nintendo announces something soon, so we know for sure what you are bringing. At least let us know when you will be announcing. That shouldn't be too hard, right?

[jonivtec]

I think nintendo NX will be a massive hit.Cant wait to get it for me and my son!!

[Pancit_Canton]

It's Nintendo's version of "teh powah of the cloud" lol

[feraldrgn]

If true I could see why Nintendo said they didn't want to reveal details as others could copy it.
It's a simple concept, but it might work.

If it's a handheld first & foremost, with the extra power box being optional & it's not a tablet/pad, then I may get this.
That's if they don't have a seperate project for a dedicated handheld in development.

[antikbaka]

i won't buy NX if as a result i will need to get some extra. It's the same thing that happened with wiiU and external HDD

[deafdani]

The external HDD isn't needed unless you plan to buy a lot of games digitally.

...which, really, isn't that different to PS4 and Xbox One, what with their mandatory game installs and huge 40+ GB patches. I don't even have that many PS4 games, and my hard drive space already got full long ago, so now I'm constantly deleting stuff to play new games.

:/

[antikbaka]

unless you wan't to have more than 1 game actually on WiiU... You can't constantly uninstall games on ps 4, I have around 10 of them.

Your comparison is bull

[Tzuno]

Pff, Nintendo rekt Sony and MS with this :)

[Axonometri]

Could be the patent for the base station that will be included in the NX.

[travelguy2k]

I thought sony already had a patent for something like this...

http://www.gamespot.com/for...

http://www.playstationlifes...

[3-4-5]

* Like the Memory upgrade for N64 but only larger.

They could release NX in 2017 and in 2019 or 2020 release the upgrade for it for $100, that would increase the power of your console.

* ^ What this does is, near the end of a consoles cycle it is usually noticeably outdated.....this will help prevent some of that near the end of the life cycle.

* It will Not Replace Console generations, but it will be something to use in between to keep it slightly more powerful until the next console it ready.

[Fist4achin]

I think they're up to something really cool.

[DiscoMan]

Seems like upgrade-able consoles are gonna be a thing. We'll have to see, obviously.

[Big_Game_Hunters]

This confirms a lot imo

[MasterD919]

It's over 9000!

[Shineon]

I had this idea 15 years ago but I called it a bit booster I was 14 at the time lol

[frostypants]

Junk patent that won't hold up. Plenty of prior art in the computing hardware realm.

[fox007]

It's fairly obvious Nintendo are defo going for an upgradable future rather then starting from zero every gen,in other words you can just keep building a bigger install base if you just keep allowing for upgrades instead of starting from zero with a whole new console/concept every 5 years,so basically as an example the wii sales of over a 100 million and the wiiu's 15 million and the 3ds sales of over 60 million would all be NX sales...