PS3's power locked away, says Free Radical

[shams]

I think Sony has the wrong approach now - almost certainly.

I'm not sure what "types" of games they are trying to create - and maybe I won't understand until I see something completely mindblowing.

But this is a GAMES machine for heavens sake, not some distributed weather simulator device that  the planet relies on. Surely we have reached a stage in the industry where "ease of development" is more important than "absolute power, via banging your head against a wall"?

Look at Unreal Engine 3. Everyone loves it - why? Sure it has great tech, with some cool features - but its the EDITING tools - the ease of use - that really sells it. It means you can make better games in less time, with less money. And this is more important than ever.

By the time people get the "hang" of the PS3, MS will be ready to release the next Xbox. It will be EASIER to program (better libraries, higher level APIs, etc..), and will blow away the PS3 (at that stage of being "unlocked") technically.

...

As devices get more powerful, the importance of "ease of use" increases, and squeezing everything out of the device is less important. It was critically important with the PS1 generation, very important with the PS2 (although the PS2 never competed with the Xbox)... and not really important at all with this generation.

Look at the Wii - and how well it is doing. Even a monkey developer should be able to get several times the power of a Wii out of a PS3... and that's without even trying.

Sony are digging themselves a deeper hole - and have just developed a much bigger shovel.