PS3's power locked away, says Free Radical

[shams]

Celb said:

shams said:

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.

Wow put down the hateraid.

Many devs already get the PS3, Factor5 has already taped power that 360 can't do. The amonunt of progressive mesh Lair runs is beyond 360s capability, and they have said its only half the PS3s power.

and whats your point with unrealengine3 ? the engine runs on PS3 so any dev can lease/rent/get it and make PS3 games easy.

 

Hateraid? Nice call! ;)

"Many devs already get the PS3, Factor5 has already taped power that 360 can't do." - this is completely wrong (was going to use a "stronger" word, but refrained myself).  Show me a single cross-platform title (i.e. running on the 360 & PS3) that looks or runs significantly better on the PS3. We have been over this, and there isn't one. Sony have failed to show that the PS3 is a significantly more powerful device that the 360.

"and whats your point with unrealengine3" - did you actualy read what is written? Go up and have a read. I am simply making the point that in todays world "ease of development" is significantly more important than "massive untapped power, that is very difficult to utilise" (given everything else is equal).

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Of course the reality is that everything else is NOT equal. The 360 has a much larger install base than the PS3. Many PS2 exclusives are now either cross-platform, or coming out for the 360 alone. The PS3 is selling significantly slower than the PS2 ever did.

And to top this all off, the significantly weaker consoles/handhelds (Wii, PS2, DS, PSP) are easily outselling both the powerful consoles (360 & PS3).

Not only is the PS3 harder to develop for (*) than every other device on the market, but the market is saying that absolute processing power does not sell. 

Reality has an anti-PS3 bias ;)

(* - a good friend of mine is working on the PS3 engine used by Team Bondi - La Noire - and I have spoken to him at length about the PS3 architecture.  We were both super-hyped when we originally saw the specs, but he has been quite disappointed with the device ever since).