Resistance 2 - Nearly 50GB Big!

[MikeB]

@ NJ5

there's no reason to optimize for space if you don't need it for other game data.

Sure there is. With regard to graphics and audio you usually can't make files smaller without loosing data and thus quality. On the PS3 there's less reason to sacrifice on quality.

Game code can be compressed up to about a 2:1 ratio, an ultra fast processor like the Cell cannot improve this ratio only improve decompression time. If you understand how data compression works it's not like a lower quality vs a higher quality JPEG, for game data there cannot be any data loss or you'll end up with a broken game engine.

Data compression works something like this. a=Sony Playstation 3 b= Microsoft XBox 360 c= Nintendo Wii d=rocks! e=sucks!

A compressed message (a lot less data):
adaebdbecdce

Uncompressed message:
Sony Playstation 3 rocks! Sony Playstation 3 sucks! Microsoft XBox 360 rocks! Microsoft XBox 360 sucks! Nintendo Wii rocks! Nintendo Wii sucks!

The better a the compression algorithm can predict what the code looks like the better the compression. For instance if the algoritm does not recognize 'Sega Dreamcast' there's no compression for this. For example:

adaebdbecdce'Sega Dreamcast'd'Sega Dreamcast'e