While the PlayStation 3 was a beast to develop for, the PlayStation 4 is proving a much simpler option. However, the console’s horsepower is prompting some headaches among developers – as studios agonise over the best ways to employ all of the platform’s added performance. One such outfit is Compulsion Games, the Canadian company behind Contrast, which still hasn’t quite happened upon the best method to make the most out of the hardware yet.
“It makes it really easy to get onto their platform,” said community manager Sam Abbot when asked about the PS4’s unified architecture and 8GB GDDR5 RAM by Gaming Bolt. “There is so much memory and so many cores on that machine that we’re still scratching our head as to what to do with all of them.”
The light-hearted response indicates that the company’s having a fairly easy time with the machine thus far, and Abbot admitted as much. “It’s definitely a lot simpler than on the previous generation of console, where the architecture was much more divergent from PCs, but it’s also not as simple as cut and paste. Once the industry has had a few months to iron out its kinks, it should be much easier to develop for the PS4 than for the PS3.”
The comments echo those of much of the development community, with Ubisoft Reflections confirming over the weekend that it took just two to three people six months to port upcoming open world racer The Crew to Sony’s impending system. Good news all around, then.
[source gamingbolt.com]
Comments 7
For smaller budget games, developers should just be looking at performance alone. Give me 1080p at 60fps and we'll be fine.
Hadn't heard of this game, but it sounds interesting. Will keep an eye out.
@ShogunRok
Thats exactly how I see it. Nobody expects breathtaking visuals from smaller, less demanding games, nor do they go to them for that sort of thing in the first place. Solid gameplay and smooth performance should be first and formost.
I'm sure devs will find ways to use the horse power whether it's frame rate, effects, graphic details, lighting, etc. Hopefully they keep gameplay at the top of the list, and let the graphics, and everything else fall into place afterwards. Good to know that the PS4 can handle all of them regardless.
lol oh.
Sounds like there's enough memory etc to make everything rendered be dynamic, like when bulletholes first stayed longer than 5 seconds/Jedi Outcast's lightsaber wall marks, but on a huge scale. I'm thinking like having pens that really have ink inside, for example; the end of the doodad, if you will. If you see it, it's actually there and you can manipulate it any number of ways. Destructible environments could use up lots of memory too if they have tons to spare. Exciting!
" the console’s horsepower is prompting some headaches among developers – as studios agonise over the best ways to employ all of the platform’s added performance."
As Cerny said "Easy to learn, difficult to master".
Sweetness!!!
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