PS3 "sometimes horrific, sometimes beautiful"

By Robert Purchese Published 26 January, 2007

Says Ninja Theory boss.

Heavenly Sword developer Ninja Theory is generally pleased with the PlayStation 3 but admits it can be "an interesting ride" to develop for.

"The PS3 hardware is a bit like a journey into the Marianas trench," said Mike Ball, co-founder of Ninja Theory, speaking to Eurogamer. "There's lots to explore and the deeper you get the more varied the life forms - sometimes horrific, sometimes beautiful."

He added: "Personally I really love the SPUs as they have exceeded our performance expectations and we've got a lot of them to play with."

The comments come after Wednesday night's announcement that the PS3 will launch across Europe on 23rd March at a GBP 425 price-point. Something we hope you know by now.

NDAs have stopped most first party developers talking about the console, but Ball remains excited and optimistic about the future.

"Currently the machine offers a massive leap in gaming and multimedia performance. However, this is only the start of what will undoubtedly be an amazing evolution over the next few years as developers become more and more familiar with the hardware," he said.

Heavenly Sword is a third-person action title for PS3, which combines gorgeous set-pieces with hearty head-chopping sword-play. Sadly it's not confirmed as a European launch title for the console, but is expected in the first half of 2007.

"In summary, PS3 exploration is an interesting ride for developers and that can only result in amazing games for players," Ball concluded.

Have a gander at what we thought when we saw the game at TGS last year, or high-kick your way to Eurogamer TV for the TGS trailer.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

You may also like...

Comments (60) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • killest #1 5 years ago

    Summary: Tough to develop for but theoretically powerful. Zzzzzzz

  • Totoriko #2 5 years ago

    Isn't the boss of Ninja Theory Jez San?

  • DaveyJ666 #3 5 years ago

    PS3 is like gay or somthing.....I didn't know what else to write, looking forward to the weekend and still stuck in smelly work, (watching He-man cartoons!)
    Edited by 1 at 26/01/07 @ 15:35

  • AcidSnake #4 5 years ago

    He-Man?
    Are you talking about the second coming?

    So the PS3 is powerful?
    Well...duh...

  • L42yB #5 5 years ago

    LOL @ AcidSnake :)

  • Venatio Verified Expo Community & Gaming Manager, Eurogamer Network #6 5 years ago

    'Isn't the boss of Ninja Theory Jez San?'

    Jez San is one of the directors but isn't involved day-to-day I don't think.

  • sajtion #7 5 years ago

    what he meant to say was its nightmere to develop for and games would require years to be finished

  • SeesThroughAll #8 5 years ago

    Ball is not the only who actually had something positive to say about the PS3.

    Even John Carmack admitted that even with the asymmetrical design, the PS3 may have a slight technical edge over the 360, but at the cost of much increased complexity. He even said something like "this time around, none of the platforms sucks".

    The bottom line? They're both great consoles. Get over it, fanboys.

  • LOLLERS #9 5 years ago

    except if the devs get horrific, the chances of you getting beautiful become somewhat slimmer...

  • Steroyd #10 5 years ago

    Tell that to those whom developed for the PS2. :)

  • Garulon #11 5 years ago

    "The bottom line? They're both great consoles. Get over it, fanboys. "

    Well _yeah_, but that's not what Sony have been spouting for the last two years, is it? "we're twice as powerful, we're twice as powerful, wah wah wah"

  • Moz #12 5 years ago

    The big problem facing Sony is that the "Horrific" ups dev costs, which puts smaller devs off the PS3 and reduces the number of devs willing to make PS3 exclusives

  • chupachups #13 5 years ago

    Doesn't really make much difference how good the hardware is until people use it to make good games. Loads of failed systems have been perfectly good technically but fallen down because they sold badly and were never developed for properly.

  • Nova5lag #14 5 years ago

    Squeal Piggy Squeal!

  • Steroyd #15 5 years ago

    Lol Sony said their CPU is twice as fast the media ran away with twice more powerful.

    You can check the E3 2K5 presentation if you want probably swirling around the net somewhere.

  • SeesThroughAll #16 5 years ago

    Well, what do you expect them to say? The truth?

    Sony PR: "Well, strictly as a games machine, our product is just about as powerful as the one our competition released about a year ago."

    Somehow, I never see ANY salesman saying the truth. Wonder why?

    I never really take the PR talk from either MS or Sony seriously. Do you?

  • spongebob #17 5 years ago

    Maybe PS3 will become a guilty pleasure. People will play it secretly and then crap on it in the interweb. This way you'll still remain your net cred!

  • DaveyJ666 #18 5 years ago

    @ AcidSnake - yea the new He-man, pretty cool show never seen it before, recognise a loto f the old characters.

    He-man versus the Snakemen, quite gnarly!...................hold on a minute!!! Are you one of the Snakemen?!

  • spongebob #19 5 years ago

    PR is never about the truth. It's about half of the truth, the one which is not bad :)

  • sanctusmortis #20 5 years ago

    On the plus side, it means a lot of developers convert across to 360 with ease or start there, so both machines get good games.

  • JonFE #21 5 years ago

    Steroyd said : "Lol Sony said their CPU is twice as fast the media ran away with twice more powerful."

    Do you mean that the "2.18 teraflops of performance mentioned in EG's famous The Real Next Generation article was not part of Sony's E3 2005 announcement?
    Edited by 1 at 26/01/07 @ 17:23

  • lotteryman82 #22 5 years ago

    well someone had to come out and a say a good word for PS3 actually it was about time. no matter lies or small twists of truth PS3 is powerful kit perhaps equal to 360 perhaps slightly better the issue is if sony can keep taking rabbits out of the magic hat coz devs really used magic to create some games on PS2 some other devs created incredible stuff that never thought it come out of that box

    if that goes on it will never be a matter of specs but till then enjoy ur 360s and Wiis
    there is so much time to see what ll happen but then again RISE fanboys ( me included ) forums are so much more fun with us around lol

  • smelly #23 5 years ago

    "perhaps slightly better ".

    .. That's the problem.. is it 425 pounds better?

  • jynxce #24 5 years ago

    Horrific? Not our problem. You decided to develop exclusively for Sony's platform out of some sort of obligation, then deal with the high costs involved and low returns from the paltry installed base...

  • The_Programmer #25 5 years ago

    "Currently the machine offers a massive leap in gaming and multimedia performance"

    Over what exactly. Must be the Wii as it's certainly not the Xbox 360 as we now know.

  • yagisencho #26 5 years ago

    "The PS3 hardware is a bit like a journey into the Marianas trench," said Mike Ball, co-founder of Ninja Theory, speaking to Eurogamer. "The pressure in the seven cores is immense. And the entire PCB substrate is covered in diatomaceous ooze."

  • Rambaldi #27 5 years ago

    "PS3 exploration is an interesting ride for developers and that can only result in amazing games for players"

    Sorry, but no. Someone 'exploring' a musiclal instument can lead to amazing music, but exploring processing equipment? I think not.

  • Steroyd #28 5 years ago

    Do you mean that the "2.18 teraflops of performance mentioned in EG's famous The Real Next Generation article was not part of Sony's E3 2005 announcement?

    I'm positive that Sony's E3 presentation back then they compared the 218GFLOP performance of Cell compared to what the Xenon had which was half and said the Cell was twice as fast --- keyword.

    I think it was the media themselves that added 1.8TFLOP from the RSX on top of Cell as well as added the Xenos and Xennon and said "ZOMG PS3 has 2 times teh POWAH!!!

    I'm not saying Sony didn't make the comparison but I'm sure the press made it out more than what Sony actually said.

  • Rambaldi #29 5 years ago

    Indeed, it's like: "because we've no option, we've learned to love it's mistakes"

    How romantic...

  • SeesThroughAll #30 5 years ago

    Easier to use dev tools on the XBox side, that's just taken for granted, that wasn't my point.

    "But the honest truth is that Microsoft dev tools are so much better than Sony's," he said. id intends to keep catching the PS3 project up with Xbox 360 development, and not the other way around.
    None of my opinions have really changed on that. I think the decision to use an asymmetric CPU by Sony was a wrong one"

    Again, his main complaints are: asymmetric design, and dev tools still not quite as good as those for the XBox360. However, he does state that the situation with the dev tools improved a lot when moving from the PS2 to the PS3. The sentence I quoted is a reference to that. He did mention - diplomatically avoiding to name the consoles - that the PS2 really was a complete nightmare to work with, but that the situation is not bad on the PS3.

    My point is, that contrary to what some people like to believe:

    1. He's not bashing or downplaying the hardware capability.
    2. He stated that the PS3 dev tools are much better to work with than the PS2 ones.

    Is this negative?

    Or are the superior dev tools from the 360 - especially for developers who traditionally worked in the PC - the only thing that matters?
    Edited by 1 at 26/01/07 @ 22:36

  • thefjk #31 5 years ago

    PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ... PS3... ... Ninjas... ...

    WTF?!

  • SeesThroughAll #32 5 years ago

    I'm not disputing the raw power of the PS3, just your take on Carmacks view.

    I didn't twist what he said into "the PS3 is better than the 360". But I hope you're not twisting what he said into "the PS3 is crap". ;)

    Oh, and I did read what he said, btw.
    Edited by 1 at 26/01/07 @ 23:04

  • SeesThroughAll #33 5 years ago

    No of course I'm not and I wasn't accusing you of being biased either, I just read the interview and obviously got a different feeling from it than you did :)

    Fair enough.

    When I read the interview, I took the fact that MS supplies dev better devtools than Sony as granted, so there's no surprise if he says they're much better imo.

    I was pleased to hear, however, that the PS3 devkits have evolved from the reputed mess they were on the PS2. He made this pretty clear in his G4 interview too.

  • thinktank #34 5 years ago

    Applauds Kato and SeeThroughAll on debate that didn’t descend into petulance.

    /lowers eyebrows

    I personally think the dev tool situation mirrors the xbox live situation. With MS delivering on both these fronts Sony are forced to compete. Although they are behind in both aspects, they are improving compared to PS2 as stated by SeesThroughAll. Which can only be a good thing for competition between the two platforms.

  • smoothn00dle #35 5 years ago

    yeah, dev is not easy. If a game developer say it is easy, one good game per year that is serious mistaken.

    Xbox360 directx legacy vs PS3 assembly level coding

    Xbox360 will easier to code because directx. Directx was for PC game developer to create game on multiple hardware specification. The issue with that, it just don't encourage game developers to access the hardware directly. For example: On Windows XP, a directx game will run on every directx support video card but the game won't take advantage of the each video card's strength.

    PS3 & PS2 approach
    No directx. Game developer are encourage to write the game from bottom up. All the way down to graphic card and possessor, using assembly level programming mix with some abstract coding. It's sure harder to write but the game developer has more control and optimizing the hardware performance. As time go by, developers will find more new ways to breakthrough performance bottle neck. For example PS2 Tekken Tag Tournament(First Generation PS2 game) vs Tekken 5(Year 2005)

    P.S This comment is base on my knowledge from reading Game developer interview and variety of article on console game development. I never develop any console games for either Xbox or PS. If any game developers here has different opinion on this issues, please point it out to me with reference and support. I would love to hear it *v*

    @myiagros Thanks. Tekken Tag
    Edited by 2 at 27/01/07 @ 06:45

  • myiagros #36 5 years ago

    "yeah, dev is not easy. If a game developer say it is easy, one good game per year that is serious mistaken.

    Xbox360 directx legacy vs PS3 assembly level coding

    Xbox360 will easier to code because directx. Directx was for PC game developer to create game on multiple hardware specification. The issue with that, it just don't encourage game developers to access the hardware directly. For example: On Windows XP, a directx game will run on every directx support video card but the game won't take advantage of the each video card's strength.

    PS3 & PS2 approach
    No directx. Game developer are encourage to write the game from bottom up. All the way down to graphic card and possessor, using assembly level programming mix with some abstract coding. It's sure harder to write but the game developer has more control and optimizing the hardware performance. As time go by, developers will find more new ways to breakthrough performance bottle neck. For example PS2 Tekken 3(First Generation PS2 game) vs Tekken 5(Year 2005)

    P.S This comment is base on my knowledge from reading Game developer interview and variety of article on console game development. I never develop any console games for either Xbox or PS. If any game developers here has different opinion on this issues, please point it out to me with reference and support. I would love to hear it *v*     "



    a very well made point.

    But i assume you were refering to Tekken 5 compared to Tekken Tag not Tekken 3, as Tekken 3 was a PS1 game.
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 01:39

  • grandmaster Verified Director, Digital Foundry #37 5 years ago

    PS3 has a toolchain just like Xbox 360, complete with libraries for accessing all parts of the hardware. There is no "encouragement" for writing directly to any of the hardware at all. It's just that the toolchain is not as good as the 360's.

  • penhalion #38 5 years ago

    Hmmm Carmak said none of the platform suck, before attempting to use them. At the point he said it we had all (developers) only seen paper tech specs and cell chip demos.

    Now the reality sinks in as you actually write for the thing (hence his change in stance toward 360). It's all well and good creating a completely new chip layout but, as is often the case, the reality of it's use only hits you after the fact.

    The cell is a good number cruncher (the beautiful that he talks about) and useless for AI branching stuff (the horiffic). The memory split (again horrific given xbox one showed how to do this right some years ago).

    In about two years time when people finally figure out how to use the chip in a way that actually benefits games and not blue-ray movie playback, THEN you will see something amazing. Until then I'd simply save up some money really slowly. Incidentally the size of the machine will most likely shrink by then too!

    Edit:

    @Grandmaster

    I take it you haven't seen the PS3 toolchain because, there isn't one. I'm not sure who keeps saying there is. I bet it isn't Sony themselves as they give you reams of documents and some libraries from IBM! You can get UE3 or roll your own on top of the libraries. Currently (and after seeing the price of UE3) most people roll their own!
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 10:06

  • -TKF- #39 5 years ago

    @The_Programmer

    You know something we don´t know yet?

    Or do you have actual concrete proof that the PS3 is not vastly superior to the 360? Or are you just eating up Microsoft PR release with benchmarks on shit that doesn´t matter in 3D games?

  • mrbandersnatch #40 5 years ago

    "PS3 exploration is an interesting ride for developers and that can only result in amazing games for players"

    One word. Gundam.

  • captainrentboy #41 5 years ago

    These are the developers that are using a stupid amount of the PS3's processing power just to get the main character's hair flowing right,as the movement of her crazy red hair is in direct relation to her current mood,or something like that.
    I remember reading it in an interview with them in Edge months back.
    It's good to know where all that cosmic PS3 power goes though isn't it :)
    This game does look rather sexy though,and the PS3 is in desparate need of exclusives like this.
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 14:26

  • Goolz #42 5 years ago

    Incoming hype wars.

  • Calgon #43 5 years ago

    Oh finally...

    Does anyone remember the amount of times Ive predicted that a Sony dev would come out with another "untapped potential" peice? It doesnt mean a right lot to anyone but Sony Fanboys(who might be a bit worried theyve been ripped off... which is never what anyone was trying to say... too expensive? yes). They should have ditched both blue-ray and cell and came out with a console that was right for the time at the right price, neither cell nor blue-ray are necessary in the grand scheem of things. Cell technology sounds interesting but we know they still didnt get the performance they needed(they should have waited till PS4 and matured the technology since there are still many things that fall short of your standard x86 and PPC CPUs). Blue-ray only has greater capacity to offer to gamers and devs... what good is that when you are reading and accessing at speeds far lower than previous DVD drives in your competitors products?

    Heres how it is... the 360 is the cheaper, in someways more powerfull(yes Cell is the more powerfull CPU but a) Xenon isnt miles behind b) we dont know how real-world performance will fare... c) the SPUs arent as flexible as standard PPC cores, so how usefull to devs this "untapped potential" will be is up in the air... as Mr Carmack hinted) and easier to develope for along with having some of the best tools to develope with. 360 may always have this advantage in price and possibly performance(since devs will have an easier learning curve. This is not to say I think 360 will pown PS3 in sales(interesting though, would Xbox have sold at all if PS2 had an equal amount of processing power overall... perhaps stronger in some key areas? I doubt it but Sony has the "cool brand name" factor... Xbox had J.Allard, he almost pulled it off and EG love him for it but it wasnt enough)... MS are in a much stronger position(ALOT better) than last gen though and theres no denying it now.

    PS3, 360 and Wii all have untapped potential, its annoying that Sony always takes this stance, "Oh our console has special utapped potential technology..." to make their hardware seem more special than it really is... has Nintendo, Sega or MS ever tried to use such nonsense? even though they could have the answer is NO.

    edit: before anyone says it... yes I beleive Sony devs are always pressured to make comments like this(Kaz Hirai went around to the devs house personally with a Katana) unlike the majority of Pro 360 comments(Carmack has no association with MS and is a powerfull industry figure in his own right, what gain would he have choosing any sides? the same can be said of 3rd party devs on the list)
    Edited by 5 at 27/01/07 @ 16:43

  • SeesThroughAll #44 5 years ago

    Again, John Carmack has always stated his preference for the XBox360, with his good reasons, but he doesn't trash the PS3 like a MS fanboy would.

    Calgon, why is it you don't accept that the PS3 is not as bad as you want it to be?
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 17:36

  • Calgon #45 5 years ago

    Seesthroughall: My friend you have it all wrong... I will say it(not just to make you happy either) the PS3 isnt the total mess some people feared it would turn out to be. It is a powerfull console yes but so is the 360, they are evenly matched for the most part which is no bad thing... I think this could be a time where we see two competing consoles really being stretched to their limits(which is more value to gamers who wont look back at this generation and think "surely devs could have squeezed a little more out of that machine?";) as devs from both sides try and get the upper hand before all is said and done and I just feel 360 devs will have an easier/faster ride for the reasons stated in my last post.

  • smoothn00dle #46 5 years ago

    @Calgon
    I on the other hand, see BlueRay as positive sign. It differentiate PS3 from other two products. If BlueRay took off,will give PS3 an significant advantage. For example: All new release Video rental support blueRay. When that happens, consumer would buy PS3 like DVD player today.

    The movie Game
    Sony Movies studio have made a number one hit movie every year for the past four years. Right now, it is most successful movie studio, has respect from studios and stars. Halo3 movies is in dead in the water, properly because of Sony movie studio's influence. In Contrast, MGS movie has smooth sailing. Sony studio has a huge movie collection and will deny share it library with M$. The coming MGS, Devil May cry and Spiderman 3 movies, will very likely support BlueRay.

    The window opportunity
    M$ don't own or control any movie studios and media companies. As time go by, it will harder for M$ to get the latest and best of content into the box. Plus Sony brand name and first party game support, it could give Sony a positive multiplying effect. M$ has to figure out an counter strategies quick and act before BlueRay movie arrive.

    @Calgon
    About BlueRay speed, Spinning speed in this case doesn't make it faster. BlueRay uses Blue Laser, which can get more data each read.

    and John Carmack is over-rated. He is M$ guy by default.
    Edited by 5 at 29/01/07 @ 01:22

  • SeesThroughAll #47 5 years ago

    and John Carmack is over-rated. He is M$ guy by default.

    Not really, he is know for taking sides against MS in the OpenGL / Direct3D dillema.

    EDIT:
    Actually bothered reading the rest of your post. Are you doing astroturfing for Sony?
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 19:14

  • smoothn00dle #48 5 years ago

    @SeesThroughAll
    the OpenGl/Directx was almost ten years ago. Carmack is over-rated.
    Which part don't u understand?

  • cyber_nicco #49 5 years ago

    @SeesThroughAll

    >>"But the honest truth is that Microsoft dev tools are so much better than Sony's," he said. id intends to keep catching the PS3 project up with Xbox 360 development, and not the other way around.
    None of my opinions have really changed on that. I think the decision to use an asymmetric CPU by Sony was a wrong one"

    Again, his main complaints are: asymmetric design, and dev tools still not quite as good as those for the XBox360.
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 21:51

  • cyber_nicco #50 5 years ago

    @smoothnoodle

    Well, I don't know where to begin. Quit a lot I disagree with in your post, but I will just stick to one glaring error.

    "About BlueRay speed, Spinning speed in this case doesn't make it faster. BlueRay uses Blue Laser, which can get more data each read."

    You are just plain wrong here. The read speed on the MS DVD drive is something like twice as fast as the read speed on the Blu-Ray on the PS3. This has nothing to do with "spindle speeds", but, rather, is a matter of KB/sec. This is well known and well documented.

    edit: When I say "nothing to do with spindle speeds", I mean that I am only considering data throughput.
    Edited by 1 at 27/01/07 @ 21:48

  • Calgon #51 5 years ago

    cyber_nicco thankyou for saving me a job there ;)

    Also access/seek times are not the same thing as transfer rates and equally important... this extra space might be used to help matters by duplicating all the content on the disc(GTA used this trick on the PS2... which is a game alot of Sony fanboys bring up for the arguement of disk space since it ended up using alot more disk space than most games of last gen, I dont think the xbox disk was the same... better DVD drive and added hard-drive) but even that isnt ideal(still worse than 360 even if all PS3 games use this method... the Oblivion devs have said as much).
    Edited by 3 at 27/01/07 @ 23:55

  • SeesThroughAll #52 5 years ago

    @ cyber_nicco: ???

    What did you repeat me for?

  • smoothn00dle #53 5 years ago

    @cyber_nicco
    "PlayStation 3 version of Oblivion that's sure to ignite fanboy ire"
    [link url=http://www.joystiq .com/2007/01/17/ps3s-blu-ray-drive-speed-could-be-reason-for -oblivion-delay/
    ]http://ww w.joystiq.com/2007/01/17/ps3s-b...[/link]

    Do you know what KB/sec mean? Well Documented? Can u give me one reference on BlueRay KB/sec? Because there is none.

    "Quit a lot I disagree with in your post"
    Which part do u disagree, can u give me an counter argument?

    Edited by 1 at 28/01/07 @ 07:11

  • Twinfalls #54 5 years ago

    Why does this site now always use 'price-point' when 'price' would do perfectly well?

  • Xerx3s #55 5 years ago

    Tell that to those whom developed for the PS2. :)

    tbh, even the best looking games looked shit to what the xbox or pc was showing at the same time so I don't really see your point. :/

    Having said that, the ps2 did show some awesome graphics for what it could do.

  • Xerx3s #56 5 years ago

    yeah, dev is not easy. If a game developer say it is easy, one good game per year that is serious mistaken.

    Xbox360 directx legacy vs PS3 assembly level coding

    Xbox360 will easier to code because directx. Directx was for PC game developer to create game on multiple hardware specification. The issue with that, it just don't encourage game developers to access the hardware directly. For example: On Windows XP, a directx game will run on every directx support video card but the game won't take advantage of the each video card's strength.

    PS3 & PS2 approach
    No directx. Game developer are encourage to write the game from bottom up. All the way down to graphic card and possessor, using assembly level programming mix with some abstract coding. It's sure harder to write but the game developer has more control and optimizing the hardware performance. As time go by, developers will find more new ways to breakthrough performance bottle neck. For example PS2 Tekken Tag Tournament(First Generation PS2 game) vs Tekken 5(Year 2005)

    P.S This comment is base on my knowledge from reading Game developer interview and variety of article on console game development. I never develop any console games for either Xbox or PS. If any game developers here has different opinion on this issues, please point it out to me with reference and support. I would love to hear it *v*

    @myiagros Thanks. Tekken Tag

    Apart from the fact that just about any system ever made supports asm or similar. And the dx on the 360 != dx on the pc.
    I don't know about other programmers but using stuff like asm is preferable when it is relevant. Yes, it takes some more time, but it's better & more optimised (when writing for EmbSys it can result in a code that takes up half the size of others) than HL coding. I'm not a games coder (apart from the odd mobile game & xna) but I think that most games coders use asm or something similar at some point in their game on any platform.

  • Steroyd #57 5 years ago

    tbh, even the best looking games looked shit to what the xbox or pc was showing at the same time so I don't really see your point. :/

    Having said that, the ps2 did show some awesome graphics for what it could do.

    Exactly my point.

    If Sony can transfer that type of mentality over to the PS3 then we have a winner. :)

  • spongebob #58 5 years ago

    In about two years time when people finally figure out how to use the chip in a way that actually benefits games and not blue-ray movie playback, THEN you will see something amazing. Until then I'd simply save up some money really slowly. Incidentally the size of the machine will most likely shrink by then too!

    It did take almost a year before we saw the same thing with X360. It's something that simply happens with every new hardware, and esp. consoles. With Nintendo early adopters seem to always pay for crappy, big product design. If you wait a year or two, you seem to able to buy a more sleek and stylish version of the console.

    Good things come to those who wait..

  • dirigiblebill #59 5 years ago

    @ mrbandersnatch

    I'll see your Gundam and raise you Chromehounds :)

  • Calgon #60 5 years ago

    Erm... DX is an API for multiple PC configurations(and it lets be fair it doesnt do a bad job does it? Guestimates put the amount wasted to around 5-10%, who in their right mind would expect 100% efficiency? Modern PC GPUs have more raw power than the ones featured in any console so it isnt really necessary). The GPUs on PCs are more comparable to Consoles than CPUs are(OS and general seperation of game code from hardware that Console devs dont have to think about... the efficiency here is probably about 50% higher on a console when done right)

    Xbox360's API is custom(of course they made sure porting to and from PC wouldnt be too difficult, XNA was all about that)... not only that its been described as paper thin(their best yet) which means less resources wasted(more efficient). Ideally this is what devs want something that makes their jobs easier(thats what they are for) yet doesnt comprimise on efficiency, from the comments given by the likes of John Carmack it sounds like theyve nailed it this time(its not restrictive so there are more benifits for using it than against it... it would be a waste to ignore it, this is one of 360s main advantages and one that a few Sony devs have said Sony is lacking... they could have atleast made more of an effort even though its unlikely they could match MS on the Software side).

    Of course in 2 years Sony devs will have gotten the hang of Cell but 360 isnt going to stand still either(its got just as much "untapped potential" if not more... in other words theres just as much for 360 devs to learn and they should advance faster too) the PS3 will likely always be a step behind 360(these machines REALLY are evenly mached for the most part*no Cell wont ever make 360 games look miles behind if anything they will need it to keep up in some cases* yet PS3 devs are in for a tougher time, its always going to take them longer and cost them more). None of these arguements really matter anymore, we can let the games speak for themselves as time goes by and enjoy the ride as MS and Sony crack the whips on the poor devs every time they want to show "the real next-gen is here on our console".
    Edited by 3 at 01/02/07 @ 01:44