Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent Comments by Tom Bramwell

The 8/10 is for game play and not technical issues....

I have to call that one... Since when do bad frame rates and audio issues not affect the rating of a game? Dropped frames affect game play... They detract from the overall experience... Rating the game 8/10 is telling the publisher its "OK" to do crappy ports... An 8/10 is a "Recommended Purchase" in my books...

I realize that Eurogamer has a large interest in facilitating the sale of product, but if the reviews do not reflect the true quality of the game? Where is the journalistic integrity?

I expect the reviews to be more critical.

I'm going to apply for a restraining order.

lol

One thing no one has mentioned is that the P3 version of SCDA uses v-sync so it has a lower framerate but no ghastly tearing like the 360 version. That does not excuse the poor textures and other technical issues though...

I have to call that one... Since when do bad frame rates and audio issues not affect the rating of a game? Dropped frames affect game play... They detract from the overall experience... Rating the game 8/10 is telling the publisher its "OK" to do crappy ports... An 8/10 is a "Recommended Purchase" in my books...

I realize that Eurogamer has a large interest in facilitating the sale of product, but if the reviews do not reflect the true quality of the game? Where is the journalistic integrity?

I expect the reviews to be more critical.

Well, surely it depends how much the reviewer feels that issue affects the gameplay overall? It is stated that said problems 'lessen' and that the rest of the game is comparable to the 360, and of course the conclusion did give a reasoning for how (little?) those problems factored into the eventual score, even whilst recommending the (higher review rated) 360 version ahead of it.

I've not played the game, in any case, so I'm not going to argue with the experience of either the reviewer or those who have and disagree with it. However, it just strikes me as, I dunno, distasteful to be shouting 'journalistic integrity' and making allegations of corruption because you disagree with the score and AFAIK haven't even played the game in question (please correct me if wrong in this).

Especially as it's not as if Ubisoft / Sony are the only companies who advertise on games websites - do we assume that any review of a game whose published has an advertising budget will be biased, then? Fair enough if it's something like Driv3r which turns out to be awful, but as far as I know this isn't that case.

I've heard of many developers complaining about the PS3's RAM situation compared to the 360. The way it's split up seems to be an obstacle to developers getting the best graphics out of the machine. This seems to be the situation here, with the PS3 simply not having enough RAM available for the GPU to use for textures.

But for a machine allegedly twice as powerful as the 360 (or so say Sony) this doesn't bode well. In both multiformat and exclusive games the 360 has a graphical edge over the PS3 thus far. Either devs are having trouble with the PS3 or it simply isn't all that more powerful than the 360 (if at all).

Not that it matters, the power of a system is never tested by ports is it?

No, it just uses a newer shader thingy that was released as a patch on the 360 iirc.

If you read the review, it seems to say that the frame rate issues and that are only noticable in the first section of the game, just in true EG fasion they have focuse aslmost entirely on that point.

I'm not yet conserned about how future ports are going to turn.

Just have to remember what Need for speed most wanted was like on the 360 (Don't think the frame rate ever got above 25fps and most of the time it seemed more like 20!) to know that it's still early days.

Well, Need for Speed tends to stay around 20fps on whatever platform, no matter how powerful...

I think it's one of the worst game engines ever, at least from NFS:Underground onward. Not that this detracted anything from its success.

WaxBrazillian = IGNORE

@aldo_14

My link to the Rein quote wasn't to prove there's a 'problem', just that these little remarks can easily snowball into problems without anyone checking the source quote. :)

I've given this a 7. Surely that fixes things...

Shit, I gave it something other than a 7 by accident...

aldo_14 - "distasteful to be shouting 'journalistic integrity' and making allegations of corruption because you disagree with the score and AFAIK haven't even played the game in question (please correct me if wrong in this). "

Very Dramatic... but I think your over reacting to my comments... As a gamer/consumer I'm looking to sites like Eurogamer to provide critical reveiws of games/hardware to assist with my purchase decisions... If I am unable to question the quality/standard of a review then I think we have a real problem.

No... I do not own the game, hence the reason for reading the review in the first place.

I found the "Scoring Metric" for Eurogamer in the FAQ's it appears to be a "Black Art" http://www.eurogamer.net/scoring_policy....

/Deleted origional post by accident lol...

Oh... and if Wax Wing Nut responded to my ignore posts... then he really needs some help... lol

@Manic Mouse: "I've heard of many developers complaining about the PS3's RAM situation compared to the 360. The way it's split up seems to be an obstacle to developers getting the best graphics out of the machine. This seems to be the situation here, with the PS3 simply not having enough RAM available for the GPU to use for textures"

http://www.ddj.com/dept/64bit/197801624?...

"the most radical peculiarity for programmers is that SPEs have.. a 256-KB-scratchpad memory called "local store" (LS)... All the variables you declare are allocated in the LS and must fit there. Larger data structures in main memory can be accessed one block at a time; it is your responsibility to load/store blocks from/to main memory via explicit DMA transfers. You have to design your algorithms to operate on a small block of data at a time, fitting in the LS. When they are finished with a block, they commit the results to main memory, and fetch the next block...

"The PPE, SPEs, and memory controllers are connected by the EIB bus... Cell programmers face issues of process mapping and congestion control—traditional problems of parallel computing. Additionally, the larger the blocks are, the higher their EIB transfer efficiency. So programmers are pressured to keep data structures small enough to fit the LS, but large enough to be transferred efficiently on the EIB...

"Unfortunately, the compiler won't help you with parallelization, choice of optimal data structure size, scheduling of transfers, SIMDization, loop unrolling, and the like. You have to do that manually."

It's a sad fact that many of those purchasing this game will neither know nor care that it looks better on 360.

Had this on the 360 and thought it was rubbish and it looks like the PS3 version is following suit. Just glad I traded it in when I did!

Thank you Gurgeh for information that is of no interest to any gamer.

Important thing that needs to be stressed:
The score for the PS3 version of Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Double Agent is misleading. Read the review and see for yourself.

"In short, the Cell offers an impressive potential for performance. However, due to its architecture and limited support offered by the compiler, you can't expect to exploit this potential by just recompiling your current applications"
http://www.ddj.com/dept/64bit/197801624?...

Too next gen for it's own good, then and certainly a bad candidate for 'porting'. Let's just hope the sales figures pick up over the next few years or devs may never bother to go to the effort of truly exploiting it's power.

Anyhoo:

Ask me to recount SS1 and I can. I vaguely remeber SS2. I never could be bothered to finish SS3 and SS4 left me cold.

I don't like MGS either.

I DO love stealth games though, so...WHERE THE FECK IS THIEF!!!!

"This does seem to be a reoccurring problem doesn't it? I mean as far as I can see, the only PS3 port that is actually as good as the 360 version is Oblivion (as mentioned by others) which has had an extra years dev time. I think it's pretty shocking tbh, I mean I doubt the 360 ports of VF5 or DMC4 will be borked (in fact they may even offer more functionality). Ok, we all know that a 'lazy' port has nothing to do with the power of the PS3 etc but surely a console is only as good as the games it plays, I'm unimpressed so far."

Well if it was one or two games then I wouldn't think much of it but how many are we into now - double figures yet? Not only are the PS3 versions not clearly better in some way but some of them aren't even complete! (VT online etc).

I really do strongly suspect that we're seeing difficulties with the PS3s h/w architecture here and it's severely hampering development timescales. It's to be expected of course but it's the degree of it that would have me concerned. I'd have thought esoteric architecture + 'power of the Cell etc' would have cancelled themselves out somewhat and you'd end up with something decent rather than falling short of milestones met by the 360 12 months ago ...

Anyway, it is what it is. I just hope they get their shit together and start releasing some quality PS3 titles. 360 owner or not, I don't want this to be a one-sided contest and it's starting to look a little embarassing ...

""The PPE, SPEs, and memory controllers are connected by the EIB bus... Cell programmers face issues of process mapping and congestion control—traditional problems of parallel computing. Additionally, the larger the blocks are, the higher their EIB transfer efficiency. So programmers are pressured to keep data structures small enough to fit the LS, but large enough to be transferred efficiently on the EIB...

"Unfortunately, the compiler won't help you with parallelization, choice of optimal data structure size, scheduling of transfers, SIMDization, loop unrolling, and the like. You have to do that manually." "

K, well that explains some of it then lol

They're going to need to develop an engine within an engine to cope with all that shit, meanwhile the games get f*cked ...

PS: re "engine within and engine"; doubtless this is what the Unreal Engine guys are referring to when they say they're going to try and improve how it runs on PS3 ...

An even better quote:

"Software that exploits the Cell's potential requires a development effort significantly greater than traditional platforms. If you expect to port your application efficiently to the Cell via recompilation or threads, think again."

Bugger.

Firstly on the whole Oblivion issue, from what I have heard there is very little difference betwwen the 360 and PS3 when the new shader patch is applied, is this wrong?

Just a thought but a lot of people are saying that the PS3 is graphically less powerfull weather due to memory or chip, but better at physics.

As far as I am aware in games physics is mostly used to create more particles in destruction, or movement.

I rememeber reading a review of a new physics card for PC's about a month ago and the end result claimed the physics was brilliant when exploited but overall led to problems and slowdown as the graphics card struggled to render the polly's the physics card was requesting, could this be a problem for the PS3?

Please don't take this as an attack on the PS3 but I am intrigued as to your opinions

Don't buy these crappy ports! It's the only way they'll get the message unfortunately:-(

bonker wrote "I really do strongly suspect that we're seeing difficulties with the PS3s h/w architecture here and it's severely hampering development timescales."

This is pure bs.

Excerpts from Yosuke Hayashi interview (director for Ninja Gaiden Sigma).

..we want to provide an experience that looks totally new and fresh. One of the best ways to do that was to have a game that runs at a 1080p with a constant 60 fps, and utilizes real-time self-shadowing. No other game as accomplished all three of these goals at once.


As far as A.I. goes people have played our game before will see that we've made some subtle improvements. A lot of it has to do with using all the Cell's SPU processors.


And by the look of the screen shots this game is really looking good.
http://www.gamepro.com/sony/ps3/games/pr...

I believe that many developers just suck. They don't want to put any affort into learning how to program the PS3, they try to port their PC/X360 code over to the PS3 and are happy that it works without any greater effort. Developers that learn to program the PS3 will get a lot of juice out of it. Just lool at the PS2 and what they've managed to squeeze out of it.

Hansi320: Unless you were already involved in programming a hardware demanding PS3 title I'd rather believe the developing studios and people with a little insight in technology and ignore your "this is bs" comment.

Parallelization is difficult enough already and the PS3's design definetly doesn't make it easier as far as memory management is concerned. And yes this will eventually be a problem because you either don't use multiple SPEs or you only use a fraction of the power. Neither way is desireable solution.

Just lool at the PS2 and what they've managed to squeeze out of it.

Fair point. Too bad it took nearly 10 years whereas the UE3 engine worked wonders only a year and a half after the 360's launch.

I can understand that it is hard to learn how to utilize the PS3 in an effective way. But like this developer says, "http://www.gamesradar.com/us/ps3/game/ne... it sounds like a bad excuse from developers that haven't put in the time necessary to really push the PS3.

Hansi320


"I can understand that it is hard to learn how to utilize the PS3 in an effective way. But like this developer says, "http://www.gamesradar.com/us/ps3/game/ne... it sounds like a bad excuse from developers that haven't put in the time necessary to really push the PS3."

Until there are more ps3 then 360 in the developers main market they wont be arsed. That is the unfortunate fact of the marketplace. Therefore expect the jap developers to get up to speed first, followed by europe and america in about 1-2 years time. (so games out 2-3 years will benefit)

(there will of course be noble exceptions, I am referring to the "average" game)

I guess if there was no 360 and no management than it would indeed be an excuse. But don't forget that titles these days cost more than ever. Looking at it this way:

360, 1 1/2 years development, 10 million userbase
PS3, 3 years development, 1 million userbase

It it is easier to develop for the 360 which it obviously is (if only because it has been around one year and developers already have experience with the hardware) then I can imagine why developers are more likely working towards the 360 and porting to the PS3.

It is an approach Nintendo took with the DS and the Wii. An earlier codename of the DS was developer's system (or developer system) and just look at the prices of Wii SDKs. The thing is incredibly cheap compared to other console SDKs and the Wii is easier to develop for just because the hardware is limited. You don't have to worry about shaders or models using tons of polygons - the hardware could not cope with it anyway and it will never look as good as the 360 so why try. It takes a huge burdon off the developers. Not everyone can afford artists working on high poly models and hire people to do the animation. The Wii gives smaller developers the chance to develop games that don't look like shit compared to other games because the Wii games of big developers simply cannot look all that much better because of the hardware. There is much less risk developing for the Wii because the SDK is cheap and you don't need 2 years or more to come up with a game.

Comparing the 360 with the PS3 it is very likely the same. The 360 is easier to develop for and if I can get two good looking games on both the 360 and the PS3 then this is clearly prefereble to just one really good looking PS3 game and lacking a 360 version.

The reason why so many games this generation are multiplatform is the fact that the costs are so high you simply cannot risk releasing the game on a single platform only and thus having only half the userbase.

It was a bad decision to make the PS3 hard to master albeit it being very powerful. It seems not all too many developers are wanting to take the risk of developing for the PS3 only or with the PS3 as the first console in mind besides the usual exclusive games like Final Fantasy which would probably appear on the PS3 only too if it was only half as powerful as the 360.

In the long run games will look really good on the PS3 but I think that it will cost Sony a lot in the early years. I really cannot see the PS3 overtaking the 360 and the Wii is a very strong competitor too.

Well I wrote too much anyway. But even if it is an excuse of developers I can totally understand why they don't want to put in the effort. Why do it the hard way when there is an easy (and much more cheaper) way too?

haha...the excuses. How about the following analysis.

1. PS3 is completely overrated
2. To get a game to look nearly as good as its 360, it takes an extra year of development, because the architecture of the HARDWARE SUCKS!
3. GPU on 360 is flat out better than the PS3
4. You clowns can wait another 10 year to fully realise the Bull Shit power of the PS3, which sony has promised and LIED to you since day one. I've been enjoying the 360 for a year and half now. The 360 delivered it's promises earlier, better, and at a cheaper price point.

5. 360 is just a better product, end of story.

My my what a trainwreck.

Sometimes you wonder if the site would be better without the article commentary.

Surpised by how different the quality is between version though;

Screen comparisons

GamesConnoisseur
10-Apr-07 14:35:47 The worrying issue is that for multi-platform releases, multi-platform owners would likely choose X360 version over PS3 version if the shoddy port becomes the norm.

Why is that a worrying issue - unless you work for Sony?

Der_tolle_Emil
"Fair point. Too bad it took nearly 10 years whereas the UE3 engine worked wonders only a year and a half after the 360's launch."

So your saying the XBox360 has reached it's limit? It took 10 years for devs to squeeze every last ounce out of the PS2, it will take 10 years for devs to do the same for both XBox and PS3.

And if people are going to pick on random features of the cell processor, at least just start by reading the manual :)
http://www-306.ibm.com/chips/techlib/tec...

I'm not saying the 360 has reached its limit but devs were a lot quicker achieving visuals that far surpass everything else on the console. I cannot remember any other console where only a year after the lauch games already made such a leap forward.

Obsequious: To be honest I never was all that much interested in the PS2 and its games. Actually I was thinking more of the xbox and also the cube and maybe even the n64. The really stunning games, at least what I call stunning, all came at the very end. It was Conker for the xbox and the N64 and Resident Evil 4 for the cube. I own a n64 and a cube and as far as I remember it took more than a year for a game like Gears of War to appear.

All I'm saying is that I think that PS3 developers will need more time to really get the hardware. Of course I cannot tell for sure and we will see in a year from now. The technology of the PS3 is new territory for many developers and it simply takes time to master it.

I heard somewhere that 360 was but shooters...
I wonder if PS-fundamentalists enjoy this RPG ?

Aren't some of you tired of waiting, I mean since 2005 I hear you say "in a year!!! we'll see it in a year!!!", FFS, what about now ?

I'll be playing Xbox 1040 and Wii2k10 and you'll still saying "the Cell! the Cell! in one year, in one year". C'mon, the party is now!

Der_Tolle_Emil: Obsequious: To be honest I never was all that much interested in the PS2 and its games. Actually I was thinking more of the xbox and also the cube and maybe even the n64. The really stunning games, at least what I call stunning, all came at the very end. It was Conker for the xbox and the N64 and Resident Evil 4 for the cube. I own a n64 and a cube and as far as I remember it took more than a year for a game like Gears of War to appear.

All I'm saying is that I think that PS3 developers will need more time to really get the hardware. Of course I cannot tell for sure and we will see in a year from now. The technology of the PS3 is new territory for many developers and it simply takes time to master it.

Hey Der_Tolle_Emil, nice way to prove that your previous posts about PS3 were actually not based on facts at all and were fanboy ranting. "As far as I remember" just doesn't cut it if you want to back your opinions with factual information.

I think you should seriously think twice next time before posting. And while you are it, check the screenshots of PS3 games that are going to be released around this September (Lair, Ratchet & Clank, Heavenly Sword and maybe KillZone). These are games that are coming out in the same time as for example Gears of War came out on X360's developing cycle.

At the same, there's no excuse to jerky graphics and flat out glitches in a game. But this is a completely different issue to the one you talked about, which was the quality of the graphics and special effects.

"or, just don't buy the fifteenth sequel in a series, especially one with annual updates."

Guess that rules out the Entire Games Offering of EA then.

I know my latest comment makes my earlier once look plain stupid. I just think that we are near the point where the effort it needs to use all the available technology is becoming just too expensive and time consuming. There will be the time where the hardware will be able to do more than developers can actually put into a game. The PS3 is a powerful machine but I still believe that the effort it takes to utilize the power will become too much for some developers. And the developer comments about the PS3 sound exactly like that - it takes a lot to master the PS3, possibly more than developers want to. Especially since there are alternatives (360). The PS3 hardware concept may seem somewhat unbalanced and I truly believe that this will affect game development in the first couple of years.

I thought it was appearent in the PS2's lifecycle as well. I guess I was wrong.

Good news about PS3 for the developers is that in time all the major commercial game engines (and game developing frameworks) will be updated to use the maximum potential of the machine. This means of course that most developers don't need to know all of the inner workings of the machine, they just need to licence the right toolsets. At the same time it means that even smaller developers can easily get in on the game.

This is one of the biggest differences between developing for new generation machines and the older ones. Developers don't build everything from ground up. This way they can concentrate on making good games and interesting gaming experiences and still get all the special powers of different platforms they're developing for.

So, in a way, I think people are overstressing the cross-platform developing in the longer run. The real battles between different gaming platforms will be fought with exclusive games, and even then it's not about the technical aspects that count, but the overall experience.

Of course there will always be screenshot comparisons and other bull****, but that's obvious when testosterone filled young males try to show off. Whose got the best bump mapping is not far off from best bipecs or biggest subwoofer. Boys will be boys...

I giggled when I read some diehard Sony fan refusing to accept that PS3 version can be so bad in place compared to X360, insisting that it was a fake. If you still have doubt go see IGN Insider head to head comparsion or even better waste your money on PS3 inferior Double Agent

Gizmo's link above can take you to a photo side by side comparsion

And no I am not Sony staff, I only commented generally that it is worrying especially for those expecting differently, and consider the costs of huge investment to get the over hyped console.

So, in a way, I think people are overstressing the cross-platform developing in the longer run. The real battles between different gaming platforms will be fought with exclusive games, and even then it's not about the technical aspects that count, but the overall experience.

You are right about the exclusives and that technical aspects don't count there. But with multiplatform games they somewhat do have a slight importance. You can compare 360 games with their PS3 counterparts and you can notice a difference. Although I would wait for the PS3 games that are ported onto the 360. If they look better on the 360 too than it will be interesting to know why. Otherwise I also don't think that ports really show how powerful a machine can be.

As for winning the battle by exclusives: I is still a huge factor because there will be people buying 360s for Halo and there will be PS3 buyers just to play the next Final Fantasy but they are far less important than in earlier generations now that so many titles are multiplatform.

Kato wins the thread.

As long as the bad ports are for games I don't care for, it's all fine :)

What is all this ruckus? SC:DA sucks on ALL platforms. MGS3 pips it easily. Note how almost no one actually discussed the game itself.

Ubi's ports are shite and you know it. Let's give the PSThree a chance. :P

/devil's advocate mode.