PS3 - Activision Blizzard "threatens" to stop developing for PS3/PSP

[Coren]

Originally Posted by nu_11

The only thing retarded about Sony's hardware practices may be 256 MB of ram and the Cell processor from what it seems, because it uses about a Geforce 7900 GPU. The memory I understand, but the Cell is arguably the more powerful processor in the next gen consoles if utilized correctly.

As the RAM goes, Sony's big issue there is their OS takes up so much more room than the 360 OS...both have 512 total. Sony's improved that by a huge amount already but still has a fair bit more to go.

Sony splits up their RAM between the CELL and GPU where the 360 has just one pool that both share from. It makes memory usage easier to work with on the 360, but memory access is faster on the PS3 due to having a pipe to each group of memory instead of one pipe to the whole thing like the 360 (kinda oversimplified), but it makes memory balancing harder I'm sure on the PS3.

So still, the PS3 has a fair bit more potential horsepower than the 360, but it's so much more of a pain to use...as evidenced by the PS3 exclusives being the most advanced console games this gen, and multiplat games having traditionally favored the 360 (Though the majority is leveling out pretty nicely between the 2 as companies get used to the PS3, with an occasional game being better on it.)

[Zarcath]

Originally Posted by Erie

Sure it may be more expensive to code the games for ps3, though I really don't know. Do the programmer's get paid more because it's more difficult to code for? I'm sure they're expected to get shit done just as fast as for the xbox.

Edit: Didn't really read your previous post since I'm a bit drunk, but I guess from your perspective the ps3 team gets paid more than the 360 team. Which is understandable I guess, but then again.. I could see them getting paid the same, since they both specialize in different areas.

Anyone in the industry that's worked on both platforms will tell you the PS3 is balls to develop on. We constantly have to drop the bar or place work arounds to make shit work on the PS3.

The nice thing about making a 360 game is that it's guaranteed to work on the PC, essentially developing 2 games for the price of 1. Where as the PS3 is like developing 1 game for the price of 2.

[Del]

I know it's been well known that the PS3 is more difficult to develop for, but can you explain exactly why in detail please? Since you seem to code for games on the PS3 or know people who do. Is it because it's really just that complex, or is it because it's different? Does it use standard programming languages and compilers? Also trying to understand why some devs can handle it so much better than others and why some first party developers look godly in comparison.

[Vorph]

Both systems have pathetically small amounts (512MB) of RAM by today's standards. However, the PS3 still has better, faster, and more efficient RAM, and its memory controller is on-die rather than external.

The stumbling block to coding for the PS3 is the cell processor, because it requires significantly more competence in the programmer's ability to do multi-threading. There is a night and day difference between coding for three 'normal' cores and coding for 1 PPE with 6 SPEs hanging off it.

It has very little to do with DirectX vs. [the PS3 version of] OpenGL. The GPUs in each console are quite similar in performance at the hardware level, though it's likely that the RSX is a bit better simply because the 360 GPU is based on ATI's architecture at the time ATI started going to shit. Also, the RSX is G70-based but it supports some features that weren't available in PC cards until the G80.

Bottom line: multi-threading is hard and multi-threading for the Cell is really fucking hard. Half-assing it with horribly inefficient ported code is possible so that's what most games do. I don't see this ever changing as far as cross-platform titles go, except in the case of games that were developed primarily for the PS3 and then ported elsewhere. Can't say I care anyway, since almost all cross-platform titles that I give a shit about have a PC version as well.

[Szlia]

Originally Posted by Zarcath

The nice thing about making a 360 game is that it's guaranteed to work on the PC, essentially developing 2 games for the price of 1.

I know I am an horrible horrible person, but when I read this I thought: "One bought, one pirated, that's 2 games for the price of one indeed!"

[Caliane]

Originally Posted by Szlia

I know I am an horrible horrible person, but when I read this I thought: "One bought, one pirated, that's 2 games for the price of one indeed!"

As much as bad companies blame piracy for poor sales, they don't like rentals either.

[wild_whiskey]

The expense of porting games to PS3 may have been initially high, but it has levelled out quite a bit, particularly for the big publishing giants. Look at Capcom - they're now churning out games with their framework engine that look damn near identical between the two platforms. DMC4, RE5, SF4 etc. show that they've pretty much mastered the art of multiplatform development.

Ubisoft does a similarly efficient job. In fact, I'd say of modern multi-plat games, very few are still hindered by sloppy port coding, and some developers (Criterion's Burnout: Paradise comes to mind) do come out better on the PS3.

As far as Activision goes, they did a fantastic job making the PS3 port of CoD: World at War.

EA seems to be the only publisher that still struggles with it. Mirror's Edge, Dead Space, and EA Sports games still have notably better 360 versions.

[Vorph]

Pretty sure Rockstar and Volition have proven that a Windows version of a 360-centric game isn't really as much a freebie as people would like to believe either.

[Sean]

Well, let's be fair here. I wouldn't say Capcom is "churning out" games. They put a fuckload of work into their products and it shows over other studios. Though, I may be a bit biased there since a lot of their work is by far my favorite stuff.

Btw, hating on RE5 will make you a soul-less and bad person. =(

[wild_whiskey]

Originally Posted by Sean

Well, let's be fair here. I wouldn't say Capcom is "churning out" games. They put a fuckload of work into their products and it shows over other studios. Though, I may be a bit biased there since a lot of their work is by far my favorite stuff.

Btw, hating on RE5 will make you a soul-less and bad person. =(

I hate on RE5 elsewhere! I'm definitely not hating on it here, it's a very nice-looking game.

When I say "churning out" games, I'm not referring at all to the quality being low... They've been releasing consistently high quality games on the HD systems, and its astonishing that a Japanese publisher is the most successful this gen in terms of being able to keep multiplat games normalized and still great-looking, especially while the other Japanese publishers are having such a difficult time assimilating to the style of current gen tech.

[Sean]

That's not entirely fair - don't forget Konami and Bandai-Namco. MGS4 is one of the most stunning games this generation and Bandai-Namco's fighters are gorgeous.

Sega's team that Valkyria isn't bad either - it's not a high tech game, but it is an incredibly pretty one. I really hope they do a full RPG soon (it's the Skies of Arcadia team).

Though, I guess I just listed all PS3 exclusives and not multiplat games! >< Those guys certainly have adapted to the new tech though.

Also, we've yet to play offerings from Square's main studio too and Final Fantasy XIII looks undeniably fantastic.

Edit: Oh, wait, Bandai-Namco does do cross platforms! The ones I was thinking of though were exclusives.

[Coren]

Originally Posted by wild_whiskey

EA seems to be the only publisher that still struggles with it. Mirror's Edge, Dead Space, and EA Sports games still have notably better 360 versions.

This one made me scratch my head...I thought the consensus was Mirror's Edge and Dead Space are so similar as to be unnoticable between the 2 platforms graphically. (With Mirror's Edge having much less issue with loading on the PS3).

[wild_whiskey]

Originally Posted by Coren

This one made me scratch my head...I thought the consensus was Mirror's Edge and Dead Space are so similar as to be unnoticable between the 2 platforms graphically. (With Mirror's Edge having much less issue with loading on the PS3).

I wish. PS3's Mirror's Edge suffers from a complete lack of anti-aliasing. It looks a lot smoother and nicer running from a 360. Dead Space, which sounds worlds better on the PS3, does have framerate issues, outlined here:

Xbox 360 vs. PS3 Face-Off: Round 15 Face-off - Page 2 // Digital Foundry /// Eurogamer - Games Reviews, News and More

The consensus may be that it won't hinder your enjoyment of the game (certainly it won't, Dead Space can be enjoyed 100% on either platform), but I'm just pointing out that the only publisher that still seems to have issues with porting is EA, as evidenced in the titles I referenced. EA also took care of the much-maligned PS3 port of Orange Box. Perfectly enjoyable, but noticeably worse than on 360.

I'm surprised there is so much backlash regarding my comments. I'm a PSWii non-360 owner but I still recognize a better image when I see it. Almost all of my games are Japanese-developed, but it's pretty well-documented (a cursory glance at the Metacritic top 100 for PS3 would support this) that Japanese developers are having a harder time putting out the audio/visual experience that western developers are delivering with a high budget behind them.

There are outliers and exceptions (MGS4 is in its own class in terms of audio/visual), I'm just stating what seems to be the norm. Even looking at Square, outside of FF13 and FF13VS, which look incredible, the other JRPGs from the current gen have been lukewarm at best in terms of visual fidelity. The Last Remnant is an absolute mess, Star Ocean 4 is (IMO) hideous-looking, Infinite Undiscovery is nothing special at all, Blue Dragon and Lost Oddysey both have a host of issues, from frame rates to ridiculous load times.. The only nice-looking JRPGs on PS360 thus far have been Tales of Vesperia and Valkyria Chronicles - both of which (much to their credit) went for simplicity over extravagance.

Bad framerates and jaggy edges don't bother everyone. Hell, one of my favorites from the last few years is No More Heroes, which, to put it politely, can be sloppy at times.

[meStevo]

EA seems to like to take a finished game and then whore it out to another internal studio to port it, which is what happened to Orange Box from what I understand. I don't know the development processes for other studios, but I think EA has shown this isn't how you should do it.

Their sports games seem to be more of a 'lowest common HD denominator' so other than the horrible first round of titles on the PS3 they've just cut whatever they had to usually so they could boast 60fps on both consoles.

[Sean]

On the JRPGs - Not one of those is from Square's main studio (as they've been working on FF13 and Vs. since FF12). They're from small guys like tri-Ace that Square publishes for. It's hard to compare the much lower budget games like that to the big player's offerings. I'm pretty sure Mistwalker fits that budget area too.