New ITAGAKI interview touches on 360 and PS3 comparison

[Titanio]

I am not, I'm sure you are.

I was just curious because I don't think we've had that many comment on the matter. And I can't remember a third party dev outright saying X360 was more powerful than PS3 for example.

The point I was making was that I've read more devs making comments that the PS3 has an advantage in processing power, if one dev says that isnt true doesnt necessarily warrant an attack on them.

I don't think anyone is ragging on Itagaki for that, because that is not what he has said. I'm pointing out a shift in his attitude that is rather humorous, and I think it's fair to do so given his arrogance in the past.

 

[Arty]

I don't think anyone is ragging on Itagaki for that, because that is not what he has said. I'm pointing out a shift in his attitude that is rather humorous, and I think it's fair to do so given his arrogance in the past.

I wasnt referring to you about the "attacking" part.

 

[deathstar121]

The title of the thread is misleading, all he said was PS3 is a complicated system, he didn't say which was better, and I can bet once he get comfortable with PS3 he will prefer it over 360, alot of the xbox fan-nation don't want to see NG2 on PS3 but it will happen, unless MS pays for the exclusive.

 

[pegisys]

The title of the thread is misleading, all he said was PS3 is a complicated system, he didn't say which was better, and I can bet once he get comfortable with PS3 he will prefer it over 360, alot of the xbox fan-nation don't want to see NG2 on PS3 but it will happen, unless MS pays for the exclusive.

and you know this how, there hasn't been anything that I have seen that makes me think the PS3 is going to be leagues ahead of the xbox360

in the interview that came on G4 a while back, he said the reason he left the ps2 to develop on the xbox was ease of programming and predefined libraries

 

[hugo]

and you know this how, there hasn't been anything that I have seen that makes me think the PS3 is going to be leagues ahead of the xbox360

in the interview that came on G4 a while back, he said the reason he left the ps2 to develop on the xbox was ease of programming and predefined libraries

Still too early to say so.

The PS3 isn't PS2.Programming and middleware tools are now more widely available.

 

[pegisys]

Still too early to say so.

The PS3 isn't PS2.Programming and middleware tools are now more widely available.

but still not on the level with the xbox360 and asfar as development environments go I don't think sony will catch up

with the cost of making games going up and the fact he has no real competition for a 3d fighter or NG type games on the xbox I would think it would be the best way to go

 

[Black Dragon37]

I don't know..they have a very strong business relationship with MS now, something I don't think they had on quite the same level with Sony's competitors in the past. And MS possibly represents a more viable alternative for them than others in the past. So I'm not sure if they'll feel the need to port to Sony systems now. Their animosity with Sony stretches back before Xbox ever existed, IIRC, and MS represents a viable ticket away from Sony for them, I think.

How far? And why?

 

[Almasy]

in the interview that came on G4 a while back, he said the reason he left the ps2 to develop on the xbox was ease of programming and predefined libraries

BS, the reason he left PS2 and went on to develop for Xbox was because there were no competing fighting game franchises on Xbox. DOA was never a big deal before the move, but now it has found an audience on it, and I don´t expect him to move from there.

And come on, he deserves being laughed at. Afterall, he used to be such a "beast tamer", and now PS3 is far too complicated for him? LOL.

 

[compres]

Still too early to say so.

The PS3 isn't PS2.Programming and middleware tools are now more widely available.

You dont need to be a psychic or a genius to see that, even with improved tools compared to the ps2, the increased paralelism and they new spes in the ps3 makes it very complicated from a software engineer stand point.

I dont know how many of the ps3 fans here are software engineers, but trust me, coding on an unnecessarily complicated platform for no benefit at all in performance(compared to the other options) is not desirable nor worth cheering for.

Last time around, the ps2 already had a big market share, for many reasons, such as earlier release, included dvd(which I remember was a big part of it, becouse some times sony sold more consoles than software), sony good brand recognition, among others. For this generation, they are 6+ months behing in the release date of their competitor, and M$ is not sega when we talk about cash or global image, so we will have to wait and see. Market share and sony's brand recognition ensured a lot of developers on the ps2, good hardware design did not(In MNSHO).

All of this posts is more opinions than facts, but saying that the ps3 is a fine developer platform just becouse its less bad than ps2 is wrong. Less bad is not good, specially when the competition has arguably the best developer tools on any 3D platform to date at launch.

 

[Inane_Dork]

If you're keeping score, who are they?

I think what you meant to say was: if you're keeping score, get a life.

 

[Titanio]

How far? And why?

I don't know why, but I do remember reading an interview from early PS2/DC days at least that mentioned less-than-happy relations between Tecmo and Sony.

I think what you meant to say was: if you're keeping score, get a life.

Haha, quite.

You dont need to be a psychic or a genius to see that, even with improved tools compared to the ps2, the increased paralelism and they new spes in the ps3 makes it very complicated from a software engineer stand point.

In absolute terms the system is probably more complicated than even PS2, at least in terms of the CPU, but for very different reasons. PS2 was complicated because of very nuts-and-bolts, low level reasons. PS3 has a some of that still on the CPU side, but the much bigger challenge is splitting your program up in ways that make sense to take advantage of the parallelism.

That's not a challenge unique to PS3 however - X360, PCs they also present that fundamental challenge. PS3 is just unique in terms of scale and the model used. Relatively speaking I doubt PS3 is as hard to deal with vs X360 as PS2 was vs Xbox. But I suppose it would be a matter of opinion for those dealing with the hardware.

 

[hey69]

In fact they leave the PS2 after DOA2 hardcore cuz by their word they max out the PS2.


When there are games on PS2 that put DOA2 hardcore to shame,he hate to much Sony but they like powerful hardware and on their history you can see,that they have always suport the better hardware,they ported DOA1 to PS cuz it was the better hardware,they port DOA2 cuz the PS2 was the best hardware,and they din't port DOA 3 cuz the xbox was the best hardware.


I know that if the PS3 realy end on top Team Ninja will fly to the PS3 as well.

the best hardware excuse my ass

it's all about the $$$$$$

 

[hugo]

You dont need to be a psychic or a genius to see that, even with improved tools compared to the ps2, the increased paralelism and they new spes in the ps3 makes it very complicated from a software engineer stand point..

So does the Xbox 360.Isn't parallelism evident in the Xenon's 3core/6 threads CPU as well?Don't forget that it comes with the new unified sharer architecture which is flexible but efficiency is questionable.

All of this posts is more opinions than facts, but saying that the ps3 is a fine developer platform just becouse its less bad than ps2 is wrong. Less bad is not good, specially when the competition has arguably the best developer tools on any 3D platform to date at launch.

I never said that PS3 is a fine developer platform but the PS3>PS2 anytime.

 

[Black Dragon37]

Look, Itagaki doesn't like Sony. Plain and simple. He said he's gonna make a game on the DS just because his daughter likes the handheld console.

 

[blakjedi]

the best hardware excuse my ass

it's all about the $$$$$$

This quote very neatly sums up PS3 fans views vis-a-vis anything pro-X360.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Titanio
If you're keeping score, who are they?

I think what you meant to say was: if you're keeping score, get a life.

I will definitely say that its more Sony fans that are keeping "score" as it were as to "who" says the PS3 is the most powerful platform. In PS2-Xbox days, it was CLEAR. This generation its not... and anyone willing to say that gets ridiculed.

Just because Cell has double the FP power of XeCPU, doesn't mean PS3 the system is more powerful than x360.

 

[3roxor]

In PS2-Xbox days, it was CLEAR. This generation its not... and anyone willing to say that gets ridiculed.

Just because Cell has double the FP power of XeCPU, doesn't mean PS3 the system is more powerful than x360.

hmm..

 

[Shifty Geezer]

You dont need to be a psychic or a genius to see that, even with improved tools compared to the ps2, the increased paralelism and they new spes in the ps3 makes it very complicated from a software engineer stand point.

As Titanio says, parallelism isn tthe issue. XB360 has that same issue. Plus the SPE's can be written for C/C++, unlike PS2's VU's that were assembler only. PS3's in order, as is XB360, as is PS2, so in that instance PS3 is no worse off then PS2 or XB360 either.

The only fundamental 'difficulty' of PS3 over XB360 is working in 256kb LS's and managing data structures to fit that.

I dont know how many of the ps3 fans here are software engineers, but trust me, coding on an unnecessarily complicated platform for no benefit at all in performance(compared to the other options) is not desirable nor worth cheering for.

You're another of these 'STI wasted buckets of money on a useless and overly difficult design' subscribers I see! We've no real world gaming examples, but we HAVE seen the advantages of Cell demo's over other processors, and we HAVE seen where the SPE's architecture has benefits.

As for PS3 being more complex vs. XB360, the only real difference is SPE's and managing local storage. And by accounts that's an issue XeCPU shares anyway. The recommendations from MS in it's developer paper was saying a degree of hand-tuned cache management would be benefical to some code. Having to manage 1MB between six threads offers it's own difficulties.

To me, both hardwares are pretty complex to master. Both need parallelism and restructuring of data in float jobs where possible, as both CPU's were designed to be strong on floating point maths. Both provide well known API's for graphics. Both provide direct CPU>GPU communications. Oh, PS3 has a NUMA which is another thing to 'worry' about. No more then a typical console though.

I'd like to know what you think is so very difficult about PS3 versus XB360, 'coz I'm not seeing it, other than the SPE coding model which is something any capable coder can learn to work with without too much bother I'd have thought. Especially an (allegedly) self-proclaimed coding God like Itagaki

 

[pegisys]

You're another of these 'STI wasted buckets of money on a useless and overly difficult design' subscribers I see! We've no real world gaming examples, but we HAVE seen the advantages of Cell demo's over other processors, and we HAVE seen where the SPE's architecture has benefits.

what exactly have we seen that puts it sofar ahead of anything else at doing games, it's barely been anything running in realtime and the stuff that we have seen is can be done on the gpu, I'm not saying the cell doesn't have it's strong points but I still haven't seen anything that makes me think it was worth the money to put it in a game machine.

 

[msia2k75]

what exactly have we seen that puts it sofar ahead of anything else at doing games, it's barely been anything running in realtime and the stuff that we have seen is can be done on the gpu, I'm not saying the cell doesn't have it's strong points but I still haven't seen anything that makes me think it was worth the money to put it in a game machine.

And what about waiting just...




















... a little huh?

 

[Guden Oden]

Look, Itagaki doesn't like Sony. Plain and simple.

It's not that simple at all. Sony's the biggest market in the console business, particulary overwhelmingly so in japan. You don't say no to all of that without figuring you'll do more money overall some other way - such as being paid by the bucketload by MS to go exclusive.

What someone LIKES doesn't count when the bottom line is how much cash you can pull in by making games for platforms X, Y, Z. It's called "capitalism", and fanb0yism certainly doesn't play a factor there, much to the chagrin of some tecmo defenders I'm sure.

Personally the only game team ninja's ever made that I'd be interested in playing on either x360 or PS3 is ninja gaiden, all their other stuff has been sexist misogynist CRAP that the world might just as well be without.