Was PS2 maxed out? (or close to it)

[Seanspeed]

There are always developers who try and get everything they can out of a system.

But there's also generally lots of ways to exploit consoles, especially back in those days where the hardware was very customized and idiosyncratic. And developers always have to prioritize when it comes to their technical choices. You cant do it all. PS2 turned into a generation where 60fps was a very popular target, and so lots of devs could absolutely have decided to push some graphics/technical elements further if they wanted to sacrifice performance, but chose not to. Doesn't mean they weren't pushing the system, as performance is still a part of pushing hardware, obviously. But I think if you mean "Were PS2 graphics the absolute best they could have been?" then no, they probably weren't, due heavily to the prioritization of that 60fps target.

That said, if you were around at the time, I dont know how you wouldn't have been impressed with PS2's graphics, especially in relation to the previous generation. It was an enormous leap! Granted, if you started comparing PS2 titles to certain Gamecube or especially Xbox titles, then yea, it wasn't always as good, but it was still an incredibly capable machine for something that launched in 2000.

 

[sribo]

There are always developers who try and get everything they can out of a system.

But there's also generally lots of ways to exploit consoles, especially back in those days where the hardware was very customized and idiosyncratic. And developers always have to prioritize when it comes to their technical choices. You cant do it all. PS2 turned into a generation where 60fps was a very popular target, and so lots of devs could absolutely have decided to push some graphics/technical elements further if they wanted to sacrifice performance, but chose not to. Doesn't mean they weren't pushing the system, as performance is still a part of pushing hardware, obviously. But I think if you mean "Were PS2 graphics the absolute best they could have been?" then no, they probably weren't, due heavily to the prioritization of that 60fps target.

That said, if you were around at the time, I dont know how you wouldn't have been impressed with PS2's graphics, especially in relation to the previous generation. It was an enormous leap! Granted, if you started comparing PS2 titles to certain Gamecube or especially Xbox titles, then yea, it wasn't always as good, but it was still an incredibly capable machine for something that launched in 2000.

it's true that many PS2 games targeted 60 fps, besides I always found it a bit weird that 30 fps PS2 games were generally not particularly more impressive than the 60 fps ones (for example Shadow of Rome, one of best-looking PS2 games, a bit like the real RE4 on PS2, and at 60 fps)
yes I was around at the time, and the gap was the biggest in video games I think (if we exclude the transition to 3D but the first 3D games were far from looking better than 2D games), I would say that PS2 games have always impressed me more technically than visually compared to other consoles.