PLAYSTATION 3
patched To perfection
Manufacturer: Sony | Year: 2006 ■ It’s easy to forget just how poor the launch of the Playstation 3 was. It was like buying a house and discovering half the rooms still hadn’t been built. Despite the shaky foundations that the console was built on, Sony eventually turned things around in impressive style, paving the way for the success of PS4.
Dan Geisler, Sony senior software engineer, consultant Why do you think the PS3 had so many issues at launch?
One of the most significant reasons was getting actual Blu-ray hardware. at Sony Of america, we got them very late in the game, which caused delays both internally and for external developers. additionally, Sony Of america developers were not able to know low-level details about the hardware. Sony Of Japan controlled all the releases of the libraries Sony Of america used.
So how do you think Sony turned things around in the end?
When Blu-ray kits became available and development kits became more affordable for developers. Our internal cost at Sony Of america was $800 dollars.
So you’d say Blu-ray was important to the success of PS3?
In my opinion, the PS3 would have flopped if it wasn’t for the inclusion of Blu-ray. for many consumers you were effectively buying a Blu-ray player and getting a Playstation 3 for free.
What was the PS3 like to work on compared to the PS2?
the development environment was virtually the same. the biggest difference was in the speed of the graphics pipeline. although most launch titles didn’t utilise its full capabilities due to the novel complexities of coding for the cell processors.
Adrian Longland, Principal engineer at Activision What sets the PS3 apart from other machines that you have worked on?
the PS3 was great in that it brought in Blu-ray. Lots of data storage for games and it served as a fancy movie player to boot. Plus it had Bluetooth, which meant reliable wireless controllers for games and no more having to aim the remote at a console buried under the tv! the nice thing about the PS3 from a multiplatform developer’s perspective was that it was so similar to the Xbox 360. there is a great book, The Race For A New Game Machine, that explains how that came to be.