According to EA, the PS4 and next-generation Xbox (Xbox Gold?) are each around eight to ten times more powerful than the current generation, and I presume he means their direct predecessors – PS3 and Xbox 360 – rather than the Wii.
As reported by Edge, EA executive Blake Jorgensen said at Morgan Stanley's Technology, Media and Telecom Conference that since the new consoles are based on “standard PC components and technologies”, it'll be much easier for them to implement things like their Frostbite engine:
“So our own investments in our back end engine like Frostbite, our libraries, our tools will very smoothly run on this and make it easier for us to innovate to the new console technologies themselves. What used to take months in the past will now take days to do.”
Jorgensen also offered an explanation as to why EA wasn't one of the developers stood on the stage at the PS4 announcement, saying that it was all to do with timing, as well as maintaining “a good balance of power with all the parties out there”. Whether that means EA is trying to stay sweet with Microsoft or Sony is more focused on developers besides EA is unclear, but Jorgensen did point out that we'll be hearing a lot more from EA over the coming months:
“I’d say between now and E3, you’re going to see a lot of stuff from us and we just choose, on our marketing cadence, as to when to start to announce stuff.”
So that's a relief for all of us who are fans of at least one EA title. That said, when those games do arrive on the next-gen consoles they're likely to be quite expensive (as well as including micro-transactions), as Jorgensen says he anticipates the pricing of “a core piece of software” will rise to around $69 at the beginning of the cycle. Which EA games on next-gen hardware would make you willing to pay that price?
