The PlayStation 4's lead system architect, Mark Cerny, has told Gamasutra he became aware that "clearly we had some issues with PlayStation 3" in 2007.
"I probably have more passion about the next generation than anybody inside the Sony Computer Entertainment world" Cerny commented, adding it was this commitment which led him to request a role in shaping the PS4 from Sony's top brass, to his surprise he was given control of the project.
"The biggest thing was that we didn't want the hardware to be a puzzle that programmers would be needing to solve to make quality titles," Cerny said referencing the PS3's notorious Cell Processor which, in the early days of the system at least, often led to lower quality titles than on rival platforms as developers struggled to come to grips with the complicated system architecture.
Cerny, the first non-Japanese designer of a PlayStation platform, revealed he began discreet talks with developers about the PS4 as early as 2008.
"It's not like we could come out and say we were developing the next generation of hardware," he commented.
Asking developers and middleware manufacturers in a survey what they hoped the next console cycle would bring studios said they wanted unified memory and a maximum of eight cores.
"We wanted our tools to be much richer and much more accessible to developers, even in the launch time," Cerny said, adding the PS Vita represented the first implementation of this developer-friendly vision.
"The insights that you get from talking to their top technology people – it's quite nice to have those insights when doing the console design," he finished.
Yesterday Adam Boyes, SCEA's vice president of developer relations, spoke about the importance they place on regular meetings with developers and how they waive the majority of game patch fees in a bid to have a more developer-centric approach to their systems.
