Anyone who picked up a Playstation 3 at the beginning of this console generation will be able to tell you that it was a lackluster experience for the first few months of its release. The launch library was exceedingly narrow, with only titles such as Resistance: Fall of Man and Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune to tide gamers over until new releases.
This time around, Sony is looking to right the wrongs of their past. The company has been very forward about the idea that the Playstation 4 is easy to develop for. This is – according to Mark Cerny, lead architect on the PS4 – the main reason the PS4 will have a strong launch library.
“This will also lead to the main difference with the PS3 era,” he said. “The main difference is, we will have many titles for launch. Because game development is easier, there shouldn’t be a barrier as there had been previously.
Cerny admits that whether or not it was true, the PS3 emanated with the idea that it was hard to develop for.
“PS3 had the image that it was difficult to develop for. Even the PS2 wasn’t that easy. PS4 has a PC CPU and a GPU that’s been enhanced from a PC so the game lineup should become very rich.”
Though the PS3 had its flaws, Cerny also said that the company is trying to replicate the SPU Runtime System from the PS3 in the PS4. The PS4 isn’t using the cell processor, so it has become quite a task to work around.
“We’re trying to replicate the SPU Runtime System (SPURS) of the PS3 by heavily customizing the cache and bus,” he said. ”SPURS is designed to virtualize and independently manage SPU resources. For the PS4 hardware, the GPU can also be used in an analogous manner as x86-64 to use resources at various levels.
Cerny then discussed “computation queues,” which can execute actions within a game’s architecture through veritable assembly lines. He says that this may not be something most developers use right off the bat, but it will give the system longevity and cater to Sony’s “10-year Plan.”
