PS4 as dev-friendly as original PlayStation, claims Cerny

The developer-led initiative to create PS4 has led to the console becoming as approachable to developers as the original PlayStation, a key system architect has claimed.
Mark Cerny, who has spent five years working with Sony to build the next generation PlayStation console, made the claim during a keynote address at the GameLab expo in Barcelona.
http://cdn.medialib.computerandvideo...304941_460.jpgHe explained his reasoning using the term "time to triangle" - a phrase which essentially means how long it takes coders to create usable graphics with the hardware.
In a slide presented to the audience, he claimed that programmers commonly required one to two months to produce low-level graphics code on PlayStation One.
Cerny then claimed that the PS2 - a system remembered for its complex and sophisticated architecture - required three to six months of coding for studios to get going.
Later in the presentation, he remarked on a PS3 development meeting he had with Ken Kutaragi back in 2004. Kutaragi, the former head of Sony Computer Entertainment, told Cerny to focus less on "time to triangle" and more on the bigger picture of building highly sophisticated hardware.
"Triangle counts are misguided," was, according to Cerny, what Kutaragi had told him. As a result, the PlayStation 3 was the most complex system yet, requiring six to twelve months for studios to build usable graphics code.
Cerny said that, prior to Sony releasing the PS3, first-party PlayStation studios were struggling with the hardware.
"The third party teams were having an even more difficult time," he said.
At launch, the internal focus shifted from sharing technology (to help devs) to working on launch titles (to create games). Cerny said much of the direction in the creation of PS3 was "clearly a mistake".
Cerny, who says he spent an entire holiday in 2007 researching the history of x86 hardware to see if it was possible on a next-gen console, told the audience that his direction is different to Kutaragi's.
As the key PS4 system architect, Cerny said that in 2008 he sent a questionnaire for third parties to ask what features they wanted on future hardware.
After speaking with more than thirty teams from around the world, he said the most popular request from developers was unified memory - a requirement which the PS4 team fulfilled.
Cerny said the company was tempted to add an eDRAM chip to the system, as it would increase the memory speeds in further, but eventually declined as it would mean more work for studios to get running.
"The straightforward approach we have gives us excellent day one performance," he claimed.
Altogether, the "time to triangle" on PlayStation 4 takes about one or two months, Cerny claimed, which theoretically makes the system as developer friendly as the original PlayStation.
This ease of use benefits the "vital" third parties, and in particular indie developers, Cerny said.

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