I hope GB is cool with this because it certainly is interesting enough to warrant documentation. Since some people around here think I'm an MS insider I figured what better way than to discuss things not even GAF let you. Not sure if the rest of you guys have seen it, so first, a little background on the story.
Albert Penello - A Microsoft rep that posts on GAF presumably, under his real name.
Adrian Chmielarz - Former employee of developer People Can Fly. GAF user name: Saphatoreal.
Albert has recently taken to Reddit with Major Nelson to make claims such as Microsoft not allowing Sony a <30-40% power advantage.
It all started yesterday when Adrian Chmielars, former employee of developer People Can Fly, took to Twitter and made the following claim:
Now granted his claim is a vague, second hand hearsay, and kind of meaningless in terms of actual tech talk. He should have known what that would do, but after seeing the craziness, he decided to clarify:
I think Adrian should jump into the conversation. He does it all the time in his blogs.
Here I am. So...
1. I am not doing a damage control, but I do want to clarify one thing. But first, yes, devs I know -- and as someone has shown it before in this thread, some other devs already talked about it too -- claim that there's 50% speed difference WHEN DEVELOPING in cross-gen/next-gen PS4/XO games. So there we are, I said it and I stand by it. Notice: WHEN DEVELOPING. It'll become clear in a second.
2. Will this change in the future? WIll devs discover some tricks to narrow the gap? Will stuff like XO cloud computing help? Hell if I know. Uhm, maybe? I know that devs -- well, most of them -- will do whatever they can do get you the best games possible. You're going to see a lot of multiplatform games this next gen, just as you've seen them in this gen, so it's in studios' best interest that there's no clear advantage in one version over the other.
3. Does it mean studios will cripple PS4 versions to match XO ones? Not really, do not underestimate the devs. Even if this happens, you will not know that and that's okay. You've never seen most games in their most powerful form anyway (when we work on them on our ninja dev PCs in 1080p 120fps with all the antialiasings and stuff turned on for shits and giggles). But most of the time devs have a target and they meet this target. If it's a multiplatform game, it's designed with this in mind from the start. So maybe it's not maxing out one console while going 100% on the other. Maybe it's 100% on both, but they take extra time for super-extra optimizations on the weaker hardware to make sure things look the same as on the more powerful platform. Etc. etc.
4. So what is that "one thing" I want to clarify, that some people may consider "damage control", but really is just an explanation. Someone mentioned Titanfall, which looks money and enjoys a great hype. Exactly. A great dev will make a great game no matter what's the hardware. Current gen CoDs looks great and it's 60 fps, on both platforms (well, and PC :). To most devs that is just impossible to achieve. And yet...
Think about it this way. X360 is faster than PS3. Not just easier to program on, it's faster overall (although PS is faster/better in SOME areas). And yet no exclusive on X360 looks like The Last of Us. Halo 4 looks great. Gears blew my mind in 2006. And still, the best looking AAA game of this generation belongs to the supposedly weaker platform.
So if you think that the war is over because PS4 is 50% faster TODAY, then you're delusional. This is far from over, and will probably never be over, at least not this upcoming gen.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=80542977&postcount=399
Shortly after though, the mods close the thread.
Then Albert Penello gets wind of the story and responds on Twitter and another thread explodes due to the fact Albert did not know who either "Adrian and his friends" or People Can Fly is. Adrian apparently led the team that created Gears of War: Judgment under Epic.
Then the mods closed the second threads on the basis that the original claim by Adrian was 2nd hand hearsay. Which is true. But it doesn't change the fact Albert took the time to respond.
It appears to me that with this turn of events, and Albert Penello going on record to make the claims he did, then respond to Adrian on Twitter, GAF had Microsoft or at least Albert cornered into offering some sort of response and addressing the original issue. Especially since Albert is a regular poster there and Adrian took the time to post, clarification is certainly warranted and was expected to ensue.
The issue isn't so much whether or not Albert knows or doesn't know Adrian and PCF, but rather the statements each made. Seems to me the recent words of Mr.Adrian Chmielars are in complete disagreement with the words and claims Albert Penello and Major Nelson made on Reddit, And that part definitely warrants a discussion.
Now I find the attempts of character assassination that was taking place in the GAF thread disgusting, and I hope that this doesn't take place here, but isn't it weird that GAF closed both threads when they pretty much had Albert on the ropes that he would have to respond? Usually they would just ban posters that take things too far. I mean, heck I know I want to know the answer to this one. I definitely want some clarification especially with all the recent rumors and upgrades on the X1. So what's going on?
Your thoughts?
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