Sony developer slams PS3

Here are some very sobering, if not shocking comments about the PlayStation3, made by Sony developer Josh Robinson (formatting is mine):

Well my immediate impression of the PS3 is... where is it? Seriously, where is it? They have a case, a controller and a dev kit. But the system still doesn’t even exist. So what is there to say? We received one of 5 PS3 dev kits in the United States some time ago. Several companies in the US as well as companies over seas were given the daunting task of creating a demo in less than 9 weeks on a first generation dev kit.

Now I’ll be honest with you. What most companies do is fake the entire demo. I mean they come up with some great visuals and neat tricks and scripted events. In the end however, its not a real time demo and its not running ON the actual box. We were the only company to my knowledge that showed something that ran it live on the box. Even then it was a scripted event. You could not pause the camera and fly around the scene.

So much for the ´Killzone 2´ demo, I guess. This must be regarded as proof that all the demos shown at E3 2005 were fake (with the possible exception of ´Unreal´). This could be a huge blow to Sony´s reputation. Ever since May, there has been speculation about the authenticity of those demos. It now emerges that the console may not even have the power to output graphics of this quality.

Now I’ve spoken with people who are on the technical side of the PS3. I’ve also talked with people on the technical side of the XBOX 360. The consistent comment I am hearing from people on my end is, “The XBOX 360 is better”. They are saying that it is capable of just doing more.

I see Microsoft execs grinning from one ear to another. Sony´s claims that the PS3 boasts two teraflops computational power (apparently twice that of the Xbox360), if true, doesn´t seem to translate into a more powerful gaming machine. At the same time, development costs are truly staggering:

The game that we are creating for a launch title is a “just get it out” title in my opinion. It doesn’t look next generation. I don’t see how anyone could debate otherwise. (...) To be fair, this is a business. Sometimes you have to treat it as a business and not make the best title you can. The best title you can make usually costs 20-40million dollars/3 start overs and 4 years of your life. You just cant do that every time out. Its impossible.

This should end the speculation about just how much the development of a ´AAA´ title (i.e. a blockbuster) will cost on the PS3. At the same time, Josh is highly sceptical that even those games will really look next-gen in the near future. As a result, his closing comments sound quite gloomy.

Where is the box? Where is the final system? When is it coming out? No one knows and in the mean time people in the industry are starting to get just a little salty. I mean I was at e3 2005 and PS3 was almost no where to be seen.

In closing, I started of VERY excited about the PS3. I was very confident that it was going to just destroy the XBOX 360 just on the name SONY alone. The more time that goes by the more I am becoming doubtful. Everything I’ve developed or seen developed has yet to be “next gen”. The poly counts are not really any higher, im not seeing sub surface scattering, im not seeing much HDR lighting. (or they are faking it and not really doing it), I’m not seeing next gen fluid dynamics or object dynamics. I suspect that you’ll be able to have more dynamic objects in a scene than before. But im not seeing games doing this yet. We dont have a controller, there is no network code and there is no box. Its still the size of a normal PC.

I’m confident that the PS3 will have a few “crazy” games that show it off to its potential. But I would expect the full capabilities of the box to not show up until the system has been released PUBLICALLY for over a year. This is the extra time the developers will need with a FINAL system to truly make next gen games.

These comments are truly shocking in my opinion. Especially so, since this developer is employed by Sony. And he really is who he claims to be. His profile can be viewed on Sony Online Entertainment´s Station.com. I have been sceptical of the PlayStation3 becoming another Sony success story all along. But Sony seems to be in even bigger trouble than I thought.

EDIT There have been a number of people who have questioned the validity of the article. I just spoke to Carlos, the owner of the review site. He told me that Josh Robinson is still with SOE and still working on a PS3 project (which, obviously, cannot be named). He is a 3D designer and, as part of a development team, works alongside programmers. They are still working on PS3 development kits and, though the article really was written in late November, the article´s contents are all still valid. Josh himself posted some further comments only a week ago:

I was having a conversation with a programmer here at sony over the holiday for a bit. We were discussig the PS3 a little and how non existant it is.

We are still getting the ps3 in a huge silver cpu case. No controller yet. absolutely NO netowork code has been written. In fact I'm pretty sure that the company i work for is gonna be the one responsible to port our network code for it.

Not sure how this thing is gonna make it out any time soon. It may be closer to 2007 or christmas of 06 before this thing sees the light of day. We'll see.

Asked why Josh was prepared to speak so bluntly about the PS3 while being a Sony employee, Carlos said that that´s just the way he is. Carlos confirmed that Josh was an industry veteran who had worked on numerous consoles, including the original PlayStation, and was about to publish a book on 3D design.

Source: Down in Front
Thanks to: Joystiq