Late Night Consoling

If you actually read the patent info, the Cell architecture (overall) represents a much simpler system than the PS2 with much broader applications, which was Sony and IBM's intention from the start. Mass production of a powerful, scalable computing platform is really the goal, with PS3 only being the leading application to which Cell is applied. For developers who want simple implementation solutions middleware is going to play an ever increasing role anyway (for costs reasons alone) as recently evidenced by various surveys. Broad use of Cell will mean various tools will come faster than they might for other new architectures (PS2). Remember that Cell is NOT just being used for just PS3 but also numerous IBM and Toshiba products as well as Sony's other electronics. In addition the architecture is flexible enough to accomodate whatever programming methods developers might chose to use in a game engine. In some ways the restrictions imposed by fixed hardware assets (graphics chips, sound, etc.) are removed in favor of a huge pool of computing power that can be applied by the developer as he or she sees fit. I am not refering to grid computing either as the PS3 by itself represents a consistent and large pool of power(and tapping into a grid for the client aspects of gaming is farfetched).

Already the trend in graphics hardware shows a move towards programmable architectures. Furthermore you'll recall several developers forecast that several years hence rendering engines would move back towards software solutions since CPUs were getting evermore powerful and GPUs more generalized. Fixed T&L is already on the way out PC side. Cell simply means that instead of one powerful CPU (as suggested by comments below) you'll have a series of linked units that can be configured by choice to do whatever. This is far more efficient and eventually cost effective. Multitasking and multiprocessor environments already exist, this just takes it to a new level. Yeah, programmers will have to learn some new tricks, just like they do when new versions of Win, Linux, OpenGl, DirectX, or various languages and APIs come out. Oh well I say; that is a fact of a programmer's life.

Tha last interesting bit about Cell is that it truly takes some of the ideas floating about regarding Internet computing (whether it be grid computing, web services, web enabled fridges, etc.) and gives them in a fixed hardware target that will allow them to be explored in a real and practical manner. Asssuming that PS3 is a big success (and I don't doubt it will be) it serves, in a way, to subsidize all these other uses. This isn't just about PS3 but also IBM and Toshiba and any other Cell users trying to find a new way to deliver and use computing resources both at the hardware level and the software level. It may not be revolutionary but it is a BIG evolutionary step.

Another thing about those PS3 chips, the more complicated they are, the more complicated the fabrication process, and the fewer they can make. So they'll be *really* hard to find when the system does launch.

there's no need to drop the ps2's price. but if the other companys need to, thats fine. even if the ps2 is more expensive, its an investment. it has FREE online play for the games that support it, (with the exeption of mmorpg's of course), and a gigantic library of games.

How do you figure if GC and Xbox drops their price, ps2 will too? The GC *already* dropped their price from 199$ to 149$, Xbox didn't, neither did PS2. My missing the math?

So I bought a Gamecube today, got Metroid prime and a memory card 251. At circuit city it came with bloody roar primal fury or something, free. So far I'm liking it MP, but I haven't opened bloody roar. Is there a good chance I can take it to walmart tomorrow and trade it in for credit or another game? Also, target circuit city and funcoland were out of zelda discs, anyone know of a place that would have them in stock? Going to try toys r us and kmart tommorrow.

Explain to me how 72x the number of processors = 1000x the power? I guess they'll be having 14 of these working side by side then? This BS number is a figment of Sony's imagination and was only chosen for false bragging rights.

Magician Lord = awesome pick for game of the evening. nice gmoney =)

Although the Ps2 was a real pain for the Gfx Engineers, some who do try and program with it produce amazing results (graphics-wise), like Metal Gear Solid 2 or Final Fantasy X etc.

Movie-like games O_O

*droools on the thought of Devil may Cry Gfx on that machine*

i bought a ps2 today. for games i picked up Tenchu and Maximo. i am gonna borrow FFX and some other sheeit from some ppls at work. so far i like it, tho the controller feels awfully light compared to my wavebird (which has the batteries of course).

Tenchu is a fucking blast, tho I suck at it now. There are some very satisfying blood sprays when you kill guys, and the stealth kills are fucking cool!!

hey, dont forget the cell technology is actually IBM's.
IBM are working with them

As a programmer I would rather program for a 1000mhz CPU then 1000 1mhz CPU's. The tech might be cool, but its often useless as a lot of tasks are parallelizable.

-Jon

I thought this made a good one of those "Wait a minute, something's missing..." puzzles. Let's see if anyone else caught this:

With the PS 3, Sony will apparently put 72 processors on a single chip: eight PowerPC microprocessors, each of which controls eight auxiliary processors.

Wait a minute, 8 PowerPCs * 8 auxilliary = 64 != 72? WTF?

It's really 9*8 because there's a PowerPC with every 8 aux'es

WTF - jason is prejudiced against the Dreamcast. I e-mailed him about it's inclusion and I am being ignored. :( I want to vote for Marvel vs. Capcom 2 !

The cell... isn't it what the Terminator legions were using in the futur. Damn you Skynet! Damn you!

Give me Zelda or give me death!

How about making the full list of all submitted "Console Game of the Evening" browsable for us mere mortals?

Way to go, Sony! More shitty architecture courtesy of Ken "I don't give a fuck what developers want!" Kutaragi!

CAN'T WAIT FOR ALL THOSE BLAND-ASS MIDDLEWARE TITLES! YAY!!!!!


(Microsoft? Nintendo? Please fucking embarass them with your next-gen systems.)

No, I'm not anti-Sony, nearly all technology companies are guilty of this. PS3 "Cell architecture" is just another hype buzzword. I remember Sony throwing around the whole "supercomputer" shit with the PS2 and riding on government hype suggesting all this stuff about being able to use the system for powering missiles. Like that even means anything. And "emotion engine" .. being able to model accurate emotions on the PS2 like it will be a living AI being. Bollucks. Anyway, the point is, I wouldn't be surprised if "cell technology" is the next buzzword we hear about when the launch of the PS3 gets closer. And let's all watch as the claims all fall in on themselves and end up being pure hype yet again.

The Gamecube isrelatively easy to program for (I was an engineer on Metroid Prime). It's mostly just two logic units: cpu and gpu. I've had friends in the industry that tell me what a nightmare PS2 development is. You've pratically have to write your own Microcode to do anything. For example, there isn't a graphics library that comes with the PS2 devkit that does stuff like mipmapping. You have to write your own microcode to do mipmaps.

The problem with the PS3 is by making it more complex in order to compensate with the fact hardware isn't improving as much as they want, they are making the software harder to make. What this means is a lot of small developers won't be able to program for the PS3. It'll only be big companies that can afford to fund a year or two of hard core development time building engines for the machine.

Or, perhaps middleware (engines such as Renderware) will start becoming more common. After all, GTA3/Vice City was made using Renderware and did pretty damn good.

As an game engineer (I'm not a hard core graphics engineer), massive paralell CPUs scare the hell out of me. The sheer amount of planning, engineer and debugging time on such architectures is a nightmare. It's bad enough to debug a process on one CPU, much less SEVENTY TWO!

I'm curious to see how it goes with Sony. Wait and see, I suppose.

/// Zoid.

Jason, I want you to know I REALLY appreciate late night consoling, i look forward to it every day. Thanks!

Um. Each 'cell' sure sounds a lot like a 970 with double the Altivec resources. I wonder if its just a 970 minus the cache and OOE/scheduling capabilities and 2x Altivec units.

(Repost because I was owned by Reply)

FFX-2 at least got good reviews. I hope it's good.

Playing Eternal Darkness, the only thing thats keeping me from throwing my wavebird at the wall is the fact that you can save almost anywhere in this game.

Man, RalliSport Challenge on Xbox is awesome. I know it's probably old news to everyone else but I've only started playing it recently (it's priced at $20 now!) and I love it, I hope that D.I.C.E. comes out with a sequel after they finish up Midtown Madness 3!

There any really long rpg's out for GC, besides Skies of Arcadia?

TurboDUO
GATE OF THUNDER

"teh greatest game evr!"

no seriously, if you own this, you should be playing it regardless if jason picked it as tonights game or not. :)

hmm.. I am seeing a GBA SP with the new Pokemon games and Link to the Past in my future.

God bless LNC!

I guess I need to look and see if Sony is presenting the PS3 stuff at the GDC tomorrow.