Shack: I don't know if you're familiar with Vicarious Visions CEO Karthik Bala, but he's very outspoken about game legislation as well.

Ted Price: Of course, in New York, they have that awful legislation happening. I'm glad that he's standing up and saying something about it too.

Shack: The letter he and his brother wrote contained a lot of good points, and it was very well-written and polite.

Ted Price: I think that's what you have to do, to talk to folks who are not gamers. You can't simply rant and wave a flag, you have to appeal to reason.

Fortunately, we do have reason on our side in this particular battle.

Ted Price: More people have to join the Video Game Voters Network, just because there's opportunity to get involved as a gamer and make a difference. When you write a letter to your Congressman about bills that are happening in your state, it does make a difference.

Otherwise, legislators don't know that their constituents care and they're just simply, I think, walking blindly, following what they think is the mainstream opinion. But it's not the mainstream opinion. I think gamers outnumber non-gamers these days.

Shack: There was that study that claimed a majority of kids play games these days.

Ted Price: Yeah, that's fantastic news for us as we move into the next 10 years. Because all of those kids are gonna become voters and be able to help us fight unfair legislation that restrict us as creators.

Shack: Where do you see the gaming industry going in the next five to ten years? Some folks say it'll all be digital distribution, other folks say that's rubbish and we'll still have some sort of physical media. What's your take?

Ted Price: Really tough to predict because we don't know how big games are gonna get. The media that we create these days gobbles up a lot of space, and bandwidth doesn't necessarily keep up with what we're creating. On the other hand, I think there are fantastic technologies emerging that allow us to distribute games digitally much more quickly. I was reading the other day about technology that allows you to play the game after it's only 10% downloaded. I can't remember what it's called.

Shack: I know GameTap had something similar.

Ted Price: It wasn't GameTap. I can't remember who it was, it was another distribution system.

I think that digital distribution is here to stay, but at the same time, I think that there are enough people who appreciate the fondle factor, having a physical copy of the game in their hands, that games' retail will stick around for a long time too. So, anybody's guess.

Shack: For so long, the game industry has focused on better graphics, bigger storage space with every hardware revision. Do you think we're nearing the point where graphics become so advanced that progress no longer matters?

Ted Price: I think we're still several generations away from that. I'm probably in the minority saying this, but when you look at a real-life scene--look at this right now--you cannot duplicate this lighting real-time in a game yet in this quality, this detail. We are still ways away from having the processor power to do real-time global illumination and the kind of effects you would expect, you take for granted, in real life.

Now, there is real-time global illumination being done with some engines out there, but it's limited. I think that we still need a lot more processing power and new techniques to do it.

And I think we'll be constantly surprised over the next 10 years with the increase in fidelity of video game graphics. I think people were saying the same thing 10 years ago, "We've reached the limit, we can't really go much further."

Game makers have always surprised gamers with what they're putting out.

Shack: Are you at all worried about the rising cost of development that comes alongside more processing power, new techniques and better graphics?

Ted Price: Oh yeah. That's a constant worry in the development field. The rising cost of development, in many ways, is driven by a consumer's demand for more fidelity, bigger games, more options in games. And we as game developers--in many cases, not all cases--place our bets that we're gonna have the best looking game, or the game with the most options, and hopefully satisfy the largest percentage of that audience and be able to offset the development costs.

On the other hand, there are more avenues now to distribute games to more niche audiences, such as through Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network or PSP and DS. There are many more options for game developers who don't necessarily want to go for the big budgets. At the same time, they can make fantastic groundbreaking games without having the most amazing graphics or the largest game.

Shack: On a more personal note, what have you been playing lately?

Ted Price: To be perfectly honest, I've played Resistance 2 non-stop for the last 3 months. I mean, that's what I do, and it's important. All of us want to make sure that we're delivering the best possible game we can. That takes playing it over and over and looking for the problems and fixing them.

When we ship Resistance 2, the first game I'm gonna pick up is LittleBigPlanet, mostly because I love playing games with my kids. Actually, the game I've been playing is Rock Band. My kids and I play all the time together, and LittleBigPlanet will be the next kinda family game that we pick up.

I can't wait. The Media Molecule guys are really cool guys. They're down to earth, a couple ex-Insomniacs over there as well, and we talk a lot, between the two companies. We've been very impressed with what they've been able to do with a small team.

That's a great example of creating a groundbreaking, unbelievably beautiful game with a very small team. It demonstrates that can still be done.

Shack: It's always a pleasure talking with you Ted.

Ted Price: Yeah, you too man.

A PlayStation 3 exclusive, Resistance 2 launches November 4.