• 09.18.2005 | The Braincell Processor | Geoffrey Duke
• 05.21.2005 | Welcome to the realm of double standards. | Geoffrey Duke
• 05.12.2005 | The truth hurts. | Geoffrey Duke
• 05.11.2005 | Seeing is believing. | Geoffrey Duke
• 05.10.2005 | Is this what they call "positive spin?" | Geoffrey Duke
• 05.08.2005 | Resident Evil 4 porting issues? | Geoffrey Duke

"Ian Pearson, the head of BT's futurology unit has said that the rapid advances in computer power will make cyber immortality a reality in less than 50 years. At last week's launch of the PlayStation 3 Pearson said this was a sign of things to come.

'The new PlayStation is one percent as powerful as the human brain,' He told the Observer. 'It is into supercomputer status compared to 10 years ago. PlayStation 5 will probably be as powerful as the human brain.'"

> I'm almost lost for words; I didn't know people could see into the future. What they should
really be doing is scrutinizing the past. Sony promised us a 4 gigahertz processor in the PS3, but already that has been scaled down to a 3.2 ghz processor. How many more broken promises can we expect?

     > Are we really going to swallow more of the BS Sony is force-feeding everyone? Open wide! The Cell processor sounds organic, and the Reality Synthesizer graphics processing unit powering the PS3 sounds so advanced that that advanced-sounding name alone will probably seduce people with the implied promises of the creating realistic game worlds with ease. Sony certainly knows how to make an impression on casual consumers whom don't know any better.

     > The PS3's specs (these are a tragic story for another day) lay almost entirely on paper, yet people are jumping to all these grandiose conclusions. I'll believe it when I see it. A poster at panzerdragoon.net (under the username of Team Andromeda) said it best when he said Sony should just call the CPU in the Playstation 3 the "God chip" backed up by the slogan "So powerful it can create worlds". He also went on to say that if you believe the hype, the PS3 will be so powerful that God himself will have to ban it. *Laughs uncontrollably*. Wasn't the PS2 banned in certain countries because it was supposed to be so powerful that it could supposedly launch missiles? What's the key word here?

     > The future is never certain, so let's not presume a fifth Playstation is only a matter of time, especially considering Sony's dwindling finances... or is the PS3 so powerful that it can predict the future?

Good Gaming,

Geoffrey Duke

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"Presentation-wise, this would be a pretty-good-looking Dreamcast game. On the Xbox, it's fair, at best."

> Will wonders never cease?! I really wish more GameSpot reviewers would apply this logic to more Xbox games that are merely ported from the PS2 with little or no extra eye candy. Suddenly, half of the Xbox's line up, which are mere ports from the PS2, would look "fair, at best". Imagine how much more richly detailed those games might have seemed to the naked eye if they had taken full advantage of the Xbox's power. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm sick and tired of all these double standards. Some people need to look up the definition. My kingdom for a fairer analysis!

Good Gaming,

Geoffrey Duke

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"The PlayStation 2 version of the game is also much, much worse than the Xbox and PC versions of the game. Strictly on its own merits, this version is a good but unimpressive action adventure that still smacks of being a watered-down port of a technically superior game."

> LMAO. Where are those 75 million polygons per second when you really need them? I remember Ubisoft boasting about all the new graphical tricks they'd learned and planned to use to bring the PS2 version of Chaos Theory up to standard. So what happened? Did Ubisoft lie, or did they finally come to the inescapable conclusion that all the graphical tricks in the world weren't going to change the fact that the PS2 only has 4 MBs of VRAM? If you were expecting Ubisoft to squeeze every last drop of power out of the 5 year old PS2, then you won't be disappointed. Like low frame rates? Then you'll love this game to death. Loading times aren't too bad either... if you like enduring more of them. Not that they help because the detailed texture mapping contained within each level was sacrificed to Sony. Last but not least, the split screen co-operative mode suffers from so much aliasing and slowdown that it's almost unbelievable. Let's all bow down to the power of the PS2.

     > Remember everyone, it's not that the PS2 isn't as powerful as the Xbox - it's just far more difficult to program! The PS2 version of this game is only so much poorer than its PC and Xbox counterparts merely because Ubisoft, one of the largest third party developers in the industry, doesn't know how to program! In case anyone didn't notice, I was being sarcastic. However... don't be surprised if you stumble over that kind of rhetoric spewed from the lips of PS2 fanboys who have sunk their claws deep into gaming forums everywhere and still refuse to let go even now.

     > For some inexplicable reason, a lot of gamers still cling to the (false) notion that the PS2 is on par with the Xbox even though the Xbox is practically a generation ahead benefiting immeasurably from high resolution anti-aliasing, unified RAM, in-built vertex and pixel shaders (for bump mapping and per pixel shading) and on-board memory compression (which can even compress transparencies down to size unlike the vector quantization compression the Dreamcast used) all of which the PS2 doesn't benefit from at all (the PS2 has to stream textures etc. in several times a frame to compensate for the absence of memory compression, and can only run "true" full screen or edge anti-aliasing in software, which consumes too much CPU power to even consider employing in polygon/AI intensive games), on top of much higher specs (the Xbox simply has more of everything). 

     > I guess a lot of gamers can't stomach the truth. Opening their eyes to the truth must hurt, especially when they've been closed for so long. Oh, and by the way, I just thought I'd mention that Splinter Cell Chaos Theory for the Xbox isn't quite as close to bordering on realism as Resident Evil 4 is for the GameCube, so even pushing the PS2 to regions where no one previously thought it could go, won't make much difference when converting the game to a console that started showing its age from the moment it arrived. Let's not delude ourselves into believing the PS2 is a console whose power knows no bounds; the sad fact is developers have already pushed the rusty piece of scrap to a point where it can simply go no further.

     > Lest we somehow forget (believe me when I say that some of us have selective memories when it comes to the true power of the PS2), Tecmo's Tomonobu Itagaki (a man who publically criticized Tekken 4 for playing like a 2D game and holding the fighting genre back instead of moving it forward, while praising Virtua Fighter 4 for returning to its roots and expanding on them) said that it would be impossible to port Dead or Alive 3 to the PS2 without "drastically degrading" the visual quality of the game. His comments naturally sparked an uproar online with PS2 owners coming out of the woodwork to prove him wrong. Were gamers being reminded of something they'd rather forget? Call me immature, but I personally love giving PS2 owners a taste of their own medicine. Let's face it: a lot of games simply cannot blossom in the shadow of the PS2 whether we want to admit it or not. Thanks to the inefficient nature of the PS2's design, developers have to work three times as hard to produce visuals barely one third as good as high-end games seen on competing consoles. How is that fair to developers who can't afford to ignore the PS2 or the games themselves?

Good Gaming,

Geoffrey Duke

What do you think? Email

"Masashi Muromachi, corporate vice president of Toshiba Corporation and president & CEO of Toshiba's Semiconductor Company, described Cell as 'a revolutionary microprocessor with a brand new architecture that leapfrogs the performance of existing processors.'"

> Of course it does! No doubt this bio-mechanical Cell processor in the Playstation 3 will be every bit as "revolutionary" as the Emotion Engine governing its predecessor. You know, I'm still waiting for my PS2 to render CGI graphics in the same league as Toy Story in real-time. I guess I was expecting too much when I expected the Emotion Engine to live up to all the hype. Hardware hype about how the PS2 (with its Emotion Engine processor which sounded like it ran the risk of becoming sentient) dealt a knock-out blow to the Dreamcast long before the quality of the PS2's software could speak for itself. The hype gathered so much momentum that nothing could stop the PS2's march to victory. I think some people were even expecting the Emotion Engine to become self-aware and take over the world. What's the moral of this story? We were all misled to believe that the PS2 was something it quite clearly wasn't. I'm currently expecting the PS3 to allow players to enter virtual reality simulations that are so life-like that these simulated realms will be indistinguishable from reality. I can't wait...

     > Because of mounting debts that threaten to topple Sony (61 billion dollars the last time I checked), I doubt Sony will be too eager to sell the PS3 at a huge loss, which means either the price of the console itself will go up (along with the price of games to recoup rising development costs), or Sony will be forced to cut back on RAM or other features to keep costs to an absolute minimum, or perhaps even both. If this Cell processor delivers everything it promises, then that alone will put a drain on Sony. I would hope (and indeed expect) that building a cost-efficient console doesn't mean building one out of parts that aren't known for their durability. Every time I turn on my PS2, I keep expecting it to explode due to shoddy craftsmanship.

     > Judging from the amount of complaints received, it seems that the PS2 wasn't built to last. PS2s have been frequently known to stop reading disks and start scratching them instead, and even break down just outside of their warrantees (how convenient). Even Capcom's Shinji Mikami, one of the more prominent minds behind the creation of Resident Evil and Devil May Cry, accused Sony of distributing faulty PS2s *in the full knowledge* that people would buy replacements to inflate Sony's marketshare after his own PS2 broke down. He described this phenomenon as "almost criminal". He even complained about the lenses wearing out too quickly in original Playstations - a problem the PS2 has apparently inherited if all the PS2s with faulty lenses being sold on Ebay serve as any clue. I actually own more than a decade old Sony-made PAL (60 Hz compatible) TV that has outlived two of my friends Playstations and Playstation 2s. What's wrong with this picture?

     > With a new generation of consoles dawning on us, I'm beginning to wonder if people will fall into the same hype trap again. Is it just me, or does Sony's "Cell Technology" almost sound like it's alive? With Microsoft releasing the Xbox 2 late in the fourth quarter of 2005, and Sony releasing the PS3 in the first quarter of 2006, there really shouldn't be much separating the two consoles from one another hardware-wise unless Sony wants to rename the PS3's processor SkyNet. Both consoles will be put in a position where they will be forced to rely on their software to do the separating for them, which sounds like a fair fight to me. As far as I'm concerned, Microsoft entering the fray has levelled the playing field; Sony won't be competing against someone that's a billion dollars in debt like last time. Sony can throw all the money it has at third party developers because it won't matter this time when someone with even deeper pockets will be doing the same. It's about time someone started playing Sony at its own game. I cannot help but wonder, though, if the Playstation 3 will be another "SmokeStation" (as Shinobi once put) full of more smoke and mirrors purposely built to break down to fuel sales once again. If it is, then you can expect Microsoft to exploit that chink in Sony's armor. Perhaps some "real" competition will ensure that Sony delivers a quality product this time. One can only hope.

Good Gaming,

Geoffrey Duke

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"In a joint announcement issued today, the group said that Cell delivers 'vastly improved, real-time response for entertainment and rich media applications, in many cases 10 times the performance of the latest PC processors...'"

> In many cases? So in some cases, this Cell processor at the center of the Playstation 3 is in fact not that far ahead of "the latest PC processors"? Please elaborate...

Good Gaming,

Geoffrey Duke

What do you think? Email

"One of the big issues the team over at Capcom is facing is the fact that the PS2's texture memory capacity is far smaller than the Gamecube's. In the Gamecube version of Resident Evil 4, players were treated to 24 bit textures. However, in the PS2 version, expect 8 and 4 bit textures, which is quite a downgrade.

But no sir, it doesn't end there.

Leon's polygon count, in order to run on the inferior PS2 hardware, will have to drop from the original 10,000 polygons to a mere 5,000, slightly more than Snake from Metal Gear Solid 3..."

> Inferior indeed. I almost cannot believe that some of the more outspoken PS2 fans (short for fanatics) actually believe that the conversion of Resident Evil 4 to the PS2 will look almost completely identical to the original GameCube version once it's finished. I'm willing to bet that Sony's worshippers have already ignored the above article in the vain hopes that the underlying issues highlighted by it will magically go away. Maybe it's a malicious hoax designed to lead them astray? Talk about being in denial.

     > Seeing as how I see things from a less clouded perspective (*laughs evilly*), I cannot help likening the GameCube-to-Playstation 2 conversion of Resident Evil 4 to shoe-horning a huge foot into a shoe several sizes too small. Even the people at Capcom are admitting to having trouble porting the game, and if the creators of a graphically amazing PS2 game like Devil May Cry 3 admit that they are being forced to not only reduce the polygon count, but go from very sharp high resolution 24 bit textures to very rough low resolution 4 bit textures with a lower color depth (which will leave its mark on the game, mark my words) to maintain a consistent frame rate (which will probably also be reduced to 24 frames per second -- the same as motion pictures -- to increase the level of detail in each individual frame), then I see no reason to doubt them. 

     > The truth is, however much some people might not want to admit it, the PS2 didn't turn out to be the uber-console capable of displaying 75 million polygons per second in a real game that Sony hyped it up to be. Sony released the 75 million PPS figure (which was later reduced to 66 million PPS) to the world even though it was just a figure for raw polygons with no effects, textures, AI etc. making their presence felt *in the full knowledge* beforehand that anyone ignorant of the technical side of things would take that figure at face value. And it worked. The reality of the situation is the PS2 can't display all those polygons and still have room on its high speed yet meager VRAM for textures et al, which greatly reduces the overall polygon count even in high-end PS2 games to the region of 15-20 million PPS tops (even now, five years after the console was launched). The worst part is there are lost souls out there who *still* believe that the PS2 can display 75/66 million polygons per second and who I have little doubt will try to attribute a poorer version of RE4 to poor programming as a consequence. What the hell is wrong with these gamers?!

     > Notice how Capcom aren't so much worried about matching polygon counts as they are concerned with drastically toning down the game's realistic character models and environments to something the PS2 can handle without its pipelines choking to death. Even now it's becoming less and less about polygon counts and more and more about textures and lighting. Although the Dreamcast was said to be limited to rendering 3 million polygons per second when it was initially unveiled to the world, Test Drive Le Mans displays no less than 5 million polygons per second at a non-stop 30 frames per second, and with photo-realistic cars, the game is comparable to the likes of Gran Turismo 3 for the PS2. A quick comparison of the PS2 version of MDK 2 with the older, original Dreamcast version will reveal muddier, rougher textures, a frame rate that stutters far more noticeably and frequently in some of the game's larger areas than before, and poorer audio coding where music cuts off abruptly now instead of fading out like before. If the PS2 can't even handle a lowly Dreamcast game, then what chance does it have of replicating one of the GameCube's finest? BTW, I love how reviewers were complaining about how the PS2 version of MDK 2's visuals weren't brought up to modern PS2 standards (at the time) due to it being a port of a mere Dreamcast game (as if the DC didn't belong to the same generation of consoles as the PS2) when in reality the PS2 couldn't even bring the game up to the Dreamcast's standards. Their complaints make perfect sense, don't they? Was bad programming to blame? BioWare isn't known for bad programming (I remember BioWare's David Faulkner commenting that due to the PS2's extremely limited texture capacity, implementing eye-pleasing visual effects like high resolutions to negate jagged lines, full screen anti-aliasing, and high-resolution textures etc. take up so much memory that setting them in motion all at once ended up being what he called a real "juggling act"). However... PS2 owners can rest secure in the knowledge that their beloved PS2 can push more polygons. >:)

Good Gaming,

Geoffrey Duke

What do you think? Email