It's no secret that the PS3 is pricey to develop for -- the average dev kit would set you back a cool $10k -- and that likely hinders a lot of devs from making games for it. However, Sony has decided to take action. Edge Online reports that the new DECR-1400A debugging Reference Tool retails for about $2000 in North America, marking a significantly more affordable way to develop for everyone's favorite console-turned-George Foreman Grill.
Sony commented on the new tool:
“Having the same form factor as the commercially available PS3, the new Reference Tool models allow advanced game programming and more efficient computer graphics rendering."
Interesting. It makes one wonder, though, why the original options were so much more expensive in the first place. I assume they allow one to do much more. Does this mean the games we see made with the DECR-1400A will be of lesser quality? Sony is also talking about an optimised PS3 compiler and a new range of software tools. This could really result in more of the types of games that most fascinated me on the PS2, which is an exciting prospect indeed.
[Thanks, Brian]
| BBcode help |
| [b]Bold text[/b] |
Bold text |
| [i]Italic text[/i] |
Italic text |
| [url]http://www.dtoid.com/[/url] |
http://www.dtoid.com |
| [url=http://www.dtoid.com/]Web link[/url] |
Web link |
|
| [img]http://www.example.com/robot.jpg[/img] |
 |
Post a comment! You can also post a photo below:
Comment with Facebook
Click connect and comment instantly!
|
Comment with Dtoid
New? SIGN UP - it takes 5 seconds
|
24 comments | showing # 1 to 24
|
Comment with Facebook
Click connect and comment instantly!
|
Comment with Dtoid
New? SIGN UP - it takes 5 seconds
|
Comments policy
Destructoid is an open discussion community. You don't need to "audition" to post a comment - just speak your mind. We respect differing opinions on the site, so have at it. Be smart, funny, insightful, clueless, or cute -- but back it up with substance. Keep your cool, keep it fun. We only ask that you act respectfully and above all: don't be a troll and ruin it for everyone else. Don't bring down gamers or we'll, you know, gently shoot you in the face and stuff you into a flaming mailbox. Each comment is your opportuntity to make this community awesomer. Is that even a word?
Avoiding the banhammer only requires common sense: spamming, trolling, racism, NSFW stuff, and other forms of sucking will not be tolerated. If anyone is griefing please report abuse. Be good. Don't suck!
Contest:
2:20 PM on 03.24.2009 | 
Who else though the next clause in the sentence was going to be, in fact, about the George Foreman Grill?
I'm not quit sure I follow your logic. I've played plenty of big budget games that were complete garbage, and plenty of indie games that were phenomenal.
I'm not even going to address your miquote of what I said.
You said:
"I guess the price served to prevent smaller dev companies from putting crap on it, at least that's probably Sony's logic. Anyway, improvements and price drops are always welcomed events."
I pointed out that this is faulty logic because plenty of large development companies put out crap games also. By increasing the accessibility of PS3 dev kits, everyone benefits. And so what if people make crappy games for the PS3 or XBLA? Don't buy them and save your money for the good ones.
2k? I'd be tempted for that much, if XNA and iPhone weren't cheaper options.
You said there exist quality games by small dev companies and crappy games by large dev companies. I said that the reality of it was that the large percentage of games made by small dev companies suck ass (look at DS and Wii content) compared to that of games made by large dev companies.
By starting off with a higher dev kit cost they prevent the flooding of crap on the PSN, which happened with XBLA, until a point that they fixed many of the dev kit issues.
As far as why no crappy games on PSN or XBLA is because they don't want people being turned off from buying games in general from these services due to them finding that the games they do get suck. Especially since PSN has a long stance of not just allowing any game onto the network.
Again, look at the Wii and see how people view the majority of the games there and their general third-party software sales numbers. Tons of people have the opportunity to buy tons of games on the Wii, but they primarily buy first-party titles only and have a very low attach rate.