By now, you should've heard about id Software's Rage , which is in the process of being developed for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PC and Mac.
Anything id and John Carmack does will get a lot of attention, but it got the wrong kind of attention last month, when an Edge magazine article ignited a spark of negativity in the PS3 community. He said that currently, while the 360 and PC versions were running at a very nice 50-60 frames per second, the PS3 was only functioning at 20-30 frames per second. But sometimes things progress more slowly when a designer isn't 100% familiar with a platform, and that doesn't mean the final product will be inferior. id tried to explain this in a recent Tweet :
"The Edge Magazine article has caused quite a ruckus. We are committed to ensuring that gamers on all platforms have a great RAGE experience."
There's no doubt that we have faith in id Software, but PS3 owners are beginning to "qualify" the developers: if they don't have a solid history with PlayStation products and their area of expertise in the past has centered almost entirely on PC hardware (and Xbox hardware, which is very similar), we have our reservations. Valve is a good example; that studio even admitted they'd have to "go out and get some PS3 guys" to really do things properly. So although we're certainly expecting identical Rage experiences across platforms, perhaps PS3 owners will notice id's history and…well, buy another version.
Related Game(s): RAGE
I used to love id games on the PC back in the day. But they haven't done anything too fantastic on ANY console yet. If I were them, I'd keep my whiny mouth shut and quietly "go out and get some PS3 guys" if need be.
They are way to small do go out a get a large group of Cell programmers. And Doom 3 on the Xbox was awesome coop game
Never heard of this company or this game. Seems a majority of developers that have problems working on the PS3 are ones I've never heard of. What does that say? Either way, i wouldn't buy this game. If it was one I wanted. After this, I'd probably opt for the Mac version.
How have you never heard of ID Software? You have never heard of Wolfenstein, Quake, or Doom???
If you like FPS you must know this guys.
Aye? Where have you been mate. They practically invented the modern FPS. Before the online con …er fad; their FPSs (amongst some other) were the one to play on the internet. And you weren't stuck with just playing them on Windows.
Aaaah. I see. I have heard and played all three of those games but I didn't know id made them. When those games came out I was very young and didn't care who made them. I stopped playing these when i got a SNES.
yup the bigger company's.
valve and ID are legends in the community.
they made games what they are today.
halo gears quantum resistance killzone.
all these games wouldnt be half as good if it wasent for ID and valve.
now come to think of it they created better games for their time.
when doom came out everyone shat themselvs.
same for half life its still thought of as the best FPS how many years later.
those games were more of a revolution than what were getting today.
thats why people are riding on ID and valve, to raise the bar as they did with half life and doom, because no other company will.
if the bigger companys are having trouble with the ps3, imagine what the smaller companys will be going through.
the bigger companys like ID and valve can afford to have 2 teams working on each system, like capcom did with resi 5.
but smaller comapnys cant do that costs way to much cash, but at the end of the day your title is much better and it really shows you put more work into it.
i would love to see ps3 games selling better, because once that happened than hopefully devs would be more confident and willing to spend the extra cash and have different teams working on each version.
then and only then will we see MP games rising above the 360s.
that would be the best, separate teams working to bring the best out of each system.
You have never heard of id? jesus christ and you play video games?
Jesus Christ plays video games?
Yeah, Jesus is pretty awesome at HALO. Pun intended. 😉
Heard he's not that great at God of War though 🙂
I haven't but its great that I haven't FPS is ruining gaming IMFO
John Carmack also stated in the Edge interview that they were having problems with textures in the 360 version. While the textures in the PS3 version were fine, but it was only running at 20-30 frames per second. Looks like the PC version might be the only way to go. It's a damn shame!
Last edited by Evil Incarnate on 8/3/2009 12:07:55 PM
Or the Mac version…id is proficient there too. I still remember PC users getting irked when an early QUAKE III (I think) demo came out for Mac MONTHS before a PC version.
Sorry didn't mean to leave out the Mac, which is what I would like to get in the next year or so. Just have to convince the wife it's just as easy to use as a PC.
Last edited by Evil Incarnate on 8/3/2009 4:51:54 PM
Hi i am somewhat new here but anyways i'm an owner of both xbox and ps3. I still dont get why developers can't make the game better on ps3. Its the most powerful game system out there. It should be challenging but tht means theyll have to put more work into a game and its potential to be good will be even better. The xbox 360 has had too much praise for too long. We need to get developers eyeing the ps3 as the one they want to make the best quailty games for.
They can't make playstation 3 versions better because of the xbox 360's technical limitations. Whether they are disk space issues or the consoles capability.
Last edited by Andysw on 8/3/2009 12:39:50 PM
Because they take the easy(i.e. lazy)way out and build it on the Xbox then port it to the PS3 or they build it on the PC the port it to both. I believe the PS3 requires cleaner code then the Xbox does so when you port it over, the PS3 has problems running the dirty code.
Last edited by Jawknee on 8/3/2009 12:56:19 PM
As was somewhat stated above, the issue is the developement process, combined with developement costs. The PS3's architecture requires developers to work very very differently, than the 360/PC. What we've seen in the past, is companies making the product for the PC/360, then just dumping the code onto the PS3, expecting it to function normally. Sadly, it doesn't, as we've seenw ith many a multiplatform game on the PS3.
ID's no slouch tho, they'll probably get it up to par by launch.
As far as I can tell there are two issues with iD and Rage atm. Firstly there's this dd habit they, and particularly Carmack, have developed of trying to appease gamers on each platform which has really backfired.
They first moaned that the game had to be cut in size(possibly because of MS royalties on games over two discs long but never confirmed either way), then calmed 360 heads down by telling us all that it was "lead" platform. Then the 360 textures being off so they had to level up with PS3 and the poor framerate-none of which is from the finished game so who cares?
And now they're back to calming us PS3 owners down but had they stayed quiet noone would have mentioned anything!
The second issue is the usual multi play prob for PS3 gamers to worry over when a PC/360 heavy developer tries their first PS game this gen. IDK exactly why the PS3 version should be the one that suffers when games are running wel below the standard of PS3 exclusives like KZ2 or MGS4 but they do.
The weaknesses of both platforms are present for multi plat devs aiming for parity over their platforms and it just seems that a mix of them being more happy/used to MS/360 dev tools and unable/unwilling to ask the likes of Sony SM/ND/GG for advice means PS3 gets poorer, though by very little, versions even now.
iD have a great pedigree and though the majority of the fanbase is PC/GFW based you'd think they would be able to get a good and very similar experience on the go on both consoles even where some have struggled but the exact reasons behind why games optimised for neither PS or 360 run better on MS console remains beyond me.
I guess it has to be familiarity with the dev kits but haven't they seen what Sony's first party devs have managed?
Well then wouldnt be smarter to start out with the hardest platform first? I'm kinda new to debating on this so don't act like im a dumas haha. But it would be easier to convert the harder to do code down to an easier code. They should put more time and effort into the harder code than being lazy. I know iknow its a third party game but all third party developers are looking at the ps3 the same way as others making the ps3 look inferior it has soo much potential. But it is kinda early to mkae a statement like that when the release date is tba 2011.
@ ShadowxOps – We've actually heard that from a few developers, and it was something that Sony was stating in the past. That you'd see 3rd parties moving to the PS3 as the staging ground, the moving to 360/PC. It does take longer to get the PS3 engine working properly though, optimizing their code and their processes onto the SPE's, and utilizing the post-processing HP that the PS3 has. I've heard it stated from several developers, but, I'm not entirely sure I believe them yet, time will tell. And as Sony & Co. make newer and more refined middleware, and other such engines that can either be borrowed or reverse-engineered to learn their secrets, the quality when compared to the 360 will continue to increase.
The quality of games have gotten better defeinatley already. Quanity could get better too =)haha. Anyways i have both xbox and ps3 like i said before and when i was watching e3 Sony was the only part of the show that i enjoyed haha. Their conference i was sure won the show then i look at like gamespot and gi and i look at the ratings and of course they give microsoft an A and playstation a flat b. Its almost as if the developers are being paid by microsoft to make the games better for xbox haha im pretty sure its not true but it feels that way. Exclusives for PS3 look soo much better than xboxs. I might be rambling a bit but u should get the point.
It's hard for devs who are familiar with the PC and Xbox dev environment to make the jump because:
1) They have to think about something new, and the learning curve is steep. The CPU is new, and the 7 SPEs can be used in many ways which have to be learned. The compiler can only so so much, the developer has to make a lot of design decisions. On Xbox you have a CPU with three identical cores, and an application model that relies on a relatively standard multi-threading methods. For Xbox the developer can lean more on the compiler than they can on the PS3.
2) The PS3 takes a completely different mind set because your CPU has two types of core, and one of them is optimized for floating point math, but not limited to FP math. PS3 development requires developers to do a more thorough analysis of their game and it's code so that they can separate out the specific tasks that benefit from the SPEs extra speed with FP math, as well as the tasks that benefit from the ability to chain SPEs together in series. You also have to re-think some of the larger computational problems in your game and consider a parallel processing approach to get the most out of the Cell.
3) PC devs use Direct X, Xbox360 development tools and libraries are largely based on PC tools, so skills and library use such as Direct X translate directly. Although Sony uses OpenGL, no where near as many PC devs develop in Open GL as standard.
4) Finally, although the first party devs and Sony themselves have offered lots of help, and the tools have improved greatly, a lot of developers, especially folks like id and Valve, create custom engines and libraries for their games and don't want to incorporate the lessons or techniques of others, favoring their own way. Sony actually will work directly with developers, literally providing subject matter experts for Cell and RSX programming, but the developers need to ask for the help for it to be provided. Pride may get in the way, as may confidentiality fears.
However, after this round of development is complete, id will be in a much better position to work on their next game, and may even see the benefits of working more closely with Sony.
I expect big news at about Rage at QuakeCon next week. Dallas Gaming Mafia in full effect!
Actually somehow Rage got by me, hadn't heard of it. Hows Doom 4 coming along? I wouldn't put too much stock in the way Edge spins things anyway.
I believe id also said if Microsoft didn't change their "per disc" licensing fees, they might be forced to fit the 360 version on a single DVD at the expense of texture qualities.
You people are total Xbots… that is if this was a conversation last gen and Sony and Microsoft were switched… it's funny how things change even though the diffrence isn't nearly a glaring as it was last gen
Troll.
What has changed? Sony is again being hailed as harder to program for and has once again built hardware with longer legs. The only difference is that instead of arriving a year late to the party, this time Microsoft arrived a year early.
Other than that, the Sony device is still by and large the more powerful device, with the more difficult programming model, but the longer designed life. I'll make no bones about it, in some ways I wish Sony had pushed the envelope and simply gone with two CellBEs, but they chose to go with a GPU instead. Fundamentally the RSX and Xenos are similar, and in some ways the Xenos is better, and in some ways the RSX is better. If you can harness the specific abilities of each to your advantage each can be made to sing and dance. Multi-plat games are not in a position to do that, and typically default to the lowest common denominator, or Direct3D (part of DirectX), which ever comes first. For games with a PC release, you know that it will be DirectX/Direct3D first and foremost with a port to Open GL and PS3 afterwards. This is unfortunately not the best way to develop a game from a PS3 point of view, but makes perfect sense if you're trying to hit all three platforms I mentioned.
Although OpenGL is implemented in the PC world (it's actually used in many OS environments and is not specifically designed for games), it's often considered a poor performance option for games because the drivers and libraries are not native to Windows. In the past, OpenGL ran partially in user mode and partially in kernel mode forcing a performance sapping mode switch. Microsoft designed DirectX specifically to support better game performance in Windows NT/2K/XP where applications don't have direct access to the hardware. DirectX provides a more direct interface to the hardware for game developers. PC developers therefore program for DirectX first, and program for OpenGL as a compatibility option if an application is to be portable across other platforms. id Software and Valve are fundamentally PC developers who have gotten into console programming. Because Xbox 360's APIs are based on Direct3D, DirectX/Direct3D is/was the easiest starting point for them.
With comments like that id has guaranteed that people will wait for the reviews before considering a purchase of Rage on the PS3.
EDGE is such an Xbot
World I never heard of Rage either, I didnt know Doom 4 was being made either lol 🙂
I think the problem here, and the problem that Valve will face is that they are really developing for the PS3 the first time, so this is effectively their first generation experience with the PS3, where most multi-platform developers are onto their second or third generation experience with the PS3 because they are working with the PS3 for the second or third time. So they are running into some of the issues that others hit before them. Consequently they sound a little like other multi-platform developers did a couple of years back. That said, I have confidence that Carmack's lot (id Software) will manage to get their games working well on PS3. Although their first attempt might not be quite as good as it could be, it will still be very good.
John Carmack has too much pride in himself and his work to allow a substandard product out. He expressed some reservations about the PS3 before but felt it was time to work on it. He's now said some positive things about it, and I honestly don't see him backing down there, he'll find a way to make it work.
I'm getting Borderlands instead.
borderlands is going to be out years before RAGE.
im expecting it late 2010 if not 2011.
but to miss out on RAGE would be a massive mistake.
it will revolutionize the industry.
its going to set the bar higher than a game has done before, i have verry high expectations for RAGE i hope they dont let me down.
but thats ps3 fanboys for you.
i read the article off CVG and the ammount of babys insulting his programming skills.
wake the … up.
ID are the FPS gods.
there the dady of FPS.
they gave us wolfenstiene 3D.
they gave us DOOM.
they gave us PREY.
like god if that does not show your commitment and skill what does?
as far as im concerned anything with a ID badge on it will be pure gold.
put simply they dont know how to make a bad game.
but i know what system im getting rage on.
and doom 4 for that fact.
now all thats remaining is PREY 2.
come on ID, DO IT! DO IT! NOW!!!!
3d realms gave us Prey
ahhh yea they did my bad.
im starting to wonder if sony really do support 3rd partys.
playing through haze again, that game had allot of potentional.
a little more polish and it could of been the halo killer we all wanted.
since it was a ps3 exclusive and had allot riding on it you would think sony would constantly check up on it to see how their going.
than they would see the games really buggy jump in and say hey guys this is unacceptable, than send a programmer in to help ubisoft.
it looks like ubi were out in the cold with haze with no help from sony what so ever.
and now coincidence SP Conviction is a 360 exclusive because ubi said M$ has given them allot of support.
may be haze was the deal breaker for splinter cell conviction? nice job sony.
they need to help out allot more 3rd party devs.
thats what devs have allways been saying that M$ is always going out of their way to help them, you never hear 3rd party devs saying this about the ps3 only 1st partys do.