Sony Worldwide Studios’ Shuhei Yoshida, Michael Denny and Richard Lee have spoken to Develop about developing for the upcoming PlayStation Vita, claiming the world of games “has now changed” and this required a shift in focus.
“[They] had very, very high potential and peak performance, but programming for the PlayStation platforms was a huge challenge for game developers,” says Yoshida. “In a sense, Kutaragi [Ken; ex-head of SCE] was enjoying challenging game developers.”
“That was very good – it was great – for the teams with engineers who liked the challenge, but the world has now changed, and today there is a much larger community of developers,” he continued. Of course, since then, the ease of development has led development startups to head for platforms like iOS over traditional consoles and handhelds.
Sony’s focus has apparently “shifted to be less about getting the most out of the hardware, to be about having a very smooth production process” to reflect this new world. “That’s because now it involves so many more people to make one game…development efficiency has become more and more important.”
Also chiming in was Denny, the SCP of Worldwide Studios: “In terms of smoothing the development process, certainly what the Vita offers is close to that of the PSP, and with some of the help we’re giving to developers, I would say it is the easiest and most well supported platform yet.”
WWS’ chief technology officer Lee agrees: “I think we took the experiences from PS3, and decided that we wanted to go out there with a great developer environment that is compatible with the third party tools that developers normally use…there’s never been anything like this on a PlayStation platform. It is a great development environment, and the stuff that is available before launch is really good in terms of helping developers with performance tuning an so on.”
Of course, Sony couldn’t let a whole interview go by without mentioning the power under Vita’s hood. “In terms of performance, and the graphics power and programmable shaders and so on, what you can get out of it is far closer to PS3,” says Denny. “It’s a great contrast of ease of development to the output you get from the system.”
Hopefully this will mean a steady flow of new titles for Vita, compared to the slow trickle of the PSP’s later years.
Source: Develop
Crocadillian
Hopefully unlike the 3DS, there will be a steady stream of third-party games 3 months after it’s launch too. I’m sure considering the conscientious design up to this point that developers will want to create for this console.
Sympozium
Well its as loads of PSP games (on my download list) so I guess that would set it far apart from the 3DS.
jayjay119
Hopefully they’ll follow this philosophy throgh with the PS4, in the days of the PS1 and 2 having complex architecture wouldn’t have been a problem, but with the introduction of the 360 it’s made that way of thinking obsolete. Last gen the PS2 was so popular to to it’s accessablity, but this gen Sony changed up their philosophy about their console becoming a media hub, graphics whore machine with still complicated architecture. Against the Xbox brand, which is know in both this generation and the last as being the ‘pretty box’, this decision was stupid. As a result, the 360 really has stolen the popularity because of accessibility factor the PS2 had last gen and thrown nice graphics into the mix. Sony need to find a way to claw that reputation back next gen and simple architecture way very well be the way to do that.
TURRICAN-808
I hope ALL titles from the PS Store will work on it. I’d like FFVI on it!
JoshHood
I don’t see why they wouldn’t?
Sympozium
I agree if not games work… I’d be annoyed.
SpikeyMikey23
cannot wait to get my hands on this!
carson321
If they keep to that way of thinking for the PS4, hopefully it wont take half of its lifecycle for developers to finally get to grips with what the machine can do
Shadow_lawless
What would be really cool is if they actually set up some sort of website that actually gave information on developing for the psvita. At the moment I can type develop for xbox 360 in google and they have their own xna website which helps developers get into creating for the xbox by providing tools, links, sample code information… Where as with ps3 or vita, when you search u just get a load of random kinks that may be slightly connected to ps3 development.
I think they should make it alot easier to get into developing for the system, even if it’s just developing apps or minis with a downsized sdk / maybe even an app that could be installed on the vita that allowed you create your own vita apps, but have a licensing fee if you want to actually publish it on the pan store.
Like the the way the iOS sdk is free but requires a yearly fee and a proportion of the sales for putting content on the app store .
Shadow_lawless
But then again those hardcore little big planet creators will probably be able squeeze a few quality games out of the vita
JoshHood
Check out the minis scheme on the PlayStation development pages – if you were buying into iOS development you’d be getting a Mac for roundabout the same cost as a Minis devkit. The problem is the former makes you a lot more money than the latter.
Shadow_lawless
I can’t find the pages? How much is the ps minis sdk?
JoshHood
It’s against developer NDA to talk about the cost, sorry. It’s certainly got a lot cheaper in the last few years though.
Can’t really give you a link, but e-mailing SCEE wil start things off.
Watchful
See this story for how much PSP dev kits were a couple of years ago:
http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2009/09/08/free-psp-development-kits-possible/
That was after Sony reduced the cost of the dev kits 80% to support minis development.
recurv
It’s not against NDA to direct people to this link:
https://www.tpr.scee.net/AreaNewLicensee/MainSystem/CFModules/ScreenLayout/nl_master_template.cfm?v_which_screen=NEW LICENSEE
It appears down at the moment, but keep trying. You can apply for the minis program here.
Samiro05
I would like to develop games, gotta learn how to program first though. PSV is looking evermore enticing to me as first day purchase.
Shadow_lawless
That’s actually really reasonable pricing considering it’s just a little cheaper than buying a mac mini and an iPhone for development, even if you can still use both the phone and mac for more than just developing. but I wonder if they’ve done any more looking into this free model.
UKZ-N3M1515
First line, you types Spoekn.
good article though, i enjoy reading about Vita stuff at the moment.
bunimomike
It’s great to read what’ll come of this but to see how they put it is utter, utter tripe!
You created a system that was so bloody difficult to code for that Mad Ken did his best to disguise your lack of support by saying that he likes to challenge developers and engineers. Sod that! Do you know how challenged they are in the ferociously competitive world of video games? You went off and built incredible hardware but at what cost? The cost of developers scratching their heads and having to learn a wealth of new technology and having little support from you during the incubation period.
GAH!
Anyway, lemon-flavoured water under the bridge of bitterness.
Good news! :-)