As I mentioned a lot of it comes from the nature of my experience with it i.e. someone brought me up on the comment of "scraping the API" - what I actually meant was correct but scraping correctly used usually refers to parsing human readable data from an application and API is for computer programs to interface with each other so what I actually said through lack of structured training with the subject sounded idiotic even tho the concept I was actually referring to made sense.
Maybe so! However it was more the stuff that Craterloads picked up on that I was talking about, as it again leads back to what I mean.
You post stuff like that, and it's like "well, clearly he has some insight at least" and then comments like "720p at 30FPS" and it's like "what?! his posts earlier suggested he should know better than that".
I'm not picking you up on eloquence either, as I'm not particularly eloquent myself, so I could hardly complain about it. The thing is though, it's nice that you can acknowledge what I'm saying instead of taking offense just because it's critical.
If developers started to use hardware physics, gpu compute based processing for advanced lighting effects like realtime global illumination and so on tho IMO its going to end up being less than adequate a lot quicker than it should. After seeing TressFX in action hopefully people are starting to realise that the CPU alone isn't sufficent for proper physics implementations beyond the primitive functions (simple rigid/animated bodies, basic ragdolls, etc.). Sure you can throw a few 100,000 boxes around and have it all running smooth but that doesn't represent the workload of more advanced physics effects.
Something I think you've not taken in to account is that for 1080P, even on a desktop a 7850 is still very good. Plus it's going to be a 7850 with BIG bandwidth and nice big pool of memory to use.
The fact the PS4 has an 8 core CPU will mean that PS4 developers WILL be gearing up for heavy multi threading programming, and Sony are very proactive with their developer support too.
I was reading an article recently about JAW and their development of the PS Vita version of Stranger's Wrath that was about how the quad core CPU really helped them keep the graphical quality up along with the frame rate too, and for me, I think the visuals of Stranger's Wrath on PS Vita is pretty impressive, it looks great and runs at the Vita's native resolution of 960x540, which again is very impressive for such a small device. There also seems like there's some form of AA too, as I very rarely notice any jagged edges.
But back to the article, Sony software engineers went in to JAW's studio to give them hands on support with multithreaded performance which made the big difference of getting the game to run at 960x540 at the graphics settings they wanted, which before that, they didn't think they'd be able to do it without reducing the quality and resolution.
As for hardware physics, well I agree, hardware physics is going to be great when it's properly used, and my digs against PhysX aren't because I think it's crap, but rather I Think the way nVidia use it is awful, in that they have basically wasted it.
Also, compute performance for desktop AMD parts is very high, and with direct hardware access, I think the hardware will be more than enough with an octo core CPU to supplement it.
It'll look great indeed. Dunno about the link between a launch title and not maxing out the hardware though as killzones studio are sony exclusives so they'll have had access to the tech well before anyone else. Killzone 3 on the PS3 looked great but it really paid for it in terms of draw distance, noticeably on the later levels (when you are moving through a rubble area taking out troops silently for example before you meet up with loads of them).
The only thing that genuinely puts me off the thought of buying a new console is the price of it. Inflation has risen massively since the PS3 came out so the launch price of this will be steep. The games will also be even more expensive than they are now, but hopefully not at N64 levels of expense...
They will have had early access to the hardware, but as far as I know final specifications have only recently been decided on, so there will be multiple dev kits out there with varying levels of hardware, so those with the most early access would likely have experience on lesser hardware anyway.
Additionally, Sony software engineers would likely be in a similar position, so wouldn't have the most experience yet on the hardware.
As for the price, I think the price has already been confirmed to be less than the PS3's launch price, at £399, which when factoring in inflation makes it a fair chunk less.
