PS4 Indie Games Bridge Gap Between Major Titles as Game Development Gets Friendlier
Sony announced that indie games will fill in the gaps between the PS4's big releases of the year.
Mark Cerny, a PS4 system architect told Famitsu that the Playstation 4 is looking to make the development of games easier for studios.
"We asked assorted creators what kind of functionality we should put in, and we used their responses as a base when we finalized the hardware architecture. We're aiming for not just performance, but also an environment setup that allows for smooth PS4 game development."
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Sony wants their developers to first be able to build their games on PC and then transfer them flawlessly to the console. This will also ease the hassle of Indie game creators too.
"Small-scale projects don't even take a month [to reach that point], and even big titles can get rolling in two or three months. As a result, I think we've built one of the neatest launch lineups in game history," Cerny said. "With our PS3 experience, we understand the factors needed for powerful, effective development, so that's why we treated our twin goals of performance and ease of development so seriously. Thanks to that, I think we were able to reduce development time on Knack by around a year."
The PS4 has a very strong launch lineup set for November, and when asked about a possible game drought, Sony's Shushei Yoshida had a solution.
"That's why we're trying to give our help out to indie titles. Huge titles from large makers take time to develop; they can't just be brought out immediately. However, with the indie scene, especially in the West, we're seeing really neat games coming out from there pretty much every week."
He continued, "I'd like to get that indie flow going in the Japan market as well, with unique titles coming out one after the other. More and more users are making digital purchases these days, so even studios making games with small teams can make it into a business."
The PS4 will see a slew of releases due to their indie friendliness, and the vast variety of game developers out there.
"The PS4 is really easy to build games on. I think we'll see a variety of products coming out from lots of creators. I'm confident that the system will allow many creators to get involved," said Cerny.
