The PS3. Powerful. Technically the most powerful console currently on the market. But Valve don’t like making games on it, apparently. The PS3 version of the Orange Box was handed off to EA and is apparently sloppy, with slow framerates and hang-up issues.
Why do I bring this up? I HATE Sony, after all.
Because Left 4 Dead is not going to be on the PS3. (at the time of writing, I wouldn’t be surprised if things changed in the future.) And various unscrupulous Sony fanboys have taken it upon themselves to blame Valve (One of the most consistently brilliant developers around today) for lack of skills or Microsoft love, instead of Sony (well known for making overly complicated and difficult to code gaming platforms, then lying about how good they are).
Let’s get this straight.
Valve are primarily a PC developer. Not just because it’s what they’re good at, but also because it’s where, frankly, most of their games belong, merely due to their style – thinking man’s shooters. A controller is never going to be as good at aiming as a mouse. The majority of Console owners are dribbling cretins. With most consoles it isn’t going to work.
It works with the 360 because it’s essentially a PC in a box, and therefore extremely easy to port PC games to. And while I don’t want to generalise gamers (Which surely the very term ‘gamer’ does), many Xbox 360 owners are people who can’t afford to keep up with constantly changing computer permutations. Which is perfectly reasonable. People who bought Orange Box for the 360 knew they were compromising for an inferior version and accepted that.
It doesn’t work with the PS3 because it’s completely different to a PC! No PC uses a 7 core processor (Well, 6. One is used by the OS). No PC uses Sixaxis. To seal the deal, Sony can’t use Direct3D, a Microsoft product! The Source engine which the Orange Box and Left 4 Dead utilize is based upon it! Instead Sony are forced to rely on OpenGL, which developers haven’t really used since when? 1998? To make the Source engine and it’s games work with the PS3 they have to be entirely recoded! And you ask why L4D isn’t getting a release? At least not now? It probably will eventually guys, but it’s going to take time.
Many criticize Valve nevertheless, pointing out developers who DO manage multiformat releases, such as Capcom. Yet I remember when you were complaining that these ports were rubbish and unplayable. The PS3 is difficult to develop for, because Sony decided to be needlessly different in an attempt to be fancy. Blu-Ray – a disc format that contains massive amounts of data but is so slow that games need to be installed or have information copied onto empty sectors to speed loading times. The Cell processor – powerful, but complex, and incredibly difficult to program. All of this bottlenecked by the low 256mb main memory. Sony shot themselves in the foot with their own hardware! And yet you have the Gall to say Gabe Newell is lazy or Valve can’t make good games anyway, when they don’t fancy trying to make a PS3 version? When they probably will, later? Go fuck yourself.
Why do you want it, anyway? FPS games don’t work brilliantly on controllers, but they’re especially bad on the Sixaxis/Dualshock. If you wanted to play an FPS you should have bought a PC. Failing that, a 360. And no, the red rings rarely happen these days, so shut your mouth.
I’d rather have a console that might break down so I’ll have to get it repaired than a console people don’t want to develop for.
I’m well aware details of my post may be wrong. Feel free to point them out, I don’t expect to be perfect. But I’m sure with even large corrections my point will still be valid.
Internets r SERIEEUS BIZZNEZZ!
