The Power Review

The PS3’s Full Potential: A Breakdown

It has been long rumored that developers have not been taking full advantage of the Playstation 3’s extra capabilities, but is there any proof of this? Many gamers and press say that there isn’t any proof that the Playstation 3 has more capabilities than the 360.  However, there have been slight hints that the PS3 does have a little more power than the 360.  If you look at the top graphical games in certain genres that are comparable, but the PS3 games leads the way with its exclusives versus 360 exclusives and even compared to multiplatform games

First up is the racing genre, and the games in question are: Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, Forza 2 and Need for Speed Undercover (NFSU).  Now it is without question that GT5: Prologue looks better than both Forza 2 and Need for Speed Undercover from a technical standpoint.  GT5: Prologue runs at a higher resolution than both Forza and NFS Undercover, clocking in with a native resolution of 1280×1080p.  Furthermore, GT5: Prologue also uses ray-tracing and has better lighting while running at a constant framerate of 60fps.  While Forza 2 is good, it only runs at a native resolution of 1280×720p and a constant framerate of 60fps.  If you look at a multiplatform game like NFS Undercover which runs at a frame rate of 30fps and has a native resolution of 1280×720p which is good, but where the confusion comes is where the PS3 version runs worse with slight framerate drops and missing effects. This multiplatform discrepancy makes no sense considering the PS3 has the best looking game in the racing genre in GT5 Prologue.

Next up we have the 1^st person shooter genre, where once again the best game from a technical standpoint is a PS3 exclusive, Killzone 2. Yes, Halo 3 was good on 360, but from a technical standpoint Killzone 2 was much better. Killzone 2 runs at a consistent 30fps and at a native resolution of 1280×720p, and it probably has the best lighting this generation of any game period. If you look at Halo 3, it’s a good looking game but only has a resolution of 1152×640p and runs at 30fps with above average lighting. Yet, if we look at a multiplatform game like Bioshock, which has at a resolution of 1280×720p and runs at a constant 30fps, the same scenario applies to the PS3 version with low res textures and framerate drops in comparison to its 360 counterpart. Again I ask how can a PS3 exclusive, Killzone 2, be the best looking in the 1^st person shooter genre, yet a multiplatform game, Bioshock runs worse in comparison to the 360 version?

Lastly if you look at the 3^rd person shooter genre, you again have another PS3 exclusive, Uncharted: Drakes Fortune from a graphical standpoint at the top. Uncharted had a native resolution of 1280×720p and ran at 30 fps and had higher polygon models then Gears. The 360 exclusive Gears of War 2 is close with a native resolution of 1280×720p and runs at 30fps, but the low polygon count of the models killed it (that’s why everybody in the game looks like a linebacker). If you look at another multiplatform game like Resident Evil 5 which has a resolution of 1280×720p and runs at 30fps it again runs slightly better on the 360.  With the PS3’s lighting being worse in some cases and the textures in some spots not being as high quality as the 360 version. Yet the same scenario applies the PS3 exclusive is touted as the best looking in the genre yet its multiplatform version of a game like RE5 lags behind its 360 twin.

So, I ask you guys as gamers. Are these Developers really not using the PS3 to its full capabilities? Going by the track record of PS3 exclusives vs. 360 vs. Multiplatform games I would have to say signs point to “yes”. I know that most Multiplatform games are built up around the 360 architecture and ported to the more difficult PS3; which is fine, but last generation the more difficult architecture of PS2 games were ported to the Xbox with enhanced graphics. If you go strictly by the exclusives then PS3 appears to have a bit more power, certainly enough to run multiplatform games in parity to their 360 counterparts. So why aren’t these Developers taking advantage of this extra power the PS3 appears to have when they did the same thing last generation for multiplatform games on the Xbox?

Please leave your comments down below!

*updated some of the numbers… sorry about the confusion with some of the “native” resolutions versus the upscaled ones*