by
William D’Angelo
, posted 48 minutes ago / 241 Views
Former PlayStation boss Shawn Layden in an interview with VideoGamesChronicle at Gamescom Asia was asked about the power of consoles and he said the hardware has reached a precipice and things cannot continue as before.
“We’ve done these things this way for 30 years, every generation those costs went up and we realigned with it,” said Layden. “We’ve reached the precipice now, where the center can’t hold, we cannot continue to do things that we have done before.”
He added, “It’s time for a real hard reset on the business model, a hard reset on what it is to be a video game. It’s not 80 hours, it’s not 90 hours, but if it is that’s a whole different category.”
When it comes to future hardware he said, “it has plateaued.”
“We’re at the stage of hardware development that I call ‘only dogs can hear the difference,'” he said. “If you’re playing your game and sunlight is coming through your window onto your TV, you’re not seeing any ray tracing. It has to be super optimal… you have to have an 8K monitor in a dark room to see these things.
“We’re fighting over teraflops and that’s no place to be. We need to compete on content. Jacking up the specs of the box, I think we’ve reached the ceiling.”
He concluded, “That race is nearly over, and you know who won? AMD.”
Sony Interactive Entertainment is releasing the mid-generation upgrade to the PlayStation 5, the PS5 Pro, on November 7 for $699.99 / £699.99 / €799.99 / ¥119,980.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D’Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
