“NGP is a developer’s dream – Sony is finally doing the things developers have been crying out for for years,” said Eurogamer’s source. “All games at launch available on flash [the physical storage medium] would also be on PSN.
“Any shaders for PS3 stuff will just work. We won’t have to rewrite. What would have taken two-to-three months before looks like it could take just one-to-two weeks now. The architecture is obviously different, but it’s the same development environment.
“Sony has made [NGP] completely developer-centric this time. [The development kit] is really simple to plug in and use. It opens direct in Windows Explorer and you can see all systems on a network – so you could, for example, update the firmware of multiple NGPs at once.
“A PS3 dev station can take three hours to set-up. This looks like it will take under 20 mins. It just makes everything easier – they’ve really thought about it this time”.
The source also confirmed that NGP contains three gyroscopes compared to the PS3′s controller, and combined with front and rear touch panels capable of six-point multi-touch, which will allow more accurate movements, accurate movement. Sony demonstrated this buy showing a person “squeezing an in-game object,” by pinching the front and back at the same time.
“The touch pad on the back is fantastic,” said the source. “It does feel second nature, like you’re having a real impact on the world.”
Social and location-based features were touched on, so were “virtual gifts,” like “new skins and avatars”.
Sony also told attendees that a date and price for the system would be announced soon, and the rumored “cloud saving” feature was not confirmed by SCEE despite being brought up by developers.
NGP was announced last week in Japan, and the general consensus is that it will see a retail release in time for Christmas shopping. During the event, Sony hinted that the Wi-Fi edition would be released this year, and the Wi-Fi plus 3G system would be the one hitting around the holidays.
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