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Distributed Playstation
withinavoid writes "News.com has a story up about the next generation Playstation 3. Apparently the game developers are asking for a 1000 times performance increase and that's just not possible, so they are looking at distributed computing as a possibility. "
If you want modularity, just buy a PC.
Why does everyone want to turn game consoles into PC's? I enjoy the simplicity of the modern console game; just pop in a cartridge or CD, and play. That's it. No sysfiles to configure, no add-ons to buy (at least necessary to play most games, the N64 had a memory upgrade to play certain games, most notably the latest Zelda release).
I just wanna play dammit!
If I weren't nailed to the penis, I'd be pushing up the daisies!
Unless I'm misunderstanding something about the article, this makes no sense at all. Rendering a video game isn't nearly the same kind of workload as rendering a movie. The former requires low-latency, whereas the latter can be farmed out and done in batches.
There's no way you're going to get a 1000x performance boost by distributing a video game over the Internet.
I would bet that the real idea is to build in support for distributed multi-player games, and somewhere between the engineers and the marketroids things got horribly twisted.
It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
I got as far as "maybe the Playstation 6 or 7 will be based on biotechnology", or some such garbage.
Please. This story is nothing more than a trumped up press release targetted towards the Xbox and GameCube in an attempt to either 1) slow their sales or 2) engender positive mindshare for the Playstation.
Distributed computing? In other words, "imagine a Beowulf cluster of these..."
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
There are several problems with this. Memory bandwith, power consumption, etc... but the main one is that most normal applications are written for a single thread.
Imagine how many MIPS 4K cores you can fit in 300mm^2 in 4-5 years. That's a lot of power. Sure, they might only run at 1-2Ghz, but there will be 64 of them on a die. If you can harness that power, it might give your game developers much of that huge performance boost they want.
Think beowulf-cluster-on-a-chip. As with multiple-workstation distributed computing clusters, the trick is not in setting the thing up, but in figuring out how to distribute your work.
-- Erich
Slashdot reader since 1997
Which of the following processes do you want to run in the background?
(a) A search for extraterrestrial intelligence.
(b) A search for Mersenne Primes.
(c) A rendering engine allowing the geek next door to play Tekken with really, really good graphics.
Take your time.
Get rid of those hideous jaggies. Damn, it pisses me off everyone wants to release games for the system that makes everything the most ugly.
Shorter load times couldn't hurt either...
Seriously, I wonder what the heck they would do with distributed computing. Obviously, it's not going to give you any better graphics at all. Maybe in multiplayer games you could split up collision detection/physics work. Maybe this means they want to make p2p massively multiplayer games. Maybe they want to make insanely cool new AI systems.
This could really kick ass...but it's probably just hype.
BUT FIX THE DAMN JAGGIES FIRST!!!! ; )
Halo is one of the greatest games I've played, and it was a release title. Rallisport challenge blows away any driving game I've ever played.
I have a XBOX, PS2 and DC and am more excited about future xbox games than anything coming out for the PS2. They look better, run better, and will have better internet support cause of what the xbox has built in.
Also, I like how Microsoft focuses on the US first. Japanese companies release the game over there, and then six months later we might get it. That's BS.
One more great thing about the XBOX - It will rock as an emulator. (MAME, Nintendo64, etc). This is a big reason why I still love the DC, but the xbox will be even better.
The XBOX, PS2 and DC are all good systems. The only system with weak games is the Gamecube, but that could change.
This is a ridiculous hype-fest for even The very fact that the guy followed up the distributed comment by some random buzzwordism about biological computing should tip you off.
Here are some problems with a distributed gaming console that I can think of off the top of my head:
- Latency: The main reason you'd want a lot of processor power in gaming is to calculate physics and graphics. This needs to be done on a damn-near-real time basis. No distributed computing network can provide this. High end clustering, maybe, but nobody is going to pay for multiple PlayStatia to play one game.
- Availability: Sony KNOWS that they are making a device akin to a toaster. When you turn on the console you should be able to play your game. Without worrying about your network connection, whether your neighbor's microwave is disrupting the Super National Ultra Wireless Grid, etc.
- Infrastructure: Don't even get me started. Sony would have to build millions of wireless POPs in a grid across the entire country. Or wire everyone's house when they buy a PlayStation.
- System Load: Say the PS3 is 10x more powerful than it is now. That means you still need 100 of them to reach the "1000x" figure they are blathering about. This means that if America has a million networked, always-on PS3s, only 1% of them cam be in use at any given time. During peak hours this is probably not possible.
In other words, this is dumb. Tell me if I'm wrong.
Justin
"Why would God give us a waist if we wasn't supposed to rest our pants on it?" - Rev. Roy McDaniels
First of the third generation consoles?! Kids these days...
In my book, the SNES was a third generation console. First gen was Atari, then NES, then SNES. I'm sure others might even define third generation as before that. But I can't see *any* justification for calling the PS3 the first third generation console. The original PS was at least a fourth gen console.
Actual performance of machines improves much faster than Moore's "Law" * would predict. Moore's Law really only applies to how fast you can flip a series of logic gates back and forth. The rest of the improvement comes from research into things like better algorithms, better processor design, faster buses, etc.
*"Moore's Interesting Trend" would be more technically correct.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
No, no, no. What they're doing is linking your system to a thousand other Playstation 3's over the Internet. Unfortunately, in the test runs conducted so far, researchers keep ending up with hundreds of beautifully rendered frames five minutes later and in no particular order.
On the downside, the EULA for the PS3 now requires you to keep the machine on 24/7, and requires you to change disks occasionally so that it can crunch numbers for other games. If you do not have the game requested, you're required to go buy it.
Sorry, but this sounds like either a truly horrible idea, an attempt at cashing in on a hot buzzword, or (most likely) both.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
All of the developers I know would much rather have developer libraries that don't suck.
Careers should combine three things: what you can do, what you want to do, and what you can get paid for.
Stop the brainwash
Why 1000x? Is this anything other than an a number they just pulled out of their ass?
Q