FFXIII – from a developer perspective
The other day (march 9th) FFXIII was released in europe.
The game was first announced in 2006 which means it has been in development for at least 3-4 years. In the entertainment and gaming industry this is a very long time. This long wait is comparable to the development time of Gran Turismo 5. But why are these games taking so long?!
Well – actually they have something in common. They are both the first installment on the new platform (PlayStation 3 / Xbox 360) in the brand new era of HD gaming. Both series have been known to deliver bleeding edge graphic experiences since the PlayStation days (look – no version number on the PlayStation – that’s how we did it back then!) pushing the consoles capabilities beyond known limits.
To fully achieve this in the current market with the current consoles obviously required a lot of work. A lot of hard ground building work. But since the known capabilities of the consoles are currently a moving target the development might have been affected by sliding requirements. I don’t have any sources that backs this claim but I certainly hope that the new installments are build on top of some robust engines that will allow scalability for some years. Thank good HD-tv’s don’t go beyond 1080p now they’ve delivered games with that performance.
