Californian-based developer Ready at Dawn has heaped praise over Sony and the PlayStation brand, suggesting the electronics giant is helping to ‘bring people together.’
Studio boss Ru Weerasuriya expressed his excitement for the next-generation of consoles during a chinwag with GI.biz.
In particular, Weerasuriya was impressed by the fact hardware manufacturers have actively approached developers with regards to how they want new formats to take shape – something which Sony is known to have gone to great lengths to achieve with PS4.
“I’ve not seen the industry, especially the core gaming industry, go through a period like this. Especially new hardware where the manufacturers themselves are actually reaching out and making us define what their hardware is going to be. I don’t think that’s ever happened. It’s been an unbelievable two years, a little bit more than that even, of the back and forth and getting to the point where we felt like something was different about the industry," he commented.
"And all I can tell you is that we couldn’t have made this game without the hardware that is going to come up. That was one of the reasons why we decided to sign this IP now and not before."
Weerasuriya was full of praise for Sony, suggesting the company is helping to unify the games industry. He also offered that any console maker would do well to place emphasis on crafting developer-friendly hardware.
"I’m looking forward to the future. There’s a trend, a commonality that’s forming right now in what’s being built for the next generation of hardware that I don’t think we’ve had in the past. It’s been a very segmented industry and I truly feel like Sony and PlayStation actually are finally bringing… I know they’re not going to solve every problem in the world, but they’re bringing people together. And I don’t just mean the player; they’re bringing us, as developers, from different genres and from different places, to the common goal of trying to create good entertainment.”
"I think it’s going to be a necessity for everybody to be like that, not just Microsoft but Nintendo, everyone out there who’s willing to make new hardware and make a platform that everybody can develop on just like Apple did. I think that everybody’s going to have to be open because ultimately it’s just hardware. Without games, they’re pretty much pieces of junk that are just going to sit in your house," Weerasuriya said.
"So if you want something to be successful, yeah, everybody is going to have to step up and open up and listen to people."
Sony unveiled PS4 during an event in New York City in February. The console itself wasn’t shown, though we did get a glimpse of various games currently in development for the platform, such as Killzone: Shadow Fall. The new DualShock controller was also showcased.
PS4 is scheduled to ship in holiday 2013.