Naughty Dog wants PS3 for another 5 to 6 years

PALGN News | And they apologise about the museum level in Uncharted 2.

Developers of the Uncharted series, Naughty Dog, are talking up Sony’s big black box, suggesting that there isn’t a need for the entertainment giant to launch a PS4 anytime before the middle of the decade.

In an interview with G4TV, Naughty Dog co-president Evan Wells said:

“We're pretty comfortable with the PS3, and we made a very big advancement between the first game and the second game, we're really tapping into the Cell processor, but there's more there….So yes, we're getting comfortable. No, we're not itching for new hardware. I would love to keep working on the PlayStation [3] for 5 or 6 more years...I think there's still a lot to get out of it. We're not really feeling limited by the hardware, it's more about the hours of the day and how quickly we want to get the next game out.”

Wells was also brutally honest about the shortcomings in the game, and suggested that the museum level was not quite polished.

“I think it was primarily it was that second courtyard [of the museum],” Wells said.

“When you got in there and there were all the guards around, and you had to follow Flynn through that area. We knew it wasn't 100% polished but we had to get it out there. We playtested it and knew there was going to be some hang-ups there, but we just didn't have the time to address it...if for whatever reason you got distracted and you thought "Okay, I have to take all these guards out," or something, you could get really in a loop there where you're getting caught over and over again. And yeah, we apologize for that.”

Wells also went on to talk about the Nintendo Wii and motion control, suggesting that while they have no plans to use motion control in their games, he is a fan of the Wii and the concept of waggling.

“I'm not a Wii hater at all, in fact, it's probably one of my most played consoles in the house. I have a 3-year old son which might account for some of that, but I think Wii Sports and Wii Sports Resort are some of the best experiences of this generation, honestly. They're immensely playable and competitive, and just great fun with a group of people in the same room. Yeah, I think the PlayStation audience is totally for it [motion control], in fact, I bet you there are lot of closet Wii owners in the PlayStation community.”

So there you have it. Some Sony fanboys are closet Wii owners. Are you one of them? Fess up in the comments section below!

Related Uncharted 2 Content

Uncharted 3 villain reveal trailer
09 Mar, 2011 And here it is.

Uncharted 3's villain revealed
08 Mar, 2011 Minor spoilers inside.

Sony boss happy with 2009 figures
17 Feb, 2010 Uncharted 2 sells almost 3 million copies.

19 Comments

Frozencry

2 years ago

The museum level wasn't polished? Pretty funny because I did feel that was a pretty fantastic start to the game. Gotta love their immensely high standards.

I too want to see ND and other studios continue advancing the tech on the PS3. Considering the remarkable technical breakthroughs they pulled out on UC2, and prior to that Guerrilla with Killzone 2, they can likely do a hell of a lot more if given the time.

Karai Pantsu

2 years ago

Agreed! I'd like to see the PS3 go on for another 5 years or so - get a good lifespan on it and hopefully start seeing some absolutely amazing stuff coming out towards the end.

Reminds me, I really need to get UC2 one of these days...

Cyph

2 years ago

Bizarre, I absolutely loved Uncharted 2, I didn't have a single problem with it or any of its levels. It's good to see that Naughty Dog think they can get more out of the PS3, but the real issues are a) can other developers do this as easily, and b) how far will the gaming industry (PC included) progress after 5 to 6 years, as in, will the PS3 (as well as other consoles) be long in the tooth by then?

Karai Pantsu

2 years ago

I don't see any reason for them not to have a lifecycle that long - I don't think that anything getting 'long in the tooth' will be much of an issue, especially given that the PC gaming market has dropped off significantly with so many of the big name titles now being fairly lazy ports from the consoles.

Look back at the PSX as an example, or the PS2 - both had pertty long lives, and the difference between first gen games and those created towards the end is staggering.

Frozencry

2 years ago

^This, and PC is going its own way which consoles cannot follow; DirectX 11 and OpenCL.

It evens out really. PC still has a solid amount of devs working on massive technical leaps to further gaming as a whole, while consoles have a large chunk of exclusive developers working on maxing them out. By the time consoles seem just about maxed, they'll be ready to progress into the 'next gen' which PC will have already prepared.

Buttmouth

2 years ago

*possible gameplay spoiler*

the loop they're talking about in the museum level, yeah that happened to me.

the way they designed it made me think i had to go and take out all the guards, and i spent a good chunk of time scratching my head trying to understand what order to take them out in. when in reality you only need to take out like 3 of them to get to the next section.

I think that if they had time they would have polished that room a bit more in the way some players (like me) were getting confused by what the goal was.

If you're rushing ahead trying to take them all out you can easily miss the fact that Flynn glances in the direction of the next guard you're meant to take out.

x7h3CUREx

2 years ago

i didn't have any issues with that museum level either. i think i made a point of taking all of the guards out anyway but it wasn't overly difficult. although i did play it on the default difficulty so that may have helped.
i loved the game from beginning to end and thought it was one of the most polished games i've ever played. i'm stunned that the devs think we deserve an apology.

G3ck0

2 years ago

I didn't have any problems with the museum level on Hard or Crushing, the difficulty makes no difference at all.

JP2daMC

2 years ago

The loop also happened to me. I didn't follow Flynn though.

While I also loved the game, I found a couple of very minor annoyances:

* the ice level because there is no way the villagers designed it to be that hard to get around with ropes to jump to and impossible areas to jump over. The Naughty Dog guy talks about that in the full interview and agrees that it's difficult to get the balance right between making something believable and challenging and points to that level.

*The constant narrow escapes in the cutscenes where someone grabs your hand to rescue you from falling to your death or you rescue someone else like that. And while it's one of the good action movie cliches, after half a dozen times it starts to wear thin.

*Fighting the monster thing in the ice cave that didn't die initially confused me as to how to weaken/kill it. After shooting it forever, I thought there must be an environmental way of killing it or some quick-time event I was missing. But it turns out you just had to shoot it 8 bazillion times.

But I'm really nit picking. It's a great game.

grim-one

2 years ago

PALGN wrote

they have no plans to use motion control in their games

Doesn't Uncharted already use motion control? For grenade aiming and such?

döppelgangbang

2 years ago

The Museum had me in limbo for a while too. If I wasn't getting stuck taking cover on the fountain I was alerting the guards to my presence in some other way. It was probably the part of the game I replayed the most. Especially as silent KOs were new to the repertoire, nailing guards from behind a wall I eventually sorted out... but the bloody rounded fountain wall was not a consistent proving ground as Drake wouldn't behave near it!

Blenny

2 years ago

*Possible spoiler*

Jason Picker wrote

*Fighting the monster thing in the ice cave that didn't die initially confused me as to how to weaken/kill it. After shooting it forever, I thought there must be an environmental way of killing it or some quick-time event I was missing. But it turns out you just had to shoot it 8 bazillion times.

Um, don't you just have to let it grab you twice and then Tenzin will wake up and stab it for you?

JP2daMC

2 years ago

Perhaps I'm just really crap but I thought it grabbed me a lot more than that and nothing happened.

Frozencry

2 years ago

I have to agree with Jason about the demon yeti things - they were meat shields and a half. Though I just kept firing away at it like a madman, upon reflection I do think it could've been done slightly better instead of "I am nigh unstoppable so keep soaking me with bullets until I yell and jump off a cliff".

It's nitpicky but definitely something they can improve.

Karai Pantsu

2 years ago

But hey, what a testament to the overall quality of the title that the only things you can really gripe about are such small issues?

One day I'll experience it for myself. I expect good things =)

JP2daMC

2 years ago

And when you are so close to perfection, the flaws become a bit more obvious because by nature we do look for flaws.

But they are itsy bitsy issues.

Gamesta

2 years ago

Karai Pantsu wrote

Look back at the PSX as an example, or the PS2 - both had pertty long lives, and the difference between first gen games and those created towards the end is staggering.

For sure.Play midnight Club then play MC3.The cars in MC look like they weremade out of cardboard boxes compared to how they looked in MC3.

plantshot

2 years ago

Finally there are some decent games coming out for PS3 and the price is finally reasonable. Uncharted 2, Metal Gear Solid, Gran Turismo 5, God of War III and FF XIII make this console rock. I hope there is a 5 to 6 more years there is a lot more to be developed for the PS3 in the coming years.