Why Valve Don't Make PS3 Games

[Mess]

Gaming website Loot Ninja managed to have a chat with Valve's Tom Leonard at E3 and Tom gave some quite scathing comments on the PS3;

The PC and the 360 are just more straightforward. We can focus on what we want to do, which is make game experiences, instead of sweating bullets over obscure architectural decisions they make with their platform... I didn’t come into this business in the 90s because of some technical fetish. I came in because I wanted to give people experiences that made them have fun.

You can read the full article if you need any more convincing that L4D isn't heading to the PS3 anytime soon.

[dark_veil]

put it simply... lazyness lol

[Mr. Happy]

Saying it's lazyness is like saying a construction worker is lazy for using a crane instead of lifting the i beams by hand.

[dark_veil]

FINALLY.. someone understands :p

[Mr. Happy]

[Psy]

I'm completely with Valve. I don't see any reason why they should develop for a platform which is still doing poorly despite what Sony may say.

[Australian Bushman]

Exactly. And what's the point of "sweating bullets" like he says when they're doing just fine selling on PC and Xbox?

It would be cool to see a casual game like Portal for the Wii though, that would be special. At least they know there's not a limited number of Wii users out there

[nub]

Jesus fucking Christ, did you see the user comments for that article?


People make me fucking sick sometimes.

[The Wanderer]

I'm completely with Valve. I don't see any reason why they should develop for a platform which is still doing poorly despite what Sony may say.

They've sold millions of ps3's, That's a pretty huge playerbase. Despite that, the reason they don't want to develop for the ps3 is because of its immensely overcomplicated architecture, not because "it's doing poorly", which it isn't...

btw did you know that the ps3 outsold the xbox360 in it's first year compared to the 360's first year? But let's not end this thread in a ps3 vs 360 debate as it annoys me to death the amount of fanboyism those debates brings with them, let's end it with: both consoles are doing quite well, the end.

[dark_veil]

let's end it with: both consoles are doing quite well, the end.

word! i have an xbox, it suits me well, but i want a ps3, but im broke lol

they are both good and both have their advantages and disadvantages

[tundra_cool]

I fucking hated working on the PS3. While the X360's Xenon looks and acts just like the regular retail kit, the PS3's devkit is a huge block of metal which fits into a server tray and makes the office lights flicker when turned on. While the Xenon can auto-propagate builds to it's HDD, the PS3 devkit has to emulate from PC and get around all of the system obstructions when you simply want to play the latest build of a game is FRUSTRATING. There are so many annoyances with it and it made me hate the PS3.

[tundra_cool]

Hm, I can't edit in this forum but I believe 'emulate' was the wrong word. I meant to use something more towards 'run off of.'

[ankhsethamon]

Jesus fucking Christ, did you see the user comments for that article?


People make me fucking sick sometimes.

Damn... I just did... really really idiotic comments. I must say.. "If you're a game developer, then, post your opinion. Otherwise, shut up". A lot of PS3 fanboys and so say that Valve is too lazy to develop for the PS3... They just need to consider that Valve is know working on L4D Authoring Tools, L4D2, HL2:EP3 (we hope so XD) and TF2 class updates... A lot of things to do, and I think that's why they don't want to migrate L4D to the PS3... they have better things to do...

[RefaelBA]

Like it or not, they'll have their games on the PS3 eventually.
Sooner or later they'll want to do things that will only be possible on the PS3, since its hardware is somewhat more advanced than the X360's. This doesn't mean they'll abandon the X360, but I think the PS3's technological advantage is starting to show lately, and will be much more considerable in the future. Don't mistake me for a Sony fanboy though, I just call it as I see it (I don't have any kind of console). Unless Microsoft will let out a new console in the next couple of years, which doesn't seem very logical to me, we'll start seeing Valve games on BluRay and PSN sooner than you think... Very much to Tom Leonard's dismay

[Major Banter]

It's not a point of console supremacy.

It's not a point of sales.

It's not even a point of coding with the horrific power of the cell processor.

Incredibly, despite the fact the new games on PS3 far outstrip xbox in terms of graphics, technology and occasionally gameplay (notably MGS4, Uncharted 2, WipeOut HD, Killzone 2, etc etc), Valve still prefer to keep with what is increasingly an obsolete format, even though Valve try to push the forefront of technology every time they make a game. (Please note, this is an objective argument, not fanboyism. The xbox is growing old, it's not shitty yet, it's just like your uncle not being able to lift you up anymore because of back problems. He's still awesome.)

The reason Valve don't work on PS3 is simply because Gabe Newell and Doug Lombardi (from what I've been led to believe) made an absolute packet out of Microsoft. Naturally, this means they're pretty much spokesmen for the company and on a yoke to some degree as to what they can say. Gabe's comments about the PS format needing to be "taken back, and remade" are merely the sign of not so much a lazy developer, but one that is firmly set that Microsoft is superior to Sony, however ridiculous that view may be.

On a side note, PS3 to PC online gaming has been achieved with DC Universe MMORPG. It's pretty much inevitable that Microsoft and Sony will still be competitors, but have to work together to a slight degree if they want online gaming to advance.

PS - Notably, you don't have to "sweat over architecture". You don't have to use 100% of the capabilites of the console. Look at Doom, it's shockingly awful by modern standards, but still my favourite game, despite the fact it uses up all of 2MB on my hard drive. Valve are just nitpicking.