With the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S having both launched with impressive hardware, developers across the industry have been excited about the potential of what the more powerful consoles will enable in terms of development of games. When it comes to the difference between the PS5 and Xbox Series X, however, results have been far less conclusive, with most landing on the conclusion that at the end of the day, there’s very little to separate the two consoles.
Another developer who feels that way is David Smith of White Paper Games, who is platform programmer on the upcoming mystery adventure title Conway: Disappearance at Dahlia View. Speaking in a recent interview with GamingBolt, when asked specifically about the difference between the GPUs of the PS5 and Xbox Series X, Smith said that ultimately, especially for smaller multiplatform games, those differences aren’t going to count for too much, and that in the end, it will be major first party developers who get the most out of the respective consoles.
“When it comes to the smaller teams working on cross-platform titles, it won’t make that much difference,” Smith said. “Ultimately the Unreal Engine is constantly being optimised for both sets of hardware and it’s in Epic’s interest to keep them in line with each other supporting features like ray tracing. We haven’t noticed any significant performance differences between the two consoles during development of Conway.
“The first-party studios and platform holder partners will be the ones with the time and resources to push and get the absolute most out of the hardware. We’re really looking forward to seeing what companies like Naughty Dog and The Coalition manage to accomplish on PS5 and Xbox Series respectively.”
For the foreseeable future at least, as games continue to release as cross-gen titles, we’re likely not going to see many games fully taking advantage of the newer hardware, but as time goes on, it stands to reason that it will be the big-budget exclusive developers that will squeeze the most out of the machines. Of course, there is the odd multiplatform third party title that does so as well – like Red Dead Redemption 2, for instance – but something like that likely won’t arrive anytime soon.
Our full interview with the developers of Conway: Disappearance at Dalhia View will be live soon, so stay tuned for that. The game launches this Fall for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC.
